New concepts in games

[Dekker]

I have to ask this, because I think it comes from two valid directions...why do you need a boat?

If you are generating the imagery anyway, it can be presented in your living room. More people are in their living room than are buying boat rides at Pearl.

From a programming standpoint I think accounting for the imprecision that is inherent in driving around in a boat is a pain in the butt, and in fact the imagery has to adapt depending on where you sit in the boat.

So if you just do the imagery full cloth and feed it through a standard computer or even play station VR rig you get to educate/entertain a lot more people.

That said, man, sign me up. MY gf is in about round six of convincing herself that she wants to turn the living room into a VR stadium (meaning a few more rounds and one day she will up and say "I want this and I want it like yesterday, make it happen"), and I'd be totally into taking VR tours of all kinds of places.

I think obviously yes epic VR set up for the living room would be great for exploring any such time period event setting imaginary world etc. And I can't wait until the tech catches up to the hype, but in regards to the AR experience, I think there will always be something about being in an actual Place, that no be will be able to replicate. Being somewhere real, feels more, significant, and the AR overlay would simply be to add a bit more flavor. So.while VR can take you onto the shores of Normandy and up close shooting Nazis, walking through a real place with some background visuals would be neat in itself.

 

[Birdjaguar]

I think obviously yes epic VR set up for the living room would be great for exploring any such time period event setting imaginary world etc. And I can't wait until the tech catches up to the hype, but in regards to the AR experience, I think there will always be something about being in an actual Place, that no be will be able to replicate. Being somewhere real, feels more, significant, and the AR overlay would simply be to add a bit more flavor. So.while VR can take you onto the shores of Normandy and up close shooting Nazis, walking through a real place with some background visuals would be neat in itself.

It seems that your talking more about augmented reality, where your current setting is added to by the device. You stand on Omaha Beach and it puts n the appropriate German pill boxes and the US fleet.

 

[Timsup2nothin]

I think obviously yes epic VR set up for the living room would be great for exploring any such time period event setting imaginary world etc. And I can't wait until the tech catches up to the hype, but in regards to the AR experience, I think there will always be something about being in an actual Place, that no be will be able to replicate. Being somewhere real, feels more, significant, and the AR overlay would simply be to add a bit more flavor. So.while VR can take you onto the shores of Normandy and up close shooting Nazis, walking through a real place with some background visuals would be neat in itself.

I might have to adapt to that a bit. I kinda put that "something about being in the actual place" in conflict with being insulated by the technology. If I go someplace I want to get it full blast and unfiltered, but maybe that's just me. I'm perhaps twisted, when I first read the idea from @hobbsyoyo I couldn't help myself. I immediately pictured a boat full of people with VR visors on and two deckhands sitting on the pier rocking the boat with their feet and laughing at the rubes who thought they were going somewhere.

 

[Zkribbler]

Ambush,

Sounds a little too violent for my taste. I'd rather see blow guns with sleep darts so the interlopers can be dragged back to headquarters.

 

[Bamspeedy]

First, one that I always think is silly but it keeps coming back to me...Plant Simulator. There are a lot of critical decisions to be made by a plant. Do I need more roots, or more leaves? If I opt for leaves and there's a dry spell I'm gonna wish for those roots... And what about those roots anyway? Should I just spread out? Send down some tap roots looking for the elusive water table? Maybe invest in sending a root under that foundation into the parched wasteland in hopes that I'll find a leaky pipe?

I mean, obviously it is pretty low key. Maybe something for the casual gamer...

Which I'm surprised nobody on Kongregate made a game like this. I checked and the the dozen 'plant' games don't seem to have a plant sim where you are the plant (and not someone else growing the plant), the most obvious hurdle is "plant needs water", if you are the plant you don't have control over that, it's easier for a 'caretaker' of the plant to add water.

I'm assuming you talking of games more professionally done than most of the cheap, poorly thought out stuff on Kongregate, one problem is the obvious name of this potential game is 'PlantSim' would run into possible copyright issues with the Sims. https://sims.fandom.com/wiki/PlantSim

I have long thought that firefighting in the American West would make a great game. Only a few firefighters working across a huge area supplemented by air units. Some areas, with buildings are more important than empty places. The wind and rain are unpredictable. I know nothing about this subject. I would like a simulation of historic fires so that I might learn a little something about this.

Lots of firefighting games, but most (all?) deal with driving the truck or running into burning buildings (more urban settings).

There is already training simulations for wildfire fighting, just need to turn it into a game for the masses.

 

[MaryKB]

I'd really love more simulation story games, but with complete customization. I want to make my own character and put her into these stories, with things being very realistic and so many things you can do, but also about your character.

Like say a game about where you're running a company. Maybe you start off as an intern, and you work your way up to Executive (and I feel this could work really well for like a legal drama story, where you have clients and cases and such). But I want my own character, and I want to customize everything. When I play games like The Sims, I spend most of my time making my people, and redesigning my outfits and such.

Something revolutionary I'd love is where your game can connect to online shopping sites, and you can import models into your game. So say you're looking at Macy's, and you see some shoes you want, well your game can interpret those into a model and you can get them for your character. I don't care if I'd even have to pay a little money each time I did that, I think there could be a huge market. Also for hair styles too, having more control over everything seeming real.

And in my games, you wouldn't just be stuck at your office building, you'd be earning money for your social activities and buying luxuries, and you'd have some larger narrative going on too. But for me, freedom and customization is like 60% of the game, I feel things are just so empty without that.

 

[Birdjaguar]

I'd really love more simulation story games, but with complete customization. I want to make my own character and put her into these stories, with things being very realistic and so many things you can do, but also about your character.

Like say a game about where you're running a company. Maybe you start off as an intern, and you work your way up to Executive (and I feel this could work really well for like a legal drama story, where you have clients and cases and such). But I want my own character, and I want to customize everything. When I play games like The Sims, I spend most of my time making my people, and redesigning my outfits and such.

Something revolutionary I'd love is where your game can connect to online shopping sites, and you can import models into your game. So say you're looking at Macy's, and you see some shoes you want, well your game can interpret those into a model and you can get them for your character. I don't care if I'd even have to pay a little money each time I did that, I think there could be a huge market. Also for hair styles too, having more control over everything seeming real.

And in my games, you wouldn't just be stuck at your office building, you'd be earning money for your social activities and buying luxuries, and you'd have some larger narrative going on too. But for me, freedom and customization is like 60% of the game, I feel things are just so empty without that.

Sounds like life. It's all around you now take advantage of it.

 

[MaryKB]

Oh dear, I'm guessing you don't like playing The Sims so you can do virtual laundry and cleaning?

(Why does The Sims not have vacuuming? Sure I can have a roomba, but why can't my character ever do vacuuming or sweeping?)

 

[Lexicus]

Yo I was just thinking how cool Skyrim would be if it actually had a quasi-realistic smithing/armor system, with some magical elements around the edges maybe. Anyone know of a game that has any kind of even vaguely realistic smithing?

 

[Phrossack]

Yo I was just thinking how cool Skyrim would be if it actually had a quasi-realistic smithing/armor system, with some magical elements around the edges maybe. Anyone know of a game that has any kind of even vaguely realistic smithing?

I'll second this question; I have a serious itch for in-depth crafting games.

 

[Kyriakos]

Another indie hit, which obviously was a lot simpler and not as important as minecraft, but did become very known, was "five nights at freddie's pizza". That one relied on ambiguous and scary plot

 

[Arakhor]

Kingdom Come: Deliverance has a sword-sharpening "mini-game" where you can attempt to operate a grinding wheel manually, rather than paying a blacksmith to do it for you.

 

[Phrossack]

Kingdom Come: Deliverance has a sword-sharpening "mini-game" where you can attempt to operate a grinding wheel manually, rather than paying a blacksmith to do it for you.

I did get that but haven't tried it yet, as it was eating up all my memory space.

I was wondering more along the lines of starting with pieces of metal, and then manually doing all the work on them to turn them into a finished product.

 

[Birdjaguar]

Oh dear, I'm guessing you don't like playing The Sims so you can do virtual laundry and cleaning?

(Why does The Sims not have vacuuming? Sure I can have a roomba, but why can't my character ever do vacuuming or sweeping?)

I've never played the Sims.

Coming in 2019: Harry Potter Augmented Reality game. Niantic is doing it.

https://www.harrypotterwizardsunite.com/

 

[Thorgalaeg]

After a couple of years with my Vive I have come to the conclusion that the so called VR experiences burn pretty quickly. It is a lot of work for the developers for 5 minutes of enjoyment if any. Some are amazing as the already classical The Blu ( I recommend it as first experience for any VR newbie) but most are boring. They take a lot of space too. For instance, a detailed photogrammetric scene can take several gigas.

Anyway I think that after some months most VR user continue using VR almost exclusively for two kinds of games: 1st person games as fallout and such, specially the ones where you can use firearms (weightless ghost swords don't work that well), playingsuch games with VR controllers feels very close to having a real gun in your hand, after that it results ridiculous to play in a monitor with a gun fixed to your character nose. The other kind of game is obviously racing sims, which basically don't make sense to play in a monitor (or 2, 3,,,) anymore. Not at all. I would add flight simulators but neither HMDs resolution nor PC power are there yet. Maybe in a couple of years.

EDIT: ah, and Goggle Earth, you won't believe your eyes.

 

[Timsup2nothin]

After a couple of years with my Vive I have come to the conclusion that the so called VR experiences burn pretty quickly. It is a lot of work for the developers for 5 minutes of enjoyment if any. Some are amazing as the already classical The Blu ( I recommend it as first experience for any VR newbie) but most are boring. They take a lot of space too. For instance, a detailed photogrammetric scene can take several gigas.

Anyway I think that after some months most VR user continue using VR almost exclusively for two kinds of games: 1st person games as fallout and such, specially the ones where you can use firearms (weightless ghost swords don't work that well), playingsuch games with VR controllers feels very close to having a real gun in your hand, after that it results ridiculous to play in a monitor with a gun fixed to your character nose. The other kind of game is obviously racing sims, which basically don't make sense to play in a monitor (or 2, 3,,,) anymore. Not at all. I would add flight simulators but neither HMDs resolution nor PC power are there yet. Maybe in a couple of years.

EDIT: ah, and Goggle Earth, you won't believe your eyes.

I would think these VR experience things are expected to be one offs, like a movie, not something you keep on your system like a game.

Can you weight the ghost sword controllers? Still not going to have the balance of a real sword (unless you use an elongated weight, which is probably a really bad idea) but it seems like it would provide better feedback, even if not really good. I would expect a gun controller to feel better if it has some heft also.

 

[Thorgalaeg]

I mean swords in VR feels weightless and immaterial. It doesn't feel right. Waving a huge epic claymore feels as if it was made of foam. Guns doesn't feel like the real thing either but you can forgive it. Vive controllers make a good work simulating a gun handle too.

 

[hobbsyoyo]

I have to ask this, because I think it comes from two valid directions...why do you need a boat?

If you are generating the imagery anyway, it can be presented in your living room. More people are in their living room than are buying boat rides at Pearl.

From a programming standpoint I think accounting for the imprecision that is inherent in driving around in a boat is a pain in the butt, and in fact the imagery has to adapt depending on where you sit in the boat.

So if you just do the imagery full cloth and feed it through a standard computer or even play station VR rig you get to educate/entertain a lot more people.

That said, man, sign me up. MY gf is in about round six of convincing herself that she wants to turn the living room into a VR stadium (meaning a few more rounds and one day she will up and say "I want this and I want it like yesterday, make it happen"), and I'd be totally into taking VR tours of all kinds of places.

Yes, the whole point of VR/Holodeck is that you don't have to leave your living room to experience things. You can walk through the Forbidden City without flying to China.

I think obviously yes epic VR set up for the living room would be great for exploring any such time period event setting imaginary world etc. And I can't wait until the tech catches up to the hype, but in regards to the AR experience, I think there will always be something about being in an actual Place, that no be will be able to replicate. Being somewhere real, feels more, significant, and the AR overlay would simply be to add a bit more flavor. So.while VR can take you onto the shores of Normandy and up close shooting Nazis, walking through a real place with some background visuals would be neat in itself.

It seems that your talking more about augmented reality, where your current setting is added to by the device. You stand on Omaha Beach and it puts n the appropriate German pill boxes and the US fleet.

Dekker here got at exactly what I was trying to explain before.

At BJ's last post - yes, exactly. And in some places, you will be able to walk right up to the real life ruins and see how they twist and diverge from their original forms. And you can always take the glasses off and just enjoy the natural setting of the place you are in.

As to why a boat? Well that's just specific to Pearl Harbor as an example. Riding a real boat between virtual battleships while they rock under Japanese assault would be very impressive and quite an experience. You could even put some pyrotechnics about to splash water onto your passengers from 'near misses'.


But my concern (brought up by family members) is that at some point you are turning a real life war grave into Call of Duty: AR Edition.

It becomes an ethical issue for this specific example. Other historical sites - say, watching the endless parade of human sacrifice at one of the Aztec temples to appease the gods - would have their own unique ethical and moral complications.

I think it is fine to show things exactly as they happened to the best of our understanding and to avoid sensationalizing the events. Adding augmented reality to real world historic sites or natural wonders would add incentive to travel to far off lands to see and experience on top of being in the actual place.

Yes, you can recreate an environment from scratch in VR but AR has it's own qualities in this setting which set it apart.


The more I think about this the more inevitable I think it to be. We already have AR concerts with holograms of long dead artists.

Imagine dragons darting between the peaks of Monument Valley, chased by warriors on winged chariots.

 

[Birdjaguar]

And with appropriate preparation: AR experiences of your dead pets. How far are we from revisiting dead parents and children?

 

[hobbsyoyo]

A common present may be for loved ones to have themselves professionally recorded for AR/VR reconstructions to give to loved ones.