VR still makes 40-70% of players want to throw up, and that's a huge problem for the companies behind it
VR still makes 40-70% of players want to throw up, and that's a huge problem for the companies behind it
Why virtual reality makes a lot of us sick, and what we can do about it.
I'm in the other camp. The first time I squeezed my 155m spaceship through the tiny mouth of a rotating space station in VR, I wept like a baby. (An Anaconda in Elite: Dangerous)
Absolutely, ED in VR is indescribably breath taking. Basically an entirely different game
I'm usually fine with motion sickness while playing VR, but Elite man...
I feel like all I see in the VR space is endless articles on new hardware and basically nothing on quality VR games. I always thought I'd upgrade my Vive to an Index or something better one day, but so far the only compelling reason is HL: Alyx and I'm not spending that kind of money on a single game.
Ms flight simulator is quite clunky and hard to get good frame rates, but damn if you can put up with that it's an awesome experience in VR. Also beat saber.
For quite awhile now those have been the reasons for VR. Sad really. Still these two things are compelling.
Racing games in VR are excellent. It’s all I’ve played in vr for quite some time now.
there are quite a few games out there that aren't specifically VR games but are still very well suited for it because they put you in the cockpit of a vehicle. I haven't really used my VR headset much for VR specific games, but I've been putting a lot of hours in Assetto Corsa Competizione because with VR and a wheel, I'm completely immersed. Same goes for people who like flight or space simulators
I had the same thought when I had a Vive. I ended up just buying the Index Knuckles controllers so I could play HL: Alyx. It really is the only AAA game available that makes it worth it IMO.
Because If you were going to spend 1 Million to make a game. Do you make a game that only a select few users can buy? Or do you make it so all gamers can buy it?
I see your point and I agree with it but the “opposite” is also true.
“If you have 1 million to make a game, do you make one in a system that is incredibly saturated with other games or do you do in a a system completely starved of good games?”
So it’s a compromise. I still agree that your point has a bigger weight but there is something on the other side of the scale even if lighter
Idk about 40-70% that seems ludicrously high. I play all the time, mild motion sickness when I could not run the game well, otherwise no issues.
That seems high to me as well. Obviously this is anecdotal, but I've introduced probably 20 friends/family members to VR and none of them have had issues with motion sickness.
Simulation sickness is real, and more common than most gamers (a population that tends to self-select for people without that trait) think. This prevalence doesn’t surprise me at all. It’s not severe for everyone. You might not notice if a friend had it, except that they might play fewer video games with you. (They might not, some people are fine unless in full VR.) People aren’t generally keen on going “You know that thing that you like doing and that I’ve seen 5-year-olds do on the internet? I can’t do it, it makes me vom.” It doesn’t exactly feel cool.
All those who get sick obviously stop playing. So if you ask the users, basically no one gets sick. Because those who get sick are not users any more.
I started by playing while standing and moving smoothly in game and I couldn't last long before getting sick. Now I play seated with snapping in game movement and I can play for hours without issue. Depending on how you define it, I don't think it's surprising to see so many people say VR makes them sick.
The statistic quoted is for "users", so presumably the measurement was made against randomly selected individuals of the general population (though the article frustratingly fails to cite a source). This is important because the effect is not evenly distributed among demographics, per the article:
What’s more, we don’t know why some people are so much more susceptible to it than others, but we know that there are numerous markers that make us more likely to experience it. Women, as mentioned previously, are more likely than men to get VR sick. Asian people are more likely than other ethnicities to experience motion sickness in general. Age is another factor—we’re more likely to experience it between the ages of 12 and 21 than in our adulthood... until we reach our 50s, upon which the likelihood increases again.
40-70% seems reasonable if it includes the people who eventually get used to it.
Nah, it's quite real and quite accurate (even though the range is high).
I haven't touched my VR headset and over a year. VR games just are not good and have very little contents and very little replayability. What I'm trying to say is it's still very much a gimmick.
It’s well suited for anything where you’re seated, eg racing sims, flight sims, euro truck sim etc.
If you’ve got any interest at all in those genres give it another try and it’ll be hard if not possible to go back. Digital Combat Sim in VR is a whole nother game.
Other than that I agree. Just a gimmick and I don’t see the way forward.
I enjoy VR gaming and I get motion sickness.
The trick is to slowly acclimate, which takes patience and body awareness. Play for a short amount of time, pause the game when you start to feel slightly warm (or ideally just before that point), and go do something else for 20 minutes or so. With time, the play periods will get longer and the rest breaks will get shorter. Eventually you may stop needing the rest breaks.
A couple caveats: my sample size is 1, a hiatus of more than two weeks means retraining again, and you have to be firm with yourself about stopping on time.
I'm just trying to chill out with a game though, not slowly build up tolerance to cyberspace
Fair enough, and I didn’t mean to imply that everyone should. It’s totally understandable to decide the juice ain’t worth the squeeze.
That is understandable in the moment, it's alot if the only pay off is one game. But I would argue it is very worth it overall. It's a small price to pay to permanently be able to handle it and have no qualms about future VR games/uses.
Plus most games and experiences don't even cause VR sickness to the most susceptible people, so if you pick and choose your games and stick to ones that don't cause issues, you can play VR without any conditioning right away too.
As this is my personal strategy as well, I would like to add that your sample size is now 2, with a 100% success rate :3
Although for me personally I don't have to retrain that quickly. My resistance to motion sickness certainly gets weaker over time, but I seem to have reached some kind of baseline, compared to my previous state, where about five minutes could give me an awful headache, while now I can take it for a bit longer, even after not being in VR for a month or two.
Speaking of, we need more VR games. I'd love to play more of them, but nothing new is really big and exciting or anything, which is how these long breaks even happen.
My sample size is much larger and indeed that has been the case. I've been hosting VR demos for 10 years now, since DK2. DK1 was bad news for people even slightly prone to motion sickness. 3dof is only viable for motion sick prone people if they can keep their head exactly where the game expects it to be, which you can't.
With each new generation of headset, there has been so much less prep for getting random people into it and making sure they wouldn't even get mildly nauseous. More software options without translational movement and much less obvious safety nets in games that do. You can always find at least one game/experience that is right up someone's alley that won't cause motion sickness even if it turns out they would otherwise have been really sensitive to it.
But I always let them know that when they do want to start branching out from the "safe" choices, that they should treat it like sea sickness, limit exposure at first and build up sea legs. Ideally never get to the point where you would throw up, try to stay as far away from it as possible while still having fun. You will eventually notice one day that you haven't thought about it in a long time.
I take an off-brand Dramamine then hop in. Best if I know 20 minutes in advance that I'll be playing since it takes a little time to digest, but I'm not doing chores.
You get used to it. I think people try it for a short while and give up.
Even playing fast-paced shooters on a widescreen will make me slightly “screen-sick” if I haven’t played in a month or two, but it goes away by the next day.
I found VR to be worse for the first couple days, but then it fades, too, and pretty quickly it becomes second nature.
Worst thing I found with VR headsets is the heat. Those displays and sometimes the gpu (depending on headset) get warm, and the HMD is snug on your face so it gets too warm sometimes.
Yea it's like getting your sea legs. I could only play bone works on the valve index for about ~10 min before the nausea got to the "oh shit I might actually puke" level.
Just playing for 10 - 30 minutes a day basically cured the nausea within 2 weeks. After that I could play till the controllers died.
Truth. My kids pay Gorilla Tag, Population: One and a lot of the Meta Quest games (I use ReVive for my HP HMD), those are kinda tough for me to get used to so quickly, but I also play Elite: Dangerous on VR and that is the absolute shit on VR (except for the on-foot part…WTaF Frontier), takes me very little time to adjust to. I love VR, this is stuff I’ve been dreaming of since I was younger, and sincerely hope it doesn’t go the way of 3D TV. It’s a lot of fun.
I remember in the heyday of the N64 3D games would make people nauseous. Especially watching someone play, I remember my mother just couldn't be in the room while I was playing Shadows of the Empire. She's a BOTW veteran now. I think there's definitely some getting used to it.
Yeh, it’s far worse to watch someone else play. I never watch YT vids of others playing. Blergh, can’t handle what they expect their brain to see when my brain is looking a diff direction.
For me, I seem to be one of the lucky people that don't get motion sickness. I still don't like VR. Why? Because the stupidly low resolutions they run at in order to achieve better frames makes it hard to even tell what's going on. You can forget about being able to read any text. It's like playing the game with a wire mesh separating you and the screen it's so bad. Last time I used a VR headset was HTC vive though.
The reason the Vive felt low resolution wasn't because it was trying to get better performance, it was because it wasn't that dense of a screen, and the lenses it used.
With DLSS you can achieve a pretty high resolution when using VR headsets. The HP Reverb 2 have a quite high resolution (2160p per eye) and the screen door effect is reduced significantly, IMO to the point that it’s not noticeable anymore.
Depends on the HMD. I’m using an HP headset on a 3080 GPU. Framerates aren’t a problem. Screen door effect barely registers. Porthole…better than most, but FoV is pretty good.
It’s what you are expecting on an OLED widescreen vs the HMD you use? Is it going to be perfect in 4K? No…the tech isn’t there yet.
40-70% and 80% for women sounds insanely high. I got a used HTC Vive to have beat saber parties with people and so far none out of about 20 people have experienced nausea even with heavy drinking.
Yeah, I would say there are definitely specific experiences you could make that make 80+% nauseous(I have pretty good VR legs but moving platforms can still disorient me). But a well designed VR game accounts for that, see something like Beat Saber.
Minecraft, sticking someone in the cockpit of a plane in war thunder are both no-nos from what I learned.
This. There is a reason why I can play beatsaber without feeling anything. But instantly get sick when playing pistol whip. The level moving around me is just disorienting.
I tried a vr headset at a convention where they had it just giving you a virtual tour of a farm to show off what the headset could do.
I had to take it off in less than 30 seconds because it was giving me a migraine and making me feel sick.
And you even have some vr fans just blindly claiming that all games should use gliding for movement and that having the option to teleport ruins the game even if they don’t use it. even though gliding (they call it natural locomotion) makes people sick because it’s obviously unnatural. They claim there is no need for movement systems that don’t induce motion sickness because it’s a matter of getting used to “natural locomotion” an anyone who doesn’t get better is because they are lying🙄.
It's a tricky issue. On one side, yes, it will make some people motion sick, but on the other side limiting a game to teleport drastically limits what you can do in the game. It means nothing of currently established monitor-based game mechanics work in VR. You essentially completely lose locomotion and environmental navigation as game mechanic and everything becomes a static gallery shooter. It also means that multiplayer completely stops functioning, as while yourself zapping around might be acceptable, having the other player just randomly switch placed is certainly not.
Modern VR has been around for 10 years and so far nobody has figured out how to make teleport gaming work. Meanwhile all the unofficial VR mods gets celebrated, since despite their locomotion issues, they actually feel like full games in VR, which the teleport games never archived.
At the end of the day, it's a far better idea to design games for the people that want to play them, then those that don't. The early focus on teleport has regressed the VR industry for years and the conclusion after 10 years is basically that it causes far more harm than good. You don't win anybody over for VR by showing them games that look far less impressive than what they are used to from a monitor.
Also worth mentioning that there are alternatives to teleport that aren't stick-locomotion. Lone Echo or Gorilla Tag have you move around with your arms and hands. This gives you smooth motion without inducing or at least drastically reducing motion sickness issues. Those mechanics still feel quite a bit underused in the modern VR landscape.
100% accurate. All the teleport-to-move games I tried just sucked. Enabling free movement is a must for good VR gaming.
It's too bad for the folks that get motion sickness, they are missing out on some rad shit.
I am not sure if you are mixing allowing teleportation with not allowing natural locomotion or if you are claiming that allowing teleportation would be limiting the game in some form. Many games support both. My comment was about people complaining that the game should not have support for teleportation (since they don’t use it).
There are plenty of multiplayer games with locomotion. The problem you describe regarding not being able to play multiplayer has been resolved in this games with different mechanics. Most of them use some form of stamina so you can’t just run away. To name an example since you claim no one has done it take a look at half life alyx.
I agree with the fact that it doesn’t work well for existing games non vr games. But I don’t want to play those games in vr…
Regarding your static gallery comment that’s not true at all. You teleport to move larger distances but you interact with your environment by moving in the room where you are playing so you can walk, dodge, crawl, etc…. Teleporting is more about repositioning your play space so you can actually walk and move around using your body.
Although with most games, the accessibility options need to be there (even when they sometimes aren't), some games incorporate their movement mechanics into gameplay heavily. Take BONELAB for example. Great game, but simply impossible to play for some people due to the movement. Adding teleporting (or really any accessibility movement option) would simply ruin it though, as the entire game is based around physics based interactions, walking, running, jumping, climbing, etc.
Bonelab literally made me sick for hours. I tried to power through it and that's when I realized VR wasn't for me.
It's a slick game...but oof...I just can't do it.
That's why I basically dropped VR, and even when playing, I only played beat saber. Alyx was a very bad experience for me (mind blowing game, but not if I'm sick after 15 mins) and with that, every other game with movements (no mans sky ship is very bad)
Did you play Alex with the free movement or the jump to location? I can't do the free movement modes but jump works fine. Similar to beat saber in that you are stationary.
I've played with both basically, because the jump mode is a bit confusing sometimes, and it doesn't work if you want to walk backwards. The VR game i played the most (after beat saber) is Elite Dangerous, because sitting in the spaceship actually makes things better, even when dogfighting
I got super sick the first few times I played. I could only manage 20 mins at most and I would be in bed for the rest of the day due to terrible headache which goes away the next morning.
After a couple of times of experiencing that, I could play for 1-2 hours and without a hint of headache. I understand how everyone is different but I'm kinda amazed how the body works sometimes.
Which headset did you use? I had the same experience with my old Rift. Got a used Quest 2 recently and all my problems just vanished. I can even do smooth locomotion now which was impossible before.
Might be worth checking out some newer tech in case your HMD was first gen
People get very stuck on this part, and I genuinely don't think it's the issue.
Look, l have very decent "VR legs" at this point, but I'm still not a likely spender and I don't play long games in VR or crack out my headsets very often at all.
The issue is not motion sickness or space or tracking stations. The issue is having to put something on my face and not being comfortably on my couch, free to go pee or get a snack without removing a thing from my face.
And yeah, it's uncomfortable. That's part of it. A version of it that looks and feels like glasses would be less of a problem. But the thing is, those aren't a thing that exists, they are not even an incremental step that we can get to at any point, and also TVs and monitors look just fine.
VR is a neat trick, and I gladly keep my headsets around for any time when something actually interesting pops up. But it was never going to be the next big thing.
VR continues to make more sense as an arcade-like attraction than as a consumer product.
Except for the part where I would have to wear a headset that 5000 other people have also worn. (And except for the VR sickness that, it turns out, I'm very sensitive to).
Having gone to a VR gaming business (the kind where you book a time slot, not an open arcade) I wasn't impressed. The hardware isn't really rugged enough for that kind of commercial use, so it was clear they were struggling to keep the gear in decent condition.
But besides that, the limited time nature of the setup meant that the game options needed to be significantly dumbed down so that anyone could pick it up in a few minutes. And there isn't enough of a demand to create any interesting experiences, most of what was on offer was neutered VR games I'd already tried on my personal VR setup.
COVID killed The Void, that was the one company that was building high end VR-arcades. Everything else so far looks quite lackluster, just using just regular consumer VR headsets and uninteresting mini-games. VR arcades are also expensive and with $300 headsets around, you might as well just buy one yourself instead of wasting money at the arcade.
It makes a bit of sense for that, and there are HMDs built for that purpose that are... eh... less gross? I guess?
But mostly it's a secondary device. A toy you keep on the side and pop out for parties or when something reignites the novelty.
VR is Guitar Hero. Does that make sense? I think that makes sense.
But there are people who think VR is worthwhile. If 40% of those people get sick from it, then that's 40% of the users gone
I’m in a similar boat. The use case where I really would use it regularly, simming, is hamstrung by two things. One, it’s so damn fiddly and laborious doing settings non stop to make it playable, and two, even if I get the settings right—I start noticing weird crap with my eyes after a couple sessions. Like you end up basically crossing your eyes all the time inside the visor, and I’ll notice fatigue/trouble focusing after using it a lot, what I would imagine it feels like to have a bad prescription or something (don’t personally have glasses).
And as you say, it’s bloody uncomfortable. Something like big screen beyond with good AR/passthrough would go a long way to fixing that I guess.
free to go pee
That's solvable with good pass through, I am speaking from experience. It's kind of surprising how little focus that aspect got, even most modern headsets still lack proper stereo-correct passthrough and instead just fudge something together via tracking cameras (e.g. Pico4 looks like a butchered photogrammetry scan due to having only a single RGB camera).
With Apple VisionPro that will hopefully change and motivate the rest of the industry to catch up.
A version of it that looks and feels like glasses would be less of a problem.
BigScreenBeyond gets pretty close (but no passthrough at all). Some AR headsets like Xreal Air get even closer, though those come with tiny FOV.
To be fair, with good enough passthrough you can get your pee wherever it needs to be.
I genuinely can't believe how quickly you glossed past the mental image of yourself peeing with a headset on. I feel I can rest my case right at that point, honestly.
Bigscreen Beyond is a new vr headset that is a little bigger than pool goggles. It's manufactured based off of a lidar scan of your face, and is supposed to be very comfortable.
Additionally full color passthrough is becoming more of a common feature so you can see the real world in good definition while wearing the headset. Also some models hinge the display upwards off of your face.
We are getting there. Personally I play for hours a day. Sometimes multiple 4 hour sessions if it's a free weekend for me. I agree we need more experiences. But it will come.
See? No, this is what I mean. It's not this. It's not even Apples insane thing.
It's not an incremental progression that will take us there. I will not pop out a headset of any kind and put it on my face as my default mode of engagement. Won't happen. Not a thing.
It could be shaped like pool goggles, it could have color passthrough, it could have perfect resolution and field of view, it could solve the nausea problem, it won't matter. Because the reality is that anything that straps to my face and substitutes my normal free field of view is by definition and by design a secondary device.
It's cool that you like what they offer, and hey, unlike the weird people out there mourning Stadia you can still use all of these things.
But a replacement for PCs, TVs or consoles they are not.
Yeah I've been interested in replacing my index eventually, this headset looks pretty promising:
https://store.bigscreenvr.com/products/bigscreen-beyond
Each one is custom to your face, and it's extremely light. I'm sure the future will bring more headsets like this
Summed up my feelings 100%. I love VR and almost every experience I've had with it have been great, but I've touched my Index probably 5 times in the past two years (and probably 3 of them were to watch VR porn). There's just a big setup and time commitment required to VR game that a lot of people don't have time for.
its an issue of refresh rate tbh.
I went from vr at 90fps/90hz to 144fps/144hz and i went from motion sick to acceptable.
That's a factor but there's many and they can vary from person to person. For some the lens type is an issue, for some people it's simply inability to get it to fit your face properly.
The frame rate doesn't matter if I start moving with a controller while I am sitting down IRL. I don't get the motion sickness if I have to actually walk to move in the game, but the disconnect between moving in the game not matching the movement of my body is what really causes motion sickness for me.
For me it's the way the motion trackers map head movements, somewhat depends on how it's implemented in the game, but there's a way I can move my head that will give me instant nausea in any VR game. I'm not predisposed to motion sickness either, fine on rollercoasters etc.
The Fresnel lenses give me eye fatigue.
Headline: VR is Still is Fucking Dope for 30-60% of Players
What kind of statistic is 40-70%? For women It "goes up to 80%", where does it start then? The numbers, what do they mean?
Usually when numbers are presented that way it's because there are many studies they looked at. So I presume there was one study showing a rate of 40%, another showing 70% and the rest of the studies fell somewhere in between those two extremes, with differences likely due to types of games, types of systems, and any number of other factors, including chance. They could have just averaged all the studies and quoted a number like 55% for example, but I think the other way actually paints a better picture of the data. It's still possible they're full of shit, but just presenting the numbers like that doesn't mean they're pulling it out of their ass.
This isn't even lies, damned lies, and statistics territory - it's just nothing. I know VR motion sickness exists (I still get it even after an uncomfortable amount of time in SteamVR sometimes) but that's... that's not anything
There's also different levels of VR. I can get sick with 3 degrees of freedom (pitch, yaw, and roll) if I move around with it on. But with 6 degrees (also includes movement along all 3axes), I'm peachy.
My best friend gets sick watching video games on a TV, but she does fine with 6DOF VR because it's the disconnect between the motion she sees and what her body experiences that's the problem
Yeah, if those numbers are anywhere near accurate I have had a significant outlier in my demos to the public so far. I have had less than 5% of the hundreds of people even get mildly nauseous. To get numbers like they are, I would have to cherry pick the worst possible experiences and not prep anyone at all.
"VR" doesn't make most people throw up, being a terrible host might, but honestly even in that scenario I find their numbers hard to believe. Considering at least 30% of people are completely immune to it and don't even need to be eased in at all. And another 30% would take a few hours of worst case scenario to get to a point where throwing up is even on the table. So unless they are specifically trying to provoke the worst possible response, their numbers aren't even possible.
I wish more people who thought they couldn't handle VR had come to me first. Or any responsible host.
1990s: VR is the future. Put these on!
2000s: VR is the future. Put these on!
2010s: VR is the future. Put these on!
2020s: VR is the future. Put these on!
It's almost as if we shouldn't listen to the marketing types that are trying to sell a product, but rather what the end users say.
I remember trying VR in the 90s: from the VirtualBoy to expensive and bulky setups in malls. I've tried 3D TV, google cardboard, and the range of consumer VR across the decades. They were all fundamentally flawed and like everyone else I was jaded. Then I tried what the 2020s had to offer.
My take away is that the technology available has finally reached the point where consumer VR is starting to become viable. We're seeing the first real prototypes that have the capacity to evolve into something practical. It's still expensive, bulky, and limited -- but the fundamental issues that plagued previous generations of VR have mostly been addressed.
They really really want to sell us new trinkets.
In my mind they look like little Goblins or Ferengi who dream about all the other VR related stuff people can start buying when finally VR headsets become common.
Some people even get sick just from the wrong FoV and motion speed combination in 3D games, this is just 10 times worse.
I easily get motion sick with first person games, so I can't imagine what VR must be like. My only recourse, however, is imagination because I have a nerve disorder in my face, which makes it extremely sensitive and I can't wear VR gear because of it. I'm far from alone when it comes to people with health issues and VR.
First person games also make me motion sick, for lack of a better word, because I’ve got permanently screwed proprioception (so less “sick,” more “horribly dizzy”), so I’ve never even dared try VR. I feel like the market is a lot more limited than companies might think it is.
I actually wonder if proprioception has a lot to do with it. We pretty much use all of our senses with proprioception, and they are more limited by VR. No matter how good the eye tracking is, there will still be big blind spots and no matter how good the 3D sound is, it still won't quite replicate how real sound moves between your ears. And then, of course, you have the illusion of walking without moving your leg muscles. This won't change for a while. Not without major technological advances in VR gear.
I also cannot play 1st person games for this same reason. But oddly enough, VR games actually make me feel less motion sick than flat 1st person games do.
I'm pretty sure that Meta is the only company that thought there's a big market for VR, and even they seem to be giving up on it. Apple's device seems more oriented to giving you a private workspace than a real virtual world - like a big array of virtual monitors to replace actual hardware - and that avoids the worst motion sickness triggers. Of course, their device is also priced far out of mass market.
The most popular applications for VR are all games, and even the gaming companies are doing very little development in that space. Fewer people think VR will be a big thing than thought 3D TV would be a big thing.
I did have motion sickness at first but got used to it quite quickly. It actually disappeared on the 2nd/3rd day of use I think. I have absolutely no problem driving race sims all day long if needed, I’ve been using my VR gear for 3 years now.
Yup, just gotta get used to it and the feeling goes away after a session or two
The trick is not forcing it -- the instant someone feels even remotely nauseous they should stop. If you the user starts actually feeling sick they're liable to sensitize themselves to motion sickness.
I am highly susceptible to motion-sickness and figured I'd need to test drive before spending $200+ on some new VR gear.
I suspected this was a problem.
I see VR arcades in suburban malls fairly often, maybe give that a shot first. The VOID experiences were great but they went out of business during the pandemic.
You just need a bit of knowledge that is tough to get without knowing it exists.
The main component of VR games that causes problems for people is when the motion in game doesn't match the motion you are really doing. There are plenty of games that don't have any of that. And even when you are ready to start trying games with that, you can overcome it if you experience it bit by bit. Just play until you start to get a warm/sweaty face or a bit dizzy feeling, then go do something else for a bit. You will build up the time it takes to trigger that feeling and it will be more mild as you keep training out of it.
I've been demoing to people for 10 years and have had less than 5% of people even get mildly nauseous during a demo, even fewer recently. The methodology of the test in the article can't have been anything other than them picking the worst possible experience and having people endure it for an hour or until they felt sick with no explanation of what to look out for. Since 30% of people are literally completely immune no matter how bad their test could have possible been.
Even back with the DK2 and the crappy choices for software back then it was still pretty uncommon to make someone sick, and usually it was either my fault or a hardware issue rather than something that could be attributed to VR as a whole.
I am never sick when doing roller coasters or reading in a moving car, but I was really nauseous after my first 15-min VR session. I was pretty scared I fucked up buying a Valve Index only to get that much sick playing... But I had a feeling (hope?) that I could get used to it: After about 2 weeks of playing a bit every night I was no longer getting sick at all. I can go until the controllers run out of battery now.
To me the effort was worth it, but I have a friend that was the opposite and didn't enjoy experiencing virtual worlds that way...
My advice: If you ever try it then try to ignore the sickness -as you can get used to it- and focus on how much you enjoy being immersed in virtual worlds.
HTC, Valve, and Oculus (well before the Facebook buyout) established very early on that frame rates of 90 fps or higher with a response time of <1 ms were critical factors for preventing motion sickness. Meta either hasn't gotten the memo or just doesn't care.
Even with well-established VR legs, I start feeling unpleasant if my FPS starts dropping below 75 for extended periods of time.
Aside from that, it's also down to game development. I've been seeing newer, inexperienced VR developers creating scenes that don't take into consideration how our brains perceive motion; and they end up creating some nausea-inducing scenes or game mechanics, in addition to doing things like shoving your head onto the floor or through an object. The easiest example is pressing into a wall or table, and the colliders shove your head and body back when you're not expecting it.
As much as I want VR to be awesome, I've had motion sickness from playing Portal while sitting at a desk. Consequently, I think this is just one of those technologies that I have to be happy for other people to enjoy.
I couldn't play portal 2 either (never tried 1). Made me sad knowing how awesome it's supposed to be.
I managed to make it through both in a weekend or so, but it was rough.
For those with nausea, I've had some good results with ginger candy. Something chewable that is comprised entirely of ginger.
I take it with me whenever I give a demo somewhere.
Works in seconds.
Look for sea sickness remedies, you should find ginger chewing gum. Chewing gum itself reduces motion sickness and at least if you follow this study peppermint is actually more effective -- though ginger itself (without the chewing part) is known to be effective so have you salt shaker ready to sprinkle on their sample size.
Try stuff and see what works for you, it's not like you're injecting chemotherapy meds.
As you get older, ginger is basically a cure for most things, and I've gone from hating it to craving ginger whenever I feel down.
Ginger candy and ginger beer are fantastic, as long as you're using the stuff without sweeteners. Sadly, some brands load their stuff with lots of additives and artificial sweeteners to save costs/reduce sugar.
A suggestion that worked for me was to have a fan blowing on you while playing.
I went on a a VR rollercoaster with my new girlfriend (asian) at a amusement park where they move the cart according to the movement in VR.
She was totally OK, and I was totally wet of sweat, down to my underwear. I really almost puked.
But I have that problem even on a bus and in a car as a passenger (so I basically always drive if possible). Big ships, trains and airplanes are totally ok.
When I was about 9 I had to puke on the bus and my dad didn't want to have to clean the buss so he let me puke into the pocket of his jacket 🤪
What does your gf being Asian have anything to do with this?
Because the article said that women have a higher chance to feel sick and Asian people have also a higher chance, and she is the combination of being a woman and being Asian, and despite that not having any problems. I thought it was noteworthy.
My girlfriend (asian 4'5, big booba)
Owned by a guy that actually read the article we are discussing. Story of my life
Chad dad
I never felt sick from just VR, but the continuous movement (rather than teleporting) made my brain confused like I wanted to fall over, but after a few hours of it I got used to it for good and now have no problems with VR, other than fatigue of moving around so much aha.
I think most people could break it in, but are reluctant to keep playing or play again once they feel sick doing it. While its easy to get immersed, you have to disconnect yourself from it a bit and remember you are in the real world, when friends and family try it I have to make sure they dont walk into walls, but on my own I have full awareness of my surroundings even when I am blind to it. It just takes time to get used to it.
It's a really fun experience, I hope it keeps getting developed regardless of sickness issues. Higher framerates are definitely important, the 120Hz mode on the Index is definitely recommended, any lower and its much more likely to be sickness inducing.
I think most people could break it in, but are reluctant to keep playing or play again once they feel sick doing it.
The article author reports trying twice: first a rollercoaster, and then a racing game. Then cites a study about people getting sick in their first 15 minutes of use.
I think you're right, but some people just aren't going to give it another try. I think this tech is likely to be one of those big generational dividers that old people just won't tolerate (like computers or cell phones, or the thousands of prior things).
Yeah for most people getting the desire to throw up is going to prevent any future use of VR. Even if it's known to get better after it's still a case of "Oh it gets better, you just haven't suffered enough yet" which is a deal people understandably don't want to take
I bought a Vive since I was careless and wanted to see what the VR hype was. Considering that I've probably used it less than 100 hours in about 4 years, I think of it as a bad investment.
In its current technologically limited state, VR feels more like a gimmick than a real experience. I think that all of what VR is currently trying to do is still waiting for that uninvented Star Trek holodeck technology to come around anyway. Headsets and wands are unwieldy and breaking down/setting up the system is a PITA.
The Quest is really easy to use since you don't need external sensors, but it's underpowered and also from Facebook.
We need wider FOV and better screens. The controllers are okay I think. Hopefully with apple stepping in we get more desperately needed content.
The OG Vive is a really horrible experience compared to modern VR headsets already. There are incredible technological advancements being made and to say all VR is doing is waiting for some Star Trek technology is incredibly ignorant. And frankly an insult to those super talented engineers that are breaking new ground on a yearly basis.
Sorry if I sounded disrespectful to the brilliant people working on this tech. I don't mean to say they aren't making insane progress in the field. However, I stand by the main point of my original comment: until VR makes a lightyear jump in tech and frees itself of the headset and the wands/hand pieces (or minimizes them to the point of negligible discomfort), I won't be sold on VR as a consumer.
It really depends on the person and the hardware. I've seen people with PC-VR setups that get sick, but are 100% okay with wireless. I think it's an issue of FOV, FPS, and overall just getting used to wearing a big box on your face.
I see a ton of people shitting on VR because they get sick, saying that it's just a gimmick and it'll pass. I think it's a neat piece of tech that deserves to get better, hopefully the issues will be ironed out over the generations.
First person shooters already make some people feel nauseous. It's the disconnect between your vision telling you that you're moving while everything else, especially your balance centers, saying you're not.
VR kinda makes it even worse if you're not on some 2D treadmill
I am a victim of this. It sucks.
Most of them throw up because of the motion. With what I've seen of Metaverse, I can understand that they throw up because of the content, too.
"Metaverse" is not equivalent to VR. VR is its own thing independent of Meta-shit.
A big part of reducing motion sickness for me was to ensure that the lenses were set to the appropriate pupillary distance. If they're too wide or to narrow, that can affect your body's ability to handle VR
Also idk if it plays a role, but I now know that it's absolutely necessary to have your contact lenses or at least glasses on when playing.
So pretty much like playing Hexen 2 on a P100 in 1997 huh.
Haven't heard about the game "Hexen" in years!!!
Today l learned that some people get motion sickness from playing flatscreen games. How do you even survive a car? Let alone an airplane?
Being in a car or aeroplane is totally different from playing a game, VR or otherwise. The motion sickness is a result of a mismatch between the sense of your own motion from what you are seeing, and the sense of your own motion from your inner-ear (which is basically an accelerometer).
In a car or an aeroplane, as long as you are looking at the window then there is no problem. (But often people get car-sick if they try to read a book or something, because then they can't see the motion - they can only feel it.) But in a game, you can see the motion but not feel it - so that can also give motion sickness.
Many modern first-person games have an option for 'mouse smoothing' (or something similar), and that generally help reduce or eliminate motion sickness.
The problem is in a car, your body is actually moving and your sense of movement aligns with what your eyes are seeing. I'm not an expert but there's something about fluid in your ears moving?
When it comes to gaming on a flat screen, your eyes are interpreting movement but you are not moving. This, from my understanding is what causes the motion sickness.
I can't use these VR headsets because they make me sick and give me migraines. I'm just fine playing on a TV or monitor though.
I would get so incredibly sick when playing the original wolfenstein and Doom. But I could play halo for hours. Really weird
Some people don't. That's why air sickness bags exist.
I'm super glad I'm not one of them... I will baselessly credit the Nintendo 3DS with developing that skill
I only play standing games that stick within the confines of room scale, that way all my movements are natural.
When I play other games, it's teleport or nothing, no other locomotion form works for my, my sense of balance is to sensitive, and I haven't had the time to work to get used to it.. and swinging on vines is way out no.
Curiously I also get severe motion sickness when I drive go karts, but not when I drive cars. Although, sitting in the passenger seat, especially the rear seats, however can be a problem sometimes if I'm going around windy roads)
So not a problem at all?
Ikr? Lmao
I'm young and have played computer games since childhood, I never bought a VR headset cause anything more than 20 minutes and I feel dizzy as fuck.
VR needs an overhaul for me to actually buy into it, I honestly just think the headsets aren't going to work, I don't think a higher refresh rate will fix this
I'm not sold on the gaming side of it but I loved my quest for movies. I'm planning to buy another one one day and it's something that I'll consider essential for old age retirement.
"... and that's a huge problem for the companies behind it."
Thank you for clarifying.
They could market it to anorexic people and make a profit. Puking while having fun.
Sorry, I'll let myself out.
I used to get sick but it goes away with time.
Yeah of all the people I know that rushed out to get vr none of them mention it now, a lot of streamers I watch did a video or two then have never done another one. It's such a great idea but also so many issues to work around.
I think most people don't really want to be totally immersed, I like just relaxing watching some YouTube and playing games, having a snack and a drink, chatting to friends on my phone... a game has to be so much better if it's going to hold my full attention but pretty much universally vr games are far worse than their screen based versions - hitman vr for example, there's a million videos of people playing and laughing at how bad it is and almost none actually playing properly
IMO, the biggest limitations are the fact that it's not quite there yet for resolution/graphics, and the devices are still a bit oppressive. If I could read text in VR and the goggles weren't much more than my prescription glasses, I'd be using it a lot more. Would be cool to even just get rid of monitors and have all my workspaces VR.
But now, I have to don this unwieldy wired thing on my head, fiddle around for the wands blindly, and everything is kinda fuzzy. It's an exhausting experience.
There are actually very good games that don't have these problems. For example Beat Sabre and the likes. Or Moss etc.
You get used to it. It helps to have a good graphics card so that the frame rate is high enough. I am sad many good games don't support VR. I.e. Start Citizen, Cyberpunk 2077, etc. Yes, there are mods for it, but it should be supported natively (if mods can do it, why can't the developer?). It is just so much more immersive to be able to look around naturally and see stereoscopic.
the developers don't do it because they know barely anyone will buy the game just because it also supports VR. it's just not worth the money.
plus, people will eventually make a mod anyways, and they are completely fine with benefiting from random people's unpaid work. Who wouldn't take all the upsides without any of the downsides?
if mods can do it, why can't the developer?
Because it's not worth it to waste budget and time on a feature used by 0.01% of your playerbase.
In the case of Star Citizen, they used to support it, but since the game is still being actively developed in the alpha stage it kept breaking. Not worth the time and money to keep fixing it, so they put it on hold. As far as I know, they still plan to support it after the main feature set is stabilized and they go into polishing mode.
But I agree, it would be great if it still/already had native support.
VR has very little appeal to me.
The only time I've ever felt nauseous playing VR games is when the game has sliding locomotion instead of teleport. When the whole world moves like I'm walking but I'm not actually walking, it feels like everything is slipping and creates nausea.
Meanwhile I'm over here still wanting to try it out.
The closest I've ever gotten was trying out virtual boy when it was brand new in stores and had one set up for people to try out.
I'd love to try it before buying. Not really interested in buying without it, but that's not how things work anymore. So I guess I'm just gonna skip it unless it gets massively popular and it's just everywhere and I'm stuck missing out on something huge if I don't have it.
Some best buy stores have demos in the US where you can try it out for a bit. I honestly find the social aspects to be the most interesting part of VR (and I'm not a people person). A 10 minute demo isn't probably going to completely sell you on VR but they can answer questions etc.
Well apparently mine doesn't. But I really don't go there anyway. I went there for something specific a while ago to buy for someone else, but in general everything they would have I can get cheaper online somewhere else. Their online store occasionally has a good deal tho. If they had a demo for it I'd go to check it out tho.
It isn't a problem with screen technology or processing technology or anything like that. We aren't going to "tech" our way out of this.
It is a biological problem and as such, I think the appeal of VR will always be rather niche.
Even the best selling VR headset that I found online was the Quest 2 and it "only" sold like 15M units (honestly way more than I ever expected) with everything else being considerably lower volume. Compare that to the number of Nintendo Switches sold (130M) and you start to see how small the VR market is. I am very curious to see how the Sony VR2 will end up selling. I would love to get a pair, but I think all these headsets will be short lived.
VR has been around since the 20th Century. It is still here, and the market is expanding with more options as time goes on.
I wanted to play VR games since I saw the first VR stuff in the 90s. Finally got a Valve Index set this year, and it's fuckin' awesome. For all the Quest and Vive users on here saying VR sucks - it's your gear that sucks.
Here's a list of VR games that are fuckin' awesome:
HL Alyx (as everyone already mentioned)
Into the Radius (S.T.A.L.K.E.R. in VR)
Grapple Tournament (UT2004 with grappling hooks in VR)
Dragon Fist Kung Fu (kung fu fighting in VR duh)
Blade and Sorcery (swords and sorcery)
Battle Talent (ripoff of Blade and Sorcery that is also cool)
Assetto Corsa (racing sim)
DCS World (flight sim)
Beat Saber (music chopping)
I don't know man. Feels like the whole damn field of medicine does just that. It fixes body problems with (medical) technology.
I would not at all be surprised if later we find a certain framerate or fov reduces motion sickness. Or maybe there's some device that will go over our ears to trick our equilibrium from getting confused. Or maybe really good head tracking fixes it...
I think it's more likely than not that we do "tech" our way out of it - just in some unforeseen way.
Only one way to find out, I guess. But still, a lot of this stuff comes from the high end that eventually trickles down, and I've never heard any discoveries that claim to have solved the problem. You'd think that since the military would be all over this tech, their limitless budgets would have stated they have sickness-free headsets. But in all these years, nothing.
Maybe we just aren't built to experience motion in this way.
I can spend hours doing VR, prefer standing but some games are sitting. High paced jumping/spinning/flipping games. Elite dangerous, Sorento (sp), robo recall, windlands. No issue of sickness at any point, even with fps drops and frame hangs
Good for you, I could do all that on a ship out at sea using a laptop with a 1070 and a wired headsetand and could also not get sick.
Doesn't change the fact that literally like half the people I ever tried to introduce to VR have immediately felt violently sick to their stomach within minutes and some did try to get over it. With multiple attempts.
I’m a game developer who had a chance to create a VR game. I have to admit, VR was not my cup of tea at first. It gave me a terrible headache and nausea for hours after playing for a short time. But I was determined to overcome it and I kept practicing. Now I can enjoy VR for hours without any issues. I think kids will be fascinated by VR as well, even if they have some initial discomfort. They will be amazed by the simple games that make them feel like they’re in a different reality. VR is not about making games that look like real life, like Call of Duty. It’s about making games that let you explore new worlds and possibilities. Imagine playing games that involve sports or exercise in VR, or games that let you interact with 3D characters that have realistic personalities thanks to LLM AI. You could make friends and connections with them instead of fighting them. That would be awesome, right?
You think people forming personal connections with AIs instead of real people is a good thing?
I'm in the group that gets violently sick using VR. It also induces blinding migraines. Oddly, I don't get car/air/seasick.
I read this as "40-70% of VR developers don't know what they are doing". What needs to be done to avoid motion sickness has been known for a long while now.
Clearly they need to understand how... much data they can manipulate at once
I'm honestly curious about the science behind why VR makes some people motion sick. My first time using VR I never got motion sick once and never have since then. And my sister on the other hand got motion sick instantly when she tried it.
Edit: Fixed my atrocious spelling, must've been high or something.
The science is vestibular mismatch and your personal sensitivity to it. There are plenty of options for VR activities with no mis-matched movement. And there are plenty of people that can handle a mismatch without any problems.
Basically your inner ear and your eyes are disagreeing about what is happening, and historically when that happened to humans, it was because they ate the poisonous berries. So eventually the people who randomly had the gene where that mismatch leads to throwing up were more likely to live to procreate.
But the brain can be trained, if you are susceptible to VR sickness, play until you start to feel the first minimal symptoms (varies per person, but commonly; warm face, inexplicably sweaty face, or mild dizziness) then immediately take a break. As you continue to do so successfully you'll notice the response takes longer to come into play and is milder when it does. And if "the berries" keep not killing you, your brain will assume you know what you are doing and don't need to be protected. But every time it does get too bad, or worse does lead to throwing up, it will reinforce that your brain saved you and it will start coming on more quickly and strongly. Still totally reversible, but best to avoid it if possible.
There are some people who don't have the response to start with, in my experience it has a surprisingly strong corellation to people with autism, which was nice for us autistics in early VR. We had the whole place to ourselves, hehe. But hopefully we never have to actually worry about poison berries.
Damn thats really interesting. I don't have autism myself but have never had issues with VR at any point so I guess I'm just lucky. Apreciate the write up!
I'm just as surprised when people say they don't get it. Locomotion is the thing that makes me sick. 1:1 room scale walking? No prob. Teleporting, cool. Joystick movement? Taking a ride on the Vomit express.
I almost got motion sickness just trying to read your comment.
Lol I didn't realize how bad it was until I read your comment, fixed haha.
start chewing bubblegum (with mint) if you have issues with vr, it sounds stupid but it really helps
Or take a Dramamine - it is identical to sea sickness. Treat it that way.
Your body will eventually get used to being on the sea if you do it even slightly correctly. Same with VR.
But I don't see why for example my Grandma is gonna do that, or my neighbor.
It's cool but it isn't that cool, and I say that as someone with 2000+ hours in VR with arguably the best VR headset (Index).
Or take a Dramamine - it is identical to sea sickness. Treat it that way.
I would go with chewing gum, less invasive ;)
Are they just using shitty headsets, such as the Oculus ones? I've never had this issue with HTC Vive OR Valve Index...
I think it's more likely they made a game that was just poorly designed for VR, moving players when they don't expect it a lot and the like.
Uh Quest is better than the Vive 😅
there are pros/cons to each brand, plus there are tons of models across each product line. I own many headsets (index, vive original, vive xr elite, oculus dk2, quest 2) and honestly I can't say any one of them is the best as each is unique from the screens (oled VS not), wired/wireless, full body tracking, standalone VS pc, comfort, etc.
That being said, I personally go for the vive over quest as it has more accurate tracking (laser VS camera), full body tracking, better screens (OLED), and works better with steamvr.
Plus as a VRChat user I can use vive advanced controls which is a godsend for expressing yourself in VR, other controllers just don't have as much flexibility in terms of mixing expressions and being able to set intensity levels to each expression ingame.
Depends if you look at the manufacturer behind it. But hardware wise, it is indeed better.
I do think they mean the standalone vs PC powered.
How many have the same issue with regular FPS games? Since Half Life 2 on a monitor (pre-FOV patch) was worse than any VR game I played so far.
No motion sickness, but most VR games make me disorientated after a while and I just don't enjoy them very much. They're fun for a couple of hours once in a great while, but I never see myself doing it as a daily hobby.
Let’s see if vision pro holds up against this number with it’s special chip.
I doubt the hardware will make a difference. Motion sickness is almost completely down to software design at this point, unless you running 90s VR headset at like 15fps. Low-persistence and 90fps took care of hardware induced motion sickness for anybody except the most sensitive people[1].
What makes VisionPro not have motion sickness issues for now is that it completely avoids any form of locomotion. Everything they have shown so far is standing/sitting in place with some 2D apps around you. That doesn't make anybody sick on PCVR or Quest either. What makes people sick is fast action games that have your character running around a virtual space. Apple so far has shown nothing doing that. Once they start having games that require people moving around in virtual spaces, the motion sickness will return, though I expect them to cut down on that with store policy until VR has established itself some more.
[1] PSVR2 turns into a high-persistence display when the brightness is cranked up, that still causes issues for some.
Good point, apple is in fact limiting devs to design full VR apps only in a 1.5 meters sphere around the head, until the Vision Pro turns on AR mode again.
Marques has reported that when he tried it, there was a AR presentation where T-rex comes through the a wall and walks towards you even if you move. Like, it adjusted it’s path and turned towards him, but maybe I understood that wrong.
I had to Google what this even was, and I've been into VR since the beginning...
Real talk: Apple's fans aren't into this... They just want the same shit as last year (a phone) with a higher model number.
Apple stopped selling to people interested in innovation around a decade ago. We moved on, and let me tell you... We were BIG fans after the first iPhone. They sold out. It's that simple.
Have you watched reviews of people who were allowed to test it? They are mind blowed about how real the AR feels with the fast refresh rate the vision pro achieves. Additionally, they told, that they dis not recognize any drift (e.g. placing something on a table in AR, looking away and looking back, the thing you placed is exactly on the place you put it). Any other AR device yet has this problem according to the reviewers I watched. Many say that too slow refresh rate, too low resolution and the drift are the 3 major things which cause motion sickness. That is way I am looking forward to see reactions of average non techy people. Between, I heard from a lot of apple fanboys (and girls of course) with too much money, that they will buy one (or two including one for the loved ones) and replace the TVs and their monitors with it. And if that really is Working, you may safe more money on those screens, than you spend on a Vision pro.
VR still sucks, but didnt boats make people want to throw up. Then trains, then cars. They still do sometimes, but it'll be worth it
I think the challenge is that with transportation, there are approaches to reduce the impact such as looking at the horizon, sitting in the front where the motion impact isn't as severe, etc. With VR there's less way around it, and fewer ways to redirect your perception (yet). Which is why the percentages are higher than car users
I know I'm not really in a virtual world. A helmet isn't going to fool me.
Women, as mentioned previously, are more likely than men to get VR sick. Asian people are more likely than other ethnicities to experience motion sickness in general.
It doesn't make sense. Also, I can't see any scientific evidence or sources that underpins this article mentioned. It's kinda racist, in a sense.
This proved to be a fact. My apologies.
You've got to get used to using new technologies. When iPhone was first introduced, people confused that there's no button to control things in the screen. The same thing is happening here.
You could actually look it up rather than just call it racist and remain ignorant.
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1369847819306539
look at section 3.3
I get sick playing 1st person shooters. Like thief back in the day. Not even in a headset....literally sitting there. So it's not about getting used to technologies.
You will get used to it, if you do that several times, but I understand that 1st person shooter cause dizziness sometimes.
VR is like flying cars. It's a stupid idea that sounds cool.
What we can do about feeling sick is to ignore VR and never use it again.
Posted this reply in another instance, but several years ago researchers found that adding a virtual nose dramatically decreased motion sickness. However, I haven't seen any developers adding one in games. I wonder if it'd help.
When the camera movies without me physically moving, I am throwing up immediately. Do you mean a virtual nose would fix that?
Potentially, yeah. Here's an article I found talking about the research: https://www.purdue.edu/newsroom/releases/2015/Q1/virtual-nose-may-reduce-simulator-sickness-in-video-games.html
Yeah instead of throwing up immediately, you won't throw up until 2.2 seconds in. Problem solved!
I wonder if that is why Voldemort is so angry all the time. It's because he's nauseous.
Outside of that news article, I have literally never seen a single VR game use a virtual nose.
Eagle Flight uses it, but it is a beak instead of a nose.
Like with everything, it would cause an uproar in the game world unless it were controllable. I wonder if it would also require sacrificing some usable pixels? If virtual noses take off, I can see video games being designed around them, but it’s possible that integrating one into existing games is harder. Games have a development lead time measured in years so fundamental changes take a while to integrate.