I’m never making another VR game.
Last year, I made a VR game about moving through a level as enemies spawned to a beat. It was an experiment to see whether or not moving a player along automatically would cause any form of motion sickness. It wasn’t the most full-featured thing, but it did prove a point. That said, I wanted to go further with the idea.
This year’s game is a two-level game that expands on the ideas a bit, focusing on a more traditional action game format. In terms of player handling, the weapon system has been improved. You can now eject your magazine at any time and put in a fresh one, allowing for tactical reloads. You now have semi-functioning hands, although no real use for them. And you can now switch weapons. The new gun is an SMG I made.
Switching weapons actually involves putting your hand on different parts of your body and pressing the right grip. My understanding is that Boneworks already had a similar system, so it’s not as novel of an idea as I thought, but my implementation works well enough.
As for the levels themselves: The first level is a standard action level where the player moves through a dance club as enemies spawn around them. There’s a part in the middle of the dance floor where the player stops and enemies spawn around them. They then proceed through an office before eventually ending at the last room. Fairly traditional stuff, mostly there just to keep testing that moving the player along doesn’t cause problems.
The second level is the real stress test. The player is standing on the bed of a pickup truck as it drives through a city. Enemy cars spawn as they chase the player, and the player has to shoot them. The increased speed and turning might cause more problems for players, hence why it makes for a good test bed. Originally, there was going to be a helicopter sequence, but in testing that, the up-and-down motion of it made me feel really unwell.
There’s not really much more to it than that. Feel free to give it a go if you have VR.
The SMG that was made for it will be available for purchase at a later date. I need to fix and improve it a bit. There was also another gun that was cut because my friend couldn’t get it done in time due to personal problems. We will get that one ready at an even later date.
So what’s coming up next? Well, a video about 7DFPS to begin with, which I’m currently starting on. After that, the usual end-of-year blog post where I talk about all the games I’ve been playing.
In the new year, things are going to change a bit. I’m going to stop putting unedited first parts of playthroughs on my gaming YouTube channel. It gets bugger all views, and I want to clean out my folders of videos that I, quite frankly, don’t need. I might do more highlight videos or something, or just change the content of the channel entirely.
Global Game Jam is of course coming up. I might join it, but negotiations with the friend I usually do it with have not gone terribly well. I want to use GB Studio to make something, and he wants to use Godot because he hates anything that isn’t 3D. Despite the fact that Godot’s 3D capabilities are less than satisfactory. But we’ll see. I might be able to compromise.
Next year is going to be a wild time. Cybersurfer needs to start being a lot more playable; early access by next year is a goal for me. But it’s going to be difficult.
-Adam