greghgradwell

You should sign up for updates at www.trydrivr.com and if we come demo nearby, you can hate it in person :D

Yeah, great idea! I think there should be some simple ways to increase the perceived speed. Either with other moving objects like you mention, or by altering the environment, e.g. with fog, tunnels, overhangs, etc. Even at its current leisurely pace, the game is still fun (and even hectic at times), which is encouraging for what it might become after some of these enhancements can be implemented.

Agreed! It's a great platform for a game like that where you're following a fixed path.

In its current state, it's actually more challenging if a real track already exists. Years down the road I would love to be capable of perceiving a real track and generating a virtual version of it on the fly. But this will always be a VR experience, rather than AR. And the go-kart is moving slowly enough that spinouts aren't an issue. However, given the right vehicle design, I'm sure that they could be intentionally conducted in a controlled manner. Being able to simulate drifting is definitely on the list for the next vehicle iteration.

Ha! That, and you beat me every time we play.

Finding an open place to drive could be less challenging if the go-kart had a better turning radius, so I could make the driving area a bit narrower. In that case, there would lots of parking lots where this would work, at least for the purpose of showing someone who wanted to try it. I've taken the current prototype as far as it should go. The architecture is really only suited for single player experiences. I wanted get to a point where I had convinced myself that the concept was feasible and fun, and I've done that. The ultimate goal of this project is to build a product that can function as an autonomous vehicle development platform. To get to there, I'll need to work with people who have built large multiplayer games and autonomous systems. So I'm done with the engineering for now until I've got a small team.

Haha, yes, the graphics are definitely not going to win any awards. This is a standalone app on the headset, and I wanted to ensure a smooth frate rate. Plus, I think it's easier for someone with very little game dev experience (me) to create a highly immersive environment using low-poly assets.

I've been impressed with techniques like redirected walking. People are so clever! For this application, I think it would present some challenges when trying to add a second player, in terms of ensuring they don't collide in real life. However I can scale the players perceived speed with a simple multiplier, e.g., have them move 2 meters in the game for every 1 meter they move in real life.

That's a great point. I'm starting out with experiences that are intended for low speeds. In the video, the vehicle is never going more than 5 mph. I think there's a lot of ways to make things interesting, e.g. adding additional tasks, without having to go much faster.

In regards to multiple vehicles, you're absolutely right. At the current state, this is limited to one player per driving area. But the fact that the vehicle is software controlled, will allow multiple vehicles to eventually drive on the same track.

There are boundaries in the game that will trigger a return to start, which just computes a new path from the current location back to the level's starting location. The game coordinates are all referenced from a real origin latitude/longitude/rotation, which can be set at any time with the push of a button.

That video is rad! I had a wheel/pedals/6spd setup in college, and that made driving games so much fun.

Thanks! Yeah, for sure. It makes the absolute speed of the vehicle less important too, which is great for safety. If you have other objectives besides just crossing the finish line, you're not worried about how fast you're going. In fact, in some cases, you wish you could go more slowly.