PSVR Owners Thread.

[dataDave]

Actually it's €850 over here in Croquette Land. I'll just wait for GPUs to come down a bit, hopefully around about when the 4K Vive launches. At least I'll get my tax back.

[Brad]

I don't understand why pc minimum specs are so high for VR. Seems unnecessary really. Someone lent me Robinson; in addition to being a bit crap it's also vomit inducing. There's obviously a real art to avoiding that for Devs. Farpoint I can run around like a loon no problems but a casual stroll in this crytek game is awful.

I didn't notice the screen door effect that people go on about so I read up on it and the psvr actually has higher resolution subpixel rendering than oculus and give so it's less noticeable. I imagine the new Vive pro improves on this.

Anyway, novelty has not worn off for me. I struggle to play more than about 15 minutes of resi 7 at a time though because the atmosphere is just too much; I end up feeling total dread and can't bring myself to carry on lol.

I would give anything to have a Halo game in VR. Or Arma!

[Neon Ignition]

Here's one I don't hear about often, has anyone tried their PSVR with their PC?

[Asura]

I don't understand why pc minimum specs are so high for VR. Seems unnecessary really.

It's for a couple of reasons, but mainly because the rendering must maintain a high framerate, and it's different to normal videogames - not only does there need to be a high FPS, it must be consistent with zero hitches.

Think of it this way; on a console racing game, the most detailed things are usually the cars. In a game where there are up to 20 cars on the track, that means the game could, at some points, have 20 cars onscreen - but most of the time, it'll have at most 3. As a result, console racers are usually optimised to have their best experience when there are fewer onscreen cars, and use various tricks to try and reduce detail when more appear, accepting that lower framerates will occur.

Some people are extremely sensitive to low FPS in VR, giving them an immediate sense of motion sickness. Additionally, some of the things that are typically done in videogames can be problematic in VR, because the developer has much less control over where the player is looking and when. Players in VR are more likely to investigate random things, corners of rooms, undersides of tables, places where you would hide low-detail stuff in regular videogames.

So there are a bunch of reasons. PSVR has an advantage in that it exists on a console, which is a pretty closed environment where a developer has a great deal of control over the system resources (or at least, Sony allow this). It's similar to why Final Fantasy VII ran on a PS1 with a puny processor and 2mb of RAM, but the PC version of FFVII pretty much needed a 3D card and 128mb of RAM.

[dataDave]

Trying to re-watch Stranger Things with my wife. I no longer feel satisfied with a two-dimensional screen limited by height and width, despite amazing PQ. Even for watching TV.

I knew this would happen. FFS.

[Brad]

Haha! Another convert!

[MENTION=5941]Asura[/MENTION] I understand all of that about maintaining a constant frame rate. What I don't get is how my pc, which is way more powerful than my PS4 has an insufficient CPU and GPU apparently, to even do 90fps whereas my PS4 does 120fps. I think they should have lowered the entry specs for PC vr gaming. People would happily take the resolution hit to get all that vr offers I reckon. Well, as evidenced by over 2 million psvr sales.

[Brad]

[MENTION=345]Superman Falls[/MENTION] I did think about using psvr on my pc but to be honest PlayStation has all the best VR games anyway and I expect Steam would just moan that my pc wasn't good enough anyway.

[dataDave]

But it only handles 'base' Skyrim. That's enough to sway me in the PC direction.

Agreed on the performance though, it's amazing.

[ItsThere]

I was saying long before the grratvfirum destruction of 2017/2018 that VR was the future and that it’s hard to go back. Brad has just reiterated all my sentiments!

[dataDave]

Thinking of sabotaging my laptop in order to fast-track my PC Mega Build. It's the only way I can convince my wife.

I can't bring myself to harm this thing though. It's been an absolute belter and continues to serve me well.

[kryss]

With a PS4 and NS back in the collection I'm consoled out until next gen hits. I'm definitely unshaken from my view that VR is this gens Kinect, they're just so... so far from getting it where it needs to be and even then it'll never be the de facto way of gaming.

But, as we get towards the end of life for the generation it'll definitely be something I'd want to have to try out more fully as it carries a solid risk of seeing its content lost to its generation in a similar way to many Wii titles are for that system. It needs to come down further though, even with the recent price drop it feels like you're still looking at circa £300+ to cover the peripherals most likely to be needed before anything else which is just insane.

Looking at the software though, to create a sort of hit list so when the time comes I can get straight to the meat of the visor these look like the ones most interesting of the existing and upcoming titles:

Batman: Arkham VR

Bound

Here They Lie

Rez: Infinite

Until Dawn: Rush of Blood

Trackmania Turbo

Rogue One: X-Wing Mission

Psychonauts in the Rhombus Ruin

Farpoint

Star Trek: Bridge Crew

Arizona Sunshine

Superhot VR

Obduction

Radial-G

PSVR Demo 2

Chernobyl VR

Gran Turismo Sport

The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim VR

Doom VFR

Justice League VR Experience

The Inpatient

Moss

Golem

Rick and Morty: Virtual Rick-ality

Wipeout Omega Collection

Zone of the Enders 2: Second Runner

Any obvious guff there?

Bound is odd with an annoying camera system.
Rogue One: X-Wing Mission is only available as part of Star Wars: Battlefront, but still worth it for both.

No love for Catlateral Damage?

[Neon Ignition]

I didn't see much on that one, I'll take a look at it

The PC angle interests me as whilst I think ease of use would keep it PS4 focused being able to use on PC would really open up the title selection and eventually justify the outlay more. It's probably the better way to experience stuff like Skyrim VR as well given the ability to tidy up image quality and deploy mods.

The talk about VR making 2D play less appealing does remind me of something though, Wii-Remotes. They were 1:1 with the hardware so enjoyed a much, much stronger move towards adoption but where ultimately dropped just as I expect VR will be next gen but back then there was a portion of gamers who were reluctant to move away from Wiimotes due to the increased accuracy they offered to some genres compared to controllers.

[Asura]

The talk about VR making 2D play less appealing does remind me of something though, Wii-Remotes. They were 1:1 with the hardware so enjoyed a much, much stronger move towards adoption but where ultimately dropped just as I expect VR will be next gen but back then there was a portion of gamers who were reluctant to move away from Wiimotes due to the increased accuracy they offered to some genres compared to controllers.

Somehow I feel it's different. I think VR is a completely different way to approach interactive entertainment.

The problem with WiiMotes and why they didn't catch on is that they were ultimately limited. There were certain game types which benefited from them, such as the resurgence of lightgun games that we saw on the Wii, but so many of the games just took an existing mechanic and made it motion based for no good reason (I think the textbook example of this was Sonic and the Secret Rings which should've been controlled with an analog stick and button, but became a tilt-and-waggle).

Even some of the more impressive demonstrations, like Red Steel 2 and its sword-based antics, were ultimately gimmicky. Technically proficient but when it came down to it, you were just playing a simplistic Devil May Cry-esque game that could've been controlled with a pad.

I think this was inevitable because motion control would always be limited if you were forced to stare at a rectangle on one side of your room, whereas if you have a freer persective, they start to make more sense.

My remaining gripe with VR is that it's quite a solo experience. Multiplayer VR is what I'm looking forward to; the idea of being in a virtual space with the participation of other people.

[dataDave]

Fortunately pointer/gyro controls are still a thing.

[Team Andromeda]

The talk about VR making 2D play less appealing does remind me of something though, Wii-Remotes. They were 1:1 with the hardware so enjoyed a much, much stronger move towards adoption but where ultimately dropped just as I expect VR will be next gen but back then there was a portion of gamers who were reluctant to move away from Wiimotes due to the increased accuracy they offered to some genres compared to controllers.

That sounds like something someone who's never experienced VR would say. Its not meant as a dig, just once you play VR, going back to a playing a game on a TV is never quite the same.

VR is the most amazing experience in gaming, but the Tech and interface quite isn't there yet. When consoles get so powerful they can handle VR in 4K and with a head that's as easy and light as putting on a pair Ski Googles, or those 3D specs one puts on in Universal Studios Florida is when it truly be massmarket imo.

Honestly playing REZ Aera X in VR, Resident Evil 7 in VR , Farpoint in VR are just incredible experiences, hell even the Shark Dive in PS Worlds is incredible. It's just that I have issues with the low Res display the set up of VR with the wires and the fuss of putting the headset on or off.