Godot with the Flow

My project for the PPXR hackathon aims to provide a glimpse at the stark contrast between VR native and legacy control schemes for games and experi- ences. The project consists of two game scenes with te same puzzle. One scene uses native VR grab commands on the controller to manipulate the puzzel. The other scene uses the joysticks to manipulate the puzzle and the camera. Users will not be able to just tell the difference between the experiences, they will feel the difference by playing the same game with the different control schemes. I wanted to explore the theme of space through interaction. The puzzle is based off of a toy I have fond memories playing with as a kid. In the puzzle there is a marble run with small ledges to keep the marble on the track. To get the marble to the end of the track you have to carefully rotate the entire puzzle to get the ball to travel along the track until you get to the end. If the marble falls then you have to get the marble back onto the start of the track. In my game there is a brown ball, and the goal is to get the ball into the ring at the finish of the track. This puzzle provided a great way for the user to feel connected in space with the puzzle. My hypothesis for this project was that the legacy control scheme (controller and mouse/keyboard) would feel extremely jarring when compared directly with the native VR scene. The current convention in VR games is to use the two lower buttons on the back of the controller for grab commands and the joysticks for locomotion. Legacy control schemes, however, need the joysticks to control locomotion and camera movement. This makes manipulating real world analogs more difficult. The conclusion I found, and I believe anyone who has tried the demo will reach, is that the VR native scene is much more fun to play. Being able to see and manipulate the puzzle feels like second nature compared in VR when using the correct control scheme. The legacy control scheme plays more similarly to a brain teaser than a game, it is so difficult to wrap your head around the controls. The most interesting finding I had while building the project was actually how difficult it was to actually make the game work with legacy controls. Due to the camera being locked to the joystick, I needed to find 3 axes of rotation with other inputs. Originally, I tried using only the left joystick as input, but the game was too difficult to complete. If you are looking for a challenge try completing this mode without using the x or y buttons. Likely, you will find the same frustrations I did. This project was a lot of fun and helped me become a better VR developer. It is a good reminder that control schemes for different media exist for a reason. However, it is also important to recognize when a control scheme has become outdated for your media. The next step of this project I hope to complete is trying the same puzzle with hand tracking gloves. I believe there might be a similar jump in usability and fun, but will need to try it out in the future.

Built With

• gdscript
• godot
• quest3
• vr