What about VR in SL?

[Curei]

WHAT ABOUT VIRTUAL REALITY?   Some time ago, when the first semi-serious VR headsets were introduced, many on Second Life were expressing enthusiasm for what they thought was the coming of full immersion experiences that would give one the impression of really being there, right in the middle of things.  So many got so excited.  But nothing seemed to come of it.

My question is a simple one.  What happened?  And, to further complicate my inquiry, why did nothing seem to happen and will it ever happen?

The best reply will be to JonathanWest2000@Hotmail.com

[Alwin Alcott]

9 minutes ago, Curei said:

Or, you can reply directly to me at: 

VR is abandoned by SL, and you should remove your email here... now around  8 billion people potentially can see it

[Alwin Alcott]

On 23-4-2017 at 8:30 AM, Curei said:

  And, let us hope that SL will catch up.

I, and a lot others hope they won't ... most don't have powerfull machines and the full wallet to get these niche products.

[Nalates Urriah]

5 hours ago, ChinRey said:

There are also the issues with proportions and camera position. Second Life weren't made as a world to immerse yourself in, it was made to be viewed from a distance and everything is adapted to that. There were actually sims made specially for VR users for a while but it didn't really work out.

I disagree.

I've never heard a Linden voice the opinion proportion and camera were reasons for dropping VR. It has ALWAYS been performance.

We have a number of areas in SL that are designed and/or have been rebuilt to work with VR. I haven't heard any of those involved in building for VR that have said they would change how their builds are made... The part that didn't work out is the amount of non-optimized content in SL and the Lab deciding to drop VR.

Architects that use SL have been building to correct proportions for VR for some time.

Certainly everything is NOT built to be viewed from a distance... that should be obvious in how textures are used. LoD is certainly a clue that things are to be designed to facilitate near and far camera locations.

For years Penny Patton has been promoting building to scale and sizing avatars to RL sizes. Also, to change camera placement. Those changes are more and more prevalent throughout SL. Mesh builders tend to work to RL scale and sizes. So, more and more new stuff is proportional and to RL scale. Proportion and camera are just a matter of changing some minor settings, nothing that would kill VR.

[Nalates Urriah]

On 4/24/2017 at 4:17 AM, Richardus Raymaker said:

Well, i did read in the past that the want to make sansar so it can run on mobile devices to. Not sure when. I do not think secondlife will ever cstch ip with VR, the platform is not suitable for it.

 

You may be right.

I think I see them moving in that direction. The Lindens never, almost, say they are working on something until they are sure they can do it and do it well. So, I'm not surprised they don't talk about VR.

I can hope.

I think a SL-VR is likely to be more popular with users than Sansar. Sansar is very much for people that want to build an experience, which means separate worlds/games and smaller communities. 

[Curei]

Or, you can reply directly to me at:  JeanieWilliams100@Gmail.com  (My SL name is:  Curei)

[LittleMe Jewell]

Search the forums for 'Sansar' - some seem to think it is the second coming of SL.

[Lindal Kidd]

To expand a bit on what others have said...

There was a "project viewer" for the Oculus Rift developer's kit.  However, after they'd played around with it for a year or so, and when the Rift finally hit the shelves, Linden Lab dropped the project viewer.  There is no further support for VR headsets.  Linden Lab has said that it's because SL's interface and controls don't map into a VR implementation very well.  I sorta believe them, but I also think their lack of enthusiasm is partly because they DO plan for their new virtual world platform, Sansar, to support VR.  So part of it is probably a desire to differentiate their new product from their older one.

However, Sansar will be a very different place...assuming that it ever actually makes it to prime time, it is aimed at a very different user base than Second Life.

[Alwin Alcott]

9 hours ago, LittleMe Jewell said:

Search the forums for 'Sansar' - some seem to think it is the second coming of SL.

i think we have to be more carefull in this kind of info forwarding .. Sansar cán host a SL like environment, but is not a second SL.

[Richardus Raymaker]

Well, i did read in the past that the want to make sansar so it can run on mobile devices to. Not sure when. I do not think secondlife will ever cstch ip with VR, the platform is not suitable for it.

 

[Rhonda Huntress]

VR has made several many attempts to out on the market. I thought it had a chance this last time. It really hasn't caught on with the consumers nor the nerd community as a whole.  Until you have large scale "must have" games (and unfortunately pron too but that's the way tech grows) that is designed to be used with VR rather than having support patched on to an already playable game, VR will always be a niche toy.

[Nalates Urriah]

On 4/22/2017 at 11:30 PM, Curei said:

Curei and I are very grateful for your answer to my query.  It's too bad there is so little workable content of any major degree that is available for VR.  I understand that a much greater volume of content creation is on it's way, but it will take time.  And, let us hope that SL will catch up.

The primary reason the VR version of the viewer was dropped was stated by Oz Linden. Too much lag... the SL VR Viewer could not maintain the minimum frame rate of 90 FPS.

The problem is all the hobbiest made content in SL.frame rates tend to get down to 10 FPS. Only the newer hardware comes close. My 7 month old computer runs at 20 to 140+/- FPS depending on where I am and how many avatars are around.

Once the frame rate drops below 90 FPS the occurrence of simulator sickness goes up. The Lindens think the sickness would give SL a bad name and drive people away. So, they dropped the VR Viewer.

Will the Lab ever develop a VR Viewer for SL? May be. As hardware improves and the Lindens make improvements to SL they may. Or a third party may.

In the mean time there is VorpX. The HOW TO instructions are old: Second Life and OpenSim in VR using VorpX

[ChinRey]

On 26.4.2017 at 4:25 AM, Nalates Urriah said:

The primary reason the VR version of the viewer was dropped was stated by Oz Linden. Too much lag... the SL VR Viewer could not maintain the minimum frame rate of 90 FPS.

There are also the issues with proportions and camera position. Second Life weren't made as a world to immerse yourself in, it was made to be viewed from a distance and everything is adapted to that. There were actually sims made specially for VR users for a while but it didn't really work out.

It is certainly possible to make a VR friendly SL style virtual world. The low frame rate is mainly caused by inefficient content and it's easy enough to build to a scale and proportions suitable for first person POV viewing. But almost everything would have to be specially made for such an environment and then it's hardly any point in doing it within SL, better to make a separate grid for it using one of the open source branches of the SL software, OpenSim or - preferably - WhiteCore. I'm actually involved in such a project right now but I honestly can't say when - or even if - it will be online. Just building a library of basic assets, what I'm mainly trying to do these days, is a huge undertaking. You need thousands  of items of all kinds and there si hardly anything available, open source or commercial, that'll work without much modifications it's almost as easy to build from scratch.

[ChinRey]

3 minutes ago, Nalates Urriah said:

I disagree.

Do you? It seems to me we're mostly describing different aspects of the same situation.

 

10 minutes ago, Nalates Urriah said:

I've never heard a Linden voice the opinion proportion and camera were reasons for dropping VR. It has ALWAYS been performance.

Oh, performance is certainly the main issue, no doubt about that.

 

11 minutes ago, Nalates Urriah said:

Certainly everything is NOT built to be viewed from a distance... that should be obvious in how textures are used. LoD is certainly a clue that things are to be designed to facilitate near and far camera locations.

Important warning: mentioning how textures and/or LoD models are (ab)used in Second Life may cause seriously long Chin Rey rants. Not this time though. I'll try to stay on topic.

 

16 minutes ago, Nalates Urriah said:

For years Penny Patton has been promoting building to scale and sizing avatars to RL sizes. Also, to change camera placement.

Yes and things could have been very different if more people had listened to her all those years ago.

 

18 minutes ago, Nalates Urriah said:

Those changes are more and more prevalent throughout SL.

They are indeed. When I started building mesh houses back in 2013, I was criticized for building them at too small a scale. Those houses are actually big by today's standards.

 

22 minutes ago, Nalates Urriah said:

Mesh builders tend to work to RL scale and sizes.

Not yet. I've measured quite a few modern mesh houses and they tend to be somewhere between 120 and 150% of real life size. The trend is towards matching SL sizes with RL ones but there's still a way to go if that's the goal. There are some practical limitations too. If you make a realistic sized door to a house, many avatars won't be able to walk through it and the walking speed in SL is twice as fast as in RL. Try to jog around in your RL house and see how long it takes before you crash into something. David Rowe found a way around that speed problem when he made CtrlAltStudio but the hack he ahd to settle for there is hardly an ideal solution.

 

32 minutes ago, Nalates Urriah said:

Proportion and camera are just a matter of changing some minor settings, nothing that would kill VR.

Even if builders build closer to scale these days than they used to, most of the content in Second Life is fairly old. You don't have to go back more than two or three years before you find the majority of content being built at a much larger scale than today. And ignoring the scale/proportion issue only takes us back to the main problem: frame rate. I promised not to do another rant about textures and LoD models but to put it short inefficient content is by far the biggest cause of client side lag in Second Life. That hasn't improved recently, if anything it's gotten steadily worse.

Yes, apart from the walking speed issue which really needs a server side solution, a VR friendly virtual reality could have been made on the Second Life grid. But why would anybody want to do that? Such a project requires content that is not only built to some reasonably scale but also render efficient and there's precious little available here that meet both those requirements. And in case there's any doubt, when I say render efficient I'm not talking about land impact or calculated render cost. I'm talking about actual effect on the frame rate and that is often a completely different story. There's no doubt that Second Life's software is better developed than the open source volunteer powered alternatives but it's not that much better and with a hosting expense ten times or more that of an independent grid, it's a no-brainer.

[Curei]

Curei and I are very grateful for your answer to my query.  It's too bad there is so little workable content of any major degree that is available for VR.  I understand that a much greater volume of content creation is on it's way, but it will take time.  And, let us hope that SL will catch up.

-- Jonathan West and Curei

American Communication Arts