Early last month we published a story about Chris Hewish, the former Head of Studio at Raw Data and Sprint Vector developer Survios, leaving the VR company. According to both parties it was a completely amicable parting performed purely for growth-related business reasons as both looked to continue moving in separate directions. Now we know where Hewish is headed next: Skydance Media.
In a phone call with UploadVR, Hewish explained that he would be joining the company as their new Executive Vice President of Interactive, effective immediately. “I’ll be working closely with Skydance Interactive to help build out the publishing arm and assist with strategy,” explained Hewish. “I intend on having a strong focus on VR content.”
Prior to joining Survios, Hewish had been at Activision for 10 years and Dreamworks Interactive for six. His deep experience in the games industry, as well as prior work with a VR-focused studio, bodes well for what he is poised to bring to the table with Skydance as they continue to get more involved with immersive entertainment.
“Skydance has done an incredible job of establishing itself as a visionary creator of topnotch film and television content, and Archangel is well positioned to be a fun and highly immersive new offering for VR gamers,” added Hewish in an official statement. “To join the team at this stage is an amazing opportunity to help grow the interactive business by creating games that reflect the world-building for which Skydance is known.”
We had the chance to go hands-on with Archangel at GDC 2017 earlier this year and came away with positive impressions regarding the game’s intense action and surprisingly articulated narrative. It doesn’t appear to fully capture the Gundam/Pacific Rim mech fantasy, but it’s certainly a step in that direction.
Skydance is expected to have a presence of some kind at E3 next month, so we will have to wait and see what they decide to show.
Even though it is still in Early Access, developer Survios has had a respectable amount of success with first-person shooter (FPS) Raw Data. Survios is now hoping to attract new players with a free weekend and a 20% Steam discount.
The futuristic shooter places the player in the role of a member of the resistance seeking to bring down the corrupt and sinister Eden Corporation. There are several heroes available to choose from, including characters like Saija the cyber-ninja or Boss, the hard-hitting mercenary. A whole arsenal is available featuring handguns to katanas to turret guns that will aid in mowing down the hordes of robots that form Eden Corp’s army.
Raw Data was originally launched for the HTC Vive, but recently introduced support for the Oculus Rift with Touch in a recent update, which optimised the game for the Oculus Touch and also introduced a new high-level mission called ‘Cataclysm’ and new powers for some of the characters.
With the inclusion of Oculus Touch support, cross-platform multiplayer is now available so users of HTC Vive or Oculus Touch can team up to demolish machines together in co-op.
The videogame is currently available to play for free for the next four days. A 20% discount on buying the game is also available, which brings the price down from £29.99 (GBP) to £23.99.
Further details and updates can be found on the Steam page.
While Raw Data was the first VR title to top the Steam Sales Charts and break the $1 million (USD) barrier, the title is still facing stiff competition from Epic Games’ Robo Recall, which which it shares several similarities.
VRFocus will keep you updates on Raw Data and other special offers and discounts.
Last year Survios released Raw Data into Early Access, a game that continues to remain popular for its fast-paced action and cooperative multiplayer on both Rift and Vive. At GDC 2017 the studio announced their next game, a speed-based obstacle course action game called Sprint Vector. Survios has consistently made headlines for being one of the first studios to reach $1 million in sales with the popularity of Raw Data as well as securing $50M in funding before the end of 2016.
Following that success and growth it was time to make some changes and this week a representative from the studio confirmed to UploadVR over the phone that Survios’ Head of Studio, Chris Hewish, would be departing the company. They provided the following official statement:
“We’re a growing company and as a growing company it’s natural for changes to occur. Chris has made valuable contributions to our team and will be missed. We wish him the best on his future endeavors.
We cannot comment further due to company policy regarding personnel matters.”
Hewish had been with Survios since January of 2016 and helped contribute to the developer’s rapid growth over the past year. He brought years of experience in the game industry with 10 years at Activision and six years at Dreamworks Interactive. While at Survios he was in charge of overseeing much of the studio’s production and development, as well as spearheading high-level negotiations and partnerships.
To get additional information about the move, UploadVR reached out to Hewish directly for a phone interview and he had nothing but kind things to say about the company, its people, and their trajectory moving forward.
“With Survios the truth is it was a great experience,” Hewish explained. “I’ve been in the industry for quite a while and going there really reinvigorated me a bit being around such smart and driven people. The truth is that we are definitely still on friendly terms and it was just time for us as we grew, certainly for me, it was a good time to start looking at other areas I can add value. Nothing negative or anything like that at all.”
Where that next spot will be specifically is still under wraps for now, but we should find out more soon. “Can’t share yet where I am going next, but hopefully in the next week or so,” Hewish elaborated. “There is no lack of faith in VR, I’m still a big believer. We’re in the early days, need lower price points, new hardware cycles, etc. After being with Survios I’ve got new energy for the industry again.”
As it stands Survios is poised to remain one of the top VR development studios to watch in 2017 and wherever Hewish ends up next will surely be worth keeping an eye on as well. We should know more next week about his post-Survios plans.
Los Angeles-based virtual reality (VR) studio Survios has made a name for itself in the first-person shooter (FPS) genre with its well received title Raw Data. Then at the recent Game Developers Conference (GDC) 2017, the team announced a new project, Sprint Vector, VRFocusso took some time out to talk with Survios about the project.
On the show floor, Andrew Abedian, Level Designer at Survios, gives a run down of what to expect of the team’s next title, describing it as an ‘adrenaline platformer’ due to the fact players have to swing their arms to gain momentum.
One of the main ideas for the project was to tackle VR movement – which tends to be tricky – so Survios has created ‘fluid locomotion’. This allows players to smoothly transition across obstacles and through levels with minimal jarring.
Checkout the video interview below, or read VRFocus‘preview of Sprint Vector for a hands-on point of view.
VRFocus will continue its coverage of Survios, reporting back with the latest updates.
Raw Data, a first-person combat game from Survios currently in Early Access, is one of the most fast-paced and exciting games out for HTC Vive and Oculus Touch right now. Far from being a simple shooting gallery, Raw Data gives you an impressive range of abilities and physical agency, making you feel like you’re in real danger. And if you can master the controls, you’ll feel like a superhuman badass too.
Raw Data Details:
Official Site
Developer: Survios Publisher: Survios Available On: HTC Vive (Steam), Oculus Touch (Home) Reviewed On: HTC Vive. Oculus Touch Release Date: July 15th, 2016 (Vive) – March 16th, 2017 (Touch)
Note 03/16/17: The article has been updated to include impressions of the game’s recent support for Oculus Touch. You’ll find those impressions in a section at the bottom. The article is otherwise untouched, save the insertion of ‘Oculus Rift/Touch’ where needed. Because of the herculean effort of updating every Early Access review to reflect changes, you’ll see that initial impressions are left intact, but you’ll also find a section below discussing updates since the game’s July 2016 launch on Steam.
Note 07/18/16: This game is in Early Access which means the developers have deemed it incomplete and likely to see changes over time. This review is an assessment of the game only at its current Early Access state and will not receive a numerical score.
Eden Corp, your standard “we’re not evil” evil corporation, is oppressing the world, and it’s your job as a member of hacker group SyndiK8 to infiltrate them. Choosing your character—the gun-wielding ‘gun cleric’ Bishop or the katana-swinging ‘cyber ninja’ Saija—it’s your job to extract massive amounts of data and defend vulnerable data cores so you can expose Eden Corp for what they really are, a “we say we’re not evil, but in all actuality we’re super evil, and you probably should have known that already” type of company.
Oh. And they have killer robots.
Gameplay
Although Raw Data is essentially a wave-shooter, it’s anything but simple, as it presents an engaging blend of tower defense elements, special unlockable moves, and a multiplayer mode that will have you battling alongside your friends on Steam or Oculus Home. Yes, that’s cross-platform, folks.
There’s a real sense of immediate danger in Raw Data too. I don’t know if it’s the fact that the game’s robot adversaries are well over 2 meters tall, or that they creep forward with seemingly no regard for their own safety, or that they’re constantly firing lasers at my face, or that when they come up to you they start punching you in the face—but it’s safe to say that Raw Data put me in a real panic the first few times I played.
If you choose Bishop, it’s best to practice with your pistol back at the starting point before you jump right in, because once you’re in a mission the learning curve gets steep fairly quickly. Because robots. Are. Everywhere. And if you don’t immediately understand how to reload consistently, you’re due for a robo-beating.
Later on in the game I learned how to reload my pistols instantly by touching them to my hip/ lower back, but the early manual reloading—using one hand to pull out a magazine and slide it into my pistol—was pretty frustrating. Several times while ducking behind a barrier to hide from an onslaught of baddies, I ended up swapping my empty pistol into my non-dominant shooting hand somehow, which is super frustrating when you have a load of enemies firing laser and punching you in the face. It happened consistently enough to make me more aware of how to carefully reload, and also keep an eye on my bullet counter so I didn’t run dry of bullets in time of need.
Then again, if you do screw up somehow by reloading, you can always punch them. No, really. You can punch a robot in the face to death. This is great when it works, which isn’t all the time though, and the same goes for Saija’s swords.
Using the sword should probably be the easiest, and most gratifying of the two, and Saija’s energy katanas sound good on paper if you’re the sort of person who wants to dispatch your enemies up close and personal ninja-style. I didn’t feel like they always worked as they should though, as slashing at a target sometimes didn’t register a hit. Thankfully you can also fire range weapons like ethereal shurikens, and even toss your swords like boomerangs, which are both reliable. If only up-close combat was.
Whether you’re slicing or shooting though, detaching an evil robot’s head from its body and seeing purple fluid spurt out gives me a clear sense of accomplishment. And getting through all four, which took me well over 3 hours, was an even bigger one, requiring me to recruit the help of a friend to accomplish.
Since it’s in Early Access, there are currently only two heroes (see update section), but Survios told us that at least two more are coming out with the game’s full release. They also gave us a better look at the individual abilities and weapons in our deep dive with the Raw Data devs if you’re interested in a more detailed look at the game.
Immersion
As far as VR first-person shooters go, Raw Data is probably the most feature-rich out there. The world is cohesive and clearly approaching what I would call ‘AAA level’ of polish. That said, there are a few things that may thwart your attempts at feeling fully immersed in the space, all of which are no real fault of the game itself.
Avatars in multiplayer are kind of wonky. Because both the Vive and Oculus Rift only has three tracking points (the headset and two controllers), Raw Data is essentially making its best guess at the position of your full body. It does this by using inverse kinematics (IK)—a method of predicting how your joints bend—and then cleverly blending animations to smooth out any accompanying strangeness. That doesn’t always stop elbows and knees from bending the wrong way though in VR, making you look weird to your friends in multiplayer. This is however pretty much unavoidable when dealing with full body avatars using the Vive’s provided gear, so you certainly can’t knock Survios for putting their best effort forward.
Robots sometimes clip through you. On one of the levels (I won’t say which as to avoid spoiling the fun) you’re introduced to crawling, zombie-like robots. Their beady glowing eyes stare at you as they crab-walk in from the darkness, predictably scaring whatever bejesus you may still have retained from the previous level. That is until they jump at you and clip through your body, breaking the illusion. It’s clear that AI just isn’t good enough yet to guarantee that enemies will react to your physical movements, or anticipate where you’ll be next.
These are relatively minor gripes when talking about immersion, and aren’t unique to Raw Data.
Comfort
Teleportation is one of the best ways to get around in VR in terms of comfort, and Raw Data has a special take on it that has some interesting trade-offs. You don’t actually blink-teleport, but rather you quickly glide to your chosen spot. Because the game uses plenty of particle effects, and the transition is quick enough, danger of motion-induced VR sickness (aka ‘sim sickness’) is pretty minimal, but more than you would experience with blink-teleportation. This, I felt, keeps you more present in the game by letting you keep an eye on the action as it happens around you so you can better plan your next split-second attack.
With the exception of Saija’s jump move, which launches you in the air for high-flying downward strike, the gameis surprisingly comfortable for what is shaping up to be one of virtual reality’s greatest first-person shooters.
Oculus Touch Impressions
According to Survios, the Oculus version of Raw Data—which for now only seems accessible through Oculus Home and not Steam— has been “completely optimized and reengineered specifically for its two- and three-camera tracking and Touch controls.”
If you have three or more sensors, you’re likely to experience the game’s room-scale glory just like the Vive, letting you turn around and slash and shoot with nary a care for your IRL direction. However, if like most people you only have two sensors, you’re in for a bit of a learning curve to get past the Touch controller’s biggest out-of-the-box limitation: occlusion.
To combat this, Survios has enabled a 90-degree snap-turn, aka ‘comfort mode’ to go along with the game’s frenetic teleportation scheme as well as an ‘arrow guardian’ to help you recognize when you’ve turned completely around and are about to lose Touch-positional tracking. The arrow guardian isn’t at all annoying thankfully—i.e. no audio cues, or big ‘TURN AROUND’ signs to block your line of sight so you can take a quick shot at an incoming robot. It simply flashes a neon arrow to get you turned back around, something that may seem garish in any other game, but works well in the high stress, 360 environment of Raw Data.
Raw Data is still in early access, meaning small things like button mapping aren’t final. That said, I had trouble with this aspect of the Touch-compatible game.
To snap right, you press the ‘A’ button on your right controller; and to snap left, the ‘X’ button on your left—logical and simple. In the thrill of the fight though, I kept instinctively wanting to use the joy stick for this like many other games. Also, because the left snap is mapped to ‘X’, I kept accidentally mashing ‘Y’ which brings up a menu screen, effectively rendering my reloading hand useless until I could figure out what I did wrong. I concede that sometimes I have what is called in the medical field as ‘dumb baby fingers’. Again, three sensor setups won’t suffer my dumb-baby-fingered plight, as you can play the game with the knowledge that your Touch controllers will be tracked in room-scale.
Despite the dumb-baby-finger learning curve and having to pay closer attention to the new arrow guardian, Raw Data on Oculus Touch can be just as fun as the Vive version.
Updates
Survios has pushed several updates for the game while still in Early Access, including a new shotgun-wielding hero (‘Boss’), greatly improved multiplayer, and a new mission called Cataclysm which the studio promises is “the most challenging level to date.” According to Survios, players on both platforms also gain access to several brand-new features, including a balancing of new and reworked abilities for heroes Saija and Boss.
Summary:Raw Data is a heavy-hitting, fast-paced game that’s more than just a simple wave shooter. While it presses all the right buttons with atmosphere and feel, the game is on the bleeding edge of virtual interaction, which sometimes doesn’t work as well as it should. Despite its technical flaws, it’s one of the best VR shooters for HTC Vive and Oculus Touch out currently.
We partnered with AVA Direct to create the Exemplar Ultimate, our high-end VR hardware reference point against which we perform our tests and reviews. Exemplar is designed to push virtual reality experiences above and beyond what’s possible with systems built to lesser recommended VR specifications.
Survios’ first-person shooter (FPS) Raw Data has been a big success for the studio on HTC Vive. It’s got a ‘very positive’ rating on Steam and just over a month after it launched in mid-2016, the developer announced the title has already brought in $1 million USD in sales. Then in February Survios revealed the videogame would be coming to Oculus Rift and Touch. That day has now arrived.
Raw Data will be available through early access on Oculus Home just as it is on Steam. To support Oculus Touch Survios has re-engineered the title, optimising it specifically for the device’s two and three-camera tracking. And as first announced at the Game Developers Conference (GDC) 2017, Raw Data now has cross-platform co-op allowing Oculus Rift and HTC Vive users to play together for the first time.
“We’re thrilled to officially welcome the Oculus player community to Raw Data,” said James Iliff, Survios co-founder and Chief Creative Officer. “With VR still a young, niche industry, it’s crucial right now for the entire community to be united regardless of platform. We believe VR is ultimately going to be a platform-agnostic medium, and we’re showing our support for that shift starting with Raw Data‘s new, cross-platform compatibility. And that’s just the beginning: we’re going to do everything we can to create content for the entire VR community.”
Additionally, both platforms will also get several new features. Characters Saija and Boss have both been balanced with new and reworked abilities, and there’s a new mission ‘Cataclysm’, which aims to be the most challenging mission so far with players finding themselves on a massive moving elevator whilst fending off waves of enemies.
It might not be as easier a launch on Oculus Touch with Raw Data facing some stiff competition from Epic Games’ Robo Recall. Another robot shooter, Robo Recall also launched this month and for free, with VRFocusgiving it 5-stars in its review.
Raw Data is available in Early Access on Steam and Oculus Home for $39.99/£29.99 GBP, there will also be a 20 percent discount available for a limited time.
VRFocus will continue its coverage of Raw Data and Survios, reporting back with the latest updates.
It may have only released one virtual reality (VR) title to date, but Survios’ Raw Data has become one of the most popular first-person wave shooters available for HTC Vive. While Raw Data uses the tried and tested teleportation mechanic, for its next project the studio has decided to take on the challenge of VR locomotion in Sprint Vector, an energetic race that requires you to put in some athletic effort to win, and hopefully avoiding any ill feeling.
Locomotion is an iffy subject in VR with developers tending to go for a slower approach rather than pushing the limits of the technology and people’s stomachs in the process. In Sprint Vector, speed is not only important it’s key, as you’ll be racing against other players to complete an assault course littered with obstacles, ramps, jumps and climbing walls, all needing to be traversed as quickly and smoothly as possible.
So how does Survios go about making a fast paced, exhilarating title such as this? Well the studio has employed a mechanic used by cross-country skiers, whereby downward motions of the arms propel you forward, the faster you swing your arms the quicker you should go. That’s the basic outline but the technique needed is a little more nuanced than that. The controller’s trigger needs to be held down for the entirety of the swing, being released right at the last moment for maximum effect. And both arms must alternate rather than swing at the same time. You can’t be lazy either, there are no little motions of the arms here, just big sweeping arcs.
This ensures maximum effort by the player so that Sprint Vector is not only a race but also a workout. As the image above showcases, get this timing right and you’ll start to see lightning appear round the edge of your vision indicating maximum speed. Additionally, you’ll be able to jump across chasms – or fall down them if you’re not going quick enough – and ascend massive green neon lit climbing walls which provide a change of pace to the rest of the videogame.
Does this all make for a jarring experience or something you’d actually want to play, in fact it’s the latter. Whether its the motion of your arms or the design layout, Sprint Vector doesn’t induce those feelings of simulator sickness that many may expect when looking at these GIF’s. The subject is always a difficult one to approach due to everyone being effected differently, but it would seem that the direct approach to controlling your own speed – and subsequently making your body move more – can help mitigate those issues developers try to avoid using controls like teleportation. If Sprint Vector used first-person shooter (FPS) mechanics using the touch pad to move forward, this could very well have been the polar opposite.
From this early demo Sprint Vector certainly does things differently, a VR Parkour if you will. VR developers are still learning the do’s and don’ts of the technology and Survios has decided to tackle a major challenge head on, and only time will really tell if this is a successful solution. Sprint Vector has all the makings of another stellar experience from the Raw Data studio, and VRFocus will be following this closely.
“Adrenaline platformer” is the apt descriptor that Survios is using for their newly announced title, Sprint Vector. The core of the game is what the company is calling the Fluid Locomotion System, a synthesis of VR movement techniques seen elsewhere that together add up to a supremely satisfying way to move around VR worlds at high speed without getting dizzy.
Moving players through virtual spaces is presently one of VR’s biggest challenges. Basic first-person locomotion—the foundation upon which a major part of the last two decades of game design has been built—makes many users nauseous when applied to VR. The industry has been researching and uncovering new techniques to move players across large virtual spaces in a ways that are comfortable. Some of the popular methods are putting players in cockpits (largely applicable to vehicle games), blinking/teleporting (where players click where they want to go and instantly appear there), or no virtual locomotion at all (designing the game to not require any virtual movement).
Except for the cockpit method (which doesn’t work thematically with non-vehicle games), few VR locomotion methods discovered so far allow players to move quickly and immersively across large distances.
Enter Sprint Vector’s new approach to VR locomotion which has players literally racing through virtual environments by means of direct interaction with the game world. At first glance it’s the sort of virtual movement that VR veterans would suspect would lead to instant nausea. And while it’s too early to say if it will work for every VR player (as nausea can be triggered differently from one player to the next), my hands-on time with the Fluid Locomotion System in Sprint Vector has astounded me. It didn’t only let me race through virtual space with no nausea, it was also incredibly fun.
So how does it work? At its core, the Fluid Locomotion System works by the player pulling a trigger on their controller and then swinging their arm backward as they release the trigger. This propels the player forward with a bit of momentum. Your other arm does the same thing, and using both in a swinging or running motion gets you into a continuous cycle of propulsion that lets you ‘skate’ through the world. Doing so quickly makes you move even faster. Vibrations in the controllers help you feel how much each swing of your arm is contributing to your momentum, which lets you quickly realize if your form is good or needs adjusting.
And while skating or running in this way is the primary method of movement, it gets seamlessly blended with jumping, flying, climbing, and swerving.
To jump you use another button on the controller to pull and release which gives you a little boost upward, moreso if you time it just right. You can double jump too, by doing the same with the other controller while already in the air.
Once you’re in the air, you can also have brief moments of flight. You control your flight by pointing both hands out in front of you like Superman, aiming your direction based on where you point your hands.
Climbing works by grabbing onto special hand-holds on walls and then using the controller to fling yourself upward.
Then there’s swerving, which uses a variety of inputs from your head and hands to let you quickly juke side to side, which comes in especially handy for dodging obstacles that would otherwise slow you down.
It’s clear why Survios is calling this the Fluid Locomotion System; all of these different forms of movement work together cohesively in Sprint Vector to add up to a thrilling race through the virtual world. As a player you feel deeply in control of how you’re speeding through the level, with your ability to weave each skill together determining how quickly you can complete each the stage.
Another reason the Fluid Locomotion System is compelling is because it keeps you immersed. Up to now, immersion and movement in VR have largely been a tradeoff. Blinking lets players move across large spaces, but over millions of years our brains have evolved a spatial sense that relies partly upon seeing the world move around us to map our surroundings; constant teleportation in VR is an immersion killer because it doesn’t let you map the virtual world in the same way that you do the real world. The Fluid Locomotion System, on the other hand, lets you see the world as you move through it, and asks you to directly interact with it at every move, further reinforcing the realism of the virtual world around you.
The significance of Sprint Vector and the Fluid Locomotion System should not be underestimated. Doom (1993) didn’t invent the mechanics of the first-person shooter, but it wrapped up the locomotion and control learnings of prior works into a functional and compelling package that inspired widespread adoption of the game itself and an entire genre to come after it. I think Sprint Vector has a good shot at doing the same.
– – — – –
As for Sprint Vector itself, Survios insists that it’s still very early days for the game, and say they still have lots of improvements and refinements they want to make to the Fluid Locomotion System. So far they aren’t committing the game to any particular VR platforms (though it was demonstrated at GDC on the HTC Vive, so that’s a pretty good bet), and (sadly) aren’t ready to talk about a launch date yet.
In den meisten VR-Spielen bewegen sich die Spieler langsam, mit statischen Bewegungen vorwärts. Die hierfür genutzten Fortbewegungssysteme verwenden Methoden wie beispielsweise Teleportation. Diese sorgen für ein angenehmeres Spielerlebnis, indem sie keine Bewegungsübelkeit beim Spieler erzeugen. Die Entwickler Survios (bekannt durch Raw Data) gingen das Thema in ihrem Spiel Sprint Vector dagegen völlig anders an. Anstelle von statischer Fortbewegung messen sich die Spieler in einem Hochgeschwindigkeitsrennen.
Fortbewegung durch das Fluid Locomotion System
In Sprint Vector bewegt sich der Spieler mit Armbewegungen vorwärts. Eine ähnliche Fortbewegungsmethode wird auch in Lucid Trips verwendet, in dem sich der Spieler physisch durch die Spielwelt zieht und mit seinen Armen abstößt. Denkt man an solche Bewegungsabläufe, könnte man von sofortiger Übelkeit ausgehen. Jedoch bleibt diese überraschenderweise aus, was für die Effektivität des Systems spricht. Darauf basiert das Fluid Locomotion System. Anstatt sich durch die Spielwelt vorwärts zu ziehen, schwingt man seine Arme wie bei einem echten Sprint hin und her. Wie das aussieht, wird in folgendem Video gezeigt:
Durch das Schwingen der Arme werden im Spiel schnelle Sprintbewegungen erzeugt. Damit rennt man mit bis zu 500 km/h durch die Spielwelt, springt über Türme, Mauern und Rampen und kann sogar kurzzeitig in Supermanpose durch die Luft fliegen. Das Ziel ist das Erreichen des Streckenendes. Das neu eingesetzte Fluid Locomotion System wirkt wie ein Wendepunkt in der Fortbewegung in Virtual-Reality-Spielen. Anstatt wie gewohnt nur langsam bzw. sprunghaft voranzukommen, geht es jetzt rasant mit hoher Geschwindigkeit vorwärts. Die Bewegungen fühlen sich dabei so natürlich wie möglich an – genauso wie das normale Rennen in der echten Welt.
Survios ist überzeugt von seinem System, dass die VR Locomotion vorantreibt und neue Möglichkeiten offenbart. Ob die Bewegungsübelkeit tatsächlich komplett ausbleibt, bleibt abzuwarten. Jedoch klingt die Herangehensweise hoffnungsvoll und wir dürfen gespannt sein, ob das Spiel hält, was es verspricht.
In den meisten VR-Spielen bewegen sich die Spieler langsam, mit statischen Bewegungen vorwärts. Die hierfür genutzten Fortbewegungssysteme verwenden Methoden wie beispielsweise Teleportation. Diese sorgen für ein angenehmeres Spielerlebnis, indem sie keine Bewegungsübelkeit beim Spieler erzeugen. Die Entwickler Survios (bekannt durch Raw Data) gingen das Thema in ihrem Spiel Sprint Vector dagegen völlig anders an. Anstelle von statischer Fortbewegung messen sich die Spieler in einem Hochgeschwindigkeitsrennen.
Fortbewegung durch das Fluid Locomotion System
In Sprint Vector bewegt sich der Spieler mit Armbewegungen vorwärts. Eine ähnliche Fortbewegungsmethode wird auch in Lucid Trips verwendet, in dem sich der Spieler physisch durch die Spielwelt zieht und mit seinen Armen abstößt. Denkt man an solche Bewegungsabläufe, könnte man von sofortiger Übelkeit ausgehen. Jedoch bleibt diese überraschenderweise aus, was für die Effektivität des Systems spricht. Darauf basiert das Fluid Locomotion System. Anstatt sich durch die Spielwelt vorwärts zu ziehen, schwingt man seine Arme wie bei einem echten Sprint hin und her. Wie das aussieht, wird in folgendem Video gezeigt:
Durch das Schwingen der Arme werden im Spiel schnelle Sprintbewegungen erzeugt. Damit rennt man mit bis zu 500 km/h durch die Spielwelt, springt über Türme, Mauern und Rampen und kann sogar kurzzeitig in Supermanpose durch die Luft fliegen. Das Ziel ist das Erreichen des Streckenendes. Das neu eingesetzte Fluid Locomotion System wirkt wie ein Wendepunkt in der Fortbewegung in Virtual-Reality-Spielen. Anstatt wie gewohnt nur langsam bzw. sprunghaft voranzukommen, geht es jetzt rasant mit hoher Geschwindigkeit vorwärts. Die Bewegungen fühlen sich dabei so natürlich wie möglich an – genauso wie das normale Rennen in der echten Welt.
Survios ist überzeugt von seinem System, dass die VR Locomotion vorantreibt und neue Möglichkeiten offenbart. Ob die Bewegungsübelkeit tatsächlich komplett ausbleibt, bleibt abzuwarten. Jedoch klingt die Herangehensweise hoffnungsvoll und wir dürfen gespannt sein, ob das Spiel hält, was es verspricht.
