The Gamer's Quarter

[ApM]

I was talking to Lackey about the lovliness of the flat-shaded polygon VR aesthetic, and was compelled to dig up some of my fantastic VR demos of yore. These come from the demo CDs of a little book called Virtual Reality Madness and More!, which is easily one of the best $7 I ever spent, even though it is simply an excuse for the author to broadly define VR as "anything I find interesting" and get the publisher to pay him to play around with video editing, 3D modelling, Doom, morphing (remember morphing?), and a Spaceball. As such, the demos on the CDs are awesome.

Anyone else have fond memories of Superscape?

The best part of Superscape wasn't the ridiculous "radiation" counter in the corner (that red box in the office screenshot is, like, a dirty bomb or something that you can disarm by clicking on it), it was that it was totally devoid of physics. Want flying cars? Just point 'em upwards and off they go. A wonderfully surreal VR sandbox.

OH THE HUMANITY ETC.

I also found an excellent little demo for an engine called VREAM.

This totally requires a hacked-up Power Glove for the full effect, I'm sure. Notable is the second screenshot, which contains a beach ball that actually bounces when you throw it, as well as an unfortunately non-functional jukebox. It is notable because it takes place in an "attic" that you are expected to float through the ceiling to get to. Forget collision detection, this is total virtual immersion we're talking about here! It's much more important that the user be able to arbitrarily roll, pitch, and yaw!

Reading the READMEs is required, at the very least so you know what the keys are. But there's all sorts of treasure buried within; for example, Superscape's readme reveals that you can click on the guy's head to get it to rotate all the way around.

I've uploaded all of the VR "worlds" on the demo disc, in case you're feeling adventurous and want to putz around with, for example, the 3D Construction Kit-created NOAH93:

[wourme]

I used to play with Superscape all the time. I seem to remember something very amusing you can do with the helicopter, but I forget what it was.

[Lackey]

ApM's VREAM screenshots don't show the hilarious and wonderful one frame animation on the hand when you press the mouse button. The fingers all fold over like they're on a hinge.
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| Little bird fighting against a bat sect game |

[DonMarco]

Virtual reality is still a pretty viable thing. The Matrix dealt pretty heavily with a concept of a virtual reality so real, it became the reality the people of the future. Which is decades, if not centuries off. Technology is better off focusing on the internet as the new virtual reality. Remember how cool the internet was in Cowboy Bebop or Johnny Mnemonic?

VRML is the future! Bow down you lazy Unix-hating idiots! Your iPods will one day upload your GPS location and cellphones will record the audio of your entire lives! Pay to download music and steal bread from the supermarket! "The end is nigh!"
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Collector of over 1,538 strategy guides. That's weird, right?

[wourme]

So, why isn't there at least an affordable home version of something like that pterodactyl game that's been around forever? I sometimes wonder what's taking so long. Is it assumed that because consumers didn't like Virtual Boy that they don't like that sort of thing in general? I guess I could actually do some research and find out what the holdup is, or why I used to hear about technological advances but don't anymore.

[Mister Toups]

Why does this go about 100 times as fast as it should and is there a way to fix it?
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where were you when nana komatsu got a wii?

[ApM]

I neglected to mention DOSBox, which you should probably be using if you want to run these at a usable speed.

[Mister Toups]

You know, I really should have known.
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where were you when nana komatsu got a wii?