Agreement is not a prerequisite of co-operation. Which is to say that you do not have to agree with a person’s point of view in order to work with them. As it happens, the VRFocus team differs quite a fair bit in not only our interests but our opinions on where virtual reality (VR) is going, where it should go, what VR videogames are good, what’s the best head-mounted display (HMD), etc.
But that doesn’t mean we disagree on everything. Much like how the former Top Gear and current presenters of The Grand Tour – James May, Richard Hammond and Jeremy Clarkson – do actually agree on some things. Such as how the old Ford Mondeo was a really good car, that the UK should remain in Europe and, most importantly, that Heinz sandwich spread is delicious. There are also some things that we universally agree on, at least in terms of the Editor and writing team. I can’t speak too much for Nina as she does her own thing.
For a start we all, unashamedly, love Moss and think Quill is the cutest thing ever. Another decision we all came to separately (and to our surprise) is that we all think that Shooty Fruity is rather rubbish. Rebecca reviewed it and gave it two stars out of five and that it “ultimately fails to rise above its roots as a wave shooter”. It was a judgement that didn’t best please nDreams as you can imagine and generated a number of comments in suspiciously short period from people white knighting the thing. But it was all rather irrelevant in the end. As I mentioned a few weeks back on VR vs. we don’t play favourites here, even for those that ‘gave birth’ to us, so to speak. So, Rebecca wasn’t enamoured of it and it got a two: Her opinion. End of story.
And if they’re still upset, nDreams will just have to be content with the multiple award nominations the title has gotten in the last couple of months. And be grateful some of the rest of the team didn’t review it who might’ve scored it even lower(!)
But, like I say that’s very specific. At EGX 2018 I got a chance to get hands-on with Arca’s Path VR from Dream Reality Interactive and Rebellion. It’s a title that we already previewed back in June at E3, but I’d been intrigued about for a while and wanted to have a go if possible. In that preview, which is genuinely positive, Kevin J did say “a question remains over whether or not the videogame benefits from VR at all” and I can see his point in that it’s easy to think that Arca’s Path VR could’ve just been replicated with any old motion controller. Except… I disagree with it. To me the benefit is that through the control scheme the resulting playstyle adds much to the title.
The key in all of this is subtlety and balance.
For those unaware of the title, a girl called Arca finds a mysterious headset and is transported to a strange world which is for want of a better description, The Void from Dishonoured if it existed in Transistor. Arca’s essence (as such) transforms into some sort of ball and your goal it to Marble Madness your way through to the end collecting crystal shards along to the way to unlock… well, that remains to be seen.
You control the ball through the obstacle course via moving a reticule in a direction and distance from Arca. The further you go from her the faster she’ll go, err, roll. Placing the target closer will slow momentum down to a stop. Which when you’re traversing 90 degree turns on a narrow pathway with no walls to stop you is something you’ll need to be extra careful about – which is where the VR headset comes in.
The reticule is gaze-controlled so where you move your head to look is where the target goes, and here’s where the trickiness comes in. Because of that you have to be very careful with your movements. You’re in a twisting route with hazards ahead so you obviously want to plan a route. In a normal videogame you’d have no problem as you’d be holding a controller and through that you’d hold the little target steady without any issue as you peruse the way ahead on the 2D screen. In VR however, you are surrounded by the world and as you’re there you want to look around in a 3D way. Except, of course that if you move your head, you risk moving the ball. It becomes a matter of self-control and deliberate movements. Looking ahead and moving your eyes while keeping focused on your head position. Likewise moving your head to control is a subtler approach than a normal controller where it’s far easier to measure your pressure and momentum via a thumb stick.
Beyond the obvious narrative reason for using a headset, no, you’re not gesticulating wildly and yes, its use makes it a very untraditional VR title as a result – but who cares about that? You gain much more through VR’s use. The world is more intriguing, the controls take more thought and planning in order to utilise them. Mistakes are costly, judgement and awareness need to be on point.
We’ll find out more of what makes Arca’s Path VR tick when the time comes to review it in full. I wonder what the others will make of it? From my side at least, I’m sure they’ll have a ball.
Or be one.
An additional note, while we don’t talk about each other that much (and I’m sure they couldn’t care less what I think), I did want to personally acknowledge the good news coming out of Upload VR just before the weekend just gone. It’s not that 
So, where were we? Halfway through matters I think it was.
Carmack Accepts That He Is ‘Out Of Step’ With Facebook On Championing Isolation
That’s all I’m going to cover for now, as always there’s a tonne of stuff to cover and not enough time for Carmack to say all he wants. One wonders why Oculus don’t have Carmack do a monthly livestream series on a number of topics then get into the really big points at Oculus Connect – or at the end of the day just let him go for as long as he wants on Day 2. He’s clearly enjoying himself talking about the things that both irk him and excite him. If you’ve not yet seen the talk in full I’d recommend it. You can do so below.
As one developer and friend I spoke to told me during a quick chat, “It’s so nice to see you out and about and know you’re not stuck in your office 365 days a year.”
Beyond that though, I didn’t see a heck of a lot of VR on display. There was 
Of course with Pete back I mostly return to my usual gaggle of roles for the site, and back gratefully away from writing up news. I’m not a writer in a professional sense, I know this. I enjoy that (occasional) part of the job about as much as getting punched in the stomach to the tune of La Cucaracha. But one thing really stuck in my mind as I was writing various news stories up over the latter part of the week – if you think about it, virtual reality (VR) is pretty weird.
As adults know though, being ill and off of work is, in fact, doubly inconvenient. While the classic ‘pulling a sickie’ might still appeal, it also does not because a) work will inevitably pile up, b) while you are away something will have gone wrong that will equally inevitably mean you will be called upon to fix it the nanosecond you are back in and if you’re in an office c) Janice from accounting will have nicked your favourite mug and your chair has been replaced with some form of torture device previously employed by the Spanish Inquisition.
The truth of the matter is I couldn’t tell you whether I agree nor disagree with Luckey’s opinion of the Magic Leap as I honestly haven’t tried it – and unless someone magically leaps to sending me one, or pays me lots of money to be able to afford one I’m not going to either, but whether I think it’s good isn’t actually the topic of today. It’s more whether you think it is; because even though the headset is augmented/mixed reality, if you’re someone who is very much pro-virtual reality (VR) over everything else you might want to hope it does okay.
Why? Well, let’s say you’re in a car and there’s an accident. Or you have something to eat out and you feel sick and get food poisoning. Or, you put your heart into something and it all falls apart in front of you. Some people would say they’d get right back on that horse – but the truth is the vast majority would hesitate to be a part of that experience again. A bad experience leaves a bad taste in the mouth is scarcely rectified quickly. It’s a truth that has dogged VR via simulation sickness and it is also a financial truth.
Today we enter the world of anime, and the first of two series linked by the voice of its principle character. For those who may have heard of the term previously, but aren’t entirely sure what that means, anime is a shortened version of the Japanese word animēshon and it refers to “a style of Japanese film and television animation, typically aimed at adults as well as children” – to quote the definition that comes up on Google.
Already (and deliberately, I might add) traumatised by his upbringing, Shinji is basically blackmailed into piloting the EVA after they wheel fellow pilot Rei Ayanami out on a gurney, still bleeding from a previous accident. Did I mention that Shinji can feel the injuries inflicted on the EVA and his first sortie ends with being stabbed through the skull and the mysterious EVA going berserk?
Four and a half years. In that time we’ll have a European football competition, not to mention another Olympics. I can’t help but wonder as to what will change in that time. If we look back to the last World Cup in 2014, which took place in Brazil, it’s astounding how far technology has come along in as small a time as this. From a virtual reality (VR) point of view it’s been a heck of a big leap, although many of you likely won’t think that. Yes, there’s still a long way to go, but there’s wireless VR now. Stuff that makes the DK1 look positively archaic. VR hasn’t taken over the world, but it has permeated nearly every facet of what makes the world tick.