Virtual Reality With Unreal Tournament

thegrommit writes: "It seems someone has been hacking the UT OpenGL driver to produce a relatively cheap VR environment. " It's really just another Cave thing, but it's still something to lust after. Imagine using a treadmill instead of pushing the up arrow. If only I was attached to my general pear-like shape.

Comments

i-Glasses!!!

[dazedNconfuzed]

Virtual I-O's "i-Glasses" have stereo vision and head tracking - why haven't any first-person games been tweaked to support this???

this is why Open Source rules

[Frothy Walrus]

To get the perspective correction right, we subverted the OpenGL code in the open-source portion of UT's C++ code.

this is why Open Source is so cool. this doesn't hurt sales of Unreal Tournament in any way, and hackers can still build cool things with it. incidentally, they have open-sourced CaveUT.

way to go, guys!

Re:Wrong Map?

[JeffreyJacobson]

D'oh! Yes, it is LavaGiant. I just fixed the web page. Thanks!

Re:Errm slight problem with this as a UT environme

[esper]

Low-mass ball floating in a viscous liquid. Low mass = low inertia, viscous liquid = significant drag. Cheap and it will stop the ball very quickly when you stop, plus I would expect it to feel more realistic to have to push off against the ground with every step instead of letting the ball spin freely.

I'd argue for a smaller ball, to keep the mass down (as well as making it easier to find a place to put one). The spherical error and distortion could be corrected for fairly easily in the control software, provided that it has a way to track the location of your head, such as with a head-mounted transmitter or a sonar system.

Re:real FPShooter simulation

[Saeger]

Oh yeah? Well, an American company (Microvision) has been working on something even more impressive than standard LCD VR goggles: retinal displays.

I expect these babies to be a must-have when they're ready for the mass market in a few years; especially since the #1 "augmented reality" app is likely to be naked 3D babes "on" your real bed. :)

Re:Sketchy VR

[Elazro]

Actually, we have a couple of versions of CAVE Quake running at NCSA, with full head and wand(gun) tracking. I believe that the QIII game engine is limited to scenery, but it is being worked on. QII is pretty fully functional.

I'm sorry that I can't post the link - we are all getting ready for SuperComputing '01, and I don't want to /. his machine. If someone else posts the link, please be considerate - we are on a very tight schedule and I don't know the capacity of the machine serving the page.

There is no treadmill (currently) hooked up, but since you are head tracked, dodging, stepping out behind corners, etc works. To get into some spaces you actually have to duck down. Jumping is a bit of a chore though. Really. :)

PowerGloves

[cr0sh]

Agreed - PowerGloves are not what they are all cracked up to be, but they are easy to hack for a PC. Your comments and ideas are all valid (in fact, look around my site, and you will find an old "issue" of an online "zine" I wrote for VR called "Cheap VR" - issue 2 deals with building your own homemade glove and wireless tracker.

The issue of tactile feedback is an appropriate issue, which is something I have considered. Using an object to represent what you are using or navigating with can be more "intuitive" and understandable. I suppose that is why there is a prevalance of "wand" type devices used in CAVES. One thing I have thought about playing with is this small "off-table" trackball, that you fit one finger through trigger style, and the other goes around the front - there is a trigger button, and two front buttons. The thumb controls the trackball - this would allow navigation as well as manipulation in a 3D environment. Coupled with a chorded keyboard, it could be a useful system.