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Valve To Demo Prototype VR Headset, "Steam to Support and Promote VR Games"
An anonymous reader writes "The itinerary for Steam Dev Days 2014 lists two talks by Valve's internal virtual and augmented reality researchers, Michael Abrash and Joe Ludwig. Abrash's talk, titled 'What VR Could, Should, and Almost Certainly Will Be within Two Years' will feature a demonstration of Valve's secret prototype VR headset that is 'capable of stunning experiences.' Ludwig's talk 'Virtual Reality and Steam' will discuss how Valve will be adapting Steam to VR to 'support and promote Virtual Reality games.' Rift inventor and Oculus co-founder Palmer Luckey will also be taking to the stage at Steam Dev Days to speak on best-practice for VR development."
There's a hint that they might be showing off a head mounted display featuring a low persistence display, which would be great news for those of us that get the urge to hurl when playing Doom on a conventional display. If you missed it you might want to check out the slides and notes (PDF) from Michael Abrash's GDC2013 talk on VR.
Low persistance displays are a tricky issue.
They obviously don't have the issues that high-persistance displays have of holding frames for too long. However, they have another annoying effect, commonly referred to as the strobe effect. This has to do with each pixel being lit for only a minute duty cycle on the display. This causes bad flicker at low refresh rates.
Early low persistance displays obviously were not very good on this issue. This is because the displays used very slow technologies such as oscolating mirrors.
By the details I've read on their blog, I'm pretty certain Valve has gotten down that they need a high refresh rate to get the VR to work right. They have identified strobe effect as a problem, and have identified that while the traditional 60Hz rate, while tolerable, is far from ideal for low persistance displays. They seem to believe they can push the refresh rate high enough to deal with strobe effect. I have confidence that they can.
Higher refresh rates also have other advantages for gaming as Internet router designs improve and ping times drop, the latency produced by interpolation becomes more substancial, and the best way to reduce it is to push more physical frames. If you are pushing more physical frames, there are clear advantages to pushing more visual frames to match.
all my money!
So, is Valve planning on introducing a product that competes with Oculus Rift? Or are they working cooperatively?
VR
V = 22
R = 18
V - R = 6
Two letters in VR: 6 / 2 = 3
Half-Life 3 Confirmed
I want LOTRO on VR! You know the first MMORPG to manage VR is going to make a killing!
Hugh? Can someone explain, why they fire their VR/AR team and then introduce this a couple of months later?
... featuring a low persistence display, which would be great news for those of us that get the urge to hurl when playing Doom on a conventional display.
Note that many CRTs (basically all modern color CRTs and most modern monochromes) are low- (not zero-) persistence, with phosphor decay on the order of microseconds to tens of microseconds. Some of the visual effects are bound to be very different with a exponential or power law decay than with the sharp cutoff of scanning devices, but it does suggest ways for some of us who aren't in secret VR prototype labs to experiment with some of the stuff he's talking about.
I'm not about to do this now, but back when I was about 12 and could do such things without getting dizzy, I tinkered with motion perception by making programs that would scroll an image horizontally across a CRT, lay on my belly across a swivel chair with my feet in the air, and spun myself by pushing off the legs of the chair with my hands to get a near-constant speed that synced with the monitor.
If I didn't have better things that needed doing, I'd strap a CRT display and an LCD onto a lazy susan, together with an Eee or such to drive one of them (swap plugs to repeat experiment with low- or high-persistence), and spin it instead of myself. (It's kinda sad that I do have better things that need doing, and yet I'm posting this on /. instead of either doing them or doing visual perception experiments...)
blank stone vr as well
I wonder how this will compare to the CastAR that they let Jeri Ellsworth walk out the door with...
They weren't targeting the same games, but the hardware for the CastAR is impressive.
Also, VR is the state-owned railroad company in Finland. And railroads were a quite recurring theme in HL2. Pure coincidence? I think not!
I really don't think Oculus VR as a company has a future, at least not as the mainstream VR king they keep picturing. Not because VR is not the future, we all know it is, but because they lack what really matters for the commercial success of a product in the mainstream tech/gaming industry: marketing, content and first party support. And on top of that their device is nothing but rehash of 90s tech with modern components. Back in 2008, when I was in college, I built in a single weekend a VR google prototype for a school project using a jailbroken iPhone and those zoom lenses that came with Metal Gear Ac!d for the PSP. If a nobody like me could do that, the only reason we don't see other PC peripheral manufactures like Logitech, Razer, Asus, Madcatz, etc making their own VR googles is because they lack the content and marketing to make it a profitable product. If by any chance Oculus end up being the only company in the field, VR is going the way motion controllers went on the PC: total oblivion. Only years later with the Wii, is that motion controllers actually became something that devs were willing to spend time with.
Said that, IMO, as a PC, console and handheld gamer there are only two companies capable of making VR a mainstream reality: Valve and Sony.
Sony because they already have experience making non-VR HMDs since 1997. With the push they've been making with the high-end HMZ and the huge success that was the launch of the PS4, alongside the many related patents on the subject, there are solid rumors that there is a PS4 VR google in the cookings(can't wait for E3 2014). Why is that a good and important thing? First, because the PS4 is a affordable and mainstream and somewhat powerful gaming platform. For $150 sony could easily deliver a peripheral capable of a enjoyable experience. Second, they have decent first party content. Their biggest system seller, Gran Turismo, is IDEAL for VR. Third, with the PS Move and Camera, they'll be the first and probably only company to provide a plug and play and "full body" VR(and AR) experience. With all that and the already 1 million users they've got during the PS4 launch it'll be much attractive for 3rd parties to support VR(instead of being a niche product on a already not mainstream platform).
As for Valve, on the other side of the spectrum, not only they are by far the most popular publisher on the PC with their own first party content and good marketing strategy, but they are their own hardware platform and standards, most of which are based on the Open ideology. With their VR prototype, there is a chance they'll be licensing the design to OEM just like the steam machines along side creating an standard protocol for VR headsets(open source head-tracking API and screen sizes/lenses specifications). That would allow the creation of headsets on all sizes and shapes(after all as a wearable device that is important) and for all price ranges. You could buy a cheap single screen 720p headset for $100 or a high-end dual screen 1440p headset for a $1000 dollars. Extra features such as eye-tracking, AR cameras, vestibular stimulation, etc, could all be an option if you have the money. This one device with one not so cheap price with a proprietary API strategy that Oculus VR is adopting is completely against the PC vision/mentality.
I think Nintendo could also do something VR related, but they dropped the ball with the WiiU. The natural evolution of motion controllers is VR not tablet games. That is the opposite of VR.
A recent video from Ben Krasnow http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vfqtKJAnJHg about a quickly hacked togethor "seat input device" mentioned that this has relation to his work on VR stuff at Valve.
NZ Electronics Enthusiasts: Check out my Trade Me Listings
...would be cool for testing!
Pictures should be streamed via WLAN, including sound for headphones output.
Could be an incredible immerse experience on a shoestring for everybody (with a smartphone).
SteamMachines + SteamOS + VR + Half Life 3
This is what I call next-gen... not watching NFL stats.
It's a shame how much money so many of us have spent on games that we are not allowed to play.
Please techno press: Dont spend all the VR press coverage time talking about how you were dizzy and sweaty. You're always dizzy and sweaty. No one cares.
SAO here we come!