Talk about Head Mounted Displays (HMDs), augmented reality, wearable computing, controller hardware, haptic feedback, motion tracking, and related topics here!
Not sure about the average age (and any first experiences at all with VR) on these forums, but how about a thread about the very first time we tried VR (and longed for it ever since).
My first experience was in 1993. I was ten years old and Ram&Rom, a local videogames store, had a Virtuality 1000CS in the middle of the store. Can't remember much else than the feeling of wanting something like this in my house. Have wanted something like that in my house ever since. I had for some reason (being just 10yo) seen the Landmower Man, as well as reading my share of articles on the matter in various gaming and computer magazines, and just knew this would some day be the standard of video gaming. It probably weren't the super awesome experience i remember it to be, but the ten year old me was sold. Ever since, I've longed for a good, immersive VR experience, as well as a flying DeLorean. Up to last year, I had given up hope for both.
I also thought VR5 was a pretty cool series, one and only because it was about some girl who spent all her time chatting on VR (VR5 being level 5 of immersiveness or something. Rift probably being level 2). http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0112209/
Linkage1992 wrote:I've never experienced VR because I was I little kid in the 90s growing up in Melbourne, and the craze wasn't as big here as it was in the US.
I'm Norwegian, and it weren't much of a craze here either. More like a distant pipe dream for kids, fueled by futuristic magazine articles and expensive showcase arcade machines.
Yeah, Virtuality and Dactyl Nightmare were my first experience with VR as well. I was totally blown away, I think this was back in '93. It was sad, too, because until the Rift nothing has even come close to that experience. Finally we are at the point of having affordable VR at home. We've really come a long way in such a short time (mostly thanks to Palmer).
I also *loved* VR5 back when it was on the air. So awesome. For those that did have it (or don't remember) it was sort of like the x-files, but it was about this girl that found a way to get into another level of VR. It was cheesy, she like plugs her telephone into the computer and then "jacks in". And they had the government conspiracy thing going on. Really cool for the 90's. Unfortunately they never released the DVD set, I still look sometimes to try to find it.
The only "VR" I've experienced was playing the VirtualBoy in a blockbuster back when I was a kid. The display was too high for me, so I was on my tiptoes, trying my best to peer into this black and red void. Terrible experience. My love/desire for VR came from watching shows like Dennou Coil, GITS, .hack etc.
Lets get it said or asked. VirtualBoy doesn't count!(?)
Assuming it doesn't, then my first experience that I can think of was atop the Stratosphere in Las Vegas (were I live) in 1999ish. I honestly have no idea what setup/system was used, or why it was even there of all places. But it was a visor type thing with a cage similar to whats shown in the picture in the OP. Being played on it seemed to be a Duke Nukem game. It was a weird night (as I said, it's Vegas) so the details I can remember are kind of fuzzy. I want to say there were 2 cages/visors setup to do a death match style battle, but I'm not certain.
But like a lot of people, I wanted VR for long before that. I don't really know if that experience made me want VR any more/less. I'm not really a FPS fan, so I could only take away so much from that experience. But it was still fun! As has been said before, any VR before the OR has been ahead of its time and the technology to do it properly.
If we are for some reason counting the VirtualBoy, then probably just a few months before that...
My first moment was five minutes ago. With the rage demo on ipad. Now running around my house looking for something that i can attach it to my face with. I had my first taste.... i need another fix.
4 player Legend Quest for me. Me and my mates spent far too much money on it back in the day. We'd have a blast on Legend Quest, then hop over the road to the Lazer Quest arena. Excuse me while I start feeling nostalgic, and suddenly very old...
Pokey wrote:I remember really wanting to try a big VR setup in a mall when I was a kid, but my parents said it was too expensive.
It was - check out the prices. This is from the place I used to go to somewhere in the region of 20 years ago.
Pokey wrote:The dream of what I missed was probably much better than the experience would have been.
You're not wrong
Actually, saying that, we still had an absolute blast playing it.
The rift will be my first experience with VR. Already, I can't play any game, at all. I'm just waiting for the Rift. All of the rest of the potentials went gray and dead, since that moment of it dawning on me of what I was reading about, hearing about, and seeing in the vids. Recall that my product is used in simulators across the world and in the world's most potent 3d theme park rides. shhh. Don't tell anyone. In reality, the two markets will never cross swords... not for quite some time, at least. Both markets are still expanding, so..no problems. It's a non-competition scenario.
Last edited by KBK on Sat Mar 16, 2013 11:21 pm, edited 2 times in total.
Intelligence... is not inherent - it is a point in understanding. Q: When does a fire become self sustaining?
cybereality wrote:I remember I was begging my parents for the Power Glove back in '89. I wanted it so bad. Never even got to try it.
I think if I had tried it, it probably would have sucked, but somehow it has stayed "cool" in my memories.
Same thing with the VictorMaxx. Funny how hard they pushed for VR before consoles could even render in 3D.
I have a box full of PowerGloves I bought back in the day (probably about 6 or so). I remember getting them working on my Atari ST and my Amiga. Back in those days you had to write your own driver... They really did not fit an adult hand very well (glove too small, but stretchy)... It worked okay, as I recall.
Now, I would insert the recent photo of Palmer Luckey wearing a PowerGlove T-shirt instead of his typical "I love VR" T-shirt, but I cannot find it...
geekmaster wrote:Now, I would insert the recent photo of Palmer Luckey wearing a PowerGlove T-shirt instead of his typical "I love VR" T-shirt, but I cannot find it...
This is going to be showing how to hack the Nintendo Powerglove. By hack I mean tap into the flex sensors and use the buttons and d pad and add anything you want. In my case I added an accelerometer.
If were counting the PowerGlove, I have one too. And used one at some point in the early to mid 90's.
Man they suck! The finger response wasn't to bad, but the sensors were garbage. In fact, I don't think the sensors on mine even work half-assed anymore.
I could see hacking mine, just for the novelty. I probably wont though.
Dactyl Nightmare on the Virtuality. I took off my glasses to use it and could hardly see a thing. It was terrible. Didn't dampen my enthusiasm though.
In the Virtual Reality subject in my university course, I got to try it properly. I can't remember exactly what HMD it was, but it was running on Silicon Graphics machines in Java 3D. I made a simulation of my dining room. My VR teacher didn't like the way I did the input, since he couldn't understand the metaphor. He was using a mouse with the ball replaced with a Pulhemus Fastrack tracker, and everyone else just had a button to walk and a button to pick things up. But I didn't think that was VR enough, so I made a proper hand with fingers and I made the left button control the index finger, and the right mouse button control the other fingers, unless it was a 3 button mouse in which case the middle button controlled the middle finger and the right button controlled the ring and little fingers. The fingers moved smoothly in and out when you pressed and released the buttons. I made it so you had to point to move and you had to use all your fingers to grab things.
Fluke wrote:4 player Legend Quest for me. Me and my mates spent far too much money on it back in the day. We'd have a blast on Legend Quest, then hop over the road to the Lazer Quest arena. Excuse me while I start feeling nostalgic, and suddenly very old...
Hockley, Nottingham.
My mates and I did exactly the same thing! Must have been 92-93 while I was at Peoples' college. So soo expensive for a student!
This games single handedly changed course of my education from Electronics (and Computing), to Software Engineering.
I went to University in Leicester mostly because that's where Virtuality were based. They kindly let me go to their office
one day a week so I could do some development on their hardware/SDK for my final year project. They went pop while I was
still there.
Gutted
Dactyl Nightmare was my first (and last) VR experience. I was but a wee lad but instantly fell in VR love! When I got home I was so bummed out how little immersion my console and CRT provided so I cut up some cardboard into a crude "headmount" for my small tv. That's as far as my experimenting went but that first VR experience left the biggest impression on me which is why I am here right now!
DarkAkuma wrote:Assuming it doesn't, then my first experience that I can think of was atop the Stratosphere in Las Vegas (were I live) in 1999ish. I honestly have no idea what setup/system was used, or why it was even there of all places. But it was a visor type thing with a cage similar to whats shown in the picture in the OP. Being played on it seemed to be a Duke Nukem game. It was a weird night (as I said, it's Vegas) so the details I can remember are kind of fuzzy. I want to say there were 2 cages/visors setup to do a death match style battle, but I'm not certain
It would most certainly have been a 2000SU machine and probably playing Zone Hunter.
I still have my virtual boy. I don't know if it counts, but it is definitely my first headset gaming experience. My parents bought it for me cheap from Toys 'R' Us after it was discontinued ~1996. I still play occasionally.
My first "move your head to look around" experience was with a tower defense game at Gameworks in Columbus, OH around 2002. The machine is still there, although the arcade has changed names to KDB. You can see it in this youtube video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=pl ... bmE#t=227s (at ~3:50 if the time stamp doesn't work). I don't actually know the name of the game and my google-fu has failed me... If I remember correctly the game was 2D not 3D. Maybe I will go back and give it another go...
Re the video are you meaning that yellow thing with the goldfish bowl attached? I tried one of those at an arcade machine exhibition and it was truly rubbish.
Personally I don't think unless you've played a Virtuality system you haven't had a proper VR experience yet.
Funny, That looks like the machine I first had a VR experience in at Foxwoods Casino in the early/mid 90's
joakizmo wrote:Not sure about the average age (and any first experiences at all with VR) on these forums, but how about a thread about the very first time we tried VR (and longed for it ever since).
My first experience was in 1993. I was ten years old and Ram&Rom, a local videogames store, had a Virtuality 1000CS in the middle of the store. Can't remember much else than the feeling of wanting something like this in my house. Have wanted something like that in my house ever since. I had for some reason (being just 10yo) seen the Landmower Man, as well as reading my share of articles on the matter in various gaming and computer magazines, and just knew this would some day be the standard of video gaming. It probably weren't the super awesome experience i remember it to be, but the ten year old me was sold. Ever since, I've longed for a good, immersive VR experience, as well as a flying DeLorean. Up to last year, I had given up hope for both.
I also thought VR5 was a pretty cool series, one and only because it was about some girl who spent all her time chatting on VR (VR5 being level 5 of immersiveness or something. Rift probably being level 2). http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0112209/
Last edited by Visual Knight on Sun Mar 17, 2013 3:29 pm, edited 1 time in total.
AMD 8 Core 8150FX CPU OC'ed to 3.9Ghz / XFX AMD 7990 6GB Video / 16GB 1600mhz DDR3 RAM / 256GB Kingston SSDNOW Sold-State Drive / Windows 7 64-bit / Sony 3D monitor
NiceGuyAndersson wrote:Don't think I've ever experienced VR. Which is probably a shame, since I won't have anything to compare the Rift with
That can either be a good or a bad thing.
You may get to experience something amazing for the first time.
Yet you may be disappointed because it's not as perfect as you hoped.
DarkAkuma wrote:Assuming it doesn't, then my first experience that I can think of was atop the Stratosphere in Las Vegas (were I live) in 1999ish. I honestly have no idea what setup/system was used, or why it was even there of all places. But it was a visor type thing with a cage similar to whats shown in the picture in the OP. Being played on it seemed to be a Duke Nukem game. It was a weird night (as I said, it's Vegas) so the details I can remember are kind of fuzzy. I want to say there were 2 cages/visors setup to do a death match style battle, but I'm not certain
It would most certainly have been a 2000SU machine and probably playing Zone Hunter.
The game in that video doesn't seem familiar at all. It's defiantly way more detailed then the game I played. What I played was more of a grey, single level arena. No corridors or doors to move through. As I said, I'm pretty sure it was a Duke Nukem game. For the machine itself. That's consistent enough with what I remember to the point that it could be it. But I just don't really remember enough about the visor or controls to really say one way or another.
My first experience with VR was Dactyl Nightmare, and boy did that kill my enthusiasm for VR. It made me appreciate Doom much more and realize how important good game design is.
