OculusRift

[itch]

[itch]

Status: Shipped

Thank god it will probably arrive after my exams.

[Cletus]

awesome

[itch]

Thanks dude

I'll do a basic unboxing when I get it.

[Cletus]

you definitely should

[Candy Arse]

Fuck man I really want a Rift as well....

[guttermouth]

I'm looking foward to try it out again at PAX next week. Gave it a bash last year on that rollercoaster demo. Worked great but the pixel issue with the screen close to your eyes was off putting. Has the new models improved on this??

[itch]

By most accounts yes.

It's a 1080p screen divided by two now. That's 960 x 1080 per eye. Apparently this is enough to get rid of the 'screen door effect'.

The consumer model is rumoured to have a 4k screen, and even if you are still running things at 1080p, the extra pixel density which will be filled in will ensure there is as little screen door as possible.

Although 99% of people say it's already gone at 1080p.

Apparently now they have filled the back orders, people who are ordering now only have a short wait.

[Candy Arse]

Fuck.............................................

[unfnknblvbl]

4k? In a 5" screen? Jesus, panel technology is going fucking gangbusters on the small scale. I'd just be happy with QHD for a VR device, I think!

[Cletus]

Fuck.............................................

Decided to wait for the consumer model. It will be difficult. I expect to break.

[itch]

4k? In a 5" screen? Jesus, panel technology is going fucking gangbusters on the small scale. I'd just be happy with QHD for a VR device, I think!

Yup. The DK2 uses the screen from a Galaxy Note 3, and I guess we're going to see 4k phones soon and they'll put that Samsung panel in the consumer version of the Rift.

Although there is a bit of speculation about that. But some things they said at the crescent bay demonstration suggest they are definitely going higher than 1080p.

[Candy Arse]

Fuck.............................................

Decided to wait for the consumer model. It will be difficult. I expect to break.

If I know for a fact it's not out for a year or so I will break. I want one so bad and my b'day is coming up...

[Cletus]

Christmas, Easter, my birthday, Father's Day... I literally have no hope if they take too long.

[itch]

[Candy Arse]

Motherfucker....

[Rorschach]

Wow, much impressed

[unfnknblvbl]

Cunting McCuntface.

Can't wait for the standalone version, especially if it really does have Android built into it. I'd install Plex immediately!

[itch]

I have 2 exams to go but I'm reasonably well prepared so I took half the day to spend in VR.

First impressions?

Wow.


Just wow.

First thing I tried is this



The desk demo it's the first thing you try (there's a button once you've set it up to start the demo.)


And oh. My. God.

The first sensation is that it's kind of underwhelming.

You know that principle when they do continuity in a movie where, if the continuity guy is doing his job well, then you don't even notice that he's done a job?

It's like that, you think oh yeah, I look around, it tracks my head...

But then you're like 'Oh shit, it tracks my head!' If you lean in to the pot plant you can look around all of the leaves, and the house of cards you can totally look around it, and it's seamless. Just beautiful little to no screen door effect to speak of.

Then I tried... the tuscany demo? Not bad, great head tracking etc, nice enough scene.



It's a villa in tuscany, a little dull.

Then I tried Half Life 2. (setup is a little iffy, btw)

Oh. My. God.

Wow. Just wow.

This one is done where your head is free to look around independent of your aim. And a little crosshair moves independent of that.

It's great, really great. The sense of scale!

You know how you get off the train and you walk around the platform at the start? Well on a computer monitor or tele everything is reduced to like 'this' big right?

Well with the oculus on, if you walk up to that lamp post/clock thing on the platform it like, towers over you.

There's that scene where Barney throws the crowbar down to you and the monolithic skyscraper in the distance is opening up and all the birds fly off it.

You like, you look up at Barney, he throws you the crowbar and you look over to your left and up at the tower while he talks to you... and it's like wow, the scale.

There's still a little 'judder' in it though and I'm trying to get the refresh rate to be exactly 75fps, I locked a 76fps max in console, used launch parameters that force 75fps... but I don't think it's taking.

Net graph reads 75 but there's still judder. Apparently if you do it right it's perfect.

Gun play is hard but really, really cool. Especially the pistol and the magnum.

The next one I tried was 'Titans of Space'



A kind of educational depiction of the solar system. Really cool. I got my first taste of Oculus particle effects 0.0.


Then, I tried this game called 'Sightline: The chair'

This is the coolest thing I tried so far.

It's this tech demo/game where your character is just sitting in a chair. You're in the dark and the lamp flicks on and it's like the desk scene.

But then, if you look around, when you look back at stuff it's all changed!

It's this weird headfuck where they use the immersion to completely disorient you it's unrealz.

If you can handle the guy presenting this, you'll get the idea.

The particle effects!!! That part where all the little lights fly around the cubes and its dark and everything's shiny it's AMAZING.

Also, there's this part where you are waaaay up on the girders of a skyscraper under construction and you legitimately get the willies when you look over the edge.

Again, it's not just rotational head tracking, if you look to your side, lean out and over and look down you legit get vertigo. So cool.

I also....

Tried watching some binocular 'sidebyside' movies. Amazing.

Yeah, overall great. Sall I've tried so far.

[Cletus]

lovely. Congratulations Itch. Quite envious.

[itch]

Edit: Thanks man.

One thing that needs to be said is when you take it off...

Like.... there's this weird... trippy feeling where you reconnect to your surroundings. I get the feeling it wouldn't be the best idea to spend 2 hours in the rift and then jump in the car. Because it's like a weird vertigo thing going on.

I read this experiment from the 50's where they made people wear 'inverting' lenses for a couple of days without taking them off? (you know those ski goggles that make everything upside down?) And apparently after about 2 days, all the people wearing them just adjusted and it actually looked the right way up to them!

So you can imagine any disconnect between 1:1 movement is actually probably rewiring your brain in some way!

Scary, but cool!

[itch]

Unfnk: Plex thanks man I'll check that out.

(saw this)

[unfnknblvbl]

Holy fuck, that Plex demo is cooler than I could have imagined! I just want to use it as a personal media player in bed

[itch]

The latest thing I tried is this room from the Unreal Engine 4





It's from a demo called 'Realistic Lighting' and the hint is in the name.

It's an engine I was worried my rig couldn't handle (even in single vision) but on Oculus I can run this at medium settings.

Solid 75 fps.

On medium there is some aliasing but this is the most 'convincing' thing with the most 'presence' or immersion I've tried so far.

It's absolutely amazing, the ease with which you can convince youself this is real!

Some of the highlights are the plastic coated woodgrain on the flatpack Ikea style furniture, the bump mapping on the white painted walls, the frames on the pictures on the wall, the glass that coats the pictures that pick up all reflections.

And last but not least the standing lamps where if you duck down on your knees and stick your head in the lamp, you can totally just stick your head in it! It's perfect. 1:1 head tracking is an incredibly effective trick.

This was cool.

[itch]

Oh yeah, and the cracked, dimpled texture of the red leather couch and the half illuminated red curtain.

There's a cool effect that oculus does that I'm noticing where if you stick your noggin really close to something (like for example if you walk up to the edge of the curtain, like 2 cm away from it) it will reach a point where it dissolves into a 'double image' in the same way it would in real life like... if you put your finger really close to your face, eventually it's so close that you can't focus on it it does that! like if you try to look at a candle stick or whatever, and you get really close, your eyes focus just breaks up and it goes double, in a very natural and realistic way.

I'm not sure if that's a trick that they are intentionally implementing or just the nature of the technology and it happens naturally as the depiction floats to far to the edge of each eye and your muscles can't make your eyes look that far apart, it's great either way.