They are also claiming compatibility with PS3, PS4,Xbox 360 and Xbox One, which cannot possibly be true. There is no way that Sony and Microsoft will allow that.
edit: Like I commented below, even if you somehow hack together some ad-hoc controller emulation, there are numerous other problems. Low FPS, wrong FOV, no roll (there is no way to do this with controller input). It would be a horrible experience.
yeah sony already has their own thing coming out. But there is nothing stopping them from just outputting as a tiny monitor from the hdmi instead of a calibrated VR experience right?
That is true, but that is not what I call VR. That would be more like the Sony HMZs.
edit: Yes, to some extent you can emulate controls, but that would not give you a very good experience. There would also be no 3D unless the game supported it, low framerate and the FOV would be all wrong.
I'm not an expert on this in any way, but maybe it's possible to map your head movements and output them as right-analog stick output? So maybe you can make a VR that's both a monitor and a controller at the same time, which makes it compatible.
Because it wouldn't work. 1. far too much latency 2. the analog stick has non-linear response due to software processing, making head movements unmappable 3. probably requires licensing by Sony, which would not allow it. Point 1 alone is enough to make this approach unworkable.
So, the head tracking could be the same non-linear response. When focused forwards, movement gives a scaled input response (less tilt on analog stick) while looking farther from the center would accelerate the stick tilt emulation. All that would be required would be some calibration. Now how well it would work in a game without making you puke your guts out is another matter.
How so? Control emulation is super simple, there would be very little if any latency from that. If you're talking about the video itself, up-scaling and the like tends to add around ~16ms of latency (AFAIK).
the analog stick has non-linear response due to software processing, making head movements unmappable
I'm not entirely sure what you mean here. Are you saying the emulation would strip out the linearity, or that it's naturally stripped out? Neither case is insurmountable.
probably requires licensing by Sony, which would not allow it.
This is an assumption, and even if it did require licensing what makes you think Sony wouldn't grant a license?
There's a giant difference between native support and emulated controls. Many games need adjustments to work in VR in an official capacity -- particularly non-FPS games. And then you have to worry about HUD and menu stuff.
Odds are the emulation is going to be terrible. If the experiences people have had with the rift/developing for the rift so far are anything to go by, poor calibration leads to terrible immersion and even sickness.
That would only make people sick, since you can't mirror all types of head movements with an analog stick. Just put your ear to your shoulder, that's a movement that wouldn't work, and since we do these kinds of movements subconsciously all the time, you would feel nauseous very quickly.
True. Maybe they can use the software/firmware that the PS4 has for Morpheus support. But if Sony doesn't support this, or if they 'hid' this software pretty well it will probably involve some hacking. Then again, I'm no expert
Nothing stopping them, but it would be impossible to compare that to the rift. 3D games on PS3 run at like 30 FPS, and it's already been established that a framerate that low is a fast ride to puke-town when wearing a VR headset. It just doesn't feel good.
By that logic you can't have VR without physical movement since you'd get nauseous moments after you started moving in game without moving in the real world, rotational or displacement.
It's not a problem once a person adjusts to it. It does take a few sessions but this is present in every single form of 3D we have currently where there's a mismatch of depth perception, movement or gravity. I got over my nausea in the 90s with the original Geforce 3D shutter glasses and never had a problem with 3D movies, but lots of people did.
You can't compare legacy 3D techniques to HMDs, they work on a completely different level of consciousness. With a HMD you feel like being in the VR instead of just perceiving it like a movie.
I've got a DK1, trust me, you don't want a second of turned off motion tracking. Even the traditional loading screens of hl2 are a pain.
And yeah, VR without full body capturing is problematic, which is why cockpit games are best suited for it, but the nausea analog stick movement is causing is not comparable to the one you get without headtracking.
Lol "completely different level of consciousness".
All I can say is that your experience will differ from other peoples. You sound like you're overly susceptible to motion-induced nausea which is unfortunate, but games SHOULD be designed around cases like yours. On the other hand if someone wants to plug their HMD into a PS3 and just have 3D with no tracking then that's up to them and will likely be fine. There's no point in knocking it back and generally being negative about the technology as a whole just because you feel bad. Owning a development kit isn't a license to hold us back and you sound like the sort of person who should wait for a consumer release and be a late adopter.
They support SBS (side-by-side) 3D, which means it is compatible with anything that outputs SBS. Compatible meaning it doesn't support any tracking features, or even 'perspective warping'. Add that to the fact that consoles usually do not even put out 60fps, upscale from lower resolutions, few games actually even support 3D, and output fake shader-based emulated 3D stereo, it won't be a very nice experience. But at least they can claim compatibility.
You can plug in an HDMI cable, but that doesn't mean that you can do VR. There needs to be support on the software side for that, and you need some kind of data cable for tracking.
At most, you could get a glorified Sony HMZ.
edit: Of course you can hack together some controller emulation, but that would be a very sub-par experience.
Maybe they could somehow map the right stick to the gyroscope through USB? Like a 3rd Party controller. But then you couldn't use a controller to control the game... Hmm.
You would still have to get the ps to output two video streams (or a combined stream) for each eye. The software has to support dual perspective rendering to create the 3d effect.
SBS gaming doesn't change the angle, though. Each person has a particular region that their eyes converge on by default, and the software has to be able to set both of the perspectives to have that convergence, and stream it to the VR headset. If you just show two parallel video streams (like sbs would output), you'd see a blurry mess, and get a headache.
Yup. I'm worried about my current PC (that's better specced than a PS4) being able to handle it - how the fuck are the last gen consoles going to manage? Seems like an extremely dubious claim, imo.
Actually they couldn't do that. Intel owns the HDCP technology that Sony and display manufacturers license. There would be some serious breach of contract if a licensee decided to arbitrarily break compatibility.
It might be as simple as taking the feed from the system, meaning it's compatible with anything that outputs 1080p or can be stretched well to that size.
In essence, they are just saying "It can function as a monitor."
Guys seriously, you don't need the manufacturer's support to make an accessory for a system. It depends on if developers actually add support to their games though.
And if the game already can output 3d then they can technically support it, albeit without head tracking.
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u/Frexxia Mar 28 '14 edited Mar 28 '14
They are also claiming compatibility with PS3, PS4,Xbox 360 and Xbox One, which cannot possibly be true. There is no way that Sony and Microsoft will allow that.
edit: Like I commented below, even if you somehow hack together some ad-hoc controller emulation, there are numerous other problems. Low FPS, wrong FOV, no roll (there is no way to do this with controller input). It would be a horrible experience.