Singapore-based studio Mixed Realms today released their high-flying ninja combat game Sairento VR (2018) in Europe on PSVR; the North American release is slated to arrive next week.
Sairento VR was first released on Steam Early Access for PC VR back in late 2016, and while it launched out of EA more than a year ago, we’ve been waiting to see just when it would come to PSVR.
Customers in Europe can either download (PS Store link) for £35/€40 or pick up a physical copy at retail stores starting today. North American customers will have to wait until July 9th to download, and August 13th for the hard copy.
The game is also currently available on Steam (Vive, Rift, Index), Oculus Store (Rift), Viveport (Vive, Rift, Windows VR).
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Image courtesy Mixed Realms
Image courtesy Mixed Realms
Image courtesy Mixed Realms
Image courtesy Mixed Realms
Sairento VR is a mission-driven, first-person combat game that’s set in near-future Japan. As a member of ‘the Silent Ones’, you use your forbidden knowledge of martial arts to fight across the game’s single-player campaign mode, letting you hone your slow-motion, high-flying ninja moves as you shoot pistols and physically slice your katanas at the game’s various enemies.
Outside of the campaign mode, the PSVR version is said to include extra missions as well as two-player co-op.
As the studio behind the excellent PlayStation VR Worlds, Sony Interactive Entertainment’s London Studio has been at the forefront of VR game design since before PSVR even shipped back in 2016. With their latest title, Blood & Truth, the studio sought to deliver its first full-length VR title, and the result is an impressive action-filled journey that delivers the most convincing virtual characters we’ve seen in a VR game to date. To learn from the studio’s approach to VR game design—and to get a glimpse at the artwork that drove and resulted from the game’s development—we spoke with Stuart Whyte, Director of VR Product Development, and Anthony Filice, Art Director, both from Sony’s London Studio.
Editor’s Note: The big, beautiful pictures and exclusive artwork in this article are best viewed on a desktop browser with a large screen, or in landscape orientation on your phone. All images courtesy SIE London Studio.
Although, superficially, making VR games doesn’t seem far removed from making traditional games, truly native VR games aren’t so easily categorized among the non-VR game genres we think of today. You might be tempted to call Blood & Truth a ‘shooter’, but that really wouldn’t do the experience justice.
“I think there are genres and experiences that we have in our minds born out of decades of playing videogames in non-VR scenarios. When you move into VR, you’re effectively creating new genres,” said Stuart Whyte, Director of VR Product Development at Sony’s London studio. “I think we’re closest, in non-VR terms, to the ‘Action Narrative’ genre, but I also think that Blood & Truth, by the nature of the incredible immersiveness you get from PSVR, is much more an experiential game where you get to feel like an Action Hero.”
Image courtesy Sony London Studio
Delivering those action hero moments—like leaping from a collapsing building onto a crane, or paragliding into a restricted area—requires significant planning well before the first geometry of a level even gets modeled. The studio found that storyboarding ideas—creating thumbnail sketches of key moments—for major setpiece was “doubly important” for VR development; the team went so far as to use immersive storyboards which were drawn to be viewed in a VR headset.
“The storyboard allows us to rapidly iterate and test new ideas and angles without burning through lots of time and money. We actually created 360-degree storyboards which helped us place the player in the space and in the headset, and we were able to test things like composition, lighting and colour all in VR,” said Anthony Filice, Art Director at Sony’s London Studio. “Storyboarding [in game development] isn’t anything new, but being able to storyboard in VR is where it’s at. We’re exploring more and more ways to be able to visualize & test our ideas in VR before we actually commit to building. It’s super important to see how things are perceived from the point of view of the player, this way we can see and feel for ourselves what type of senses and emotions are triggered by what we’re creating first hand.”
“Understanding where characters are standing in the scene (rather than in the shot [as would be the case with non-VR]) is super important when the player is the camera,” Whyte said. “Typically, once we had finished the storyboarding stage, we would ‘block out’ using ‘grey box’ (simple basic geometry) the space, level, or scene within our engine so that we could get an early feel as to what the challenges would be and how best to approach.”
In VR, however, the little moments can be just as important as the big moments—interaction drives immersion, but it’s challenging to make a completely interactive world. Blood & Truth uses a node-based locomotion system which lets players move between predetermined points. As well as streamlining player movement, this smartly limits the scope of the objects which the player can potentially interact with. Instead of making every single object in the world interactive, London Studio thus only had to consider interactions of objects within arm’s reach of each node, allowing the studio to pay greater attention to a more tractable number of objects and interactions.
“Setting the visual pillars early on was super important. Those pillars were realism, storytelling and VR immersion. It’s true that the headset will give you some of the VR immersion for free, however to take the immersion to the next level, we had to make some tough calls on where to spend our [development time] for maximum user experience,” said Filice.
As early as the storyboarding phase, London Studio was considering specific object interactions (and how they would drive gameplay moments). | Image courtesy Sony London Studio
“Anything that the player interacts with in a meaningful way—like weapons, ‘box of delights’, and (intractable) clues—all have to be modeled and animated to the highest level. For example, we know the player will scrutinize the guns close up, so we decided to fully articulate and model them down to the screws. In addition to this, we pay particular attention and placed details as easter eggs for the player to find. In one scene, we placed chewing gum under a desk because we know that the player will probably want to look under the desk. There are lots of desks in the game, so I challenge you to find it!”
Weapons in Blood & Truth are finely detailed, right down to custom two-handed grip poses when the player brings both hands together to grip smaller weapons like pistols. Some weapons have easter eggs to discover too, like how the revolver can be ‘fan-fired’ by using a second hand held against the weapon’s hammer. | Image courtesy Sony London Studio
VR Ping Pong Pro is the upcoming sequel to the 2016 ping pong simulator VR Ping Pong. However now the studio is bringing their 1v1 ping pong game to PSVR as well in addition to HTC Vive and Oculus Rift.
VR Ping Pong Pro is headed to all supported platforms sometime in September. There’s currently both a Steam page and a listing on Viveport, although pricing has yet to be revealed.
The game is said to feature nine new levels including an arcade, a stadium and a Japanese garden, this time with a clear focus on photorealism over the studio’s previous title.
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Image courtesy Reddoll Games, Merge Games, IV
Image courtesy Reddoll Games, Merge Games, IV
Image courtesy Reddoll Games, Merge Games, IV
VR Ping Pong Pro also features racket/ball customization so you can style your kit as you play against five difficulty levels.
Reddoll Games is including player statistics, online rankings and online multiplayer, although the studio hasn’t mentioned whether the latter will be cross platform.
The game features:
Singles Match – (Player vs CPU or Player 1 vs Player 2)
Online multiplayer – choose to play either single matches or tournaments with people from all over the world
Tournament Mode – pyramid-style tournaments are ranked by difficulty
Mini games where you can hone your skills or just have fun!
A variety of photo-realistic environments, placing you right at the centre of the action
True to life physics, (with full-spin mechanics), make it feel like you’re really there!
Customizable Rackets – racket changes serve a practical purpose as well as a visual one, and can alter your serve for example
We were a bit disappointed when we found out that you couldn’t properly web-sling as your friendly neighborhood Spider-Man in MARVEL Powers United VR (2018) last year, but it appears Sony has heard our collective groans and done something about it in their latest VR activation for the new film Spider-Man: Far From Home.
Called Spider-Man: Far From Home Virtual Reality, we finally get a crack at web-slinging around Manhattan in VR. The short experience, developed by CreateVR, is now available for free on Steam (Rift, Vive), the Oculus Store (Rift), and the PlayStation Store (PSVR).
Spider-Man: Far From Home Virtual Reality is a charming little experience, with actor Tom Holland providing his voice as you swing around the city. The web-slinging mechanic is a simple and a mostly reliable locomotion method, as you squeeze the trigger and pull your tracked motion controller near you to move. Cross-hairs don’t seem entirely accurate, and it’s hard to get a sense of how far your web will go at first.
Image courtesy Sony, Create VR
Although the experience could benefit from a greater level of care when it comes to graphics—something that puts a damper on immersion—it’s awesome to see a proper implementation of the high-flying, web-slinging mechanic and not-so-small playspace to zip around.
Without spoiling it too much, the experience’s story mode is geared towards stopping a colossal robot. At suspiciously inconvenient moments your web-slingers malfunction though, leaving you to deal with it in a few different ways. It’s a bit anti-climactic, but it’s a free experience, so it’s hard to complain.
Image courtesy Sony, Create VR
There’s also a free mode that lets you swing around the city at your leisure taking on mini-games like a time trial and wave shooter. Simply being able to freely swing around the city though is something that personally provides way more fun, as I honed my web-slinging ability and got a better grasp on the locomotion mechanic.
You can thankfully also climb buildings too, letting you easily get to the tippy top of the highest building. Unfortunately the city is limited in size however; red barriers are strategically set up to keep you within the play area.
We were a bit disappointed when we found out that you couldn’t properly web-sling as your friendly neighborhood Spider-Man in MARVEL Powers United VR (2018) last year, but it appears Sony has heard our collective groans and done something about it in their latest VR activation for the new film Spider-Man: Far From Home.
Called Spider-Man: Far From Home Virtual Reality, we finally get a crack at web-slinging around Manhattan in VR. The short experience, developed by CreateVR, is now available for free on Steam (Rift, Vive), the Oculus Store (Rift), and the PlayStation Store (PSVR).
Spider-Man: Far From Home Virtual Reality is a charming little experience, with actor Tom Holland providing his voice as you swing around the city. The web-slinging mechanic is a simple and a mostly reliable locomotion method, as you squeeze the trigger and pull your tracked motion controller near you to move. Cross-hairs don’t seem entirely accurate, and it’s hard to get a sense of how far your web will go at first.
Image courtesy Sony, Create VR
Although the experience could benefit from a greater level of care when it comes to graphics—something that puts a damper on immersion—it’s awesome to see a proper implementation of the high-flying, web-slinging mechanic and not-so-small playspace to zip around.
Without spoiling it too much, the experience’s story mode is geared towards stopping a colossal robot. At suspiciously inconvenient moments your web-slingers malfunction though, leaving you to deal with it in a few different ways. It’s a bit anti-climactic, but it’s a free experience, so it’s hard to complain.
Image courtesy Sony, Create VR
There’s also a free mode that lets you swing around the city at your leisure taking on mini-games like a time trial and wave shooter. Simply being able to freely swing around the city though is something that personally provides way more fun, as I honed my web-slinging ability and got a better grasp on the locomotion mechanic.
You can thankfully also climb buildings too, letting you easily get to the tippy top of the highest building. Unfortunately the city is limited in size however; red barriers are strategically set up to keep you within the play area.
Got a PSVR and a PS Plus account? Then you’ll be able to play the tactical team shooter Firewall Zero Hour (2018) for free this weekend, going from June 28th to 30th.
For users that already own the game, developing studio First Contact Entertainment is also simultaneously holding a Double XP weekend, giving pretty much everyone an incentive to jump in and fill up the servers.
There’s a good reason too: ever since the game’s ‘Nightfall’ update, which brought a number of critical changes to the game including microtransactions and weekly challenges, some users have probably fallen off the wagon due to the new multiplayer implementation that requires individual users to strive after their own set of goals.
First Contact Entertainment game director Damoun Shabestari says in a PS blog post that many of the issues experienced in squad and matchmaking have been solved in the 1.26 Patch, and that the studio hopes to keep users engaged.
“It has been a process, this buildout of a reliable and robust platform — one that will set us up for future growth, improvements, and content rollouts,” Shabestari says. “We hope where we take the game from here exceeds your expectations and rewards your continued commitment.”
If you haven’t had a chance to play, Firewall Zero Hour was released in August 2018 to much fanfare; it not only drummed up strong support with PSVR owners by offering one of the first classic team-based shooters on the platform, but also took a prime spot in a PS Aim hardware bundle at the time too. It also supports PS Move, and boasts a continuously growing number of maps that 4v4 teams can duke it out in—one team defends while the other infiltrates. The game typically costs $40, so it’s definitely worth jumping in for free while you can.
Medusa and Her Lover (2019) is a unique VR title that’s been floating around Japan since April, and the game, which delivers both a solo and couch co-op mode, is now available in the West.
Developing studio ship of EYLN has turned Greek mythology on its head a bit with their newly shipped title. Instead of a hapless victim staring at Medusa and turning to stone as per the myth, it’s Medusa’s very gaze that actively petrifies enemies, a weapon that can depleted over time and must be recharged by closing her eyes to rest.
Traveling with her is Gaios, a young guy who’s determined to cure to Medusa’s curse. But just like everyone else in the game, Medusa can’t cast her gaze at Gaios for fear of turning him to stone too.
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Image courtesy ship of EYLN
Image courtesy ship of EYLN
Image courtesy ship of EYLN
Image courtesy ship of EYLN
Creator Nishida Ryota says in a PS blog post that Medusa and Her Lover can either be played with two people in local co-op or as a single player in VR, where each side of the controller takes control of a different character. Nishida maintains that due to its unique controller setup that it can lead to “hours of fun as you face the various stages of monsters.”
Local co-op mode puts one player in VR in the role of Medusa; the other player takes the role of Gaios, played via the TV screen with DualShock4 controllers. Since Medusa can’t look at Gaios, verbal communication is a must between players.
Single-player mode is admittedly a more complex experience, Nishida says, pointing out that users have to control both characters with a single DS 4 gamepad.
Scraper: First Strike (2018) landed on PC VR headsets late last year. Now, Labrodex Studios say the standalone sci-fi shooter is headed to PSVR on July 2nd.
Based on the original IP by Jim Ivon and the novel by Ryder Windham (Scraper: The Rise of Cifer), the game takes place in the future megacity of New Austin, Texas and centers around a war against renegade robots that have taken over the city’s high-rise skyscraper complexes.
If you’re looking for more backstory than that, the studio has included the novel for free for PSVR owners as in e-format book. Funnily enough, the game also includes the novel in-game, so you can sit in the cockpit of your mech and read the source material with the whole world around you.
Scraper: First Strike features fully voiced characters, detailed and dynamic mission system with full locomotion and an open world to explore based on levels in Reactor Building 03. Unlike other shooters, the game’s locomotion system is based on a sort of hovercraft mech, otherwise known as a Modified Hover Pod (MHP). Schematics, scrap, and parts are littered throughout the game so you can apply upgrades as you go.
The PSVR version is said to include 30 unique achievements, and support for PSVR peripherals such as AIM, Move, DualShock and 3dRudder.
We haven’t had a chance to play Scraper: First Strike, however it currently rates a ‘Positive’ user rating on Steam, and a [3.9/5] on the Oculus Store.
After launching on PC VR & Oculus mobile VR headsets last year, Catan VR is finally making its way to PSVR.
The VR version of the 1995 classic board game Settlers of Catan first launched on the Oculus Store for Gear VR and Rift in March 2018, with Oculus Go support arriving shortly afterwards when the mobile headset launched back in May 2018. A version for Vive, Rift, and Windows VR came via Steam a few months later.
Starting June 25th, PSVR users will get a chance to jump in too, playing the game in an immersive online environment. Thankfully the game promises crossplay with “all major VR platforms.”
Described as “true to the classic but optimized for virtual reality,” Catan VR was developed by VR studio Experiment 7 in partnership with Klaus Teuber and his sons Guido and Benjamin, along with the Catan and Asmodee Digital teams. The board game takes place in a virtual room with views of the island of Catan itself through the windows.
“The absolute best part about Catan on PS VR is the sense of social presence you get when you jump into a game with friends or online opponents,” says Experiment 7 founder Geoffrey Zatkin.
“Catan VR has a broad vocabulary of game experiences and the excitement of a great roll, the frustration of getting robbed, or the satisfaction of landing a big trade is really evident in the myriad micro-movements that you see other players exhibiting throughout the game.”
Catan VR offers both online multiplayer games as well as solo AI-based matches. According to a PS blog post, Experiment 7 worked directly with Klaus Teuber and his team to develop AI players that both “provide challenging tactical opponents at every difficulty level, but also express the canonical personalities that have made other versions of Catan so compelling.”
There’s no pricing info available just yet, although the game currently sells for $15 on Steam and the Oculus Store for Rift, and $10 on Gear VR/Oculus Go, so we expect pricing to hover somewhere around those two points.
Gearbox Software today released their latest VR game, a title from magic/comedy duo Penn & Teller called Penn & Teller VR: Frankly Unfair, Unkind, Unnecessary, & Underhanded. The game is available on Quest, Rift and Vive starting today, with a version for PSVR coming in July.
Update (June 27th, 2019): Penn & Teller VR: F U, U, U, & U is now available for $20 on Steam (Rift, Vive) and the Oculus Store for Quest and Rift (link incoming).
Both Penn & Teller and Gearbox intend on using the game to help fight the anti-vaccine movement; the studio is donating to support UNICEF’s Immunization program through an initial $10,000 by Randy Pitchford, President, CEO and Co-founder of Gearbox Software. An additional $10,000 donation will be made for every 100,000 sales of Penn & Teller VR: F U, U, U, & U.
The original article follows below:
Original Article (June 19th, 2019): Cleverly abbreviated to Penn & Teller VR: F U, U, U, & U, the game takes you through more than 10 “cruel magic tricks” that Gearbox says will “leave your loved ones screaming and you cackling maniacally.”
While Penn Jillette initially couches it as a way to conquer your fears, Jillette says the only fear you really have to overcome is the fear of “wasting money on a frivolous collection of VR games.”
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Image courtesy Gearbox Software
Image courtesy Gearbox Software
Image courtesy Gearbox Software
Image courtesy Gearbox Software
Image courtesy Gearbox Software
The version for Quest, Vive, and Rift is set to release on June 27th. The PSVR version arrives slightly later on July 9th.
This isn’t the first VR game from the dynamic comedy/magic duo. Gearbox Software helped bring the old cult classic mini-game Desert Bus from the never-released Sega CD game Penn & Teller’s Smoke and Mirrors (1998) to life in VR back in 2017, dutifully named Desert Bus VR.
Check out the trailer for Penn & Teller VR: F U, U, U, & U below:
