Hasta La Gadget!

The Oculus Rift has been available to developers for quite some time now, and it’s been out in the ether long enough that there are plenty of demos and games that have been made, but there’s no central place to get all of these fine creations, until now. Oculus has launched Share, a new app […]

Gamers and game developers alike are excited about the potential of the Oculus Rift headset and the Virtuix Omni walking surface. But these virtual reality devices have applications beyond gaming. The Human Interfaces Group of NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory used both devices to make simulations of space environments.

In an interview with Engadget, Human Interfaces Engineer Victor Luo said that they used a stereoscopic 360º panorama of Mars taken by Curiosity, satellite imagery of the red planet and development kits of the Rift and Omni to create an immersive virtual tour of Mars (or at least part of it). They also made a similar experiment for the interior of the International Space Station, but they used the Rift by itself to emphasize the feeling of floating in zero gravity.

While the experiment showed the potential of VR, Luo also said that they needed devices that had more sensors built-in before they can consider actually using them as tools. At the very least, I think their experiments can inspire a couple of VR games. Watch out for Curiosity Simulator and Dead Space: ISS. Oh wait, we already have the first one.

[via Engadget via Destructoid]

Elon Musk wants to live on Mars, but he probably won’t have the pleasure. And you aren’t likely to either. But here’s the next best thing, thanks to the help of the Oculus Rift and Virtuix Omni. Walk the red planet, without giving up the rest of your life to do it.

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The original Paperboy was ahead of its time. While other arcade games in the 80s featured spaceships or medieval warriors, Paperboy only had, well, a paperboy. So it’s fitting that this homage to the game uses cutting edge technology. PaperDude VR harnesses the powers of the Oculus Rift, the Kinect and the Kickr power trainer, even though you can achieve a more realistic experience with, I don’t know, a bicycle and rolls of paper.

PaperDude VR is a pet project of Globacore, a company that specializes in interactive installations. Globacore is making the game using Unity and Photoshop. The game requires you to throw virtual newspapers at mailboxes to score points. As with Paperboy, you have to do this without crashing your bicycle, only this time you’re actually pedaling on a bike. The Kickr detects your speed and can adjust the bike to make it easier or harder to pedal. The Oculus Rift provides 360º visibility and the Kinect tracks your hands and arms.

Globacore said they’re planning to improve PaperDude VR by adding features like obstacles and other nuisances to avoid, an online leaderboard and even a replica of the training course at the end of levels in Paperboy.

[via Prosthetic Knowledge]

The only thing nerdier than keeping an old NES hooked up to your TV to play your favorite old games is recreating your favorite old games using virtual reality equipment. That’s exactly what this crew of programmers did recently with Paperboy.

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