Future VR Plans?

Maybe it is to early for discussion. I started in the early days of UO as a kid playing throughout the night wishing for a virtual reality MMO. I've never had the chance to play any of the new VR stuff that is out there just yet. But I wait for the day that an MMO, just like Shroud, could be in fact be VR. Putting yourself in a tavern next to your guild mates, while drinking a nice brew!

Is this that far out of reach? Could a dev shed some light on this type of possibility? I wouldn't want to leave my trusty mouse/keyboard. But merely something like the Oculus Rift, or HTC that would be the "monitor" and put me "in-game."

 

In one of the posts from Darkstarr, he said that the VR is currently not in their implementation plan at this point. It was on the Kickstart stretch goal, but was scrapped off after that.

 

But Lord British said that SOTA will finally have VR capability in the Telethon yesterday when I asked about the VR.

 

Richard a d Chris have been pretty open about their skepticism regarding VR. Chris made a post a few months ago saying they had no plans for VR and that the person who pushed for VR during Kickstarter wasnt even with the company anymore.

I'd have to see Richard stating it during the telethon to believe it because Chris's post was very clear there were no plans for it.

 

This kind of game could benefit a great deal from VR, it will be a strategical miss if they don't use it.

 

I think VR works best for first-person games and not so much for third-person games. Furthermore, the more UI your game requires, the less suited it is for VR.

 

As a general rule. On the SotA case, it's a game that rely on immersion, and on realism (despite all the magic and fantasy) for it try to depict a rich world, with a lot of objects that players can manipulate. Going VR is just a natural step here.

 

I wish I could find Chris's rant. I looked but couldn't find it. It was in a thread someone posted when we switched to the reticle system suggesting it was a move feared towards introducing VR. Chris said he wanted to put it to rest it wouldn't be introduced.

Anyway, movement and disorientation is a serious issue with free roaming third person/first person games. A lot of VR games have gone to teleport movement systems to get around it. We're VR further along, this might not be an issue. There appears to be a lot more to creating VR games than simply taking, say, Skyrim and throwing a headset on.

 

Now that I own a Oculus CV1 (actually two of them and a DK2) I have almost zero interest in non-VR games now. For me it's like going from radio to TV or from 2D games to 3D games. Even more so because no book or movie (without an HMD) has had such a emotional impact as VR. Watch the VR movie Apollo 11 (https://www.oculus.com/experiences/rift/937027946381272/) or play the VR game Dreadhalls (http://www.dreadhalls.com/) and you will understand what I mean. It will be interesting to see a VR MMO. Facebook is investing a lot in Social VR which will require a lot of features necessary from a VR MMO.

If the SotA developers released more Unity assets or sold them on the Unity Assets store people could start making VR related content based on the SotA models.

 

I believe this is the 5th instance I recall of VR becoming the next big thing for the computer gaming industry.

I shall continue to breath normally.

 

Disappointing because I too was looking forward one day to putting on a headset, moving the camera view till I wasn't in it, and playing in VR. I understand that some parts of SotA aren't suited to VR, but other parts are. However, when it becomes financially rewarding to entertain it we may see some movement on this one.

I'm a product manager IRL and looking at SotA I see many potential marketing angles. I'm working on a series for my blog about how games like SotA can monetize their product in creative, non-traditional ways. VR was one aspect of it and in light of this I may revisit that section of my series and re-examine my take on it.

PB

 

I am all for it! However, I think VR has not even had its first baby yet. Sure there is a lot of great technology, but literally everything is still geek ware and in puberty at best. It's probably not worth making a game for VR yet in business terms nor player terms other than to tease early adopters.

 

Screw VR at its current stage! The tech is way too fresh for you to even consider some mind blowing visuals and sense of being there. Lets focus on creating and supporting the long awaited SOTA.

 

There are already several good games for VR. Let me list some that I like

• Elite Dangerous
• Chronos
• Edge of Nowhere
• Dead Secret
• Lucky's tale
• The Climb

Here are a few more that are not as highly developed but still worth checking out

• DreadHalls
• Fated
• Cyrstal Rift

Chronos is particular is a good RPG that is awesome with VR. I would not be surprised at all if it cost more to develop that SotA has so far (consider that the Witcher 3 cost 80 million USD to develop with a Polish company and SotA has less than 10 million USD so far).

I think VR is off to a good start for 2016. The year 2017 will be a lot more interesting.

 

I have something new to respond to the VR capability of SOTA.

Today, when I see Lord British was online on my friend list and he was in Central Brittany and then moved to Brittany Alley, I texted him a question.
I said : "Hi My Lord! Can you answer my question? Did you ever say that SOTA will finally be VR capable?".
As I was in single player online mode and I wanted to see Lord British in person ingame, then I relogin from single player mode to multiplayer online mode. After I switched to multiplayer online mode, I found that Lord British had already replied to my question.
And my original question was not in the chat window at that time.






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I obtained the whole conversation content with Lord British from "/stats" command.
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[11/17/2016 2:35:00 PM] Anthony Lam (To Lord British): Hi My Lord! I have a question. Did you ever say that SOTA will finally be VR capable?
[11/17/2016 2:39:23 PM] <GM> Lord British (To Anthony Lam): We have said we would look into it. We will.... eventually. Not soon.
[11/17/2016 2:39:51 PM] Anthony Lam (To Lord British): Thanks for you Reply my lord!!
[11/17/2016 2:40:20 PM] <GM> Lord British (To Anthony Lam): Pleasure! Enjoy.

 

See my reply above!

 

er... well, sorry, but LB's response in that screenshot in no way whatsoever confirms that SotA will ever be VR capable. He only said that they will look into it at some point, and that point is a long ways away.

I think it is much more likely never to happen, or if it does, not for several more years. Assuming SotA is still around in several more years.

 

He said, "We will ..... Eventually."
So this one confirms Lord British's intention, right?

 

How is this in any way confirmation of VR capability. He says they will look into it eventually. Looking into it and deciding to implement it are two completely different things.

 

The first real wave of VR has started now we wait for prices to drop and quality to improve some.
I do hope they try to avoid stuff that makes VR harder to implement later
I also expect VR to earliset happen in Episode 3