I have a good bit of free time this week, so I'll probably spend most of it obsessing over GDC details...
OculusOculus released an Audio SDK. That was it. In general, this is what GDC felt like for Oculus:
http://youtu.be/XP9MolWGZNEValve
http://youtu.be/otn9y5XT6YAThe big story so far is Valve. And boy does it look big. Valve is releasing a suite of VR hardware. They've partnered with HTC, who announced a new VR headset, the HTC Re Vive. The Vive will go along with Valve's additional VR hardware.
Dev kits will be available in the spring and the consumer launch will be THIS winter!The Vive is the result of Valve's previous prototypes (which a year ago were a step ahead of Oculus'). While we're still waiting for specifics, we know that it has two screens - 1200x1080 each. It has pretty wide optics - similar looking to the Crescent Bay. It's 90hz and it is assumed has low persistence. There's an audio jack for headphones. It seems to still be wired, even though it's being built for a "room" experience.
Positional tracking is being done by some interesting tech. Valve has their own SteamVR Base Stations. You use two and it gives you a 15x15 playing area to be fully tracked in! It uses LASER technology! Internet sleuths are fairly certain that the base stations are projecting invisible IR markers around the room. The headset has IR cameras that track these markers. Valve has previously used marker-filled rooms before for VR, so this would be the natural progression.
On top of the huge tracking area, Valve is also releasing wireless VR motion controllers. It's unclear so far how the tracking is done, but one can assume it also takes advantage of the base stations. The important thing at the moment is simply that Valve is offering an input solution.
An important note is that Valve seems to be creating a VR ecosystem. It would not be surprising to see multiple headsets/controllers working within Valve's system. The HTC partnership may just be one of many. Valve/HTC has also recruited a few game dev companies, including CloudHead Games (makers of "The Gallery") who are hinting at how amazing Valve's VR system is.
Maybe the biggest game changer that may drop is.... HALF LIFE 3. For the first time since ever, there's reason to believe HL3 may indeed be Valve's VR flagship game. Earlier today an app was uploaded by Valve to Steam that
contained the HL3 logo. The app has since been removed. When pressed on whether we would see HL3 on HTC/Valve's new headset,
HTC chairwoman Cher Wang said: "We are co-operating with Half-life, and I think... I hope, you know, it will be on it." English is not her first language, and she didn't distinguish between it being a new Half-life game or maybe just VR compatibility with earlier titles, but the speculation is mounting. It doesn't help that Valve is giving their big GDC address on 3/3 at 3:00 p.m. Now that's just some epic trolling!
It seems HTC's chairwoman apologized for being misleading about Half-life. Also Valve's big "GDC address" is actually just one dev talking about physics or something. It seems the HL3 app upload is the only thing fueling that rumor now, which is shaky at best.NvidiaThere was a rumor that Nvidia was working on their own headset, but that turned out not to be the case. Instead Nvidia talked about VRDirect, which has been previously announced. It's basically the same stuff AMD is working on.
AMDAMD announced LiquidVR, an SDK to improve VR performance. The tech features Latest Data Latch, Asynchronous Shaders, Affinity Multiple-GPU, and Direct-to-Display technology.
* Latest Data Latch - The idea behind late data latching is to get the absolute most recent raw data from the VR engine to the users eyes. This means that rather than asking for the head position of a gamer at the beginning of a render job, LiquidVR will allow the game to ask for it at the end of the rendering pipeline, which might seem counter-intuitive. Late latch means the users head movement is tracked until the end of the frame render rather until just the beginning, saving potentially 5-10ms of delay.
* Asynchronous Shaders - The next feature, asynchronous shaders, is what allows LiquidVR to handle that late latch properly. Being able to use different ACEs (asynchronous compute engines) from the GCN GPU on different tasks, LiquidVR can execute VR-specific post processing while other renders are occurring. This means the time warp function that maps the head tracking movement to the rendered image can be done at the last possible moment. Time warping alters the rendered frame slightly to properly track the head movement after the frame drawing by the GPU is complete. If you have moved your head more to the right after rendering then the warp function will alter pixels to move the image to the right as well. This is a really complex process but the fundamental understanding is straight forward.
* Affinity multi-GPU - Affinity multi-GPU brings us to the past - a return of SFR, split frame rendering. AMD realizes as most of us have that the ability to map a GPU to each eye makes the most sense and is surprisingly easy to integrate. The benefit again is lower latency, rather than the inherent delay in a multi-GPU alternate frame system (AFR). Developers will also benefit from lower CPU overhead thanks to a removal of duplicate common operations between the two eyes. This is not limited to just two GPUs though - AMD said that 3, 4, 5 GPUs could all be supported if the developer builds in support.
* Direct to Display - Finally we have direct-to-display, and this feature is mostly to promote compatibility between VR headsets. LiquidVR brings native HMD support with direct front buffer rendering and provides direct application control to the headset even in operating systems and environments that didn't plan for it. This might be less useful for Windows gaming environments where VR is expected to move but for professional applications this should ensure a better user experience. Basically, AMD will read the headset as a VR headset and not a second monitor. This means it won't screw up your desktop icons, Zero! It also should help Direct to Rift mode work better.
Oculus has said they look forward to implementing AMD's tech into their own SDK as well, so this should lead to a smoother experience and performance overall!
NextVR - Light-field Technologyhttp://uploadvr.com/nextvr-positional-tracking-vr-light-field/NextVR is a VR video service. They're looking at capturing live streams and recorded events (basketball games, concerts, etc.). Light fields are a little complicated to explain, so I'll try to simplify it. Basically this tech allows you to put positional tracking into a video. You can lean around someone in a video and see what's on the other side of them. Instead of just capturing video, the camera captures light data points. This data combined with the video allows it to be spit out on the other end like a real 3D virtual space (in I'm assuming a limited capacity). It's a big leap forward for VR video!
Sony Project MorpheusNew prototype:
http://cdn1.24liveblog.com/images/2015/03/03/img_54f63f38764db.jpgOLED display.
Low persistence.
120 hz.
1920 x 1080.
5.7"
100 degree FOV
launch by Q2 2016.
"All 1920x1080 pixels have RGB subpixels, creating a beautiful full HD image."
"Developers building games for VR are encourages to target 120 FPS. But for those looking for high graphics, we offer the option to render games at 60 FPS but output at 120 FPS"
"We've reduced latency to less than 18ms, half of what the first prototype had"
9 tracking LEDs, 3 more than before.
"You can slide the display in and out without removing the headset"
"We made the headset easier to put on and take off with a quick release button"
4 demos optimized for the new prototype
"London Heist. This demo, showing in london's underworld, lets you experience presense of another character." Uses the Move and 3D audio."
The Deep (updated version of shark tank demo from before)
demo featuring the little robots from The Playroom
"We'll show more at E3"
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