Vimeo: In February 2014, I approached the german roller coaster manufacturer Mack Rides with the idea of extending a real roller coaster by wearing an Oculus Rift headset during the ride. I was wondering if it would be possible to replace the real environment by a synchronized virtual ride.
At Mack Rides, they also saw the potential and entered this ground-breaking cooperation project with me and my students, providing us two roller coasters for research and testing (Blue Fire and Pegasus in Europa-Park).
Then, on April 7th, we actually became VR coaster pioneers – being the very first people to experience an Oculus Rift VR-ride on a real roller coaster, synchronized to the real track. And it was just unbelievable!
On that day, we all felt that we were laying the foundation of something very big.
Over the following weeks and months, we have been performing more than a hundred test rides and have been making some amazing discoveries.
While working out technical solutions and patent matters, we weren't able to go public any earlier.
Of course, we had a hard time watching the first videos of people riding coasters with an Oculus Rift surfacing on the web - while we had already been performing dozens and dozens of such rides.
But, knowing that with Mack Rides we're having a major industry partner on our side, we were always confident that their amazing support would still make for a great and successful publication of this project, even if it would take some time.
And now we're happy that it's finally time to disclose our adventure to the rest of the world!
Visit vr-coaster.com to find out more about the project and our discoveries!
10 Comments
siftbotThe thumbnail image for this video has been updated - thumbnail added by eric3579.
ChaosEngineThat is such a fantastic idea!
*promote
siftbotPromoting this video and sending it back into the queue for one more try; last queued Saturday, August 30th, 2014 1:17pm PDT - promote requested by ChaosEngine.
RFlaggI see the parks and roller coaster makers getting into this idea once everything matures a bit. Want to ride the rides, buy a $60 ticket. Want Fast Pass, another $100. Want to augment the rides, that'll be another $80 plus a $150 deposit on the glasses (if you have the Fast Pass, or $120 without the fast pass plus the deposit).
newtboyI can dig it.
lucky760Very awesome. I just wish they'd show more of the virtual environment they're seeing.
Why show so much of the real coaster?!
ChaosEngineYeah, I thought the same (although seeing the rw speed etc fed back into the simulation was cool).
At one point, it looked like they actually had part of a game there, literally a rail shooter. That could be a lot of fun.
Very awesome. I just wish they'd show more of the virtual environment they're seeing.
Why show so much of the real coaster?!
billpayerFor when a roller coaster isn't exciting enough and Oculus Rift just isn't immersive enough....
...just go bungie jump or something
ZawashOooh - imagine Oculus Rift with a bungee jump!
For when a roller coaster isn't exciting enough and Oculus Rift just isn't immersive enough....
...just go bungie jump or something
GrimmSeems like they would be able to do more with something like this is in a simulator than with a roller coaster. With a coaster the experiences have to always match the speed and movement with the track. In a large simulator (like Star Tours) The could program multiple experiences.
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