作者：Martin Pichlmair

上周我参加了在丹麦哥本哈根举办的VR Game Jam。在我的印象中，这是世界上最大的现场虚拟游戏jam。因为组织人拥有强大的产业人脉，所以演讲者的阵容也是非常厉害。本文将根据VR在jam上的表现总结出当前它所面临的挑战。

VR是一个还未得到较多探索的设计领域

因为VR系统的新颖性，所以我们并不会因为这个设计领域未得到更多探索感到惊讶。而游戏Jams便是一次很好的实验机会，然而包括我在内的许多人仍需要进一步熟悉硬件和软件，只有这样我们才能开始设计一些更加复杂的体验。如今的大多数游戏引擎都为VR装备提供了较为稳定的支持。开始是件容易的事，但是一旦开发者开始致力于真正的项目时，很多问题便会逐渐浮现出来。一个简单的例子便是，如果出现一个夜晚的场景，那么头盔显示器和计算机屏幕的亮度差便意味着我们只能在实际设备上完成校准工作。因为亮度在两种设备上是一样的，所以计算机屏幕只能呈现出漆黑的画面。

考虑身体反应去进行设计是另一个不可预见的设计挑战。VR是基于一种并不细致的方式在欺骗人类的大脑。设计师需要时刻注意他们是否比在传统电子游戏中更靠近玩家。同时，人们在对视觉刺激物的反应上也是不同的。可能某些情况让某些玩家觉得有点不舒服，但是对于其他玩家来说有可能是极度反感。现在我们对于各种玩家能够接受的内容只拥有一个大概的了解，但在实际执行过程中，我们还需要依赖许多细节。在VR Game Jam中，小组需要制作一款在电梯上玩的游戏。当你在现实世界上升时，你在虚拟世界也是如此。作为一次实验，小组同时也尝试着在现实上升的同时在虚拟世界下降。在这一实验中让人惊讶的是，在现实世界的上升与在虚拟世界的下降间存在着很大的区别，相反也是如此。该实验说明了我们并未真正理解平衡感与视觉感知的真正影响。

oculus-rift-hands-on-ces-2015-5(from gamasutra)

我们的团队创造了一个非常简单的场景—-比起游戏更像是一次实验。同样地，在提到游戏设计时，大多数已完成的项目都不具有太大的野心。Oculus所呈现的Crescent Bay的演示版本就像非交互式一样。而在我们自己的例子中，我们并未找到适合的输入设备去实现我们关于互动的最初理念。

VR需要一个控制器

我必须承认自己尝试了Razor Hydra，但却没有机会去测试Valve的HTC Vive控制器。

同样地，关于如何重新定义我们使用的鼠标存在一个突出的输入方法，它能够定义我们与VR对象间的互动。控制器需要在3D空间准确地运行着并确保最短的延迟。在一个完美的世界中，VR设置并不需要适应任何起居室。不过所有现有的位置追踪系统都需要在房间里安装摄像机。而如果控制器（耳机）需要一台摄像机才能精确地呈现出其周边的空间的话会怎样？

三星的GearVR便是一个有趣的尝试，它并不需要任何外部装备或主机。它的触控板和传感器是一种轻量级解决方法，能够满足一些最低要求。在过去5年间，iPhone的性能提升了超过20倍，所以在不远的将来这一问题也一定会得到解决。不管是GearVR或谷歌Cardboard，将你的手机变成一台专门的VR设备是将我引向VR可能面临的下一个挑战的前景。

VR是一种反社交技术

当家庭计算机最初变得流行时，它们还不是社交型设备。我们是通过将其聚集在一起并分享游戏体验而赋予了它们社交性。而不具有这种体验的VR在现实世界中将失去分享性。只有在虚拟世界中我们才能聚集在一起游戏。从手机如何用于虚拟环境以及在线社交（游戏邦注：分享耳麦，在对战模式下一期游戏等等）中我们可以看出，如果一项技术拒绝了这一能力，它便会面临接纳度的挑战。对于一项技术的网络效应来说，在同一个空间为人们创造透明的第一人称体验是非常重要的。

maxresdefault(from gamasutra)

索尼的Jed Ashforth提到，他们公司清楚这一挑战并积极致力于寻找能够缓解这一问题的方法。其中一种解决方法便是在屏幕上以玩家的视角呈现游戏场景。我发现如果屏幕能够从多个视角（不只是玩家视角）去呈现场景会更有趣，这能够创造有趣的异步多人游戏玩法。我敢保证很快便会有人想出这种情况的完美游戏设计理念。之所以会有那么多2D独立游戏是取决于经济原因。大多数小型工作室都支付不起创造3维世界的费用。即使3D图像是可行的，玩家也会将独立游戏与AAA级游戏进行比较，除非独立开发者追求的是一种独特的艺术风格。我个人便非常好奇独立开发者会如何解决这一问题。他们会选择怎样的类型？也许他们会创造虚拟的桌面游戏。

虚拟桌面游戏可能会非常大

虚拟桌面游戏（比起体验第一人称世界，你将面对第三人称视图）将是一种全新的2D游戏。从技术上来看，我可以在模拟的电影屏幕距离中从一个虚拟的投影屏幕上看到一款2D游戏，这能够很好地运行着。然而，在Crescent Bay演示版本中的虚拟桌面《模拟城市》般的场景却在我心中留下了深刻的印象。这些小小的3维世界的居民比之前场景中的T-Rex还逼真。比起我在贫瘠的星球上遇到的外星人以及使用魔法棍相互对抗的机器人，我更能感受到他们的真实性。这一场景向我证实了VR所具有的强大影响力以及我们将面对的巨大的设计挑战。不管怎样让我们想办法去克服它吧！

（本文为游戏邦/gamerboom.com编译，拒绝任何不保留版权的转发，如需转载请联系：游戏邦）

Design Challenges for Virtual Reality Games

by Martin Pichlmair

Over the last weekend I took part in the VR Game Jam in Copenhagen, Denmark. To the best of my knowledge this is the biggest on-site VR game jam in the world. Given the excellent industry connections of the organisers, the lineup of speakers was excellent. This article is a quick summary of current challenges in VR based on how they manifested during the jam and the presentations leading up to the jam.

VR is a Little Explored Design Space

Given the novelty of working VR systems, it is no surprise that the design space is still very much unexplored. Game Jams are an excellent opportunity to experiment, yet a lot of people – including me – need to become much more familiar with the hardware and the software, before they can start to design more than simplistic experiences. Most game engines offer more or less stable support for VR equipment by now. It is easy to get started but a number of issues manifests once developers start to work on actual projects. A simple example is that if a scene plays during the night, the difference in brightness between the head-mounted display and a computer screen means that calibration can only be done on the actual device. Since lighting is the same in both views, the computer screen only shows a pitch-black image.

Designing with consideration of bodily reactions is another design challenge the is unexpected. VR is tricking the brain and it does so in a very unsubtle way. Designers have to be constantly alert that they are much closer to the player than in a traditionally presented video game. At the same time, people are different in how they react to visual stimuli. What makes one person slightly uncomfortable might be completely nauseating for the next. There is a rough understanding on what is acceptable to a wide variety of players, but in the actual implementation a lot depends on details. On group at the VR Game Jam made a game to be played in the elevator. When you went up in the physical world you also went up in the virtual one. As an experiment, the group also tried out going down virtually when you went up in reality. What was surprising about this experiment was that there was a significant difference between going up in the real world and down in the virtual and the other way round. The experiment highlighted how much we do not understand about the influence of the sense of balance and visual perception.

Our own team created a very simplistic scene – more an experience than a game. Similarly, most of the realised projects were limited in their ambition when it came to game design. The Crescent Bay demo presented by Oculus was as good as non-interactive. In our case, we did not find a suitable input device to realise our initial idea for interaction. I wonder if it was the same with Oculus.

VR Needs a Controller

I have to admit that I’ve tried the Razor Hydra but never had the opportunity to test Valve’s HTC Vive controller. It might as well be that this problem is already solved and if you have this opinion, please skip this paragraph.

Similarly to how the mouses redefined how we work with computers, there will be a dominant input method that is going to define how we interact with VR objects. The requirements are given. The controller has to work accurately in 3D space and feature minimal latency. In a perfect world, the VR setup would not require any adaptations of the living room. Sadly, all existing accurate systems for position-tracking require cameras in the room. Now what if the controller – and the headset – featured a camera and could accurately create a representation of the space around it?

Samsung’s GearVR is an interesting proposition in that requires no external peripherals or host computers. It’s touchpad and motion sensors are a lightweight solution that fulfils minimal requirements excellently. With the iPhone increasing more than 20x in its performance over the last 5 years (see e.g. Geekbench), this is a problem that will be solved in the near future. Whether GearVR or Google Cardboard, turning your personal mobile phone into an ad-hoc VR device is a prospect that leads me to the next challenge VR is facing.

VR is Antisocial Technology

When home computers first became popular they were in itself not very social devices. We made them social by gathering around them and sharing the experience of playing. VR is prohibitive in that the experience is not sharable in the real world. Only in the virtual world we might gather and play together. Seeing how mobile phones are used for virtual as well as on-site socialising (sharing a headset, playing games in hot-seat mode) it is clear that a technology that denies this ability will face challenges when it comes to adoption. Making the first person experience transparent to people in the same room will be crucial for network effects of the technology.

Jed Ashforth from Sony mentioned that his company is aware of this challenge and is actively working on techniques to mitigate this issue. One solution is that screen shows the game scene from the viewpoint of the player. I would find it even more interesting if the screen showed the viewpoint from a different angle than they player’s, allowing for interesting asynchronous multiplayer gameplay. I’m sure in time people will come up with excellent game design ideas for this situation. Apropos excellent design ideas: developing for VR is expensive. The reason why so many indie games are 2D is economic. Most small studios can not afford to create three-dimensional worlds. Even if 3D graphics is achievable, players would unfavourably compare indie games to AAA games, unless indie developers go for a unique art style. I’m personally curious how indies will solve this problem. What genres will they adopt? Maybe they will build virtual tabletop games.

Virtual Tabletop Will be Huge

Virtual tabletop games – where you assume a third person view instead of experiencing the world from first person – will be the new 2D game. Well, technically I can also see 2D games projected on a virtual projection screen at simulated cinema-screen distance, to work quite well. Still, the virtual tabletop Sim City-like scene in the Crescent Bay demo left me with the strongest impression. Those tiny citizens of a three-dimensional world that was about table-sized were more alive than the T-Rex in the scene before. I could feel more empathy for them than for the alien I encountered on a barren planet and the robots that were fighting each other with magic batons. This one scene demonstrated to me how much impact VR can have – and how huge the design challenge is. Let’s work on it.(source:gamasutra)