Goodbye VR... for now at least.

It’s possible that complex sims like DCS will never perform well in VR. It’s not something “wrong” with the game engine, it’s the very nature of VR. Look at VTOL VR, that’s the level of game that would actually perform well in VR and it’s way short of the complexity in DCS

 

People with the strongest hardware available (the OP has an i7-9700K, 32GB DDR4 and an RTX 2080 Ti !) struggle to get DCS running in constant reprojection mode. Not even able to run the headsets at their intended refresh rate.

 

I see myself staying away from VR for a very long time. Until resolution and performance improve greatly.

Stop already , you keep spreading and regurgitating the same thing when you have no experience yourself with DCS in VR.

I have a stout rig and can run DCS quite nicely in both Rift S and Quest via Link.

And I use it daily.

And I am nowhere near constant reprojection (ASW for Oculus) with DCS and it looks great. Even if I was, it still looks quite nice when ASW is active.

At least the OP actually tried it and gave it some time.

And yet you keep saying you are staying away from VR - really?? It would seem you can't stay away.

Goodness that would be like me being a proponent and fan of VR, to keep inundating the other forums outside of VR stating all the reasons I just will

not fly on a monitor or use a Track IR again - it just isn't good enough anymore - over and over.

I dont have a top of the line PC and I run a HP reverb without issues, looks great and runs smooth in sp and mp. Only thing I can think of is you all that have horrible issues just toss more and more hardware at the problem and dont understand how to tune your rig for VR.

In case anyone asks I'm running a Ryzen 3600 , 2070 super, 32gb pc3600 ram with the reverb.

I was going to return my reverb and go back to trackIR but after a week of tweaking the settings I'm finally enjoying VR. Yes I get some artifacts with motion reprojection but it's worth over looking for the immersion.

I really got the WOW factor when I was just playing around in a test mission I made with a simple A-10C mission to destroy a column of lightly defended fuel trucks. A MIG-21 slipped through the fighter escort and engaged me. I dove into some mountains in attempt to lose the MIG. He was right on me and I thought I was toast but after snaking my way through some narrow mountain passes I looked back and saw a column of black smoke rising from the mountain side.

The sense of speed flying low even in the A-10 was awesome!

I was going to return my reverb and go back to trackIR but after a week of tweaking the settings I'm finally enjoying VR. Yes I get some artifacts with motion reprojection but it's worth over looking for the immersion.

 

I really got the WOW factor when I was just playing around in a test mission I made with a simple A-10C mission to destroy a column of lightly defended fuel trucks. A MIG-21 slipped through the fighter escort and engaged me. I dove into some mountains in attempt to lose the MIG. He was right on me and I thought I was toast but after snaking my way through some narrow mountain passes I looked back and saw a column of black smoke rising from the mountain side.

 

The sense of speed flying low even in the A-10 was awesome!

Similar experience here. VE is a big jump, takes some adaptation and tweaking until you get it where you need it to be enjoyable. After that it can be hard to go back to 2D :)

Unfortunately VR is still a heavily compromised experience in DCS. Worth it at times, and not in others.

Unfortunately VR is still a heavily compromised experience in DCS. Worth it at times, and not in others.

That's your opinion, not a fact. I, and many others, fully enjoy the fantastic VR experience in DCS without any (more or less1!) complaints.

That's your opinion, not a fact. I, and many others, fully enjoy the fantastic VR experience in DCS without any (more or less1!) complaints.

Indeed. Another opinion and your welcome to it of course. But it's important for both sides of the coin to be exposed.

I've owned the Odyssey, 5K+, Reverb and the Index. I have an 8KX on order too. VR can be great at times in DCS but its definitely not the panacea some make it out to be. I'm convinced the concept is the future. But right now we might still be in the Betamax, Minidisc or Myspace phase.

Just my opinion of course.

Indeed. Another opinion and your welcome to it of course. But it's important for both sides of the coin to be exposed.

No, that I enjoy the VR experience in DCS pretty much without complaints is a fact not an opinion.

I don't even have a monitor in front of my flying rig anymore.

so I can only fly in VR.

so for me VR is not only doable. its now essential.

moving a monitor back and trackir would be a real pain.

I was convinced i adopted too early as well (HP Reverb is my first HMD). but after some time tweaking I find it enjoyable. even in MP.

The main issues i have are the narrow sweet spot, fog, and washed out colors.

Yes, ED could Add some HDR Features for VR Uses in the DCS Options like , Color and Gamma additional to the Brightness slider.

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As restricted VR in DCS is at the moment, e.g. lack of optimization, resolution not up to par with 2D yet... I simply cannot go back to the flat screen.

I've been spending a lot of hours doing simple fly training in VR lately and even some multiplayer. The immersion is just unbeatable. Especiallye with PointCTRL. Physically reaching out an flipping switches never gets old.

Hopefully DCS will sort out the technical optimization. And I can dream about the future with next gen headsets and hardware. It's a good time to be a sim pilot.

I bought Rift S December 2019. I feel liberated from 2D screen for the first time. There is no way that I will ever play DCS in 2D screen. The two can not even be compared. VR is by any imaginable scale far better than 2D.

The VR experience is truly a high unlike any. Cheers.

After my Daily VR DCS Multiplayer Session today, I set all options to the fullest and fly a Maxed Out Session on my Samsung 32:9 Monitor.

Nope, I never could fly DCS on a 2D Monitor again.

Switch back to VR...

Yep,that's what I like

HP Reverb, what else?

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I was convinced i adopted too early as well (HP Reverb is my first HMD). but after some time tweaking I find it enjoyable. even in MP.

 

The main issues i have are the narrow sweet spot, fog, and washed out colors.

Hey mate, one thing I found that helps this is to lower the in-game gamma options a notch or two.

Im a recent converter from 2D to VR and am still struggeling. Not only struggenling to keep my Rift S running....

I can clearly understand, what the TO is saying but am not completely on his side.

As many say, they could never go back to 2D, thats not the case for me.

I just went back to do some TrackIR flying. Just because when I saw this thread and already knew I had something to say, I wanted to back this up by a recent experience. Funny thing is, that yesterday I finally (exept for the sensor on the monitor) packed away my TrackIR stuff so I had to unpack it again...

One key feature for me in DCS along its technical approach to master such systems is its visual beauty.

And this is a big minus for VR, since its looking much worse than 2D. I have a 1440p 32-inch monitor maybe 50cm from my nose, and this gives pretty much the same (horizontal) FOV like my Rift S. But you just cant compare those two images since the resolution of the monitor is miles ahead. In the cockpit actually its ok, since the numbers on the DDI in the F/A-18 for example - even in higher resolution - not that much easier to read. But looking outside for me its day and night.

First exampe on the carrier-deck. In my Rift S the island is shimmering (aliasing) like a christmas-tree. Going back to 2D, I saw also some aliasing but much less pronounced and also partly to the fact, I was on the same low settings as in VR.

I then did the PG-F-16-refueling IA-mission and everything looks much much better, especially outside with the low sun.

Also when coming in to land, the airfield or Carrier are much easier to spot.

But here comes the BUT. The spacial awareness (I hope this is the right term) is in VR way better. I only got the F-16 after I got the Rift S, so actually never had flown the F-16 in 2D before. Right now Im slowly am getting used to refuelling the F-16 and last night had the first not-once-disconnected-refuel in the F-16, but doing it in 2D is way harder. I had maybe four or five disconnects... When I changed from 2D to monitor AAR did take some getting used to, but going back and on the F-16 is something very different. Now in VR I only look at the fuel-pod (Hornet, Tomcat) and I know how far Im away. No need for referencing the fuselage of the tanker anymore.

When doing some VR-tests late summe last year I somewhere challanged that doing BFM in VR, youd have a disadvantage against someone in 2D for its better spotting. That might be still right, but with TrackIR I often had the problem when looking back/up to know, where exactly the other plane was. With VR this is no problem at all, since the other plane is exactly there, where your looking at.

So overall for the much better spatial awareness Im giving up most parts of the great looks of DCS. Right now, Im willing to accept that. But as the test with the F-16 AAR in 2D just showed before, Id also could go back and stay back, if VR made a turn for the worse.

Also, what Id like to add is, that my overall experience in VR did not (well only a tiny bit) go up compared to the monitor. Thats what made me a bit scared when trying VR, since - as others have mentioned - I thought VR could make me unhappy but also ruin 2D for me. That did only happen to some small degree, since Im "only" not overly happy with visuals in VR and the clearly better visuals in 2D still make it a good alternative for me.

Overall I think VR is a big tradeoff and depends on what things are imporant to you. So I can understand both, the VR-is-huge and the VR-is-not-for-me approach.

I guess, it will take at least another five years to get VR to such a level, that there are clearly more pros for VR compared to 2D. Right now, Id say a Reverb-resolution with Index-FOV, comfort and sound and a RiftS sweetspot and price would be a good steps torwards that goal.....:)

i faced the same issues due to not being able to afford a good pc. i tried to go 2D but just couldnt, im now playing around with fc3 aircraft as a substitute and im finding the preformance increase is great and allows me to still do casual flying

Fantastic post Wali. Great to read your thoughts, and appreciate you taking the time to reply in such detail.

Can you imagine how freaking amazing DCS in VR is going to be in five years, when we have even higher resolutions, beautiful colours and razor sharp performance? I don't know how I'm going to do anything else other than play my flight sim when this occurs!

Fantastic post Wali. Great to read your thoughts, and appreciate you taking the time to reply in such detail.

 

Can you imagine how freaking amazing DCS in VR is going to be in five years, when we have even higher resolutions, beautiful colours and razor sharp performance? I don't know how I'm going to do anything else other than play my flight sim when this occurs!

That will be a dream come true. Also the whole ecosytem will eventually grow with visuals, and we can expect better interface usability, hand tracking to interact in a natural fashion with cockpits, and so on :thumbup:

Can you imagine how freaking amazing DCS in VR is going to be in five years, when we have even higher resolutions, beautiful colours and razor sharp performance?

In five years DCS will be even more demanding to run than it is now unless you’re assuming that all progress on the sim is going to be put on hold while VR catches up. The performance goalpost will always keep moving and running a game in 3D at high frame rates will always be more demanding than running 2D at lower fps. That’s never going to change so VR will always suffer with performance issues in games designed primarily to run in 2D. I would be glad to be proven wrong but I can’t see complex sims like this ever performing well in VR

I’ll believe it when I see it.

In five years DCS will be even more demanding to run than it is now unless you’re assuming that all progress on the sim is going to be put on hold while VR catches up. The performance goalpost will always keep moving and running a game in 3D at high frame rates will always be more demanding than running 2D at lower fps. That’s never going to change so VR will always suffer with performance issues in games designed primarily to run in 2D. I would be glad to be proven wrong but I can’t see complex sims like this ever performing well in VR

I’ll believe it when I see it.

In the meantime DCS performs better with my Reverb than it did with my 2016 PC and DK2. The hardware has developed far more than DCS has got more complex to run. This is before we see a VR optimised engine.

The key will be what users find as a threshold in terms of visual quality and performance. For me any change in hardware and optimisation that yields 90fps in a Reverb will see me more than happy, given that 45 in reprojection is acceptable (for me) right now. Others may want bigger FOVs, greater refresh rates, greater resolution before considering it ready but I firmly believe these things will come.

That said VR is unlikely to be for everyone. Wearing a headset can be anti social and make people feel very self-conscious, some will get motion sickness whilst others would never give up their incredible pits for a headset!

In five years DCS will be even more demanding to run than it is now unless you’re assuming that all progress on the sim is going to be put on hold while VR catches up. The performance goalpost will always keep moving and running a game in 3D at high frame rates will always be more demanding than running 2D at lower fps. That’s never going to change so VR will always suffer with performance issues in games designed primarily to run in 2D. I would be glad to be proven wrong but I can’t see complex sims like this ever performing well in VR

I’ll believe it when I see it.

I wouldn't bet against it. It was only 7 years ago that I got my DK1 and said "wow, but I wish I could see more clearly" And here we are with the likes of Reverb. Also, in terms of cost, I've been flight sim'ing since the 80's. And the computer I always wanted was *always* $3,000 or more. When it was 8088, I wanted a 286. Then the 20MHz (lol) version of it. Then hard drives (again, lol), Then 386, 486, Pentium, etc.etc. And every time, the rig I priced out but could never afford was over $3,000.

I don't think that will ever change. But VR in 5 years will be event more incredible. That, I'm sure.

In five years DCS will be even more demanding to run than it is now unless you’re assuming that all progress on the sim is going to be put on hold while VR catches up. The performance goalpost will always keep moving and running a game in 3D at high frame rates will always be more demanding than running 2D at lower fps. That’s never going to change so VR will always suffer with performance issues in games designed primarily to run in 2D. I would be glad to be proven wrong but I can’t see complex sims like this ever performing well in VR

I’ll believe it when I see it.

The flip side to that is there will be VR Technology forthcoming that will increase performance of the VR devices. Nvidia is working on it now on the software side, and the hardware guys are working on it as well.

And like I have already mentioned several times now, I already get good VR performance in DCS.

It matters not in VR the fps one gets as compared to what one gets on the monitor. What matters is can one maintain enough fps in VR to have a smooth and good quality experience at decent graphics settings.

Many today can.

The flip side to that is there will be VR Technology forthcoming that will increase performance of the VR devices. Nvidia is working on it now on the software side, and the hardware guys are working on it as well.

Theres a little too much money to be made for the big tech companies to not work on VR to make it more accessible to the broader tech masses. Next big thing is foveated rendering which will increase performance a lot and thus decrease the requirements for VR. Meanwhile more and more game developers will hop onto it. VR will get better in almost every stretch of imagination, maybe except wallet demands.