Hello! I love your game super immerseive! 2 suggestions I was thinking off.
(1) The oculus controllers on my quest have great haptics, it would be great if you could add haptics for reloading a gun, shooting a gun, pulling a lever, etc....! I think that could make it feel even more real!
(2) I understand that the game tries to get a square of space from your guardian. Some spaces are weird and have like a square and a long hall way sticking out. etc, do you ever plan to support non-square spaces? Could be cool to have more real estate to work with.
(1) This actually bugs me a bit because it is there for shooting (after reloading for a shotgun), picking up/touching stuff (although I am not sure if it is for every time you touch something or only for items you can pick up). You have Oculus Rift with standard Touch controllers, right?
(2) Generally speaking, yes it is possible. For time being I want to focus on the game, though. But I have in plans supporting such spaces (and bigger ones!) as it would add a lot. Initially I wanted to do that but decided to do everything with small steps. Have the basics working (generating for rectangular spaces) and then introduce more after a while.
Good thing to know, thanks :) I know that there are two ways to have haptic feedback but implemented just one. It worked on my controllers but I will make sure about that and implement the other too :)
I remember when I bought HTC Vive and I was trying out demos. And after a few teleports I wanted to walk. Just walk, normally. I quickly run into the boundary but I loved the feeling. That night, when I was walking the dog, I realised that I can get the tech that I was developing for a different game (I still want to do that game) and use it for VR.
I totally get what you mean. A lot of the time teleporting or "walking" with the analogue stick just feels wrong. There's been a lot if cool movement mechanics in vr games yet this is the first time I've seen just simple walking and it works brilliantly. A couple of other smaller things I liked are the way the robots are designed and how you can interact with them in other ways than just shooting them. I love the way the guns extend and retract into your hand. The 1 second-long process feels so natural and fluid I find myself doing it over and over again because it just feels cool.
No. I plan to move to early access in a few months. Probably even then I will be releasing free demo builds which will show new stuff but will have some limitations.
I will have to say "stop" eventually but there are so many things that can be added. Most likely I will just stop adding them, finish the game, release it and then continue to add stuff as updates.
I try to post regularly and have a new build every two weeks. With Quest build it took more time but I wanted to make it working and available to the people. And now I will be getting a few days off but I still want to have a new build available by the end of July. Follow me here, on twitter, fb :)
Do you have an antivirus soft? If so, which one. I've seen similar things with other apps. Currently my exe is not signed and it doesn't help. I will have to consider getting a certificate.
My antivirus quarantined it without any notification (Bit defender Free) but i use a lot of unsigned apps on a daily basis and this has never happened.
Thanks for the info. I'll check that. I had similar issues with a different app that I was working on. Although I can't remember right now if it was Bitdefender or ByteFence. It was different technology, was build on a designated computer. It really gets down to specific parts of the code that are taken for malware.
Hi! Amazing game so far, I love it! I did try casting to my phone via the quest app though, and was met with a "this app is not supported for casting" message. Any ideas?
I've run into that when I was showing it to my wife and wanted to see what she was seeing. It might be some setting missing or an event not handled. Added that to the list and will fix it.
Did you try 0.3.9 #186? I checked that on Vive, Rift running with both Oculus and SteamVR and it was ok. If it wasn't for you, there has to be some other bug.
MAN you are a GENIUS! This is my favorite game for QUEST so far and is only a beta version.... publish a full version of this and you will be rich. Easily I will pay 40-50 euros for a full game like this. Rarely spend so much on games. This is innovative and really immersive. Please go ahead and finish this into a game.
That's the plan. Getting there step by step. The next bigger things on the list are related to weapons and other customisations. That's when the core gameplay should start to click.
EASILY one of the most compelling and innovative VR experiences I've had. The potential for this is absolutely mind-boggling. I turned off my Guardian just so the grid wouldn't keep popping up and it was completely immersive. I'm blown away by this.
I wonder if it will be possible to change how guardian is displayed when not using Developer mode. I wish there would be the same options that are for guardian on PC (Oculus). If not, It's either developer mode or getting a larger space and adding a safety border.
A very unique and innovative game.This has a retro nostalgic feel to it.The game from 1990 out of this world and flashback reminds me of this.What we wanted vr to be in 1980.Its very ,very cool...Jesus is my Lord and Savior !
At the moment only by choosing experience mode. I have a custom mode in plans, which allows you to alter any option there is. There is also a debug menu: when you are in game, you have to take off headset, press 'C' and choose "no reactor"... and do it every time you start, so that's not convenient. I use it for debugging and when showcasing to alter game a bit.
Not yet. But custom mode should be available soon - I want to fix bugs, add a few smaller features that were requested and then continue with gameplay mechanics.
I notice that the game incorrectly determines the game space! I have more space than game zone have in one side (game out of my borders), and less in another side (game inside borders, but a bit far from them). Also, game see much less space in length than I have.
So, can you please fix abovesaid problem?
Adding possibility to resize and move safe borders will be very enough
I'd love to fix it. I need to ask you for a logfile, so I can get a few info (your headset, VR system and few other things). If you could send me a log file (output <date-time>.log from _logs subfolder) to contact@voidroom.com.
It is possible now to adjust playarea although there is no interface exposed to do that - it will be added. I will also add forcing VR system to show bounds when in playarea options, so it is easier to tell if playarea is properly aligned. Right now you would have to force VR system to show bounds manually (not that convenient).
Both open vr (SteamVR) and oculus vr (Oculus) have point 0,0,0 in the middle of playarea and I only read size of it. This way, if there was something wrong, it would stick out of the playarea on both sides. Unless of course something has changed and the centre may be now offset (for oculus mobile vr (eg. Quest) it is possible). I had a few cases when it turned out that the in-game area was stretched beyond but I haven't received the log files :( or it turned out that the vr system required calibration.
First off - this was an amazing experience (apart from the wire getting tangled up - I'm seriously considering getting a Quest just to experience this game better). This was a very fun experience and forcing me to crawl on the floor to avoid getting shot was pure genius.
However I did encounter a similar issue as the OP -
I'm on Oculus Rift CV1 , the size of the play space is correct but misaligned with my guardian border (causing me to "bump" into objects when I reach the limit of my play space.
I sent a mail with the log files and would appreciate if you could tell me how to align the play space to my guardian system.
I will be checking if Oculus may have the play area not centred and how to get info about that (for sure Quest does so and it is handled, but not for PC, OpenVR/SteamVR is centred). And besides that, I plan to add more control on playarea. Moving it around, rotating, changing size. It should be available in the next build, hopefully.
Could you send me a log file, please? One of output<date-time>.log located in _logs subfolder. It should go through all connected devices and I will check why it doesn't pickup the right controller. There is no native WMR support right now. It is in plans and it may help in such cases. Although it should work fine with SteamVR (that's why I am curious to see in the log file, why it doesn't get the second controller).
Thanks! :) If you could grab the latest build (#183). The game looks for controllers and in your case it was getting XBox controller (or something that was being reported as one) as a tracked device. For now it is solved by ignoring gamepads but I should add a proper solution for that.
Awesome game from what little I could play. I managed to get it to run only once on my Vive. I got a steamvr crash every other time. I tried starting it with the steamvr bat file and I disabled Revive and other apps that start with steamvr to no avail. Definitely keeping my eye on this one for future versions.
Does the "send a bug report" message appear and is it possible to send it? I had a few reports before but can't repro it - I introduce changes in the code to allow finding the source of the problem, that's why every report may help.
No, the game seems to load fine after a while. It's steamvr that crashes and once I close that the game closes as well. I did get it to work again and finished one level without doing anything differently from what I could tell. I did also try the previous version and had the same issue. I could try to record my screen if it helps you at all.
Thanks for the info. It seems to be the same thing, as happened to few other people. I got steam logs and there was an information that was related to the crash (as: there was something weird just before it crashed), but it was not that useful. I wish it was crashing on one of my computers, because then I could try lots of stuff (I currently suspect a one or maybe a few particular calls that crash the game later on, it doesn't seem to happen immediately but builds up).
If you could tell me what graphics card (and drivers) do you have and how many cores (strangely enough, I have one crash being reported now and then that happens only on computers with 12 cores).
That doesn't seem to be it unfortunately. I'm on a Ryzen 5 2600x with 6 cores. GPU is an RTX 2080, driver 430.86. Definitely feels like it builds up. The game is in the loading screen and freezes every few seconds until the image distorts and the HMD goes black once steam crashes.
Also, it might be worth trying, if you could open mainConfig.xml and there should be a line: <threadLimit>0</threadLimit> If you could change that to, say, 8.
I have 4 physical cores (8 logical cores) and I tried forcing to 12 but it worked). If that would work, at least I'd have some starting point.
I found this game through people talking about the sort of locomotion (or lack thereof) that Shattered Lights used. This and Unseen Diplomacy were the only other games that were cited as existing, and I gotta say, this has blown me away. The aesthetic is wonderful, the energy transfer system feels really good (once I figured it out, anyways, but even figuring out how it worked felt like a satisfying puzzle -- I skimmed the basics and set out to find stuff out in-game as best I could). I only played one level, five zones, but am very much looking forward to going back for more. Initial impressions these may be, but being that it is pre-alpha, the fact the core and first-time experience was so solid really says a lot about the potential of the game overall. I'm gonna be trying to pitch this to everyone I know that has VR, and it will become a title I demo to guests without a doubt.
I look forward to seeing where this goes from here! Thank you for all your hard work thus far!
PS: This is going to be an amazing game to have available on the Quest. I wish I could experience this wireless, and am super happy that entry-level VR users will have such a cool game available to them.
Thank you :) I am not going to give up on it. The reason that sometimes slows down the development is the same reason that keeps me going - my family. Although my daughters will have to grow up a bit to play it. Once I've shown Tea For God to my eldest daughter. Just an empty test level. She was terrified when she noticed that her own hands look differently in the game. She thought that they are witch's hands.
I have been thinking about suggesting this for a while now. Could you please implement that the game tracks the rotation count during room generation with a sumcount (+1 to the right -1 to the left) so that the game tries to keep the amount of turns on 1 side in balance?
Idk how to explain this better or if it's possible at all but I feel like it would heavily improve the gameplay for wired users.
It would work only with linear levels (currently "experience mode"). For more open levels it won't help, and currently they are still linear with mazes at some bits, while I plan to have levels with really much more open structure.
Generating level and keeping turn counts is not that trivial thing. But there is one much simplier approach: 1. count rotations done by a player so far. 2. generate level in usual way and count rotations needed to finish level (even for open levels we can just assume the shortest path). 3. if we would be rotating further away from zero, just... mirror the whole level. Then all right rotations will be left and vice versa.
I see what you mean with challenge mode yeah. I was showing the game to a friend and he played experience on bigger mode and 2 times he had the situation where the rotation was 9+ (we use the rotation counter on the wrist). Nonetheless it's not that bad to just turn around in place to unwind the cable but it does make you a bit dizzy.
So this is a killer game, it's really something that is truly designed around VR as a platform. You were clearly in the right headspace to develop this, and I think more VR devs need to really design with the platform rather than for the platform. This could be a proper system seller, one day. I played it on WMR, and it worked great *except* the lift controls seem to actually only be active while the lift is moving, and disabled when it's stopped, as opposed to the opposite. Which made it incredibly hard to actually get anywhere, because I had to hit the buttons as the lift was moving, which took several minutes for each lift.
Thanks :) I'll check the lift controls. Haven't changed them for a long time.
When the lift is stopped, one button should light up (red) to indicate the direction of movement. When it moves, other button lights up to show that you can go back. Although it could be something else, maybe something very specific to the generated level. If the lifts don't work for you as described, if you could send me a log file (in _logs folder, output<date-time>.log) at contact@voidroom.com, please.
But you're right, currently the way they die is cheap. That is going to change but now in the very near future. It is partially related to the lore, although I am not that attached to it and it evolves slowly.
Will do :) unless I completely change the way they die. But even then, this sound could stay there more or less modified.
I'd like to keep that sound (or anything else) immediately when you shoot them so you know that they die (this is not currently happening with the big guy or the bigger flying robots) and I'd like to add some animations when they stumble, fall down etc. Current idea for death is that they start to disolve but they don't do that immediately as it is now, but instead, there is this immediate burst and jets here and there and then after a few seconds they completely vanish. But as I said, this is left for the future.
I didn't have it in plans as both Oculus and SteamVR were focused on rectangular spaces. My current plan is to only support rectangular ones and add a support for different ones later. Most probably that might be post release, as an update. I have a clear idea how to do that, I just don't want to fall victim to a feature creep.
I noticed that after I published #179. Since #178, I haven't changed anything related to projectiles although there was an important change related to when particular things happen. I will be fixing that after I get the game compile using Clang (there's quite a lot work involved to get it running on Quest, step by step, gonna get there). Next update will be really small. Just few bug fixes and maybe one zone variation.
I just played your new update and its amazing. I started with the option to only play with new zones and well, starting off with a lift HELL HOLE and massive turrets that i have to hide from but cant kill and the lack of any source of power end then the level ends. I go again and slowly the reactor ticks down and my health depletes until i die. i'm not saying it's a bad zone it's great. but by itself repeating over and over is a nightmare. I also had the pleasure of noticing that if i was 7 seconds late to the exit door i would have been a goner. I would like to suggest a new zone. A space zone but its not just for the looks but a new gameplay element. in space there could be lifts that could rotate you sideways or upside down. i think this would be even better paired with the massive turrets.
"Only new" is just to check out new zones and if there's just one, it repeats over and over :) If the reactor reaches zero, you don't die immediately, your health goes down a bit every second.
Your idea for the level is already on my list. A tube in which you go to sides, effectively going upside down after a few lifts. It may require a stronger VR stomach, so I'm on edge here. But I am going to try it. I haven't thought about having turrets there but it really makes sense. It's a good idea, thanks :) I have a few other lift based level ideas written down. Cylindrical one with enemies in the centre or/and around. On a wall, where you go sideways and up/down only with huge spiders crawling on that wall you're climbing. A shooting range where you have to get the rythm of shots and fit between. And using the bridge, there is more you can do. One of the things I really want to have is a ship dock in which you are going under a ship getting a maintenance and you could control some of its turrets. A level in which some of the platforms are enclosed and every, say three minutes, there is something that can kill anyone in the level (it can be ironworks with molten iron being purred over platforms, a huge reactor or some more exotic stuff, like "evolution chamber" in which there are cycles, there are lots of inanimate objects that slowyl evolve into attacking enemies and at the end of each cycle there is a purge that kills anything not inside safe rooms.
that is alot of really cool ideas that i cant wait to see. I would not have any problem with any gravity zones you wish to throw at me as i can take almost any confusing or nauseating experiences just fine, but for others you might need to add an option to disable these zones.
Currently while I test the builds, I notice bugs but most of them I put onto "todo list", some of them I miss. I allow myself doing so right now, but soon I will have to change this and spend more time testing and fixing bugs before releasing a build. Even if that means that builds will be less often (now I try to stay within 2 weeks between each build, so expect a new one coming this weekend probably).
I can't get it to work on my Rift S, sadly. The logo splash screen at the beginning does appear and I can see my hand when I look down, but not move it. Then everything just glitches out and the screen turns off shortly, then turns on again but is all-black. I can't even go to Oculus Home and have to disconnect the headset. The game does show up on my pc screen.
I haven't got an oppprtunity to try it on Rift S. Although it should work the same. Could you send me a log file (from _logs subfolder a file called "output <date time>.log") to contact@voidroom.com, please? I will check it and see if I need to add a specific case for Rift S or maybe something else happened.
I am aware of a few problems, the most popular one is related to two graphic cards and the game running on the integrated one. I will probably add a way to detect that problem and inform about a player about it and how to solve it.
I don't think a lot of people realise what a bitch it must be to code a game like this. Carying the audio through from behind "portals" that connect the non-euclidean spaces is one thing I can't get my head around. The way you generate the mazes in challenge mode is awesome too. I'm also really impressed by the fact that you can keep the player safe all the time. I really trust the game by now and I haven't bumped into walls yet. You are awesome ~
Edit: some people asked me what the recommended play space for the game is but I can't seem to find the answer. Could you tell me please?
Audio - I will add it to the list of things to put on the devlog. Here is a short description, how it works. I build a sound scene by checking each portal and portal beyond portal and so on. This way, for each sound source that should be heard, I have a list of portals that are required to get to the source. Then I just string pull a sound source location while calculating the distance and I end up with a apparent sound source (dir + distance). There are few more things that are calculated on the way (eg. occlusion). And there come also messages for AI, so they know if player hits something, shoots, etc.
There's a post on devlog about level generation (https://void-room.itch.io/tea-for-god/devlog/76304/procedural-level-generation-using-impossible-spaces). I explained there how the level is generated at the top level (regions, rooms inside regions, how do they connect) and how everything is placed within a playarea. I think that there is nothing about moving platforms - the basic idea behind that is that you stay in the same place in your playarea, but in the game you move somewhere else. But if you travel between two locations this way, both locations share the same playarea anchor.
It's not a speculation. I mentioned it in a couple of places.
Actually, after playing a while with Oculus Quest, I want to give the port a go in following weeks. This will push gameplay systems further away, but I'd like to get the game to Quest anyway. And I'd prefer to check how does it work on Quest through the development. To not get carried away with some things that could not work well on Quest (performance wise).
I expect that it will take more than a few days, especially that I created just one android app very long time ago. And I was using a library designed to handle mobiles. Currently it won't be just switching from PC to Quest but actually having both versions work all the time. Good thing is that I actually have low level stuff finalised - there shouldn't be anything more coming. Just the actual game. That's why it is safe to port it to Quest now.
Thank you very much for the info! You can add this to the description above for all of us. Can't wait to test the first Alpha on a parking lot and then get hit by a car. :-D
Hope the porting works well and painlessly. Those who created their games with Unity or Unreal have it a bit easier...
I am almost sure that there will be problems. There will be patches of code that might require a bit of a rework. Not just change lib/functions but more fundamental ones.
And I do expect a performance hit. There are just 3 cores available on Quest. Probably I will try first modifying multithreading on PC to check how does it work with 3 cores. And I might have stick to smaller levels only. For graphics, I will probably disable some stuff and simplify meshes by having less subdivisions. Then, I will be also adding foveated rendering, which will also help. I am more concerned about CPU but there's nothing that can't be solved :)
I wonder if it is possible to feed camera into background. I actually like walking with Quest on seeing what cameras see ;)
Do you the boundary setup for your Oculus? Tea For God is a roomscale experience and requires boundary to be setup.
If it is properly configured, could you send me a log file (in subfolder _logs, there should be a file called "output-<date-time>.log") to contact@voidroom.com?
What happen? I love the game. I was playing 15 minutes worth. Then the game just randomly quit. I go to restart the game and my Vive display slowly turns grey as if it's not tracking. My computer starts to freeze. SteamVr encounters an issue and has to be restarted. And once all of my displayed just turned off (both monitors) as if my computer went into sleep mode. had to hard reset the computer. I deleted the game and reinstalled it. Still nothing. This game is awesome and I want to keep playing an show it off to friends but I can't get it to work again. Any suggestions?
Edit: I can play other steam and non steam games just fine..
Could send me log files, please? (there are "output-(date+time).log" files in _logs subfolder). My e-mail address is contact@voidroom.com I'll check what's going on.
You deleted the game and reinstalled, so it's not dependent on in-game settings (there was an issue related to MSAA settings but it was fixed in the latest build, but still, if you deleted, this should not be an issue). I also don't think that there is an option in Steam VR that disables the game. Quick few questions that may also help finding, what's going on:
1. Does a window appear when you start the game?
2. If you move your headset, is the movement visible in that window?
3. What happens when you are in the game, you see everything gray and you press System button?
I will send log file tomorrow morning .I am at work at the moment. To answer your questions.
1. Yes. The game window does appear on both windows and in the HMD. I get the intro then then "loading screen". That's when then head set seems to stop tracking (htc Vive 1st Gen btw) and slowly fades to grey.
2. The movement is visible at first then when the headset turns grey the windows display of the game also freezes. No movement seen when moving headset.
3. When I press the system button nothing happens. No menu, no Vive, no wands, no display. It's very odd. A rare bug with my configuration maybe. (Ryzen 1700x, GTX 1070, 16gb ddr4 ram)
It seems that it is completely shut down. Game logs may not be enough, but with steam logs they may point at something. In the folder you installed Steam, there is a subfolder called "logs". Inside you should have such files:
vrclient_tea.txt vrserver.txt vrmonitor.txt
There might be some info inside them that would help finding an issue. I was looking for some info about similar cases and they were related to drivers, input emulators and such stuff. But that should result in all applications behaving like that. I assume that there is a specific call in my game that causes a crash or some other unexpected behaviour. Oh, one more question, when you take the headset off, is SteamVR windows visible (one with icons what is connected and turned on), what is there?
I sent log files of Game and Steam. When I take the headset off the SteamVR window is open and shows everything green. But encounters an error and restart in "SafeMode"
I think this game needs more variation in guns. right now your right wrist gun is a pistol, your left wrist gun a shotgun and the rest are pretty much smgs with different fire rates and damage. I think maybe a rail gun that you have to press a button on it to reload would be cool. Maybe even a ricochet gun.
I'd rather have a lightsaber. The Turok 2 cerebral bore wouldn't be bad, of course, only the processors and coolant would come out. Due to the narrow spaces, some types of weapons are rather unsuitable. Arrows and bows for example, or large machine-guns.
Yes, there are just two main weapons and a variation of SMGs. And actually all of them are just a one kind of gun with different parameters. Laser gun (athough technically it's not a laser).
Currently I have plans for 5 more different types. Plus synergies. But that has to wait a bit, I am now adding a reactor (plus other features related to it) and testing a new zone variation. New build should be available within days.
Then I plan to work on extension modules (on the forearms) and then on weapons.
Don't you worry! If I consider that you do everything yourself and don't use Unreal or Unity, you are really super fast in expanding your project. A one-man army doesn't develop a complete game from scratch in a few weeks. A lightsaber would still be nice for later versions. I love swords in VR. And don't forget the work on the Oculus Quest version, mine should arrive Thursday. I am already quite excited.
Mine too! :) I am tempted to switch it to a developer mode and to port the game to it ;)
I haven't mentioned the light saber. I first want to try fist fight, hitting with guns and then I will consider adding a light saber (which means that probably this is going to happen). There were a few game design decisions that prevented me from adding such things but now there's a clear path for things that do damage but don't use energy or use it a bit only.
So that you don't always have to draw an additional weapon when using a light saber for distant shooting enemies, the light saber could throw back the laser/gun pellets at the same angle to the enemy. Be a Jedi for once! My quest has arrived today! Have you already downloaded the C++ Quest SDK? ;-D If you're interested, a cool tech demo for the quest to use the space:
love the new update. those purple orbs always confused me and your explanation cleared it up. When i would see them i would get flashbacks to other runs ended by them so i would try for minutes to find a way around those devastating spheres. An item to deal with them would be much appreciated, like a jar you could contain them in and off load it into a power station.
:D I have a few ideas already on my todo list: 1. devices that would allow grabbing them without the health drain (or making it much smaller). 2. weapons that could be used to turn purple orbs into blue ones (these weapons would also have other uses). 3. devices that would let you control such an orb and push it into an enemy (or just away from you). 4. robots that you could pick up that when held, would suck purple orb in and you could either use a station or consume it directly from the robot.
Holy shit. This game is a masterpiece. I felt like I had walked a mile but I hadn't left the confines of my room. Is there any way we can stay more up-to-date with development? Maybe a discord or something?
Thanks :) There is a discord https://discord.gg/FFwyf4n I try to put new builds on itch.io every week or two, I also do a devlog at itch,io and voidroom.com. Currently it is more technical (and a few words about new builds) but I'll be posting more game related stuff too.
Generally yes and I will have to do that. Currently, there are only arms and they stretch a bit - this is mostly because you can't move your shoulders, ie. the game can't detect shoulder movement and I could estimate how they do move a little bit but it wouldn't be too reliable and stretching arms work anyway. What I mean by "stretching" is that not the mesh is stretched (as it is done in other games) but there are actuators inside arms that make them longer. But this fails when a person is much taller or much shorter. And when the torso comes, it will be even more important. The most probable solution at the moment is scaling the whole character depending on a mix of the height and arm's length. This way also hands will be scaled. There is a certain range of size that objects you take may have. I will have to check extremes to make sure you can pick up all objects - I don't want to limit player's actions depending on their height. I just added adjusting door/room/corridor height and I am considering going a bit more crazy about it with the scale of the enemies. Although I don't know if that won't be too much.
I think the more customizable the better, personally being able change the ceiling level could make the game feel bigger or more claustrophobic. Changing enemy sizes would be cool to experiment with too. Plus I didn't know the arms had actuators until now.
I would love to have just a pure skeleton and to allow people to add armor and stuff on top of it. Or change some parameters to have a different look for various parts (hands!) or at least have some variations. I don't know how much possible it would be and it is not top priority. Enemy size could be fun too and I will be investigating that. The actuators in the arms are only to make arms longer. There are also rails on which the arm moves. Arm without any armor plates looks weird but you see everything inside moving (stretching, twisting, rotating). ATM there are lots of things hardcoded but I always start with a hardcoded stuff for meshes and then I replace magic numbers with parameters.
Just tried this last night. It really is special. Got the longest periods of presence yet in a game. Felt like really being in virtual reality more than anything I've played yet. Also this is such a natural fit for Quest , visually and physically. Had a cool idea too : One of my favourite things in the game is being able to peer out of the "windows". Got me wondering : how cool would it be to have static avatars in the distant windows of other structures . To travel to these you could simply walk into their local "mirror" copy in the room where you currently are. ( really really hard to describe!) As well as opening up many gameplay possibilities, it might be refreshing to feel that you'd really "moved" a great distance and to see the complex you'd previously been in from an outside POV. Hope that makes some sort of sense! Anyway, really great work, look forward to diving in again later today.
I think that I don't understand that part about walking "into their local "mirror" copy". On the other hand, I have in plans seeing places you are going to visit and those you've already been to. The windows, vistas in open space sections are going to be used for that. At the moment there is just that enormous tower in the distance that is the only point of reference (and the destination of your adventure).
BTW I loved Nodes of Yesod (zx), from a bit similar titles, I also liked Underwurlde. I can't imagine myself playing them now. Although I do still enjoy Tau Ceti, probably my favourite from the era.
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Hello! I love your game super immerseive! 2 suggestions I was thinking off.
(1) The oculus controllers on my quest have great haptics, it would be great if you could add haptics for reloading a gun, shooting a gun, pulling a lever, etc....! I think that could make it feel even more real!
(2) I understand that the game tries to get a square of space from your guardian. Some spaces are weird and have like a square and a long hall way sticking out. etc, do you ever plan to support non-square spaces? Could be cool to have more real estate to work with.
Thanks :)
(1) This actually bugs me a bit because it is there for shooting (after reloading for a shotgun), picking up/touching stuff (although I am not sure if it is for every time you touch something or only for items you can pick up). You have Oculus Rift with standard Touch controllers, right?
(2) Generally speaking, yes it is possible. For time being I want to focus on the game, though. But I have in plans supporting such spaces (and bigger ones!) as it would add a lot. Initially I wanted to do that but decided to do everything with small steps. Have the basics working (generating for rectangular spaces) and then introduce more after a while.
Oh! I’m playing on quest with the new touch controllers maybe that’s why.
Good thing to know, thanks :) I know that there are two ways to have haptic feedback but implemented just one. It worked on my controllers but I will make sure about that and implement the other too :)
And makes sense thanks for the communication!
This is just so fucking cool. Actually walking around in VR is so immersive.
I remember when I bought HTC Vive and I was trying out demos. And after a few teleports I wanted to walk. Just walk, normally. I quickly run into the boundary but I loved the feeling. That night, when I was walking the dog, I realised that I can get the tech that I was developing for a different game (I still want to do that game) and use it for VR.
I totally get what you mean. A lot of the time teleporting or "walking" with the analogue stick just feels wrong. There's been a lot if cool movement mechanics in vr games yet this is the first time I've seen just simple walking and it works brilliantly. A couple of other smaller things I liked are the way the robots are designed and how you can interact with them in other ways than just shooting them. I love the way the guns extend and retract into your hand. The 1 second-long process feels so natural and fluid I find myself doing it over and over again because it just feels cool.
Take my money. Do you have a patreon account?
No. I plan to move to early access in a few months. Probably even then I will be releasing free demo builds which will show new stuff but will have some limitations.
I would sign up for early access and give feedback. I’m on the quest FYI. It was pretty amazing to travel so far in a 2.5 square meter space.
Fantastic concept works beautifully on the Quest - can't wait to see new levels/commercial build!
I will have to say "stop" eventually but there are so many things that can be added. Most likely I will just stop adding them, finish the game, release it and then continue to add stuff as updates.
You have my full support - purchase day one, love the concept - and I'm showing/promoting this to whoever I know.
I downloaded this game through SideQuest and really enjoyed it! Looking forward to seeing how this develops.
I try to post regularly and have a new build every two weeks. With Quest build it took more time but I wanted to make it working and available to the people. And now I will be getting a few days off but I still want to have a new build available by the end of July. Follow me here, on twitter, fb :)
Hey whenever i unzip this the exe deletes itself and my uac acts funny
Do you have an antivirus soft? If so, which one. I've seen similar things with other apps. Currently my exe is not signed and it doesn't help. I will have to consider getting a certificate.
My antivirus quarantined it without any notification (Bit defender Free) but i use a lot of unsigned apps on a daily basis and this has never happened.
Thanks for the info. I'll check that. I had similar issues with a different app that I was working on. Although I can't remember right now if it was Bitdefender or ByteFence. It was different technology, was build on a designated computer. It really gets down to specific parts of the code that are taken for malware.
Do you need to disable the guardian system
It helps. When not disabled you will get the guardian visible a lot.
Hi! Amazing game so far, I love it! I did try casting to my phone via the quest app though, and was met with a "this app is not supported for casting" message. Any ideas?
I've run into that when I was showing it to my wife and wanted to see what she was seeing. It might be some setting missing or an event not handled. Added that to the list and will fix it.
On SteamVR with HTC Vive I don't see any controllers, any fix for that?
I had to revert to v0.3.8 to get them working :/
Yeah that worked for me, awesome game concept
Did you try 0.3.9 #186? I checked that on Vive, Rift running with both Oculus and SteamVR and it was ok. If it wasn't for you, there has to be some other bug.
And thanks :)
#186 0.3.9 is the only one that doesn't work on Vive for me, 0.3.8 works great though.
Actually I take it back 0.3.9 #186 is working perfectly, seems to have fixed the problem.
Thanks for the info :)
Thank you for the information. I will check that, fix and update the build.
Amazing, seriously amazing game.
MAN you are a GENIUS! This is my favorite game for QUEST so far and is only a beta version.... publish a full version of this and you will be rich. Easily I will pay 40-50 euros for a full game like this. Rarely spend so much on games. This is innovative and really immersive. Please go ahead and finish this into a game.
That's the plan. Getting there step by step. The next bigger things on the list are related to weapons and other customisations. That's when the core gameplay should start to click.
EASILY one of the most compelling and innovative VR experiences I've had. The potential for this is absolutely mind-boggling. I turned off my Guardian just so the grid wouldn't keep popping up and it was completely immersive. I'm blown away by this.
Played on the Quest, btw.
I wonder if it will be possible to change how guardian is displayed when not using Developer mode. I wish there would be the same options that are for guardian on PC (Oculus). If not, It's either developer mode or getting a larger space and adding a safety border.
A very unique and innovative game.This has a retro nostalgic feel to it.The game from 1990 out of this world and flashback reminds me of this.What we wanted vr to be in 1980.Its very ,very cool...Jesus is my Lord and Savior !
I remember first time seeing and playing those games. It was an unique experience, you had that feeling of a huge world, big adventure.
any way i can disable the time limit without switching to previous versions
At the moment only by choosing experience mode. I have a custom mode in plans, which allows you to alter any option there is. There is also a debug menu: when you are in game, you have to take off headset, press 'C' and choose "no reactor"... and do it every time you start, so that's not convenient. I use it for debugging and when showcasing to alter game a bit.
thanks
Can you do it for the quest?
Not yet. But custom mode should be available soon - I want to fix bugs, add a few smaller features that were requested and then continue with gameplay mechanics.
I notice that the game incorrectly determines the game space! I have more space than game zone have in one side (game out of my borders), and less in another side (game inside borders, but a bit far from them). Also, game see much less space in length than I have.
So, can you please fix abovesaid problem?
Adding possibility to resize and move safe borders will be very enough
I'd love to fix it. I need to ask you for a logfile, so I can get a few info (your headset, VR system and few other things). If you could send me a log file (output <date-time>.log from _logs subfolder) to contact@voidroom.com.
It is possible now to adjust playarea although there is no interface exposed to do that - it will be added. I will also add forcing VR system to show bounds when in playarea options, so it is easier to tell if playarea is properly aligned. Right now you would have to force VR system to show bounds manually (not that convenient).
Both open vr (SteamVR) and oculus vr (Oculus) have point 0,0,0 in the middle of playarea and I only read size of it. This way, if there was something wrong, it would stick out of the playarea on both sides. Unless of course something has changed and the centre may be now offset (for oculus mobile vr (eg. Quest) it is possible). I had a few cases when it turned out that the in-game area was stretched beyond but I haven't received the log files :( or it turned out that the vr system required calibration.
Hi,
First off - this was an amazing experience (apart from the wire getting tangled up - I'm seriously considering getting a Quest just to experience this game better). This was a very fun experience and forcing me to crawl on the floor to avoid getting shot was pure genius.
However I did encounter a similar issue as the OP -
I'm on Oculus Rift CV1 , the size of the play space is correct but misaligned with my guardian border (causing me to "bump" into objects when I reach the limit of my play space.
I sent a mail with the log files and would appreciate if you could tell me how to align the play space to my guardian system.
Thanks!
I will be checking if Oculus may have the play area not centred and how to get info about that (for sure Quest does so and it is handled, but not for PC, OpenVR/SteamVR is centred). And besides that, I plan to add more control on playarea. Moving it around, rotating, changing size. It should be available in the next build, hopefully.
Thank you for contacting and the logs :)
Hi, i have bug. Game dosnt see right controller. Im using WMR. Also left arm look like right.
Could you send me a log file, please? One of output<date-time>.log located in _logs subfolder. It should go through all connected devices and I will check why it doesn't pickup the right controller. There is no native WMR support right now. It is in plans and it may help in such cases. Although it should work fine with SteamVR (that's why I am curious to see in the log file, why it doesn't get the second controller).
https://pastebin.com/9QB3yXPe log.
Thanks! :) If you could grab the latest build (#183). The game looks for controllers and in your case it was getting XBox controller (or something that was being reported as one) as a tracked device. For now it is solved by ignoring gamepads but I should add a proper solution for that.
Disconecting gamepad solved problem.
Glad you solved it :) A proper solution for the problem will be done.
Awesome game from what little I could play. I managed to get it to run only once on my Vive. I got a steamvr crash every other time. I tried starting it with the steamvr bat file and I disabled Revive and other apps that start with steamvr to no avail. Definitely keeping my eye on this one for future versions.
Does the "send a bug report" message appear and is it possible to send it? I had a few reports before but can't repro it - I introduce changes in the code to allow finding the source of the problem, that's why every report may help.
No, the game seems to load fine after a while. It's steamvr that crashes and once I close that the game closes as well. I did get it to work again and finished one level without doing anything differently from what I could tell. I did also try the previous version and had the same issue. I could try to record my screen if it helps you at all.
Thanks for the info. It seems to be the same thing, as happened to few other people. I got steam logs and there was an information that was related to the crash (as: there was something weird just before it crashed), but it was not that useful. I wish it was crashing on one of my computers, because then I could try lots of stuff (I currently suspect a one or maybe a few particular calls that crash the game later on, it doesn't seem to happen immediately but builds up).
If you could tell me what graphics card (and drivers) do you have and how many cores (strangely enough, I have one crash being reported now and then that happens only on computers with 12 cores).
That doesn't seem to be it unfortunately. I'm on a Ryzen 5 2600x with 6 cores. GPU is an RTX 2080, driver 430.86. Definitely feels like it builds up. The game is in the loading screen and freezes every few seconds until the image distorts and the HMD goes black once steam crashes.
Ok, maybe a video actually could help a bit.
Also, it might be worth trying, if you could open mainConfig.xml and there should be a line:
<threadLimit>0</threadLimit>
If you could change that to, say, 8.
I have 4 physical cores (8 logical cores) and I tried forcing to 12 but it worked). If that would work, at least I'd have some starting point.
I found this game through people talking about the sort of locomotion (or lack thereof) that Shattered Lights used. This and Unseen Diplomacy were the only other games that were cited as existing, and I gotta say, this has blown me away. The aesthetic is wonderful, the energy transfer system feels really good (once I figured it out, anyways, but even figuring out how it worked felt like a satisfying puzzle -- I skimmed the basics and set out to find stuff out in-game as best I could). I only played one level, five zones, but am very much looking forward to going back for more. Initial impressions these may be, but being that it is pre-alpha, the fact the core and first-time experience was so solid really says a lot about the potential of the game overall. I'm gonna be trying to pitch this to everyone I know that has VR, and it will become a title I demo to guests without a doubt.
I look forward to seeing where this goes from here! Thank you for all your hard work thus far!
PS: This is going to be an amazing game to have available on the Quest. I wish I could experience this wireless, and am super happy that entry-level VR users will have such a cool game available to them.
Thanks :D There is also Somad and ARES. And there's Unseen Diplomacy 2 that is currently being developed.
There should be a playable version for Quest available soonish. And for a while new versions will be free do play.
This game singlehandedly makes me wanna drop $250 on a wireless adaptor, too much fun
If you plan to buy Quest or already have it, wait for the Quest version :)
This is by far one of the most innovative experiences you could ever try on VR. Don't pass on this precious gem.
Thank you :) I am not going to give up on it. The reason that sometimes slows down the development is the same reason that keeps me going - my family. Although my daughters will have to grow up a bit to play it. Once I've shown Tea For God to my eldest daughter. Just an empty test level. She was terrified when she noticed that her own hands look differently in the game. She thought that they are witch's hands.
I have been thinking about suggesting this for a while now. Could you please implement that the game tracks the rotation count during room generation with a sumcount (+1 to the right -1 to the left) so that the game tries to keep the amount of turns on 1 side in balance?
Idk how to explain this better or if it's possible at all but I feel like it would heavily improve the gameplay for wired users.
Thx
It would work only with linear levels (currently "experience mode"). For more open levels it won't help, and currently they are still linear with mazes at some bits, while I plan to have levels with really much more open structure.
Generating level and keeping turn counts is not that trivial thing. But there is one much simplier approach:
1. count rotations done by a player so far.
2. generate level in usual way and count rotations needed to finish level (even for open levels we can just assume the shortest path).
3. if we would be rotating further away from zero, just... mirror the whole level. Then all right rotations will be left and vice versa.
I see what you mean with challenge mode yeah. I was showing the game to a friend and he played experience on bigger mode and 2 times he had the situation where the rotation was 9+ (we use the rotation counter on the wrist). Nonetheless it's not that bad to just turn around in place to unwind the cable but it does make you a bit dizzy.
What happens when you try to run it?
It should be on Steam in a few months (Early Access).
So this is a killer game, it's really something that is truly designed around VR as a platform. You were clearly in the right headspace to develop this, and I think more VR devs need to really design with the platform rather than for the platform. This could be a proper system seller, one day. I played it on WMR, and it worked great *except* the lift controls seem to actually only be active while the lift is moving, and disabled when it's stopped, as opposed to the opposite. Which made it incredibly hard to actually get anywhere, because I had to hit the buttons as the lift was moving, which took several minutes for each lift.
Thanks :) I'll check the lift controls. Haven't changed them for a long time.
When the lift is stopped, one button should light up (red) to indicate the direction of movement. When it moves, other button lights up to show that you can go back. Although it could be something else, maybe something very specific to the generated level. If the lifts don't work for you as described, if you could send me a log file (in _logs folder, output<date-time>.log) at contact@voidroom.com, please.
What about robot death animations? Every thing that dies just turns to smoke and disappears.
Not everything. Some robots just blow up ;)
But you're right, currently the way they die is cheap. That is going to change but now in the very near future. It is partially related to the lore, although I am not that attached to it and it evolves slowly.
please keep the death sound effect though. It's pretty satisfying.
Will do :) unless I completely change the way they die. But even then, this sound could stay there more or less modified.
I'd like to keep that sound (or anything else) immediately when you shoot them so you know that they die (this is not currently happening with the big guy or the bigger flying robots) and I'd like to add some animations when they stumble, fall down etc. Current idea for death is that they start to disolve but they don't do that immediately as it is now, but instead, there is this immediate burst and jets here and there and then after a few seconds they completely vanish. But as I said, this is left for the future.
I used ALVR to cast this to my Quest and used my entire basement as my play space. Y'all are going to have a blast once it's ported!
Will you support non-rectangular play spaces? Because then people can use L-shaped rooms, or several rooms.
Awesome :)
I didn't have it in plans as both Oculus and SteamVR were focused on rectangular spaces. My current plan is to only support rectangular ones and add a support for different ones later. Most probably that might be post release, as an update. I have a clear idea how to do that, I just don't want to fall victim to a feature creep.
new bug, the red robots lasers just stay still in mid air
but turrets and my guns are fine
I noticed that after I published #179. Since #178, I haven't changed anything related to projectiles although there was an important change related to when particular things happen. I will be fixing that after I get the game compile using Clang (there's quite a lot work involved to get it running on Quest, step by step, gonna get there). Next update will be really small. Just few bug fixes and maybe one zone variation.
Any update and bug fix is great even if its small. Also if there's a new zone I wouldn't call it a small update.
I just played your new update and its amazing. I started with the option to only play with new zones and well, starting off with a lift HELL HOLE and massive turrets that i have to hide from but cant kill and the lack of any source of power end then the level ends. I go again and slowly the reactor ticks down and my health depletes until i die. i'm not saying it's a bad zone it's great. but by itself repeating over and over is a nightmare. I also had the pleasure of noticing that if i was 7 seconds late to the exit door i would have been a goner. I would like to suggest a new zone. A space zone but its not just for the looks but a new gameplay element. in space there could be lifts that could rotate you sideways or upside down. i think this would be even better paired with the massive turrets.
"Only new" is just to check out new zones and if there's just one, it repeats over and over :) If the reactor reaches zero, you don't die immediately, your health goes down a bit every second.
Your idea for the level is already on my list. A tube in which you go to sides, effectively going upside down after a few lifts. It may require a stronger VR stomach, so I'm on edge here. But I am going to try it. I haven't thought about having turrets there but it really makes sense. It's a good idea, thanks :) I have a few other lift based level ideas written down. Cylindrical one with enemies in the centre or/and around. On a wall, where you go sideways and up/down only with huge spiders crawling on that wall you're climbing. A shooting range where you have to get the rythm of shots and fit between. And using the bridge, there is more you can do. One of the things I really want to have is a ship dock in which you are going under a ship getting a maintenance and you could control some of its turrets. A level in which some of the platforms are enclosed and every, say three minutes, there is something that can kill anyone in the level (it can be ironworks with molten iron being purred over platforms, a huge reactor or some more exotic stuff, like "evolution chamber" in which there are cycles, there are lots of inanimate objects that slowyl evolve into attacking enemies and at the end of each cycle there is a purge that kills anything not inside safe rooms.
that is alot of really cool ideas that i cant wait to see. I would not have any problem with any gravity zones you wish to throw at me as i can take almost any confusing or nauseating experiences just fine, but for others you might need to add an option to disable these zones.
There's already an option for zones that require crouching, stronger VR stomach zones are no brainer then :)
One of the ideas that do not add anything to the gameplay but keep coming back to me, are pendulum lifts.
Hi, how to report Bugs? I have a crash and some Logs
Hi, please send them to contact@voidroom.com
Hey buddy just a heads up the last version has some bugs in it.
1) I can't change anything in settings - the game locks up and I need to restart.
2) The game crashes when I try to play 2 (one level, bigger game) on challenge mode after each other.
Using rift S btw.
Also: are the big turrets supposed to be invulnerable and do you just dodge their bullets?
Hi
1) Do you have build #178 or #179? I published today updated v.0.3.7 (#179) which fixes the options.
2) Could you send me a log file with a crash (in _logs, file fault<date-time>.log).
The big turrets can be killed although it requires lots of energy. It's better to consider them invulnerable and just hide from them.
Yes the newer version fixed everything!
Awesome :) Thanks for the info :)
Currently while I test the builds, I notice bugs but most of them I put onto "todo list", some of them I miss. I allow myself doing so right now, but soon I will have to change this and spend more time testing and fixing bugs before releasing a build. Even if that means that builds will be less often (now I try to stay within 2 weeks between each build, so expect a new one coming this weekend probably).
I can't get it to work on my Rift S, sadly. The logo splash screen at the beginning does appear and I can see my hand when I look down, but not move it. Then everything just glitches out and the screen turns off shortly, then turns on again but is all-black. I can't even go to Oculus Home and have to disconnect the headset. The game does show up on my pc screen.
I haven't got an oppprtunity to try it on Rift S. Although it should work the same. Could you send me a log file (from _logs subfolder a file called "output <date time>.log") to contact@voidroom.com, please? I will check it and see if I need to add a specific case for Rift S or maybe something else happened.
I have the rift S and it works fine for me. Just a heads up.
Thanks for the info :)
I am aware of a few problems, the most popular one is related to two graphic cards and the game running on the integrated one. I will probably add a way to detect that problem and inform about a player about it and how to solve it.
I don't think a lot of people realise what a bitch it must be to code a game like this. Carying the audio through from behind "portals" that connect the non-euclidean spaces is one thing I can't get my head around. The way you generate the mazes in challenge mode is awesome too. I'm also really impressed by the fact that you can keep the player safe all the time. I really trust the game by now and I haven't bumped into walls yet. You are awesome ~
Edit: some people asked me what the recommended play space for the game is but I can't seem to find the answer. Could you tell me please?
Thank you :)
Audio - I will add it to the list of things to put on the devlog. Here is a short description, how it works. I build a sound scene by checking each portal and portal beyond portal and so on. This way, for each sound source that should be heard, I have a list of portals that are required to get to the source. Then I just string pull a sound source location while calculating the distance and I end up with a apparent sound source (dir + distance). There are few more things that are calculated on the way (eg. occlusion). And there come also messages for AI, so they know if player hits something, shoots, etc.
There's a post on devlog about level generation (https://void-room.itch.io/tea-for-god/devlog/76304/procedural-level-generation-using-impossible-spaces). I explained there how the level is generated at the top level (regions, rooms inside regions, how do they connect) and how everything is placed within a playarea. I think that there is nothing about moving platforms - the basic idea behind that is that you stay in the same place in your playarea, but in the game you move somewhere else. But if you travel between two locations this way, both locations share the same playarea anchor.
You are on the list for upcoming Quest Games:
https://www.reddit.com/r/OculusQuest/comments/bsmw6k/all_released_upcoming_hinte...
Are they just speculating or did you make an announcement somewhere?
It's not a speculation. I mentioned it in a couple of places.
Actually, after playing a while with Oculus Quest, I want to give the port a go in following weeks. This will push gameplay systems further away, but I'd like to get the game to Quest anyway. And I'd prefer to check how does it work on Quest through the development. To not get carried away with some things that could not work well on Quest (performance wise).
I expect that it will take more than a few days, especially that I created just one android app very long time ago. And I was using a library designed to handle mobiles. Currently it won't be just switching from PC to Quest but actually having both versions work all the time. Good thing is that I actually have low level stuff finalised - there shouldn't be anything more coming. Just the actual game. That's why it is safe to port it to Quest now.
I literally just came here to see if this is true as well. I cant wait to try this on quest! I assume you'll be releasing apk for sideloading?
Yes, that's exactly what's going to happen. APK for sideloading :)
Thank you very much for the info! You can add this to the description above for all of us. Can't wait to test the first Alpha on a parking lot and then get hit by a car. :-D
Hope the porting works well and painlessly. Those who created their games with Unity or Unreal have it a bit easier...
I am almost sure that there will be problems. There will be patches of code that might require a bit of a rework. Not just change lib/functions but more fundamental ones.
And I do expect a performance hit. There are just 3 cores available on Quest. Probably I will try first modifying multithreading on PC to check how does it work with 3 cores. And I might have stick to smaller levels only. For graphics, I will probably disable some stuff and simplify meshes by having less subdivisions. Then, I will be also adding foveated rendering, which will also help. I am more concerned about CPU but there's nothing that can't be solved :)
I wonder if it is possible to feed camera into background. I actually like walking with Quest on seeing what cameras see ;)
The game wont start for me, it says that it "could not get boundery dimentions"
Do you the boundary setup for your Oculus? Tea For God is a roomscale experience and requires boundary to be setup.
If it is properly configured, could you send me a log file (in subfolder _logs, there should be a file called "output-<date-time>.log") to contact@voidroom.com?
What happen? I love the game. I was playing 15 minutes worth. Then the game just randomly quit. I go to restart the game and my Vive display slowly turns grey as if it's not tracking. My computer starts to freeze. SteamVr encounters an issue and has to be restarted. And once all of my displayed just turned off (both monitors) as if my computer went into sleep mode. had to hard reset the computer. I deleted the game and reinstalled it. Still nothing. This game is awesome and I want to keep playing an show it off to friends but I can't get it to work again. Any suggestions?
Edit: I can play other steam and non steam games just fine..
Could send me log files, please? (there are "output-(date+time).log" files in _logs subfolder). My e-mail address is contact@voidroom.com I'll check what's going on.
You deleted the game and reinstalled, so it's not dependent on in-game settings (there was an issue related to MSAA settings but it was fixed in the latest build, but still, if you deleted, this should not be an issue). I also don't think that there is an option in Steam VR that disables the game. Quick few questions that may also help finding, what's going on:
1. Does a window appear when you start the game?
2. If you move your headset, is the movement visible in that window?
3. What happens when you are in the game, you see everything gray and you press System button?
I will send log file tomorrow morning .I am at work at the moment. To answer your questions.
1. Yes. The game window does appear on both windows and in the HMD. I get the intro then then "loading screen". That's when then head set seems to stop tracking (htc Vive 1st Gen btw) and slowly fades to grey.
2. The movement is visible at first then when the headset turns grey the windows display of the game also freezes. No movement seen when moving headset.
3. When I press the system button nothing happens. No menu, no Vive, no wands, no display. It's very odd. A rare bug with my configuration maybe. (Ryzen 1700x, GTX 1070, 16gb ddr4 ram)
It seems that it is completely shut down. Game logs may not be enough, but with steam logs they may point at something. In the folder you installed Steam, there is a subfolder called "logs". Inside you should have such files:
vrclient_tea.txt
vrserver.txt
vrmonitor.txt
There might be some info inside them that would help finding an issue. I was looking for some info about similar cases and they were related to drivers, input emulators and such stuff. But that should result in all applications behaving like that. I assume that there is a specific call in my game that causes a crash or some other unexpected behaviour. Oh, one more question, when you take the headset off, is SteamVR windows visible (one with icons what is connected and turned on), what is there?
I sent log files of Game and Steam. When I take the headset off the SteamVR window is open and shows everything green. But encounters an error and restart in "SafeMode"
Thanks for the log files. I'll continue with e-mails, ok?
I think this game needs more variation in guns. right now your right wrist gun is a pistol, your left wrist gun a shotgun and the rest are pretty much smgs with different fire rates and damage. I think maybe a rail gun that you have to press a button on it to reload would be cool. Maybe even a ricochet gun.
I'd rather have a lightsaber. The Turok 2 cerebral bore wouldn't be bad, of course, only the processors and coolant would come out. Due to the narrow spaces, some types of weapons are rather unsuitable. Arrows and bows for example, or large machine-guns.
Yes, there are just two main weapons and a variation of SMGs. And actually all of them are just a one kind of gun with different parameters. Laser gun (athough technically it's not a laser).
Currently I have plans for 5 more different types. Plus synergies. But that has to wait a bit, I am now adding a reactor (plus other features related to it) and testing a new zone variation. New build should be available within days.
Then I plan to work on extension modules (on the forearms) and then on weapons.
Step by step.
Don't you worry! If I consider that you do everything yourself and don't use Unreal or Unity, you are really super fast in expanding your project. A one-man army doesn't develop a complete game from scratch in a few weeks. A lightsaber would still be nice for later versions. I love swords in VR. And don't forget the work on the Oculus Quest version, mine should arrive Thursday. I am already quite excited.
Mine too! :) I am tempted to switch it to a developer mode and to port the game to it ;)
I haven't mentioned the light saber. I first want to try fist fight, hitting with guns and then I will consider adding a light saber (which means that probably this is going to happen). There were a few game design decisions that prevented me from adding such things but now there's a clear path for things that do damage but don't use energy or use it a bit only.
So that you don't always have to draw an additional weapon when using a light saber for distant shooting enemies, the light saber could throw back the laser/gun pellets at the same angle to the enemy. Be a Jedi for once!
My quest has arrived today! Have you already downloaded the C++ Quest SDK? ;-D
If you're interested, a cool tech demo for the quest to use the space:
love the new update. those purple orbs always confused me and your explanation cleared it up. When i would see them i would get flashbacks to other runs ended by them so i would try for minutes to find a way around those devastating spheres. An item to deal with them would be much appreciated, like a jar you could contain them in and off load it into a power station.
:D I have a few ideas already on my todo list:
1. devices that would allow grabbing them without the health drain (or making it much smaller).
2. weapons that could be used to turn purple orbs into blue ones (these weapons would also have other uses).
3. devices that would let you control such an orb and push it into an enemy (or just away from you).
4. robots that you could pick up that when held, would suck purple orb in and you could either use a station or consume it directly from the robot.
Holy shit. This game is a masterpiece. I felt like I had walked a mile but I hadn't left the confines of my room. Is there any way we can stay more up-to-date with development? Maybe a discord or something?
Thanks :) There is a discord https://discord.gg/FFwyf4n I try to put new builds on itch.io every week or two, I also do a devlog at itch,io and voidroom.com. Currently it is more technical (and a few words about new builds) but I'll be posting more game related stuff too.
would it be possible to calibrate your arm length?
Generally yes and I will have to do that. Currently, there are only arms and they stretch a bit - this is mostly because you can't move your shoulders, ie. the game can't detect shoulder movement and I could estimate how they do move a little bit but it wouldn't be too reliable and stretching arms work anyway. What I mean by "stretching" is that not the mesh is stretched (as it is done in other games) but there are actuators inside arms that make them longer.
But this fails when a person is much taller or much shorter. And when the torso comes, it will be even more important.
The most probable solution at the moment is scaling the whole character depending on a mix of the height and arm's length. This way also hands will be scaled. There is a certain range of size that objects you take may have. I will have to check extremes to make sure you can pick up all objects - I don't want to limit player's actions depending on their height.
I just added adjusting door/room/corridor height and I am considering going a bit more crazy about it with the scale of the enemies. Although I don't know if that won't be too much.
I think the more customizable the better, personally being able change the ceiling level could make the game feel bigger or more claustrophobic. Changing enemy sizes would be cool to experiment with too. Plus I didn't know the arms had actuators until now.
I would love to have just a pure skeleton and to allow people to add armor and stuff on top of it. Or change some parameters to have a different look for various parts (hands!) or at least have some variations. I don't know how much possible it would be and it is not top priority. Enemy size could be fun too and I will be investigating that.
The actuators in the arms are only to make arms longer. There are also rails on which the arm moves. Arm without any armor plates looks weird but you see everything inside moving (stretching, twisting, rotating). ATM there are lots of things hardcoded but I always start with a hardcoded stuff for meshes and then I replace magic numbers with parameters.
Just tried this last night. It really is special. Got the longest periods of presence yet in a game. Felt like really being in virtual reality more than anything I've played yet. Also this is such a natural fit for Quest , visually and physically. Had a cool idea too : One of my favourite things in the game is being able to peer out of the "windows". Got me wondering : how cool would it be to have static avatars in the distant windows of other structures . To travel to these you could simply walk into their local "mirror" copy in the room where you currently are. ( really really hard to describe!) As well as opening up many gameplay possibilities, it might be refreshing to feel that you'd really "moved" a great distance and to see the complex you'd previously been in from an outside POV. Hope that makes some sort of sense! Anyway, really great work, look forward to diving in again later today.
Thanks :)
I think that I don't understand that part about walking "into their local "mirror" copy". On the other hand, I have in plans seeing places you are going to visit and those you've already been to. The windows, vistas in open space sections are going to be used for that. At the moment there is just that enormous tower in the distance that is the only point of reference (and the destination of your adventure).
BTW I loved Nodes of Yesod (zx), from a bit similar titles, I also liked Underwurlde. I can't imagine myself playing them now. Although I do still enjoy Tau Ceti, probably my favourite from the era.