Random Topic Generator: My First VR Experience

Virtual reality has been around for a good couple of years now. It’s still a relatively new thing, but many people have talked about it and so it’s easy to find a blog post explaining what their first experience was like, and so I am a little late with my review. However, I’m not particularly bothered by that. My first experience was the Saturday just gone and it was something like no other I’ve ever experienced before. A truly immersive experience.

The HTC Vive was comfortable to wear. Due to it being my first experience, I did have to get used to the notion of being in virtual reality, and so I did need to take regular breaks, however, having said that, if I was able to use it more than just that one day, there’s no doubt that I would indeed get used to it and therefore be able to wear the headset all day with no side effects.

When I put the headset on, I was standing on the bright Caribbean style wooden hut, with cartoonish graphics. I spent the first couple of minutes making sure that the headset was sitting firm, and that everything was adjusted accordingly for maximum effect. At this point, I hadn’t moved in either direction. Then I moved. I turned a full 180. That was the first real moment I felt incredible immersed in a new virtual world. My brain struggled to compute that what was behind me was already there, I just had to turn and see it. It was if my brain expected there to be nothing behind me, or indeed the real world to be behind me. The fact that the virtual world was behind me played havoc with my mind.

My proprioception has never been used so much before. The sense of knowing where your limbs are in relation to your body and prevents us from hitting ourselves when our eyes are closed. When you’re in a virtual world, your eyes might as well be closed. I knew exactly where my arms were, but it most certainly felt weird. What was weirder was holding the controllers in my hands, and them moving perfectly in synch to my movements – my brain was telling me that I was immersed in the world, yet still in the real world at the same time, and that did mess with my sensors quite a bit. I did feel a little nauseous to begin with, however as my sensors started to get used to the new concept, I was able to enjoy it even more.

The next place I ventured to was a testing ground, full of various props, including a Pogostick and a jetpack. The Pogostick made my legs go all jelly-like, and once again made me feel incredible weird as my sensors were being battered constantly. My feet were firmly planted on the floor, I could feel them there, but I was in mid-air, hopping up and down on a Pogostick. When I used the jetpack, I accidentally let go in mid-air – I fell from a great height – my legs nearly collapsed underneath me. It was an incredible experience nevertheless, but one I wouldn’t immediately do again if I had another chance to use the Vive.

I played an archery game. It made my arms ache, but it was totally worth every second. All I had done before then was explore, and test, but this was the first time I actually played a game. I was lost for words. The notion of using the bow, pulling it back, turning this way and that, looking over the edge, having pinpoint accuracy with your firing; absolutely staggering, immersive, an experience like no other. Sorry for repeating myself, but it was so different from anything I’ve ever done before that all descriptive talent went out of the window. I just enjoyed it for what it was.

The next thing I did was watch a live game of Dota 2. I’m not a massive fan of Dota. I’ve never played the game before, and I doubt I will in the future. However, in virtual reality, the game takes climbs to an entirely new level. You can be a spectator of a live game, watching people all around the world play their characters in the game, fighting a battle. You can actually be on the ground, right up close to the action. I never thought I would be saying this about Dota, but I could happily watch the entire battle from start to finish and not get bored.

And then I played around with the planets. Standing in our Solar System, grabbing a planet mid-orbit around the sun and throwing it away – that made me laugh out loud.

In conclusion, virtual reality is definitely something I want to do more often. However, I would want there to be more things to do. Once your brain has processed all that excitement, all that originality, you do come back down to Earth rather quickly and I can’t help but eventually saying that I’ve “Seen it”, and not really be as entertained as much as I would like to be. I only used the Vive once, and I don’t doubt it’ll be a long while before I use it again – a newer version would probably be out by that time – and so new games are constantly in development. Given the chance, I would definitely play all day every day.

Thanks for reading

Antony Hudson

(TonyHadNouns)