It’s a standing VR game. You’d play it with something like this. Aim with gaze, and push the button to shoot (actually, press the button to notch and draw back; release the button to let fly). I’ve prototyped this much already, with just balloons floating up and bursting into confetti when hit, and I can say that it’s fun.
Weak to nonexistent.
From a business perspective, this may be a stupid move; it’s extremely hard to make any money in the app store, and making a VR game only limits your audience that much more. But this idea has gripped me and won’t let go. I feel compelled to do this.
Hmm, in that case I was going to advise you to pick up the $15 VR viewer above, but I guess I’d have to first advise you to pick up a $700 smart phone.
Then you gotta do it! But from what you describe wouldn’t it work to give the players an alternate control scheme where they just hold the phone at arms length (without stereo rendering)? Unless depth perception is super critical for gameplay I’d imagine this to work as sort of a lowered barrier to entry, saying “Oh look, isn’t archery fun? You just need to spend ~20$ and you could be doing this in VR, wouldn’t that be great?”.
Yeah… not gonna happen.
Maaaaybe a rift or vive at some point, but not soon.
Oh, didn’t know those things have a button. I was thinking of something like looking down and right to grab an arrow (optional and maybe unneccessary), and looking up to start drawing and the arrow gets released at the end of the animation, so you’d have to time it right. But if there’s a button then people likely will prefer that I think.
I just skimmed this topic but especially if you’re looking for inspiration for a defense-style game, take a look at Sweatshop.
It’s technically a tower defence game but it is themed completely different: you don’t shoot and drop enemy health but instead ‘fill a progress bar’ to make clothes.
You don’t realise you’re playing a tower defense until you’re well into the game. (well, if you’re going to check it out with that knowledge you’ll probably see it straight away, but… :p)
@JoeStrout : just wanted to make sure you know about this guy:
Probably not really as “historically accurate” as he claims and rather goofy at times, but still fun to watch and maybe inspiring for alternate “firing modes” or “trickshot challenges”.
Yes, you’re absolutely right, and in fact this appears to be something of a standard for VR games. Some call it “magic window,” others just call it “not VR.”
Absolutely. Note that not all Cardboard-style headsets have a button. My first one did not, and I was like
But then I got the headset linked above, which does have the button, and life is better. I also got a MFi (Made for iPhone) game controller, which looks and feels like a PS3 controller and connects to the phone via Bluetooth. I plan to also support that (basically mash any button to do the equivalent of the Cardboard button), for cases like my earlier viewer, or any time people want to keep their hands off their headset.
Speaking about bows and arrows…
You guys should check out Mr. Gandalf himself, Gary Chynne.
That guy teaches, how Nordic European people, shot arrows back in the
old sword and shield days.
The old style homing aiming arrow technique, he demonstrated in one of
his vids, is amazing and leaves you with alot of questions.
If you want to learn more about archery then I can recomment his videos: NUSensei
Like mentioned already you can also make the arrows non lethal. Instead of dying hit targets can simply disappear.
