Importance of cockpit modeling regarding VR headsets

As Oculus Rift support is comming at some point in the future I would just like to point out some important things which I have noticed using the rift whilst racing.

I think cockpit modeling and texturing (and all the work involved until the car is in the game) is becoming more important than ever with this feature.
Please don't take this agian as a war on things. For example in LFS IMO the cockpits are acceptable. But jump into AC with the rift into a car and you'll get pleasently surprised how good things can actually look in the cockpit. Basically it really feels like you are sitting in this car. It helps with the immersion quite a lot in the rift. The driver model gets important aswell here apart from the head of course.
If the arms and hands are moving somewhat rigid and not natural it just feels somehow weird, I personally start to feel strange really if I pay attention to them. Those little things that weren't important in the past should get a bit more attention IMO.

Another important point are the mirrors. Racing with the rift you will have to look much more in the mirrors than when you race on your tripple setup or single monitor with virtual mirrors. You have to turn your head to look into the mirrors which means you loose focus on track. Whilst in a wheel to wheel race you have to do this really often and every sinlge glance at the mirrors should offer a clear and a good view of things going on behind you.
So the mirrors have to have good resolution here and they have to work well. Just saying.

Then there are also car dependent features which are displayed in the cockpit. For example in IRacing with the GT3 McLaren you have different TC levels. As soon you switch the TC level you can see the little button/switch on the steering wheel in the car switching to the TC level you have choosen and you are allways aware of the TC level simply by throwing a look at the switch there. In the Z4 you can see it on the Motec display with a lot of other important infos like engine maping or sector times for example.
It also helps if the LCD Motec display in the car is very clear and shows as much info as available in RL aswell.
What I want to say is that basically the less additional HUD's you need whilst racing in the rift the better it is as they are somewhat annoying if there is too much of them.

I just would like to point that out in hope the devs read that and consider it eventualy for the future. Those things really do help a lot in terms of immersion whilst racing with the rift.

 

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PCars has this nailed with the rift , Motec on the stearing wheels is excellent and changeable , AC have not implement Motec of the fly like pcars and I don't think they will , but I think rf2 will not cut corners here , if they do it it will be done professionally.

I also agree with your concerns, we are in the infant stages of gaming tech we are the few in this world that has a taste of the VR racing simulation.

The day rf2 offers rift support will be wonderful , there will be no better sim for VR IMO .

 

Until the headsets...

A. much more peripheral vision
B. are tested to have the same amounts of super low input lag (not talking about pixel refresh rates) as something like a BenQ XL2720Z in "Instant Mode", an ASUS VG248QE / BenQ XL2411Z, ASUS PG278Q, etc.
C. have the same sort of equivalent resolution - well, pixel density - as a 27" 1440P monitor 28.5" from your eyes

...I am sticking with monitors. I am guessing/assuming that things will be good enough for me personally by around the time the CV2, or another company's version, becomes available.

 

AFAIK VR has deprecated DX9 support.

 

^^ So rf2 is doomed ,no proper VR support for rift unless rf2 progresses to DX11 and onward ?

 

hardly "doomed" but if a vast majority of the general sim racing public move over to VR headsets then yes it might be another Con for DX11/12/13/14/15/whatever support from ISI in the future, but who's to say they're not already making the transition, only ISI know.

 

Well, this little nugget about DX9 support came from an ISI dev after someone making completely unfounded claims about rF2 VR support--presumably as a 'head's up' of sorts, to mitigate expectations about VR support. So, I don't think it's unreasonable to assume that there are no plans to transition at this time.

IDK...can't say either way for sure, but I'm not getting my hopes up, that's for sure. I was one who was in the camp of "waiting until CV1 comes out to make the jump to VR", expecting that ISI was waiting for CV1 before they offer support. Certainly, this news doesn't bode well, and just makes me a little more disenfranchised about rF2's progress (I was definitely in the 'optimistic' group previously; now I think I'm in the 'I'll believe it when I see it' camp).

 

Exactly what I thought as I read it. It's probably not doomed really but for me personally it is. This sucks really.
Even if it might sound stupid but I bought the rift for rf2 only. Some other games have support for it but more then checking out the experience there I did not do. The rift at my desk is mostly unused and just waiting for rf2 support. No idea what to think about this now.

 

yes now you mention it I seem to remember some chat about DX9 Support, but at the sametime rememebr a dev saying it's not out of the question to move on....buggered if I'll search the forums for the specific quote though that'd take all night

As I said above though, if ISI got proof that a certain % of users had or were getting VR gear in the future then that may well sway them, only they know.

 

MarcG - I realy don't think this will sway them and even if it did I would think it will be well over a year down the road IMO before they change , better chance for RF3

jesus the best 2 sims out there and I have to leave it on my Hard drive to keep GSC from going rusty after finding out that as well most likely will not have CV1 support , bad bad week for me regarding rift support .

appoligys for going of topic .

 

Maybe more research was needed before you bought a DEV KIT for a game that had NO OFFICIAL SUPPORT.

 

Yeah maybe, really.
But maybe one would expect a sim to have support by now two years after the innital release of the Oculus Rift.
As you can see some other sims have added support two times starting from zero. After OR said nothing would change from DK2 to CV.
Maybe yes, but meanwhile you can play even Minecraft with the rift. Should really tell you something. There are even games developed around the Rift.

This DEV thing is just a way to assure there are no leagal issues with things just like this now.
After selling over 300 000 units you can hardly call something like this DEV kit practically.

I really don't need anybody to tell me that here, really. It is my own fault at the end but it could aswell gone differently if there were not such a stubborness present.
It seems for some people moving forward to something they do not know or are not used to is the same like moving to Mars.

In Austria we use to say: " The farmer doesn't eat things he doesn't know", and this is really at play here.

 

Porting rF2 to DX11+ with DX9 feature level shouldn't be that much of a problem I think.

 

I was going to say the same thing - "porting" it to DX11/DX12 while using the DX9 level-set rather than actually using DX11/DX12 features seems somewhat simple (relatively speaking, of course) compared to actually truly using and taking advantage of all the DX11/DX12 features.

That is just what I gathered from reading some stuff about the subject; I could be completely wrong though.

 

You are reaching Spinelli

Be content with what you got.

I don't believe that for a second.


If people from other sims rather drive Rift then better physics that is their loss.

But even if it had Rift you would just go and do laps in AC and pCARS anyway wouldn't you ? and the Rift users well they would still be bagging rF2 graphics.

 

Not for me I can't wait for rift support in RF2, at the moment I can only drive for ~10 laps before the lack of rift becomes to distracting/annoying. For me VR is just as important as accurate physics/tyre management etc to simulating Motorsport.

 

If VR is the future i am sure we will all know this with in 6 months of the release to the public. Then i am sure ISI and a lot of other companies will move with the times. Till then i think there is no chance. As there is more important issues to deal with right now.

 

When ever there is discussion about VR & Rf2 in the same sentence it never ends optimistically because together with the naysayers against the Rift such as few comments above, you have ISI who are just totally and completely uninterested in it as a technology. Fortunately pCars now has excellent physics.

 

quote beneath is from the Rogue System site so don't get me wrong here please this is not about rFactor 2 but imho ISI does know what it takes..........

"And now, a surprise–the Oculus Rift is now supported! The good news is that I didn’t have to do any code. Leadwerks integrated the Rift on their end, which means they maintain it and we reap the reward. All I had to do was add a player option to check for a connected Rift. If one is found it is then used, else I revert back to the montior. Now, I haven’t actually tested with the Rift yet as I’ve had no time. I’m told it will just work though. I’m certain that’s not completely true. For example, I’ll need to override my mouse-look code if a Rift is detected, etc, etc. All of this is on my end though and should only take a few hours to sort out once I get my DK1 Rift hooked up. The Leadwerks folks used a DK2 for their development, but I’m told either will work. I’ll get you some more details once I have a chance to try it myself…."

http://imagespaceinc.com/rogsys/

 

Didn't realise you could read minds, what else are ISI uninterested in?