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This is an important topic and I don't think this article is really getting into all the important things that have been learned about it over the past few year

by bentt 2y ago

This is an important topic and I don't think this article is really getting into all the important things that have been learned about it over the past few years, primarily by VR developers. Too much of the current dialogue is about how players can "get over" it. This is silly. There are demonstrable, proven things which cause motion sickness via the visual system. Unfortunately there are some irreconcilable issues with doing certain activities (ie moving/turning without player input) in VR games so it's either abandon those activities or blame the users. Considering Meta has now poured nearly $85bn into their AR/VR effort, there's a lot on the line and the last thing they're going to do is admit that the technology is fundamentally limited to certain activities. Here's an early video from Oculus when it was still a bunch of enthusiasts chasing something magic. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6DgfiDEqfaY&t=1356s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6DgfiDEqfaY&t=1356s But nowadays you have people that play VR and have "VR Legs", and then you have the rest of us who have normal human brains and normal human eyes and don't want to take it upon ourselves to relearn how the world works so we don't puke when playing an FPS. The bottom line is that the human visual system is very sensitive to acceleration, especially in the peripheral vision. Acceleration can be linear, angular, or even in odd dimensions like during an FOV shift which god forbid a game would do without telling you. The easiest thing you can do to save yourself is get a smaller display or sit further away so that your peripheral vision is spared any of the motion and your fovea is gathering the majority of it. This is why "tunnel vision" in VR works for some people.

gamedever 2y ago
I think there's a middle ground Provide options for people that get motion sickness the same way we provide accessibility options. Let those of us that get less motion sickness get the "full experience". So far I'm lucky. I've only got sick in VR twice. Once from trying Breath of the Wild via the Labo VR kit. Once trying a hacked GTA-5 VR. Both made me feels incredibly sick, far beyond what I'd have expected before experiencing it. So, I'm super sad that some people experience this more and I hope we can find ways to accommodate them. That said, I played Half-Life: Alyx back when it came out. In my mind I assumed teleporting, the default, was the way to play because I assumed stick motion (normal joypad controller based FPS motion) would be more sickening. But, for me, it turned out after a few levels, teleporting felt worse than sliding. I think because each teleport was so disorienting. Strangely, I got zero motion sickness from Jet Island. One of my top 5 VR experiences of all time and at a glance would also seem to be the most likely game to make people sick. Why it doesn't I'm not sure other than the obvious (fast framerate) https://store.steampowered.com/app/587220/Jet_Island/ https://store.steampowered.com/app/587220/Jet_Island/ To add, I got a 38inch wide monitor. Playing any first person came on that screen full screen makes me sick. I have to play all PC games in a window now. I think if I switched back to a 27inch monitor I wouldn't have that issue.
- bentt 2y ago
  The reason that Jet Island doesn't make you sick is mostly that it does a lot of work to tie the movement to your physical actions. Games like Gorilla Tag have done well here also. The major insult to our vestibular system via visual input is when visuals change without any corresponding physical action... the classic example is vection when a train moves and your car stays still. You have no other physical inputs so the brain says "hol up". Ironically, we don't puke every time we accelerate a car, and that's because we get to feel the pressure of the seat against us, maybe the decision to push the accelerator pedal, etc. It doesn't hurt that Jet Island puts your hands right in front of you so you have a frame of reference. Frame of reference is another cue to helping with VR sickness. Cockpits are our friend. But yeah, it sounds like you've pushed your personal boundaries pretty far. To be clear, I have no problem with enthusiasts testing themselves. The issue is when giant companies like Meta try to mainstream things and they flip the responsibility onto players. I don't appreciate that.
me4502 2y ago
Hi, I'm the author of the article, thanks for your comment. I definitely agree I didn't mention as much around VR as I would've liked, mostly as it's an area that I've paid a lot less attention to in recent years. I was an early adopter of it (as a developer), but mostly dropped off when the industry moved away from teleport-style locomotion. I'm honestly really glad that research is actually going into this in the VR/AR space. The article was primarily focused on non-VR games and the various accessibility settings that can greatly diminish the problem, but are often an afterthought even in games that are praised for pushing accessibility. Eg, the recent Indiana Jones game inspired me to write this article, as it's being heavily praised for pushing accessibility standards in many ways, but lacks accessibility options to disable the head bobbing and weapon sway when moving. Something I've become fairly aware of are all the little "quirks" in the ways I like to play games that I've developed over the years, that I hadn't realised were actually to reduce motion sickness. I do definitely plan on going back and updating the article to include some of my learnings since writing it. Eg, I always play in windowed 1440p on a 27inch 4K monitor because it then takes up less of my total vision, which I guess is a workaround when having a display that's too large for the sitting distance.
theshackleford 2y ago
I get zero motion sickness from VR, it’s just never been an issue. And I really abuse the limits of locomotion with my highest playtime being doom wads/duke3d. Oddly, what will induce nausea is <120 FPS on sample and hold displays. From the day someone put an LCD in front of me, they’ve done the same thing. The blur as my viewpoint shifts, it’s immediately like I’ve been placed on a boat in rough waters.

by bentt 2y ago

gamedever 2y ago

I think there's a middle ground Provide options for people that get motion sickness the same way we provide accessibility options. Let those of us that get less motion sickness get the "full experience". So far I'm lucky. I've only got sick in VR twice. Once from trying Breath of the Wild via the Labo VR kit. Once trying a hacked GTA-5 VR. Both made me feels incredibly sick, far beyond what I'd have expected before experiencing it. So, I'm super sad that some people experience this more and I hope we can find ways to accommodate them. That said, I played Half-Life: Alyx back when it came out. In my mind I assumed teleporting, the default, was the way to play because I assumed stick motion (normal joypad controller based FPS motion) would be more sickening. But, for me, it turned out after a few levels, teleporting felt worse than sliding. I think because each teleport was so disorienting. Strangely, I got zero motion sickness from Jet Island. One of my top 5 VR experiences of all time and at a glance would also seem to be the most likely game to make people sick. Why it doesn't I'm not sure other than the obvious (fast framerate) https://store.steampowered.com/app/587220/Jet_Island/ https://store.steampowered.com/app/587220/Jet_Island/ To add, I got a 38inch wide monitor. Playing any first person came on that screen full screen makes me sick. I have to play all PC games in a window now. I think if I switched back to a 27inch monitor I wouldn't have that issue.

bentt 2y ago
The reason that Jet Island doesn't make you sick is mostly that it does a lot of work to tie the movement to your physical actions. Games like Gorilla Tag have done well here also. The major insult to our vestibular system via visual input is when visuals change without any corresponding physical action... the classic example is vection when a train moves and your car stays still. You have no other physical inputs so the brain says "hol up". Ironically, we don't puke every time we accelerate a car, and that's because we get to feel the pressure of the seat against us, maybe the decision to push the accelerator pedal, etc. It doesn't hurt that Jet Island puts your hands right in front of you so you have a frame of reference. Frame of reference is another cue to helping with VR sickness. Cockpits are our friend. But yeah, it sounds like you've pushed your personal boundaries pretty far. To be clear, I have no problem with enthusiasts testing themselves. The issue is when giant companies like Meta try to mainstream things and they flip the responsibility onto players. I don't appreciate that.

me4502 2y ago

Hi, I'm the author of the article, thanks for your comment. I definitely agree I didn't mention as much around VR as I would've liked, mostly as it's an area that I've paid a lot less attention to in recent years. I was an early adopter of it (as a developer), but mostly dropped off when the industry moved away from teleport-style locomotion. I'm honestly really glad that research is actually going into this in the VR/AR space. The article was primarily focused on non-VR games and the various accessibility settings that can greatly diminish the problem, but are often an afterthought even in games that are praised for pushing accessibility. Eg, the recent Indiana Jones game inspired me to write this article, as it's being heavily praised for pushing accessibility standards in many ways, but lacks accessibility options to disable the head bobbing and weapon sway when moving. Something I've become fairly aware of are all the little "quirks" in the ways I like to play games that I've developed over the years, that I hadn't realised were actually to reduce motion sickness. I do definitely plan on going back and updating the article to include some of my learnings since writing it. Eg, I always play in windowed 1440p on a 27inch 4K monitor because it then takes up less of my total vision, which I guess is a workaround when having a display that's too large for the sitting distance.

theshackleford 2y ago

I get zero motion sickness from VR, it’s just never been an issue. And I really abuse the limits of locomotion with my highest playtime being doom wads/duke3d. Oddly, what will induce nausea is <120 FPS on sample and hold displays. From the day someone put an LCD in front of me, they’ve done the same thing. The blur as my viewpoint shifts, it’s immediately like I’ve been placed on a boat in rough waters.