“The Oculus Rift has come a long way from a Kickstarter concept piece to billion dollar acquisition by Facebook.”

Oculus VR are not breaking new ground for the integration of VR technology and innovative motion controls into video games.  It has been attempt before in various different guises, from Nintendo’s Power Glove to Victormaxx’s ridiculously expensive Cybermaxx headset. Peripherals for video games have never really improved on the overall gaming experience, at least not enough to make gamers shell out cash on the high priced products. The Oculus Rift is really a refinement of the technology laid down by Jaron Lanier, Thomas G. Zimmerman and others alike. The wide field of view, HD display and head tracking the key selling points of the new device and may well be the final piece of the puzzle that was missing previously. The other issue that held back many devices prior to the current day equivalents was a simple matter of size. One of the first virtual reality head mounted displays was so heavy and cumbersome it had to be suspended from the ceiling, users nicknaming the device the “The Sword of Damocles”. Even Nintendo’s Virtual Boy seems bulky and unwieldy by today’s standards. There is no doubting that Oculus VR have put their work in trying to make their device slip seamlessly into the gaming experience and make the interactivity as intuitive as possible.

“Virtual Reality has come and gone in the past can the current trend maintain prolonged interest and more importantly sell in sustainable numbers.”

However it is not as if the company has a monopoly on the VR market as both Sony and Valve are looking to enter the arena with their own interpretations. At this year’s Games Developers Conference in San Francisco Sony came out swinging with their own version of a VR headset dubbed Project Morpheus. The Japanese tech giants have been working on VR prototype headsets for a number of years, integrating their own Move controllers into the system. Sony has the slight advantage of having a long history in the tech industry and all the experience that comes with it. However the Oculus team can boost about the veteran developers that have joined the company, with id Software founder John Carmack the chief technology officer at Oculus VR. Even Valve’s own VR specialist Michael Abrash has switched sides and joined the Oculus Rift team. It would seem that at any rate gamers will be spoilt for choice when these devices make it market, when that will be is still up in the air. Some hints point towards a late 2014 early 2015 launch for the Oculus Rift, but another important question arises in response to that is the devices proposed price point. Again no official pricing structure has been announced only guesstimates can be made at this time, the most recent Dev kit version of the device going for $350 (€254). $250(€180) to $300(€220) the price range been floated around by some market analysts. Oculus VR founder Palmer Luckey has stated that he may adopt a similar model used by the console manufactures, dropping the price and making up the money on licencing deals with game publishers. This is integral to the success of any of the current VR headsets in development, the support of the video game developers to integrate the technology into their games. At the end of the day if there isn’t an extensive catalogue of titles that will support VR then the Rift, Morpheus, Gameface or any of the other VR headsets will ultimately fail.

“The Oculus Team have had VR market all to themselves the last two years but now competition is heating up with others jumping on the VR bandwagon.”

The decision by “Notch” to pull his official support for Oculus Rift integration with Minecraft doesn’t help with publicity for the VR company. Not that ‘Minecrafters’ desperate to see their blocky creations up close and personal are out of luck, as there are mods that support Oculus Rift input. However an official release of a VR compatible version of Minecraft could have been a big boon for the Oculus Rift over it soon to be competitors. The Rift is definitely carving itself out as a PC peripheral as opposed to Sony’s VR which obviously will be supported by their PlayStation console. Sony already demonstrating their eye tracking technology working with the current PS4 release Infamous: Second Son. So just like the console wars that take place between Sony and Microsoft it is the exclusive titles that can often sway customers moreover than hardware specs. There is even now a host of tech companies that want to take VR even further, not happy with just tracking movement of the player’s vision they want get them on the move. Companies like Virtuix with their Omni motion tracking device want to have Oculus Rift users get of their seats and start moving. The demonstration of Valves new VR headset at Steam Dev Days also incorporated spatial awareness and the capturing of full body movement. This entire aside the current generation of VR is still in its infancy with projects still in development and release dates still TBA. It would seem that there is enough momentum behind the VR push this time that it is unlikely to be a flash in the pan. Whether or not it will be a revolution in video game interaction is still out to tender. A quick review of interactive peripherals of video games past doesn’t paint a great picture. Even the evolution of the video game controller has been fairly stagnant for the last decade, although Valve might have something to say about that. The coming years and eventual product launches will offer a clearer idea for the future of Virtual Reality.

By Colm O’Sullivan

The post The State of the Industry: Virtual Reality The Future or Fad? appeared first on Game Design Ireland.

“The player takes on the role of a nameless space marine fighting through hordes of the damned set on invaded the realm of man.”

The development for the game began in 1992 after the release of Spear of Destiny the sequel to Wolfenstein 3D. As with the companies previous titles it was the engine that powered the game, which would be as crucial as the game itself. Prior to the start of development Carmack had carried out some research and experimentation for the companies next engine. The result was the ShadowCaster engine that featured improved graphical elements but was too slow for their action orientated games. It was not used by id but was licenced to Raven Software and used in their game titled ShadowCaster. The experimentation would lead Carmack to build out the far superior Doom engine also known as id Tech 1. Differing level heights , full texture mapping, varying light levels and non-perpendicular walls all helped set Doom a field apart from their previous effort Wolfenstein 3D. The level designer could now implement atmospheric conditions and visual aesthetics to improve on what was in some ways a static experience in their previous 3D titles. Wolfenstein 3D was the base on which id built the far more technically and graphically advanced Doom. During the development process a level of conflict arose between the creative director of the game Tim Hall and the rest of the team. Hall was unhappy about the level of violence featured in the game and wished for the company to return to the Commander Keen series of games. Initially opposed to the games themes, Hall conceded and set out to write up a comprehensive design document known as the ‘Doom Bible’. Hall set out in it a highly detail backstory and narrative for the game, however when presented to the rest of the team it was rejected. Carmack feeling that such a detailed plot was unnecessary for what was a fast paced action type of game.  Hall left the company just months before the games release; he would later use material from the ‘Doom Bible’ in his own games such as Rise of the Triad and Terminal Velocity.

“The level of violence in Doom not only lead to the resignation of tier creative director, but also caused some in the medium to question its influence on violent behaviour.”

Hype for the game had been steadily building prior to its release, with even an unauthorized alpha build of the game find its way onto the web. Just as with its previous titles Doom was distributed through the shareware model, with the first part of the game released online on December 10 1993. Although most users just played the free version, over a million copies of the full game were sold. The popularity of Doom was in no question with the game becoming wide spread within a matter of months. It addictiveness with gamers causing some companies to set policies banning the game from the workplace. One company in particular whose employees were utterly obsessed with the game was Microsoft. So much so Microsoft’s owner Bill Gates had contemplated buying id Software, ultimately Microsoft went on to develop a Windows 95 port of the game to help sell their operating system. Bill Gates appearing in a Windows 95 showcase presentation, superimposed into the one of the games levels as part of promotional video. It marked a point at which games were moving beyond their own sphere of influence. Companies and individual not directly linked with the video game industry could now see the growing popularity in the medium. Doom helped video games breach the divide between their own industry and the wider world.

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“Although not the company first game it was the title that brought them to the attention of the wider industry and media alike.”

The history of Wolfenstein 3D is intrinsically linked with the fortunes of the games creators’ id Software. The company was founded by four employees of Softdisk, a publisher and developer of disk based games sold with computer magazines. John Romero, Adrian Carmack, Tom Hall and John Carmack all came together to form id Software in February of 1991. The four had developed and released their first title Commander Keen the previous year and instead of pitching it to their bosses, had used a third party publisher. Scott Miller of Apogee Software had been impressed by the teams work and offered to publish their games through his shareware model. A method were a small part of the game was released for free with the rest of the game sold by mail order. Due to the success of Commander Keen Softdisk soon realised the potential in their four employees and offered to form a new venture with them. The four declined and went their own way with id Software, publishing their future games on the shareware model with Apogee Software. The Commander Keen series would help the company establish it’s self in the early days and gain some level of recognition within the industry. A key part of the company’s business strategy has been the licensing of their game engines that power their various titles. The “Id Summer Seminar” in the summer of 1991 was an event held to find prospective buyers of id Software’s Keen engine. It spiritual successor QuakeCon is the annual event were new information on id’s latest projects and new game engines are announced.

“Commander Keen originally started out as a tech demo by Carmack and Romero, aiming to emulate the side scrolling technology of Nintendo’s Super Mario on the PC.”

As part of the breakaway deal that led to the formation of id Software the company agreed to produced future titles that their former employers Softdisk would publish. Two of these games would have a direct impact on the advancement of video game technology, that paved way for the development of Wolfenstein 3D. Hovertank 3D and Catacombs 3-D both feature a first person 3D perspective that show an evolution in the technology that would eventually lead to Wolfenstein 3D. The games developed began soon after the release of Catacombs 3-D in late 1991, Apogee Software the games publisher offered $100,000 upfront to help jump start the process. The game was based on an earlier set of 80’s titles produced by Muse Software called Castle Wolfenstein. They contained a heavily stealth based gameplay which id had originally aspired to emulate. The gameplay proved to be too difficult to implement and the game evolved into an action based shooter. As with their previous Commander Keen titles, Wolfenstein 3D was released on the shareware model.

“Mecha-Hitler is often cited as one of the seminal video game bosses in the history of the video game industry.”

By the end of 1993 after a year on the market the game had broken all previous shareware sales records, selling over 100,000 copies and garnering much critical acclaim. Even though the game was a massive success within the industry, picking up numerous awards and honours it was not without its own controversy. Due to the games depiction of a SS prison set in WWII and featuring Hitler as the main antagonist the game was banned in Germany. Nintendo decided to heavily edit the game for the SNES version sold in Germany. Removing all references of the Nazi content, including a retextured Hitler renamed “Staatmeister”. Despite this minor setback the game was an outstanding success for the company and laid the tenants that all future First Person Shooters would be judged by. It gave credibility to the shareware business model and boosted the popularity of the pc market. Wolfenstein 3D is without out a doubt a landmark title in the history of the video game industry and cemented id Software’s place within it.

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