Exploring virtual reality on PlayStation 4 with Shuhei Yoshida and Richard Marks (video)

It was 2010 when Sony engineers first explored virtual reality concepts. The idea of a VR headset sprang from another project at the company: PlayStation Move, a wand-like motion controller for the PlayStation 3. Company engineers attached the controller to head-mounted displays, enabling a form of homemade VR via motion and depth tracking. Sony Computer Entertainment Worldwide Studios head Shuhei Yoshida was asked to try these early prototypes, one which put the player into the role of Kratos in God of War 3 and the other a mod of Half-Life 2 where you could lift up and look at your own gun. "That was a totally compelling experience, so I became a believer," Yoshida told us in an interview this week, post-Project Morpheus announcement. "It was a 'wow' moment!"

Project Morpheus (GDC 2014)

View the Original article

Punching virtual sharks for points with the Oculus Rift and Leap Motion

"This could be a science lesson on the innards of sharks."

Chance Ivey, game design lead for Chaotic Moon's whimsical Oculus Rift demo SharkPunch, was only half-joking when he made that comment to me as I exploded a megalodon with my fist in virtual space. That's because the minigame, which incorporates a visor-mounted Leap Motion controller to let users punch sharks in 3D, actually has firm roots in an educational simulator the Austin, Texas-based company's been developing for prospective clients. Yes, that connection may be hard to swallow at first -- after all, how does a frenzied, and fun, game of shark carnage assist players with learning? The simple answer is that it doesn't, but by no means does that lessen SharkPunch's educational origins in the slightest.

Chaotic Moon's proper Oculus Rift education demo begins by placing a user within a virtual classroom. At the front of this room is an interactive periodic table that the "student," acting on instructions from a nearby teacher, uses to pull elements together and create a molecule of H2O, also known as water. Once that goal's been achieved, the molecules begin to multiply in a chain filling the room and, eventually, transforming into water; water which then floods the classroom. It's at this point the student finds him/herself immersed in an undersea environment populated by swimming fish. Chance told us that it was this tempting virtual environment that prompted a multitude of users to wonder aloud, "Can I punch those fish?" If you've ever submerged yourself in the Oculus Rift's VR world, you'd understand the impulse.

"This could be a science lesson on the innards of sharks."

The undersea world of SharkPunch isn't as pretty as it could be -- which is to say, it's not searing your retinas with HD eye candy. But that's no fault on Chaotic Moon's part. It's because the small team of three had to make do with Dev Kit 1 of the Oculus Rift and not the more refined HD or Crystal Cove iterations. It's a small wrinkle that's easily overlooked considering two points: SharkPunch isn't headed for commercial release and its core shark-punching game mechanic is pure, addictive bliss.

That said, there is a slight learning curve for the game's gesture-based controls. Since the Leap Motion controller's mounted to the front of the Oculus Rift, users have to hold their fists in a fighting stance higher up than feels natural so their motions can be accurately tracked. Also, it's worth nothing that the entire rig is tethered to a system of ropes hanging from overhead, as most users will inevitably wander about the room swinging at the increasing parade of attacking sharks. The game, however, is unforgiving. One missed shot at a shark and you're dead. Which makes the company's current in-house high score of 26 (one point per dead shark) something to envy.

Its core shark-punching game mechanic is pure, addictive bliss.

SharkPunch may be nothing more than an endearing calling card for Chaotic Moon's charming brand of tech innovation, but that's not stopping the company from trotting it around as a party game. So if you happen to be down in Austin this week for SXSW and have the right RSVPs, there's a chance your virtual fist could connect with a megalodon belly.

0 Comments Share

Tags: ChaoticMoon, ChaoticMoonStudios, hands-on, hdpostcross, leap motion, LeapMotion, oculus rift, OculusRi, oculusrift, SharkPunch, SXSW, SXSW2014, video Next: The Engadget Podcast is live at 12PM ET!
View the Original article

Yahoo Acquires Virtual World Gaming Startup Cloud Party, Will Shut It Down

Yahoo is doing more than just throwing shade at Google on Twitter today and then taking it back – the company has acquired Cloud Party, a browser-based game creation engine. In a blog post today, the Cloud Party team shared that they will be joining Yahoo after two years of operation, and that the service will shut down on February 21, 2014.

Cloud Party is the work of a founding team of MMO and console game industry vets, including Sam Thompson (formerly of Cryptic and Pandemic), Jimb Esser (also ex-Cryptic), Conor Dickinson (ex-Facebook, Tomb Raider dev and Cryptic alum) and Jered Windsheimer (Cryptic, natch). They built Cloud Party as a sort of free-form virtual world experience, similar to Second Life, but with an updated view of what an online virtual world might look like with more emphasis on user-generated 3D content.

It’s not exactly clear what the team will be working on at Yahoo, but it will definitely be games related, as Thompson notes in his farewell blog post that the Cloud Party squad is “excited to bring

View the Original article

Valve: The future of Virtual Reality is just one year away

The most exciting aspect of contemporary virtual reality is its implications. Even using Oculus VR's early duct taped-prototype, most users immediately "get it." You're transported to, say, Tuscany, or an underwater exploration vehicle, or a space fighter, and that experience is enough to trigger a flood of ideas for other potential interactions -- interactions that are dramatically heightened by employing a VR headset. How about deep-sea exploration in 4K? Or maybe Mars? And we're not talking just video games, but experiences. Valve VR lead Michael Abrash detailed that notion in a recent talk:

"Not only could VR rapidly evolve into a major platform, but it could actually tip the balance of the entire industry from traditional media toward computer entertainment."

Abrash believes that VR headsets so vastly outperform other interaction methods (TV, theaters, etc.) that how folks absorb media in general may be impacted by the coming wave of head-mounted displays. His concept of our potential future may be distant-sounding, but the beginning of consumer-grade, extremely polished VR headsets isn't far off: 2015. At least that's what Abrash and Valve are targeting as primetime for VR, and they're laying the groundwork right now.

View the Original article

Valve Expects Virtual Reality To Be Awesome Within 2 Years

Virtual Reality is coming. As in, actual, good, user-friendly virtual reality. The stuff sci-fi has promised us for decades.

Don’t take my word for it. Valve — easily one of the most revered and admired companies in gaming — has gone deep on virtual reality R&D, and they believe that amazing, consumer-friendly virtual reality is but a couple of years away.

If you’re looking for an excellent weekend read, check out this slide-by-slide transcript of a Steam Developer Day talk given by Valve’s own Michael Abrash. Abrash, an industry vet with code in everything from Windows to Quake, now works for Valve (after Valve’s Gabe Newell spent years convincing him to join) on their Virtual Reality research team.

No time to read the whole thing? You should still find time — it’s really a great read into the mindset of people who are aiming to change the face of gaming. But if you can’t, Here are but a few of the most interesting bits gleaned from the presentation:

Abrash estimates that “compelling, consumer-priced” Virtual Reality headsets will be on the market within 2 years. (The Oculus Rift is well on its way, but it’s still very much a developer-centric product. Oculus isn’t rushing to get these things to market, and that’s for the better.)The biggest challenges to solve, according to Abrash: display resolution is too low (“1080p works,

View the Original article

5 ways to build company culture with a virtual team

PreviousNextCommentsShareTweet

John Stelmach is the President and CFO of Contentverse, a virtual document management system used by parts of the US Government and small to large businesses all over the world.

For every desk-bound cubicle-dweller, the dream is to work from home. No physical demands. No need to look over your shoulder. No need for pants. The glorious green grass of the work-from-home employee is a goal for many successful people (and not-so-successful people) and a great way to hire the best talent without having to pay to relocate them.

The truth, for those of you demanding your boss lets you do it, is that it’s one of the more intensely hard-to-manage business processes. You go to work in an office because you at times do need to be near people. Or you won’t feel quite as part of the team if you’re not there.

Contrary to that belief, you can successfully run a well-cultured company with many parts located across a state, a country or even the world. It’s just challenging and requires even more discipline than might be necessary for a normal employee.

While companies like Google instill a company culture through a giant, all-encompassing campus, that’s not so practical when you need to hire a designer in the Czech Republic and a social media expert in Chicago. They may be

View the Original article

Reason #152 Virtual Reality Is Awesome: Personal Movie Theaters Without The Awful Other People

I love going to the movie theater. Seriously, I love it.

I just hate all the other people that go.

Quite early on, my parents taught me that there was but one rule for going to the theater: silence is golden. If the theater was a moviegoer’s church, talking or otherwise ruining the experience for others was sin. If I talked, we’d leave. Simple as that.

Sometime in the past few years, though, it’s like people have forgotten how to do the movie theater.

I’ve tried going at different times. I’ve tried going to different theaters. No matter what I do, no matter where I go, the shitty moviegoers follow. They talk. They crack jokes that only their friends laugh at. They muck with their phones, blinding everyone in the rows behind them so they can blast out a Facebook update about being at the movies that literally no one will care about.

I went to 10 movies this year; 9 out of 10 had at least one person who happily paid their $12 just to go in and crap on the movie for everyone else. I’ve given up.

But this

View the Original article

Fedora 20 Heisenbug arrives with ARM support and smarter virtual machines

Red Hat wants to be ready for a world of ARM-powered PCs, and it just took a big step toward that goal by releasing Fedora 20 Heisenbug. The Linux distribution now supports ARM as a main platform; users and developers no longer have to use Intel-based chips if they want Red Hat's full blessing. The OS also brings much-improved virtualization through both a new visual interface and "first-class" virtual machine images. There are updates to desktop environments like GNOME and KDE, too. Whether you're setting up an ARM server or just appreciate Red Hat's nod to Breaking Bad, you'll find full details of the Heisenbug upgrade at the source links.

0 Comments Share

Source: Fedora Project (1), (2)

Tags: arm, enterprise, fedora, fedora20, heisenbug, linux, opensource, OperatingSystem, redhat, server, software Next: Google's 2013 Zeitgeist includes Mandela, iPhones and a 3D trend map (video) .fyre .fyre-comment-divider

View the Original article

Time Machines: NASA goes virtual at CES

BYJon Turi23 hours ago 0

Welcome to Time Machines, where we offer up a selection of mechanical oddities, milestone gadgets and unique inventions to test out your tech-history skills. In the week's leading up to the biggest gadget show on Earth, we'll be offering a special look at relics from CES' past.

View the Original article

How Oculus Plans To Be Riding High When The Virtual Reality Wave Breaks

Advertisement

A company that was conceived less than a year ago today announced its Series B round of funding late last night, with a massive raise of $75 million to add to its existing $16 million Series A and $2.4 million in Kickstarter crowdfunding dollars. That company is Oculus Rift: A virtual reality headset dreamt up by Gaikai veteran Brendan Iribe and a team of other startup vets. With nearly $100 million invested, expectations are huge, but the company is ready to meet those expectations, Iribe tells TechCrunch, and exceed them with a vision of the future that blurs the line between the virtual and the real.

Why So Much Money, So Fast

The Rift has already managed to sell over 42,000 units prior to its consumer launch, via development kits that are admittedly rough around the edges, according to Iribe. That’s impressive enough, but it’s not what’s selling investors like Marc Andreessen and game industry legends like John Carmack on the Rift – that’s the experience provided by the next-generation prototype, which is functionally the same as what we’ll see from the first consumer device, Iribe says, but which has been used by only a few hundred people at most as of right now.

Once the new prototype was perfected, Iribe got in touch with Marc Andreessen and Chris Dixon, to say that they’d achieved what they’d set out to do and asked how soon they could come in to see it. The combination of the prototype demonstration, and former id founder and Doom creator John Carmack explaining his vision of where he sees the entire Oculus project headed “pretty much convinced them on the spot,” Iribe tells me. Dixon and Andreessen join the fairly limited group of outside VCs with ownership stake in Oculus VR, and Iribe says that the partners and funding were chosen specifically with the intent that they should help them get to through the initial V1 consumer launch without having to go find more money elsewhere.

“The point of the first raise was to build out the technology,” Iribe says, explaining what the money has been spent on so far. “We actually thought it would take us a bit longer to get to the point of where we’re at now.”

But it didn’t take that long. The new Oculus Rift prototype should be virtually identical in terms of experience to the version that ships to consumers.

Achievement Unlocked: Consumer-Caliber Experience

“We got to the point where the latest prototype of this technology really is beyond even what we expected for V1,” Iribe told me. “We kind of put the hammer down and said ‘Okay, this is it, this is definitely enough to totally blow away the world and deliver our consumer, V1 product.’ We’re looking back even now on the dev kit and going ‘oh gosh, this new one is so much better.’ It is literally an entirely different experience.’”

View the Original article