Well, the worst part is that I can't unfortunately afford switching to either forward or move away from TAA
#virtual-reality
icy dirge
sturdy coral
and performed really bad
anything with dense geometry seems to not work well with it
wicked oak
remember msaa works by supersampling on triangle edges
so yes it performs horribly if you have dense meshes
becouse you are supersampling a bigger amount of the screen
sturdy coral
and then if you wanted to use POM instead of tessellation, that needed dither temporal AA to work well
full junco
4.16 has quite a few performance optimizations for the forward renderer
icy dirge
Secondly, I know this is a bit off-topic but everyone seems to be in this channel :p
What's the realistic maximum map size for baked lighting?
mighty carbon
Is there any experience for Rift that is stylized low poly?
wicked oak
oh, even greater about 4.16
icy dirge
I kept seeing "1 square kilometer" thrown around, but I can't find any info now.
full junco
@icy dirge the size of your RAM I would say 😉
wicked oak
and of users hdd
icy dirge
Hence the "realistic" part of my question 😄
wicked oak
baked light just scales horribly bad on big maps
icy dirge
I got 64GB of RAM, I doubt I should use myself as reference
mighty carbon
Aim for 8 Gb
full junco
I only have 48GB 😦
sturdy coral
1square km will let you have ~50cmx50cm texels in your light map with 2048x2048 lightmap res
icy dirge
@sturdy coral - In my 3 years of using UE4 I have never used Lightmass once. I assume 50x50cm texels are unacceptable?
wicked oak
tfw 16 gb of ram and you are just fine
full junco
16GB isnt really enough for UE4
its constantly full
especially with chrome running in the background
icy dirge
Same
full junco
even 32GB were constantly full when UE4 ran
wicked oak
i have no issue with 16 gb
sturdy coral
@icy dirge half a meter by half a meter; it means you won't get much detail up close. you really want to have some dynamic shadows up close and then blend to that baked lighting
wicked oak
and im using visual studio that is bloated to hell
full junco
only after I had 48GB I finally didn't have RAM issues with UE4 any more
I always have opened something like 100 tabs though
sturdy coral
@icy dirge you can split your landscape into sections and get more lightmaps
we really need megatexture
icy dirge
I would kill for some real case study numbers on lightmass map sizes... We have made a pretty big pivot on our game project that has me a) experiment with adding VR support and b) allows me to MAYBE switch away from a fully-dynamic lighting model.
sturdy coral
there is a plugin you can buy: https://www.unrealengine.com/blog/two-thousand-gigapixels-of-textures-anyone
a few VR titles have used it
wicked oak
vr titles have used that?
really?
sturdy coral
realities.io (probably no lightmaps, but just lots of photogrammetry imagery)
wicked oak
i didnt knew people used it
icy dirge
Oh neat
Oh well, I suppose the easiest thing for now to do is to use my demo level and try baking lighting...
(It'll be horrible but it's a test)
sturdy coral
@icy dirge look into the highrise map on shootergame
it uses baked but blends in shadowmaps near the player
I think the vehicle game (the desert one, not the template) does the same, with a landscape
icy dirge
Oh, hope you don't mind me bragging a bit though - a bunch of guys here on Discord helped me through a ton of issues i had with the game in the past few months during crunch time, which resulted in us getting the Visual Excellence award at this year's Reboot Develop 2017.
glossy agate
World composition should split the map up. Also use a bunch of streaming levels.
icy dirge
er... "build lighting only" is greyed out for me
(My lights are in a separate streaming level)
Nevermind
"LogStaticLightingSystem:Warning: WorldSettings.bForceNoPrecomputedLighting is true" it's not Q_Q
full junco
its not?
icy dirge
It's not in the world setting, it was on on the project level hah
full junco
ah 😄
mighty carbon
Fun fact - women here at my office are skeptical of VR
wicked oak
from personal experience, women get sick much more easily than men
mighty carbon
In a sense "what would I do with it?!"
wicked oak
and older woman have problems handling it, they get sick real fast
icy dirge
Well I am still not sure that it's not just a gimmick that'll pass within the next 5 years
but we'll see
wicked oak
ive said it a few times, i see it a stepping point to AR/mixedreality hardware
mighty carbon
Watch out @wicked oak , feminists will try to paint you as sexist :P
icy dirge
The whole problem is the hardware - it's bulky, cumbersome and most importantly, very expensive.
Feminists will try to paint everything as sexist.
icy dirge
Sure, but you can do much more on a 4k TV than you can with a VR headset
wicked oak
no
icy dirge
most games are glorified tech demos, and even then, the number of genres that work in VR is rather limited
mighty carbon
I don't know about bulky. I mean, it's no glasses, but it's not heavy/cumbersome
Lol, what can you do more on 4k TV, @icy dirge ?
icy dirge
Everything you can do on any screen
Which is by default more than you can do with a VR headset 😛
mighty carbon
What you can do in VR beats crap out of TV
icy dirge
Except in the arguably most important feature of TV - comfort.
I play games on consoles because I want to get comfy on the couch instead of sitting in front of my PC
wicked oak
except you can just stream or plug your pc to a tv
i use a steamlink for that
works flawless as i use a PLC to have a "direct" wired connection
and i also stream ps4 back to the PC
im doing it right now in fact
wicked oak
i have Destiny
mighty carbon
And my chair is more comfortable than my couch
wicked oak
but i just cant play it
mighty carbon
Destiny 2 is coming to PC ;)
wicked oak
FOV is ridiculously low, wich means i have some serious level of blindfold
and console aiming is trash
icy dirge
Streaming PC to TV is yet another cumbersome step that your average consumer won't bother with.
mighty carbon
Even if I had console and TV, my wife would be watching TV :P
icy dirge
My point is - it takes more than 5 minutes to set up so it's way too complex for the average consumer, without whom the whole thing won't ever become an accepted mass-produced gaming peripheral 😛
mighty carbon
So in other words you are saying PC is cumbersome and isn't consumer friendly ?
icy dirge
Considering that most people buy their PCs pre-assembled and call tech support every time a cable disconnects, yes.
mighty carbon
But somehow there are 3-fold more PC gamers than console players
glossy agate
It won't stay cumbersome, and consumers get smarter. Every child I know, knows how to grab films off Pirate Bay ect and send them to the tv.
Even know how to use vpn. At least high school age children I know.
icy dirge
I'm gonna need a citation on that number, but even if it's true, that's again due to convenience, and a huge point against VR - You already have a PC. Gaming on it is a matter of clicking "install". Consoles require going out and buying dedicated hardware.
mighty carbon
Cumbersome = elite
That's how it was back in 90s
For PC gaming
And the world was a better place
icy dirge
You are talking from a consumer standpoint, I am talking from a developer standpoint 😛
mighty carbon
Gaming world that is
wicked oak
well, pc gaming is huge if you count facebook games and lol only players
icy dirge
Dedicated hardware for a small amount of games in a few specific genres = bad sales pitch.
mighty carbon
Make Matrix and people will be happy get cumbersome just for the experience
wicked oak
i know there are many smurf accounts or dota-only accounts
but it should balance with lol-only and mmo-only players
and all of this means. The amount of players with a vr tier pc
is ridiculously low
mighty carbon
HOTAS are niche and still doing great
1050Ti + i3 Skylake is Rift ready PC
It's quite affordable
Devs need to make games scalable for such PC
We, as devs, shoot ourselves in the foot by going for 1080 GPU and i7, when only tiny % of potential customers have such powerful PCs
personally I aim for i3 + 1060 making my VR stuff.
mighty carbon
970 is old and expensive
full junco
it's still the most used gpu by vr gamers I think
mighty carbon
Maybe
But I think the goal is to sway non-VR gamers with capable PCs to the dark side
full junco
those also have 970
mighty carbon
1050Ti and 1060 are capable too
full junco
but still quite new so they don't matter that much
mighty carbon
Btw, has anyone played Raw Data when it just came out in Early Access ?
How much content did it have?
full junco
good question
doesn't matter though
people compare games with other existing games. back then it was probably good compared to other vr games
now a VR game needs to have more
and in a year it needs to have even more
glossy agate
Yeah, tech demo won't cut it today
mighty carbon
Not too shabby @wicked oak but I think it would work today too.
I'd probably go with early access with my Rift project
glossy agate
When raw data came out it was also "THE" wave shooter, but now a bunch are on the market so it's hard to stand out in that genre. You have to make a new genre if it's starting as a tech demo.
full junco
oh 😄
mighty carbon
@glossy agate I am not planning on wave shooter. I am making matrix :P
full junco
"Major Known Issues in Preview 1
UE-44303 - HotReload fails with Linker errors when using Visual Studio 2017"
so good that I havent updated yet
that would have annoyed me way too much
glossy agate
Sweet. Like the matrix doing kung fu and doing big jumps? Or like if the matrix was a real thing?
mighty carbon
A bit of both I hope :)
I am still debating about visual style
I don't think cuboid world would be as attractive as more detailed low poly anime'ish world
RR quality is out of question of course
Also by "matrix" I don't mean Matrix movie rip-off
full junco
"Unified Console Commands across VR platforms. The previous code base did not share common interfaces across HDMs; now there is a shared layer that developers can work from rather than maintaining each platform individually. This provides several benefits such as easier bootstrapping of new platforms, consistent interfaces, and less redundancies in HMD implementations."
mighty carbon
I'd love to get a VR plugin for 4.16 that incorporates new features ;)
wicked oak
Garbage Collection improvements make collection times twice as fast.
glossy agate
Would be nice if they unified default controller rotations too. So holding a sword or gun ect would be correct for either platform.
wicked oak
im hella happy
mighty carbon
Just thinking about implementing all the stuff for desktop VR (controllers, interactions, etc.) gives me creeps
full junco
its fun 😄
sturdy coral
"A Spline IK node has been added to Animation Blueprints; useful for character spines." that's cool, gonna try using that instead of FABRIK and see if it is better
@full junco the changelog has some details on the new bloom option
sturdy coral
Post processing now supports Image-based (FFT) convolution for physically realistic bloom effects in addition to the existing bloom method. This new post processing feature is designed for use in cinematics or on high-end hardware.
Image based Convolution adds new control parameters to the existing Lens | Bloom section found in Post Process volumes.
In using a new texture to serve as the kernel image, it is important to ensure that the full image is present on the gpu and available at full resolution. Two settings are required to ensure this:
Mips Gen Setting should be set to NoMipmaps
Texture option Never Stream should be selected.
full junco
ah you mean that bloom stuff
full junco
thought you talked about the less blur stuff
that fft stuff doesnt matter for VR at all
sturdy coral
yeah I don't see the details on the blur optimizations
full junco
as usual a lot is missing in that preview summary
they also didnt mention that they created compute shaders for almost all post process things
sturdy coral
yeah they didn't mention the character movement component stuff either
full junco
they also didnt mention niagara
sturdy coral
I want to see this volumetric fog stuff, that sounds cool
full junco
yeah, thats the only thing I really want to test, wanna see if its possible to tweak it for good performance
I also didnt understand how that fog works yet
sturdy coral
yeah, me either, says something about locality being driven by particles, and quality/performance coming from volume texture resolution
mighty carbon
Anything new for Gear VR?
sturdy coral
mobile performance improvements for slate
and "The mobile multiview path now supports GearVR. "
that's all I saw
full junco
so I downloaded 4.16 through the launcher now for testing
@sturdy coral the "less blur steps" stuff seems to work
sturdy coral
cool, you think you are going to move to that over the solution from the forums?
full junco
I don't know yet
btw, the log default color seems to be different: http://puu.sh/vw5Pg/1c93c519a7.png
it seems to be more white than before
the bloom appears to be quite expensive still with 1 blur I think
thats 1 blur
in 1080p
thats 0.22 ms
its still twice the res than that solution from the forums I think
so that makes it roughly twice as expensive
sturdy coral
ah good to know
mighty carbon
Ok, just read the forum post - seems like 4.16 doesn't bring whole a lot of new things
sturdy coral
steam audio is pretty big
mighty carbon
True
sturdy coral
and part of the new audio engine could be turned on in 4.15 but I think 4.16 added a lot more to it
(they used it in robo recall, the new audio engine, not steam audio)
wicked oak
damn
full junco
with temporal reprojection enabled its 1.45 ms
full junco
I like the volumetric stuff
wicked oak
have you tried it on vr?
it might not work
and postproces as compute shaders?
whats the difference with that?
i mean, they are already just a fullscreen quad with some per-pixel kernel
one could do them as async shaders, but that part is still a bit problematic
and has logical latency
full junco
have not tried the fog with vr
wicked oak
i think ps4 already did postprocess as an async compute
full junco
only ssao
wicked oak
makes sense, ssao only needs the depth pass, it can done alongside the main pass
full junco
I will try the fog in vr
that button there is new I think http://puu.sh/vw7Rw/357a26b3b6.png
full junco
fog works in VR
and looks really awesome
its 3 ms though
but who cares about performance
some people have 2 1080ti and we make games for those, right? 😛
wicked oak
3 ms out of 10
too much XD
how does it look in vr?
tomorrow ill try to port DWVR to that version
see how it runs
on its forward renderer. Also i needed those animation features and ps4 improvements
full junco
I said it looks really awesome
I think it probably only works well with TAA though
not sure
sturdy coral
@wicked oak @full junco I thought SSAO also used normals as well as depth
full junco
it has a mode where it can run without normals I think
sturdy coral
ah ok yeah that could run in parallel with everything once the early z pass is done then
real needle
thanks @sturdy coral for pointint me to this discord channel ❤
mighty carbon
glossy agate
Is the new audio supposed to give us the spatial audio or something? I need it.
full junco
@glossy agate don't you already have it with oculus HRTF?
glossy agate
I'm on vive
full junco
you can still use the oculus stuff I think
glossy agate
I heard fmod is good, but obviously and integrated solution is more convenient
full junco
the Oculus Audio Plugin works with all HMDs as far as I know. all desktop HMDs
glossy agate
Oh, I'll look into that. It really enhances the games that do it good.
full junco
but yes, with 4.16 you also get steamvr audio HRTF which might be better than the oculus one
it has audio occlusion which the oculus one hasn't I think
glossy agate
Nice. Gonna be sweet
mighty carbon
Is Nvidia driver 381.89 good ?
(I'v seen reports in the past that some releases had negative impact on VR performance)
tired tree
oculus one makes a virtual boxaround your head
it doesn't have any actual geometry interaction at all
so no occlusion, no refraction worth a damn
but steam audu doesn't care about platform, so hopefully the overhead is low on it
tired tree
"The Oculus SDK only supports direct reflections and does not factor in the virtual world geometry. This problem needs to be solved at a higher level than the Oculus Audio SDK due to the requirements of scanning and referencing world geometry."
Also they are doing their "shoebox model"
if you read those actual articles
its not REAL reflections and occlusion
SteamAudio is integrated and baked alongside the world geometry
"The Audio SDK supports early reflections and late reverberations using a simple 'shoebox model,' consisting of a virtual room centered around the listener's head, with four parallel walls, a floor, and a ceiling at varying distances, each with its own distinct reflection coefficient."
is what oculus does
mighty carbon
I see
I hope Steam Audio will come with good docs and it won't affect performance too much
full junco
good docs? ideally you wont have to care about it at all. you place your audio sources and thats it
real needle
I made a fun game during the SeattleVR hackathon with the concept artist of Rec Room, we made a short video clip: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=moEp81Rf5gQ&feature=share
We'll try to get a character artist to swap out manny soon and then release it for free
pearl tangle
Couldn't really see what was happening there. You scan guys and then shoot them if they have a disease?
glossy agate
So why did the last 2 guys get shot? Or does that just demo what happens when you miss the tumor?
Like a moving version of operation
Or can they just not afford health insurance for the service?
real needle
@pearl tangle You scan them to find the injected bombs (Viper Corp. is monitoring earth's population) and then you need to stealthily extract them using your syringe
THe streets are also monitored by Viper Corp. security (which is manny, big in black)
And you use the extracted bombs to shoot them
We changed the design for the future to allow you to sterilize (freeze) and extract their cortex but we didn't implement it
You can't get close to your patients because they'll be aware of you and that you're manipulating the bombs, which will automatically blow them up
Safety Feature ala Viper Corp.
The original mechanic idea was to move around humanoids in your chaperone
A poor patient gets killed aswell in the video because I believe the surgeon who played got scared
mighty carbon
so, second day in real VR - tried Dead and Buried, Unspoken, Farlands, Disco VR and Dreamdeck
mighty carbon
Dead and Buried sucks since it has no SP
full junco
volumetric fog driven by particles
opal bobcat
they were driven by FOG
mighty carbon
Farlands cute, but has no touch support and annoying
Disco VR is still pics and Dreamdeck was half ok and half not ok
Unspoken is pretty cool, but sounds like wave magic shooter
so, VR lacks experiences and lacks them badly
opal bobcat
isn't interested in VR experiences
mighty carbon
well, consumers are
opal bobcat
yeah
mighty carbon
I can't even show anything to my wife since there is nothing to show from Home or Steam 😦
mighty carbon
wanted to get Dinosaur island, but it doesn't run for anyone (neither Rift nor Vive)
there is nothing to show :/
opal bobcat
thats the only thing you could find?
mighty carbon
maybe Lost and First Contact
opal bobcat
theres literally hundreds of titles between the two of them
opal bobcat
thats a cool one
mighty carbon
maybe fruit ninja, but it's not impressive at all
glossy agate
Put her in the Star Wars demo. Pretty simple but fans love it
mighty carbon
Arizona Sunshine and Batman on my to-buy list, but that's not something she'd play
she isn't really a big fan of StarWars 😃
glossy agate
And your still married? Whaaat? Haha
full junco
just show her the lab, there are enough "experiences" in there
mighty carbon
the Climb seems to look good, but comfort rating isn't comfortable and I don't trust Crytek for shit
glossy agate
Yeah lab has the experiences that are easy to show. My wife kind of liked budget cuts but it requires 360 maybe. Might have snap turns though.
full junco
the first thing I showed people in VR is always the robot repair thing from the lab
glossy agate
Yeah that was dope. Everyone loves the bow and arrow thing too
mighty carbon
well, what about non-gamers? what'd you show them? (or older people)
glossy agate
Actually a really easy and fun one is the nvidia circus demo thing
full junco
the robot repair demo from the lab @mighty carbon
that's a mostly passive experience
very good for non gamers
just shows off VR really good
glossy agate
The nvidia one is moddable too if you want to make something custom to try
mighty carbon
have you tried We Were Here ?
glossy agate
I Haven't heard of it
mighty carbon
what about Google Earth VR ?
so, anyhow, there you have it - a niche in VR market that is empty. Experiences that are more on the passive side.
full junco
because almost no one would pay for that
mighty carbon
that's what you think
hardcore gamers is a niche as it is
hardcore VR gamers are even smaller niche
casual crowd is massive
mighty carbon
I like to play games, but sometimes I just want to chill in VR
and I can't cuz nothing is offered for chilling in VR
they have no reason to have it
since there is no software to support it
full junco
you wont be able to create a new market
mighty carbon
I am just a small speck in the sea
but if many specs make it happen, it will happen
quartz bay
Has anyone else done VR consulting? If so, what are your hourly rates? I'm trying to figure out the going market rate for offering my consulting services.
mighty carbon
charge whatever you need to earn
quartz bay
a million dollars!!!
mighty carbon
sure, but then you will have no clients
some people charge $10 per hour, some - $50, some - $100
quartz bay
mighty carbon
all depends on your skill, what you offer and what you need to pay in life for
quartz bay
I'm currently charging $50/hour, but I am thinking I should raise my rates to $75/hour
mighty carbon
if you live with momma in the basement, then it's one story. If you have family, loans, mortgage and health insurance, then it's another story
quartz bay
but there's a good chance that my hourly rate could be worth $150/hour
full junco
what are you doing as "VR consulting"?
quartz bay
I'm currently making a promotional video for Dell for the GearVR using both 360 video and creating a VR lobby scene. I'm apparantly also doing VR / Unreal troubleshooting, because today I helped a local VR team figure out how to optimize their gearVR app for 90 fps, though they weren't ready for me.
full junco
ok
quartz bay
The thing is, the market is extremely scarce with people who have both VR experience and UE4 experience, so based off of the laws of supply and demand, I could demand a lot because the supply is low.
the real question is, how much would the market be willing to pay before my rates are too high?
full junco
I have no idea what companies like dell think
but I don't think "the market is extremely scarce with people who have both VR experience and UE4 experience"
quartz bay
relative to just general programming and IT experience, we're rare as unicorns...
full junco
just look at this chat or the ue4 forums, there are definitely thousands of people with ue4 and vr experience
just that most probably dont have the idea to charge others for help
mighty carbon
@quartz bay how did you manage to lure Dell into your net ?
glossy agate
That's gonna be a tough sell. Not mainstream enough. Everyone who devs on this is somewhat savvy.
quartz bay
I'm working in an office of freelancers and they're all film makers and dell is one of their clients, and they've been doing 360 videos for people, but their go to guy sucks, so they pinged me for help and now I'm their point man for all VR related 360 videos
glossy agate
Not like it where everyone uses it but like 3 people in the company are competent enough to fix stuff.
*IT
quartz bay
I was just consulting today at another VR company and I was shocked by how behind they are. Their "programmer" didn't even know how to use the command prompt to ping google.com
full junco
well, a programmer doesn't need to know how to ping google with the command prompt
though most probably do
glossy agate
But does a company with people like that have money to pay?
quartz bay
no, I think this company is on the verge of going broke. I think they've been on the verge of going broke for the last two years, but somehow they've managed to hang on.
I don't have the heart to charge them anything more than my lowest rate and just keep my hours low and my commitment minimal.
glossy agate
Not trying to slam your idea, but consultants usually go for mid size companies in order to make them huge companies. Just not any mid size vr companies yet. You are too early to market in my opinion.
glossy agate
Well I hope it works for you. Clever idea, and hopefully for all of us the market grows up around you as first mover.
In the vr consulting game.
quartz bay
It's my side hustle to bring in extra cash, I'm still working on my own VR game
sturdy coral
@mighty carbon you should show your wife tilt brush, quill, medium, the Blu, the lab, any story studio stuff, audio shield, irrational exuberance, the rose and I, soundstage, Google earth,
That's off the top of my head, most are free
jaunty shell
goood mornin' !
eternal inlet
@quartz bay i was doing some work for 20$/hour, but i felt it was too little. So 50-75 sounds more reasonable
wicked oak
to be fair, high skilled programmers with knowledge in VR are in big demand
and they are SUPER hard to find
so just charge more
dont undersell yoursefl
real needle
Do you guys have any tutorial or sample to create a flying AI that only spawn and attack the player ?
wicked oak
flying AI needs special pathfinding. OR just a bit of cheating
real needle
I do not mind cheating. I want nothing special
wicked oak
then just make a pawn that uses the navmesh but flies above it
real needle
But if there is house under it. The navmesh won't works ?
It need to spawn behind houses then pass over it and attack the player
short tangle
Soo I'm starting VR
And my boss would like to have a thing where not only your motion controllers are shown but your hands too
And if you press a button on the Touch motion controller, the virtual hand will press that button too
Using Oculus, he said there might be something like that in the SDK already but I don't know
jaunty shell
with the Oculus avatar system maybe ?
mighty carbon
Bah, these people on the forums... VR is expensive and advertised on every corner according to them (arguing UE4 devs should not focus on VR)
dusky moon
Oculus Avatar system is not integrated yet in UE4 right ?!
mighty carbon
Hands and Touch model have nothing to do with Avatars
short tangle
I've been told the oculus SDK for unity has this working already but I'm not sure myself
mighty carbon
I think they have FBX models in their C++ Avatar SDK
wicked oak
i dont think its even fbx, you grab the data "directly" from the sdk
so you can get the customized mesh for a given avatar
but no ue4 support
sooo
doesnt matter for us
wich is a shame
tired tree
well...its implementable right?
UE4 doesn't officially support steams version of that but it wasn't that bad to handle
tired tree
yeah the skinning system
jaunty shell
@short tangle if you want custom visuals just make your own blueprint with every animation/model you want
wicked oak
that might be more useful if it works with more headsets
but for now, generic HMD and hands for both is fine
or like i do, just have 3 controler models and switch beetween them as needed
after all, you gotta switch control logic anyway
tired tree
meh, I like my overwatch controllers :p
jaunty shell
@tired tree so are you using custom controllers or using the ones defined in SteamVR ?
tired tree
The steamVR skin for an overwatch controller
pulls whatever the user has selected in options
jaunty shell
aye
tired tree
son plays with bannanas
jaunty shell
and the controllers are animated by default ?
tired tree
there is a more advanced API that pulls in all buttons and parts of a controller as seperate meshes
so you can run procedural animations
based on state and finger position ect
jaunty shell
yeah I see
Didn't know there was an api for that, I made my own including animations and stuff
tired tree
lots of people using their own
but a lot of unity games pull the users skin
for menu's and the like
jaunty shell
yeah one of the apps we use is made with Unity and pulls the skin for steamvr
Guys, RelativeLocation works the same in VR and 2D mode right ?
tired tree
yes
jaunty shell
I get a different behaviour
tired tree
related to what
jaunty shell
the root of my pawn
tired tree
no, as in how is it different
jaunty shell
ah, well it just doesn't work
tired tree
and in 2d are you using a Fps controller
jaunty shell
nope, same controller, I'm just translating the pawn around
and I have a child actor that is supposed to follow the pawn root
but it only works in standard play mode
tired tree
in VR the root isn't moving with you
jaunty shell
ah, that could be it
tired tree
in the "suggested" setup by epic the root stays at 0,0 and the HMD and controllers move relative to it, the actor acts as your roomspace with the root being at the dead center
jaunty shell
I'll just add a dummy scene component as a ref then
tired tree
follow the cameras location instead
jaunty shell
the camera root or the camera itself ?
tired tree
camera
camera root doesn't translate either, its there to set a height...damn forgot how clunky the suggested setup was
jaunty shell
x)
hmm I wonder if were'll get the right behaviour
I want to move the actor relatively to the playspace
not the camera itself (which moves in the playspace)
tired tree
then keep it offset from root
root is playspace center
if you move the actor it will follow with it
jaunty shell
okay so after fiddling around with it
it seems the actor looses its parent after being manipulated
might be because we attach it to its interactor then release it when dropped
tired tree
if you are detaching then yeah it would lose the parent
raven halo
@mighty carbon remember how I told you that my game was failing Oculus submission test because it was failing on S6 Edge?
Turns out they messed up the test results
they mixed them up
it does in fact work on S6 Edge
the devices that it does not work on are certain devices running Android 5
mighty carbon
Ha, crazy stuff o.O
raven halo
yes totally
we were going nuts
turns out that the game is not launching on certain devices running Android 5... because...
well
mighty carbon
Glad to hear it's been resolved!
raven halo
you know how Epic advertises Unreal as being OpenGL Es 3.1 compatible?
It's a small lie
there is a catch
mighty carbon
Oh
raven halo
it does not work with OPenGL ES 3.1 specifications
it also needs the phone OS to enable certain extension of the GPU through the driver
otherwise it wont run
mighty carbon
Interesting twist
raven halo
yes
so what epic should say is:
Unreal on ES 3.1 works with ES 3.1 compatible devices that also have 2 specific extensions enabled
so
our problem is that Oculus also tests S6, S6 Edge and Note 5 on Android 5
for whatever reason, Android 5 does not enable the extensions needed by Unreal on those devices
and the only solution is to upgrade to Android 6
interestingly enough, Android 5 enables the extension if it runs on a Note 4
but there must have been a bug or whatever on the driver for the S6 chip on Android 5
mighty carbon
I am guessing one should tell them "no Note 4 and no Android 5 devices supported" when submitting for the review?
raven halo
exactly
I still haven't heard back from them regarding the Android 5 request
(I don't even know why they are asking for android 4 support in the first place)
also interesting note
you can also drop support for Note 5 if you want
mighty carbon
But it's the same as S6
mighty carbon
I see
raven halo
we told them the only reason why it's failing on Note 5 is because of Android 5
and we haven't heard back yet
but I'll let you know as always
mighty carbon
Well, people should have upgraded to Android 6.0.1 by now
mighty carbon
Btw, have you tried 4.16p1 ? It supposedly has multiview working properly on Gear VR
raven halo
i can understand if a casual phone user doesn't upgrade OS, but a enthusiast who goes out of his way to get a gearvr?
how likely would that be?
I haven't no
we are right now on the Oculus branch of unreal
that had the latest sdk stuff
fun fact:
mighty carbon
I am sure Oculus already released 4.16 p1
raven halo
the oculus branch of unreal, for whatever reason, is set to ask for all imaginable permissions when running the game
mighty carbon
Oh, that's bad
raven halo
we only noticed because we failed another point in the submission process that was asking us to remove so many permissions
and we were totally surprised!
by default it even asks for your contact list
mighty carbon
Is it hard to remove those?
raven halo
it's crazy
nah
it's simple
it's just totally unexpected
if Oculus lets us drop support for Android 5
then we only have one single problem left
which is that there is sever tearing happening on Android 7
I've been talking to Oculus
and the best guess at this moment is that Android 7 uses more GPU resources, and so the OS, the game and the timewarp process are all fighting for resources
and there are just not enough
raven halo
I'm curious to see how the game would perform there. Interestingly enough, S8 is not part of the submission test
in theory, if it has a beefier GPU, it could be able to handle Android 7, the game and the time warp
mighty carbon
Hah, what a mess
raven halo
yup
we have gone through a second submission attempt yesterday
that's how we realized they messed up the results the first time
also, this time around they complained about the permissions issue
mighty carbon
Google is secretly making Gear VR work worse than Daydream. Sabotage.
mighty carbon
Tweet at Carmack and tell him to fix that shit! :)
raven halo
i'm so tempted 😛
mighty carbon
I see people actually doing that
tired tree
terrible people
mighty carbon
Lol
It just feels like there are 2-3 devs at oculus and the rest are administration and shareholders
Taking forever to fix things and improve Home.
jaunty shell
@tired tree got it, had to reattach the actor to the pawn once you drop it
tired tree
when you "attach" it to something else it loses it's original parent anyway
mighty carbon
@raven halo do you happen to have any idea how to do this kind of thing https://forums.unrealengine.com/showthread.php?142828-quot-Animating-quot-emissive-texture-elements-discretely-how&p=697783&viewfull=1#post697783
raven halo
yes
this is my bread and butter
!
I would do all of this in the shader
in the material I mean
mighty carbon
Well, I'd rather not, since I don't know shaders
raven halo
hah
I wouldn't know any other way to do it....
what were you planning on doing if it wasn't shaders?
tired tree
/** Sound class to be used for the VOIP audio component */
UPROPERTY(config, EditAnywhere, Category="Audio", meta=(AllowedClasses="SoundClass"))
FStringAssetReference VoiPSoundClass;
jaunty shell
aye sounds about right
mighty carbon
@raven halo well, it's normally done in material, so that's what I'd do. Just need to figure out how to do that.
tired tree
no its old
was hoping it was a useful override
it just looked new because the name bugs out in display in editor
mighty carbon
Thanks a bunch
I am at work right now, so I can't really test anything anyway
But I can answer questions 😊
wicked oak
rip all older console commands
now everything is "vr.something"
wich honestly is better
fuck those random commands
jaunty shell
on 4.16 ?
mighty carbon
@wicked oak How is performance with 4.16 in DWVR?
wicked oak
similar to 4.15
my archmage apex cloth is now workign
but its waaaaaaay slower than what it was
im talking a single mage (boss) taking the frames from 9ms to 20ms
tired tree
you using apex? not the new cloth system?
or are you saying the new cloth system is slower
wicked oak
it was using apex
so probably yes, apex
it used to be fast enough, is not that high poly a mesh
but now its lagging incredibly hard
mighty carbon
Try new cloth sim. It will be replacing apex anyway.
wicked oak
how do i set it up?
mighty carbon
I don't know - I saw it in the release notes :)
mighty carbon
Are there any AI improvements in 4.16?
mighty carbon
I see
What's with that Odin class from RR? Is it something new and generic for UE4 or is it just for RR?
tired tree
All the Odin classes are c++ ocnstructs for RR
some custom functionality, things that would be hard or impossible to do in blueprint
mighty carbon
I thought they will have it as part of 4.16
mighty carbon
Any idea what exact functionality they needed it for?
tired tree
well for one, AI controllers don't naturally track the correct location for VR pawns
they track the root location
so they changed that behavior to look for the camera location instead
wicked oak
i do that too, but in a simpler way
tired tree
its actually easier to achieve than how they did it though, doubt its going to hit the engine itself,
wicked oak
i just track the camera of the player
tired tree
thats how they do it?
wicked oak
i have functions that are like "get player head location"
that just return the cam position
tired tree
oh, i'm talking about the ai controller GetActorFocalPoint
mighty carbon
What difference does it make for AI?
tired tree
AIController Line Of Sight checks and facing direction are derived from the actor location
which is wrong for vr
that is unless you are directly driving a pawn
then its correct
I actually had someone ask how to do that yesterday and I made him an overrideen AI Controller
mighty carbon
I see. Is this stuff present in your template/plugin?
tired tree
as of last night yes :p
didn't consider people needing it until someone asked
its pretty simple to implement
just two function overrides
but most of ODIN classes are modified movement components, game backends, and custom AI functions. The primary gameplay is all BP
mighty carbon
So, what else RR AI does that normal ue4 AI can't do?
tired tree
also had some dude replicating 4 vive trackers, the HMD, and both controllers per player, so did some network optimization to accommodate that level of severe sillyness.
its mostly just general AI stuff, custom target finding and the like
generic things you would do when making a game
based on the gameplay
mighty carbon
Hmm.. sucks.
I was hoping AI is more flexible in ue4 and doesn't require custom C++ work
mighty carbon
Well, RR is the first VR game from Epic, so I assume AI in the stick engine wasn't capable of doing what AI in RR does
(And so far I didn't see anything out of ordinary, so I assume the issues were in the core AI functionality)
I guess when I get AI I'll see all the issues regarding working with AI for VR
tired tree
well you mostly assumed wrong here...
the ai system is pretty robust
think they just wanted some of the systems in c++ for the AI to keep the speed up
wicked oak
the behavior tree is quite strong
they used it extensively for robo recall
and blueprints
mighty carbon
So basically RR AI could have been made without C++ ?
fleet veldt
Maybe not 100% without (and still run on min spec machines) but the majority of the logic is in blueprints/behavior trees.
wicked oak
RR ai is 99% blueprints mate
only a few c++ stuff
that could be worked around in blueprints
lmao its inside out tracking with some IR marker
nothing out of the ordinary, very easy to make
even i could get that working if you give me a small budget and a few weeks
its kind of useless. It needs to you to place markers around
but its a good "give me money investors" startup that will never get anywhere
mighty carbon
True
I wonder if anime style materials with ink outlines would perform well in VR
(Toon shading)
fresh laurel
mighty carbon
Lol, I just posted that one swipe above ;)
fleet veldt
stop changing avatars on us @fresh laurel 😉
fresh laurel
😛
valid ether
I have a shimmering issue on GearVR headset. My UMG widgets and text are bouncing around a few pixels constantly while moving the camera. Looks like this is Unreal rendering issue which was tried to be addressed in v4.14 by implementing forward rendering. But this doesn't fix my issue. Here's another similar thread posted in Answerhub here https://answers.unrealengine.com/questions/71817/shimmer-on-edges-lines.html
Does anyone faced a similar issue?
mighty carbon
Gear VR have used mobile forward rendering since like 4.7
I don't have this issue. Using 4.15.1
Also, you shouldn't use UMG as is. Either render it to texture for Stereo layer, or use it on 3D widget.
mighty carbon
@wicked oak where do you get character anims for your games ?
wicked oak
marketplace
and the ones i cant get, i animate myself
like for my flying magic bosses
mighty carbon
I see
Are there plenty anims to cover pretty much anything when it comes to bipedal on-the-ground characters ?
mighty carbon
I don't like their anims
I am thinking either to animate myself (fun, but tedious) or just buy them and then modify them inside UE4 using Allright Rig plugin.
mighty carbon
@raven halo any luck by chance ?
eternal inlet
anyone tried Batman VR yet?
mighty carbon
I wanted to, but I read that people get VR sick with it
eternal inlet
really?
mighty carbon
(And supposedly they don't get sick with other experiences)
eternal inlet
from the little fottage i saw, it was mostly teleportation?
mighty carbon
Why?
eternal inlet
gun handling is anoying
mighty carbon
Is it worse than RR?
eternal inlet
actually i liked RR better even on Vive
mighty carbon
So I guess we are back to square one - no good games and no good experiences in VR :(
eternal inlet
some places also, the dificulty is just instane, and other places just boring
Vanishing Realms
that's the only game i really enjoyed
even with teleportatino
mighty carbon
I like RR a lot
wicked oak
im making a dungeon crawler myself @eternal inlet
eternal inlet
cool @wicked oak
mighty carbon
Also tried The Unspoken last night and I thought it was cool. But it's MP only :(
wicked oak
a nearly 2 weeks prototype
i got the core gameplay and combat locked down
now i need better level generator for the dungeons
eternal inlet
cool
wicked oak
while the artist i know is trying some concepts, im back to DWVR to get stuff done
btw its a cooperative game
eternal inlet
ooh nice, so MP
wicked oak
this shows it well
wicked oak
mp games are much easier to market
eternal inlet
is mp possible to do in bp only? never done any mp before
wicked oak
ys
wicked oak
this bow works MP and has critical hits that knocks down the enemy if you hit him in the head
and if you hit on the shield it will stay stuck and not do damage
wicked oak
it is
im also trying to see how would it work on PSVR
as i wont focus on pc vr
when i have the possibility of doing PSVR
eternal inlet
nice
mighty carbon
Total Biscuit won't play your MP game, but he will play SP as he won't have to search for someone to play with ;)
wicked oak
yes
eternal inlet
ok, coz im doing a terrible hack right now
it works, but it's tedius as fuck
by having a pawn that spawns a character that i just use for capsule
and then i move my pawn to the char all the time more or less
wicked oak
thats what i do, but 1 char not 2
eternal inlet
i think im gonna post a bunch of videos on how i set that up, but in hope that someone else can point to a better approach
hmm, well i got 1 char (capsule) and 1 pawn (camera)
u don't have that?
wicked oak
nope
i just have a VROrigin component on the character
and offset it in a way that the camera is on top of the collision
eternal inlet
i must be overcomplicating something
i tried that
couldn't get it to work
you also allow moving in roomscale then?
i mean
movement in roomscale moves the capsule also
wicked oak
yes
i do that by teleporting the character below the camera, and then "resetting" the camera location so its right above the capsule (as moving the character moves the camera)
eternal inlet
hmm sounds like something i tried, but it didn't work for me
ie. if i was moving in roomscale while moving with trackpad or whatever
those two things kept interfeering
wicked oak
no issue
other one here has a better version
in that free VR toolkit for ue4
his version actually works much better multiplayer
eternal inlet
Mordentral?
eternal inlet
ah yes i talked to him about it too
i actually thought the character movement was replicating correctly pr. default?
eternal inlet
ah
in that case, my vrchar may actually behave correctly
even though it's at the cost of a seperate pawn
i need to figure out how to do MP stuff and try it out
wicked oak
just grab his c++ version of that
eternal inlet
i don't understand c++ very well 😦
i actually tried to read some of it, but i don't get it
eternal inlet
yeah, well, it's gonna take a long time to learn that for me
wicked oak
but if you got blueprints covered, you already know about programming
you should try learning it anyway, it will improve your blueprints
eternal inlet
i should start with something more basic then atleast
yeah, i'll eventually try some
wicked oak
just try to learn c++ separated from unrela
eternal inlet
good idea
should do that in work hours actually lol
instead of doing stuff in c#
like i normally do
hehe
bet my colleagues wont mind me switching haha 😄
wicked oak
well, from C# to C++ its not that big of a step
syntax is highly similar
the biggest difference is that you need to manage memory properly and use pointers in C++
wicked oak
you only need to think of them as links to AActors or Uobjects
and check all of them
IsValid() constantly
all the damn time
eternal inlet
omg
eternal inlet
yeah i understand that part
yuk... well, thx for the peptalk 😃 i will start out in small
get used to that stuff and the syntax
but it will take a loooong time
full junco
@wicked oak you should not do IsValid() all the time
that would be really bad
you should write your code so that you know the pointer is valid
wicked oak
of course
full junco
only do IsValid() if theres really no other way to make sure its valid
wicked oak
also nullptr
full junco
otherwise its a waste of performance
wicked oak
the problem is that im doing replication shanenigans
with replicated actors and the like
ive had a problem a couple times where the pointer wasnt null, but it was invalid
due to replication stuff
full junco
yeah with replication you might need to do it more often
wicked oak
i would like to just send an std::Optional
to functions that do work if you send null
and avoid actual null when possible
full junco
why?
wicked oak
clear intent
glossy agate
@eternal inlet Check out this BP MP project from Epic. Its setup for Steam and VR if you want to pick through it. https://forums.unrealengine.com/showthread.php?118246-Steam-Blueprint-Multiplayer-Project-Files
glossy agate
Haha yeah. I have it downloaded, but havn't done anything with it yet.
eternal inlet
actually i recall that... someone said it wasn't working or something
so i didnt download
but now i will anyway to see
glossy agate
Yeah that was a while back. In the thread it looks like updates are in now, or at least instructions on fixing the broken parts.
eternal inlet
when did forum layout change to look like answerhub btw?
i got so confused just now when looking through it, and realizing it's the forums
glossy agate
I actually didn't notice haha. I Think its been like that for a while.
eternal inlet
could just be my browser that has been caching something
tired tree
have to download the new one
4.16 changed a ton of things
most of the time that also requires purging intermediate folders as they don't always regenerate for whatever reason
its in a beta branch on the repository until official release when it will become the master branch
I wouldn't switch over on a serious project until 4.16.0 or .1 due to tons of bugs in preview versions usually anyway
oh, the template is fully over to 4.16 though, since I keep it on latest engine version at all time
@eternal inlet you are prob on the mobile version of the forums, it keeps reverting for me to that, press Full Site at bottom of pagwe
also that multiplayer project template is pretty bad
god damn it, they broke debug rendering in VR again in 4.16
its hell to test until fixed
full junco
@tired tree what debug rendering?
tired tree
debug draw
rendering regardless of hmd orientation again
it happened back in 4.13 for a bit too
currently get ghosted black copies of all debug shapes that follow your head
zenith charm
Ah I did MordenTral, checking out the new example right now so that's helping see whats changed 😃
tired tree
all of the changes are on the back end in c++
full junco
still dont get what you mean with "debug draw"
tired tree
debug capsules / spheres / squares
zenith charm
Ah I see, I'm a few versions back I think at this point.
full junco
ah, those stuff
tired tree
the direct line rendering
full junco
that doesnt work?
tired tree
it does, but its ghosting a second copy into view
regardless of if its on screen or not
same bug 4.13 preview had
full junco
I want to move to 4.16 preview once my game is done
so that I'm sure any feature I need works
full junco
good, then complain a lot
full junco
that thing is expensive
mighty carbon
yep
but if it works ...
btw, struggling with this issue:
(not getting smooth gradients on masking and not getting even "fill rate")
any ideas folks ?
anyone? 😦
glossy agate
Oh I thought that gradient map you were using was supposed to mask the emissive coming through.
mighty carbon
it is
but I need it to be on the opaque material
it actually has the same issues for transparent material - no smooth gradients and non-linear filling
quartz bay
The hardlight suit by NullspaceVR will have a UE4 plugin for us :)
http://www.hardlightvr.com/
real needle
@quartz bay I used an old version and it worked just fine, they rewrote it with some feedback and the new one will be much better
clever sky
Oh yeah... VRGluv.
I backed it. But I'm still skeptical.
Dexmo gloves cost $11k for the DK1 prototypes.
They're so expensive you have to contact them via email to get the price!
But VRGluv? $500 mass produced slicker looking dev units?
Sounds like a too good to be true.
Only backed it because the cheapest tier was still open and i wanted the option of cancelling them in a little less than a month's time 😛
jaunty shell
It does look too good to be true, but their product almost looks like a finished one
clever sky
Problem is hardware stuff tends to be much more... finnicky in its success rate.
I've only backed one hardware thing on kickstarter. The Oculus Rift DK1.
That one passed the sniff test.
But this one... is much more uncertain.
jaunty shell
Sixense PTSD ayy
blissful bear
Unity gets VRWorks integrated? As a plugin? Unreal needs better VRWorks etc integration,maybe this will spur them on...
https://developer.nvidia.com/nvidia-vrworks-and-unity
eternal inlet
@motorsep#8292 u know how to handle moving platforms and navigation? As i understand, it's not possible right now, out of the box, but even with some manual work, how would such a thing be possible?
mighty carbon
@eternal inlet I don't know anything about AI just yet :) But I think AI doesn't jump from area to area and up/down in stock UE4
valid ether
@mighty carbon, about using stereo layer for GearVR rendering you adviced me, I could not render a simple texture in stereo layer. Also I've seen your discussion here https://forums.oculus.com/developer/discussion/44130/gear-vr-rendering-umg-widget-in-stereolayer-component-how-bp-only and tried both projects with C++ and Blueprints, but nothing was rendered to my screen.
eternal inlet
i also used stereolayers at some poinit to draw a fov limiter material
problem with it, was that it also blocks the chaperonebounds
which makes the player loose track of roomscale
so i actually reverted to a normal plane mesh
alpine torrent
i was thinking if you make a gun or hack nerf gun then connect them vie plugin to your ue4 vr project that woundn't be hard?
valid ether
My problem is, that after setting up stereo layer componnent, still nothing was visible to me.
eternal inlet
u don't see it in the viewport?
valid ether
that's right, exaclty
eternal inlet
and u're using which version of ue4?
valid ether
4.15.1
mighty carbon
Stereo layers do not show in PIE
eternal inlet
send a screenshot
mighty carbon
Only in VR
eternal inlet
true
also u may have to add some distance
im not in front of my pc, but i recall i added like 100cm
on the x axis
valid ether
ahh, let me try in VR first. I thought it should work on editor as well.
eternal inlet
with a quad size of 300x300
i usally activate mirror on steamvr when i do stereolayers
tired tree
@blissful bear Its not really possible to make a plugin for ue4 that does the same thing.
valid ether
@mighty carbon and @eternal inlet Thank you guys, thank you very much! It worked with better quality than Oculus home.
mighty carbon
No problem :)
eternal inlet
great to hear 😃
jaunty shell
Is there any good doc on how to use SteamVR loading screens with UE4 ? Is level streaming the only solution ?
eternal inlet
as far as i know yes
valid ether
@mighty carbon @eternal inlet Guys, do you think that this is a workaround and not a soluition, and we should expect from Epic Devs, that they should arm UE4 with proper means of developing UI based VR app with high quality rendering?
tired tree
the stereo layer is there because it renders in the compositor and outside of postprocessing
you can link UM
G widgets with stereo layers though
the problem is if its not Oculus hardware then there is no supported geometry occlusion
clever sky
@eternal inlet Moving platforms and AI would probably need custom logic. i.e. trigger boxes and instructions to jump onto the platform then off again.
valid ether
Sorry, could you elaborate a little more, I'm not fluent to UE4 and it is not clear to me what do you mean with "renders in the compositor and outside of postprocessing"?
clever sky
compositor is the rendering layer that sits in the pipeline after the engine... so that you can render external of game elements to the screen.
Like windows UI or steam UI
From what I understand*
Basically near the final stage just before it sends data to the display itself.
tired tree
yeah its rendering AFTER the engine passes off the scene data to the VR layer
so it doesn't have any of the post processing or lens warping that the engines image is affected with
well, lens cropping
Actually, I have a good example of that, from a video where I had an engine cap and a compositor cap side by side
look at how the keyboard renders in the compositor
valid ether
so.. this is why I couldn't see rendered stereo layer while playing through the editor?
clever sky
Yep
valid ether
Guys, I am still not sure whether what I have done is a workaround to get better rendering in VR. And do we expect in future to render in VR as good as we can achieve using Stereo Layer trick described above?
tired tree
likely not
stereo layers are likely going to stick around as a solution rather than another in engine pass
valid ether
Ok, let me describe what I have done to be clear what I ask.
I have a 3D UMG widget where I have buttons and other UI elements. When I render it in VR it is shimmering. For solving this issue, I first render the UMG widget in a texture, then I put a Stereo Layer right in front of my UMG widget and set the rendered texture to Stereo Layer. In other words, I have UMG widget to get taps on GearVR using raycasting, and then use Stereo Layer to render it normally. If UMG would be renderd in high quality, I would not need Stereo Layer. Doesn't it sounds like a workaround?