Hasta La Gadget!

We’ve seen a number of games modded to work on the Oculus Rift over the past couple of weeks with Mirror’s Edge, Team Fortress 2 and Skyrim being among the most popular games. But one of the cooler, and probably the most cruel, piece of software that was developed for the Oculus Rift has got to be Disunion.

Disunion is a guillotine simulator developed by André Berlemont, Erkki Turmmal and Morten Brunbjerg which was developed in only two days and offers its user (or victim) a first-person view of what it’s like to get your head cut off. Their demo video not only shows brief glimpses of Disunion in action, but the team also takes the demonstration one step further by chopping at the neck of the person wearing the Oculus Rift. (more…)

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The Oculus Rift isn’t even out yet, but there’s already an emulator made for it. Or perhaps it’s precisely because the virtual reality headset isn’t out yet that this emulator came about. The program’s name is vbjin-ovr, an offshoot of a Nintendo Virtual Boy emulator for Windows called vbjin. Nope, I didn’t know that existed either. But I’m sure some 90s kid out there is beside himself with joy.

Here’s a screencast of YouTuber Cymatic Bruce playing a Japanese horror game called Innsmouth Mansion.

I doubt that I’ll ever get past the Virtual Boy’s horrible red on black graphics, but overall the emulator’s existence alone merits documentation. Plus Cymatic seemed really into it. Are you among the lucky few who already own an Oculus Rift dev kit? Get the Virtual Boy emulator here.

[via Joystiq]

The latest in the Elder Scrolls series of video games from Bethesda, dubbed Skyrim, has been ported over to the new Oculus Rift virtual reality headset. YouTube user Chris Gallizzi uploaded a two-minute-long video demoing how the game works with the new Kickstarter-funded VR goggles, and also provided a bit of details along the way.

The video itself isn’t too action-packed, but it gives you an idea of what a game like Skyrim would look like through a pair of Oculus Rift virtual reality goggles. Gallizzi used Vireio Perception drivers to make the port possible, which are a set of drivers that also support Left 4 Dead, Mirror’s Edge, and Half-Life 2.

Gallizzi said that he tested out the port for around eight hours and didn’t experience any problems along the way, proving that triple-A video games are certainly ready for the virtual reality treatment. As far as his experience with the Oculus Rift itself, Gallizzi said he did get vertigo for a short while when dealing with high altitudes in games, but he notes that he’s “a believer” when it comes to VR.

Gallizzi says that the Oculus Rift is a “step in the right direction,” mentioning that it “brings something new to the living room that was only joked about in sci-fi novels.” With modern video games involving only sitting on the couch and moving your thumbs (or just standing and waving your arms with Kinect or the Wii), the Oculus Rift certainly does add a new element to the video gaming experience.

[via Kotaku]

Skyrim gets demoed on Oculus Rift VR headset is written by Craig Lloyd & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

Combine the Oculus Rift virtual reality headset with the Virtuix Omni omnidirectional treadmill and you have access to a fully immersive gaming experience. In a video released by Virtuix, a former marine uses both the Omni and the Rift to play Team Fortress 2. The demonstration shows how using the Omni and Rift can make playing games much more entertaining and much more intense.

Not only does the Rift and Omni make you feel like you’re actually part of the action, it lets you kill two birds with one stone by letting you play your favorite games in virtual reality while also giving you a good workout. With the Omni, you can walk, run, or step into any direction and your feedback will be captured by the game. As of right now, your movement is tracked by Microsoft’s Kinect, however, in the future, Virtuix plans on integrating a tracking solution inside of the Omni.

Another factor that is currently be worked on with the Omni is running speed. The speed at which you run on the treadmill does not match your speed in-game. Omni says that that feature “will come in due time.” Goetgeluk says that playing Team Fortress 2 with the Rift and Omni felt so real that it makes the game much more entertaining and intense. He says,

“The action feels like real running. The immersion is intense. I had a former Marine try HL2 yesterday, and he was slightly shaking.”

The Rift and the Omni have gamers all around excited for the products to launch. These two new pieces of equipment shows off “the future of gaming”, and the video was more than enough to convince consumers to purchase these products when they become available. Team Fortress 2 will be the Oculus Rift’s first virtual reality game, but there will be plenty more on their way. Get ready to play your favorite games how you’ve always wanted to play them.

[via Road to VR]

Oculus Rift and Omnidirectional treadmill show the future of gaming is written by Brian Sin & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

Mirror’s Edge is a first person action game that allows the player to perform parkour in order to navigate their way around the game. If you’re the sort of person who suffers from motion sickness, then chances are Mirror’s Edge is not really for you. However for those who love the game and thought it’d be cool if they could actually perform the stunts themselves, you’re sort of in luck because it seems that the game has been modded in order to play nice with the Oculus Rift Virtual Reality headset, a device which at the moment supports a handful of games, Team Fortress 2 being one of them.

For those unfamiliar with Oculus Rift, this is a virtual reality headset that creates a more immersive gaming experience by making the player feel like they’re there. At the moment the Oculus Rift headset is not as widely available yet, so that means not many gamers will have a chance to experience what this is like, but you can go ahead and check it out in the video nonetheless to get a rough idea. Once again, for those who suffer from motion sickness easily or who are prone to headaches, this is a video you might want to pass on.

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