Community Question | Who Here Uses VR, And Why?

[Paul Jeffrey]

Sim racing is far more than just the simulations themselves - a long, wide and varied array of hardware can be used to enhance your experience, and one such device is VR - but who here uses it on a regular basis?

VR - otherwise known as Virtual Reality, brings with it the ability to place a driver right into the heart of a virtual racing cockpit. Adding an immersive 3D experience to the driving aspect of sim racing, the technology and immersion are no doubt impressive - but can come with a cost - namely loss of visual performance, high PC horsepower demand and the (potential) discomfort of wearing a headset for prolonged periods of time.

As with much in life, one has to weigh up the pros and cons and VR is no different. With that said, I'd love to know how many of us here at RaceDepartment regularly use their VR headsets when sim racing, and the reasons why they prefer it (or not) over traditional screens.

Fire away in the comments section and poll!

 

[Duke55]

Resolution baby, all about the pixels ;-)
2160x2160 per eye.

Valve pro 1440x1600
Rift s 1280x1440

Thats why the 3090 is a must so you can max the gfx settings

That's good to know the specs of each one. It makes the Quest 2 a reasonable bit of kit. 1832x1920 @ 90Hz per eye isn't too shabby.

 

[gspice198]

I really want to like VR, but I find I spend too much time chasing optimal settings, trying to get the frame rate vs Qulaity compromise just right.

In addition I find that after relatively short periods of time my eyes are sore and I struggle with the comfort. So in the main I stick to flat screen, but I will keep trying.

 

[plaqfree]

If anyone here has not used VR because of budget I'd be happy to give you my Rift when the G2 arrives. I'm in SoCal.

I would love to have the rift s. If you are willing to ship it at my cost.

 

[Speckle]

I was a long term VR user but, recently switched to triples and honestly prefer them to VR. My eyes aren't what they used to be so, the graphical limitations of VR was gradually becoming more of an issue. Setting up and having a quick race when I had a spare 30 mins always seemed like more of a hassle with VR.

The triples have been like a breath of fresh air. I can see which buttons I'm pressing, quickly and easily access other software, look things up online or take a sip of beer.

My Vive hasn't been used since getting the triples a few weeks ago and I can't see it being used again any time soon.

 

[Fezza458]

I've been running VR since 2016 on the original VIVE, have a reverb G2 on order and having just sold my 2080ti hoping to pickup a 6900XT in Jan unless I get lucky on launch day.

 

[lbray2]

Having just tried VR for the first time tonight I feel I can give a interesting insight to the topic. I currently have the loan of a Oculus Rift for about 2 weeks. The first game I tried was ACC and to be honest i was pretty disappointed with it, even after tweaking the settings. I then tried AMS2 at sunrise and the difference was incredible and so much more immersive.

Now I know I have only tried VR for about 3hrs in total but will I be getting one? Probably not. At the moment only 2 of my games support VR natively, ACC and AMS2, of those only one has seamless and faultless integration of it. The rest of the games I play either flat out don't work with VR or can sorta do but only after a lot of tweaking.

The second reason why I probably wont go VR is my eyesight, I have to wear fairly strong prescription glasses full time and only have vision out of one eye. Whilst i can wear my glasses under the VR headset it starts to get very painful and uncomfortable after about 20min. Furthermore, because I only have vision out of one eye, the 3D effect is very much reduced or in some cases completely not there. In ACC, it felt like i was racing on a 100" flat screen, AMS2 not so much, but it still didn't feel a clear night and day difference between a good monitor setup and VR.

Maybe in the future when the technology has progressed further and more games support it I will reconsider. But at the moment and considering my medical issues, I feel a good triple setup may actually be not only more comfortable but more immersive for my situation .

 

[blekenbleu]

The second reason why I probably wont go VR is my eyesight, I have to wear fairly strong prescription glasses full time

Prescription lenses can be added at fairly low cost to many VR headsets, e.g. Odyssey+

and only have vision out of one eye.

Certainly, 3D is a nice feature of VR, but head tracking is another, as is being able to use far vision.

 

[Dave Thayer]

Question for VR users. How you press buttons on your real steering wheel during racing? Adjusting pit strategy?

You mean how do you feel where the buttons are with a VR headset on. For me it is all knowing the Steering wheel
location of each button and what they do, then it comes down feeling where those buttons are with VR headset on.
Doesn't take long to use all the buttons on the Steering wheel while racing with VR headset on.

The more complex the Steering wheel, the longer it may take you to find the right buttons and dials. My steering wheel
is not that complex.

 

[Colin Peach]

Its funny, i read all the comments about difffrent wheels and peddles to get proper immersion. But then say they dont like vr because of having something hot and heavy on??

Motorsport in vr is the best immersion you can get, trust me its no diffrent to a full helmet and hanns device. Infact hanns restricts movement alot more.

 

[Pywackett-Barchetta]

For the most part, I only use it occasionally, primarily with Assetto Corsa (though I'll note I do not play AC any other way since I started playing it in VR). As somebody that doesn't participate in leagues, so much as tends to watch a lot of motorsports on TV or listen on radio, I absolutely love being able to tour the tracks beforehand. It's been well worth it even as somebody not even near great at sims to be able to see these places in 1/1 scale and at proper speed.

(Most of all, I feel like the ease of being able to look into the apex of the corner while you're turning is something subtle that ends up coming so naturally that it feels actively weird being unable to do it when playing on a screen again.)

I'm definitely not in the "no VR no buy" camp, but if a game offers VR, I'll try it, and frequently, that'll just be what I stick with. (Finding myself wishing much more lately that Project CARS 2 wasn't as finicky as it was about tire temps in qualifying, because that game's career mode with VR is, otherwise, stellar a time.)

 

[mrbungle83]

Haven't used a screen for racing since CV1 released.

 

[Terje Helle]

For me I can not do without VR, if a game is without VR I’m not going to buy it like F1-2020 or MS FS2020.

Off topic, but MSFS are coming with VR. #soon

 

[Davey07-O37]

I have recently discovered sim racing using VR. I'm rockin' the Quest 2. All I can say is WOW!. It adds a whole new dimension. Not just racing but anything(especially 1st person shooters). I hadn't played the 1st Assetto sim in quite a while in favour of ACC and after getting a Quest 2 and link cable I went back to the 1st Assetto sim with all the mods(particularly F1). I can't go back to flat screen now. Complete game changer for me.........

 

[Deleted member 1234936]

Hi Andrew,

Wearing a helmet for a few hours is not terribly comfortable (not sure if you've tried it), add extra weight that will be added by all the optics and electronics and it will be a torture device.

I've a fair few motorbike helmets dating back to the 70's, early ones were quite heavy, and are considered garage art, with a motocross one being a Robin's nest for a few years. However modern helmets, don't weigh anything noticeable, And are very comfortable to wear. I wear an arai when sim racing, and it's never been a problem for me, the rs6 seat causes me more grief to be honest.

I don't know how heavy the electronics are in a VR set, but perhaps they could go in a box that attaches to the back of the seat, and use cast technology.

J

 

[b)b]

VR = no buy.

 

[Deleted member 197115]

...

 

[Neilski]

as is being able to use far vision.

I don't understand what you mean by "far vision" - can you explain?

 

[Wilko Jones]

The 256GB Oculus Quest 2 on Amazon is going for $399USD. The 64GB version is cheaper, but seems to be a bit of a shortage of them at the moment.

Thanks Duke. It looks like I will have to bite the bullet on an Oculus then. Good thing I already have a Facebook account. Time to blow the cobwebs off of it, I guess.

LOL

Just checked, the PC meets all the required specs, although the GTX 1070 card isn't the ideal option for VR. I should be able to pull off low settings, I hope.

 

[Jugulador]

But isn't monitor setup even more expensive?
My last single monitor for non racing gaming ran me $1500.
If you do 49" ultrawide or triple it will be the same if not more.
Odyssey+ on sale is like $250. And latest and greatest HP Reverb G2 is $599.
Unless you account the expense for PC, that will be the same VR or monitor setup if you are interested in visual fidelity.

Man... a lot of sim racers still use 20' screens with over 10yo wheels. Both VR and triple screens are way over budged for a great part of the folks. Most of those PCs can barely run AMS1.

 

[Duke55]

Thanks Duke. It looks like I will have to bite the bullet on an Oculus then. Good thing I already have a Facebook account. Time to blow the cobwebs off of it, I guess.

LOL

Just checked, the PC meets all the required specs, although the GTX 1070 card isn't the ideal option for VR. I should be able to pull off low settings, I hope.

No worries, mate. I'm in a similar position where i've gotta swap out my gtx970 for a rtx2070s.