Here, have a look at this:
Specifically, skip to 15:00. That's the program I use for playing the old Atari games in there. Yeah, resolution on the video isnt the best, I havent exactly mastered the art of using recording software, heh. Recording VR footage is complicated.
Anyway, that part of the footage lets you see what the room is like, and a bit of how I interact with it. Note that when a game is running there's no sound here, well, that's a recorder screwup... there's full sound for all games when I'm actually in the program. I've no bloody clue why it didnt come through into the video. Note also that this program is still in beta, it's not finished. That's why the consoles themselves and the cartridges have a "generic" model, is that a proper accurate 3D model of them simply hasnt been implemented yet. Not that I care much about that part.
Jump to 19:00 to see the program going further. All those TV screens of various sizes you see around that room? All are usable and you can have every one of them running some game or other at the same time if you want. I dont know WHY you'd do that, but I show it off just a bit here. You can also spawn in more TVs or move things around. It doesnt just run 2600 and NES games... it can run mostly anything! You just need the emulation core files, as well as the roms. Fortunately I have the roms. ALL OF THE ROMS.
Oh, and if you're wondering why the view seems to just sort of "blink" from one position to another, that's because that program uses typical teleporting for movement, and "snap turning" for, well, turning (obviously though I can just spin around IRL but I'm generally sitting down when using that program, trying to spin the whole chair is silly). Teleporting is the most common form of movement when it comes to navigating an environment in VR, as it prevents motion sickness. You can see me use smooth movement in the nature program shown at the start of the vid, and in Google Earth, shown at 10:00. I dont let new users do smooth movement though. Ya gotta get your "VR legs" first, so to speak. I've had this thing for quite awhile so at this point I can fly all over the place with no trouble. I do have room to physically walk around as well, but any given headset's cable is only so long, heh.
Also if you want to see VR at it's most visually chaotic, jump to 24:00 and watch from there. Again, full VR here, so everything you see there isnt flat, it's all flowing around you as far as you can tell. I dont put new people into programs like this, that's for sure.
And if you want to see a display of raw processing power, jump to 4:45 and then watch the next 5 minutes or so. That one, Chroma Lab, is one of the first 2 programs I always show to new people. You can probably see why. If anything is going to sell someone on the idea of what VR can do... it's that.
There's one other major thing I wasnt able to capture in video though:
View attachment 65554
I TRIED to record this but for some reason it comes up as a garbled mess in video form... no bloody idea why. I hate recording software.
Anyway, this is the real reason I bought the VR set and this PC in the first place. This program recreates an entire 80s retro arcade. See all those machines? All are fully active, all at once. I can go up to any one of them, poke it, and play it, as if it were a real cabinet. Looks real (unless you do something like phase your head into it, that kinda ruins the realism, heh) and sounds real. All other machines and anything else will still be active while you're playing one of these, it's not like the whole virtual universe freezes or something. Since this also SOUNDS like a retro arcade it is always very loud in there.
Also you can set up any games you want in any of the 30 cabinet positions... you just need the roms for the games. And again, I have all the roms. ALL OF THEM. Some utterly baffling number of the things. I use a randomizer program to choose and set up a different set of games each time I jump in.
There's more to it though! Look at the trailer here:
Save 35% on New Retro Arcade: Neon on Steam
Notice there's things like Skee-ball, air hockey, even a full bowling alley. The physics all behaves like you'd expect it to. There's lots of stuff you can pick up and throw around too, and a room for setting up consoles if you want (though I prefer that earlier program for console games). Also the video doesnt show the "neon psycho field" that the game loads you into when you start it, wish I had actual footage of it because that's the bit that makes people go "holy crap this is awesome" when first shown. And then they may or may not fall over, I make sure to stand next to someone who is trying VR for the first time.
And yes, there's light gun games in there too.
What's really amazing though is how REAL it looks. I've actually done things like trying to set the controllers down on non-existent tables, that sort of thing. Youtube is full of videos of people doing hilarious things with VR headsets on, like wildly trying to punch nonexistent zombies or outright sprinting into a doorway that in fact is actually just a wall (ouch). But to their mind, it's all real, which is why it happens. It's also why simulator sickness is an issue, but that's a different subject.
So yeah, that's the VR stuff!
As you can probably guess I'm a huge fan of retro gaming in general. Atari 2600, NES, SNES, all this arcade stuff, whatever... you name it, I'm into it, always have been. I do all of this stuff frequently. Same with all that computer stuff. Gotta have my ASCII games too, really. Which is also part of why I'm into indie games, come to think of it, as quite a few of those go the retro-ish route with their graphics and whatnot.
. In thoughts on how this subject relates to how much you have achieved life goals?
