retro gamer magazine/virtuality

plissken

Anyone here buy the most recent retro gamer magazine with the article about virtuality inc which designed and sold vr machines in the mid 90's I remember reading about the company when they first came out with much interest only to see the company die without getting the opportunity to actually play one of the machines.

As always retro gamer gave a brilliant feature with lots of trivia and photos of the machine and games was just wondering what everyone here thinks of the idea of vr and why it didnt take off in the 90's

Cant really find much info on the net about the company which is a shame but I found these two pages describing their killer app pacman vr (never released) and their ill faited joint venture with atari.


pac man vr
http://www.klov.com/game_detail.php?letter=P&game_id=8960

atari jaguar headset
http://www.atari-explorer.com/jaguar/jaguar-vr.html

Duggy747

Mainly cost issues, development and purchasing the hardware. I remember the news about the Jag VR but they didn't go with it cuz the Jag sold like snot on bread. That and there was the whole health issue of it on your eyes, seemed like a good idea at the time but then the Playstation came out and changed the whole perspective of the gaming industry.

LoGiE

They had something like that in the trocadero in London. I never thought much of all the VR stuff simpley because you like a gimp wearing it and of course the motion sickness a lot of people got apparently. If history has thought us anything it's that consoles,Arcades and portibles with the word 'Virtual' in there names are doomed to failure...

Will this stop companies trying? Of course not and hopefully they'll get it spot on eventually:)

Dr Bob

They had one of these , ( the first "stand up model" if I remember) , in the arcade in the Square tallaght: the "Atari" Expo,in around 1995 or 96ish .
From memory It cost maybe £2-£3 for a few minutes - It was actually pretty fun , and If I remember the movement of your head , translated to the camera movement worked pretty well.

97i9y3941

another reason as mentioned in the RG article was head size of people along with issue of accomindating room for people that wore specs,neck strain from the weight of the helmet,cool to see other people here read retro gamer too

c - 13

That Pac-Man VR sounds like a great laugh. I'm a huge pacman fan, this is the first time i've heard of it though.

appleidog

LoGiE wrote: »

They had something like that in the trocadero in London. I never thought much of all the VR stuff simpley because you like a gimp wearing it and of course the motion sickness a lot of people got apparently. If history has thought us anything it's that consoles,Arcades and portibles with the word 'Virtual' in there names are doomed to failure...

Will this stop companies trying? Of course not and hopefully they'll get it spot on eventually:)

i remember going to a car show back in the day and they had a virtual reality car ride and it just made me feel really sick.

But the best vr treatment is of course Virtual boy (appleidog kisses and hugg's his 2 beauties.)

BLITZ_Molloy

It'd be interesting to read up on this stuff. Some of those one-off systems cost a fortune. I'd like to see an interview with the guys used do that TV show. The format was sort of like The Crystal Maze and was on air during the early 90's. I forget the name though.

If they come up with a lightweight pair of glasses it might take off eventually. The graphics are good enough now to probably do something a little more effective. If the 3D stuff takes off in cinemas and they manage to get good, cheap 3D televisions then people might have renewed interest in VR tech.

Retr0gamer

A virtual reality version of 'Knightmare', I'd pay a small fortune for that

CCCP^

Retr0gamer wrote: »

A virtual reality version of 'Knightmare', I'd pay a small fortune for that

Rightrightrightrightrightstopupupupupupupdowndowndowndowndowndown.

Or was that DJ Kat?

Retr0gamer

CCCP^ wrote: »

Rightrightrightrightrightstopupupupupupupdowndowndowndowndowndown.

Or was that DJ Kat?

You are correct, watching some dope with a silly helmet on his head that doesn't know his left form his right in from of a blue screen with awful CG that was probably done on an amiga while his mates shouted directions. Fantastic TV

appleidog

If you watch knightmare again recently there is a message before the show starts saying warning high tech graphics. I couldn't stop laughing when i saw that recently.

free games

appleidog wrote: »

If you watch knightmare again recently there is a message before the show starts saying warning high tech graphics. I couldn't stop laughing when i saw that recently.

:pac: absolutely hilarious