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Comment by diggan | Hacker News Reader

> Everyone I know who tried VR has 30 minutes of excitement and literally never mention it ever again.

Well, except of they like simulation games like flight simulators. Then they surely have already migrated to a VR setup and won't ever go back. Yes, I'm one of those.

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How long do you typically spend under the goggles? Back when I played Elite Dangerous in VR, 4..5hr sessions were completely exhausting. I since switched back to traditional head tracking for flight simming (although I have to admit that at least for helicopter landings the spatial awareness and depth perception in VR is extremely useful - but it's just too damn exhausting).

Not the OP, but I spend in FS2020 up to 5 hour flying with HP Reverb G2 (2048x2048 per eye) without any issues. Frankly, it feels like being in a real airplane and one can visually recognize all their real favorite spots without any issues. Losing this would be a major blow for me to run any simulators as it's just so much better and outclasses any 3D projections on the screen.

> How long do you typically spend under the goggles?

Max around 3 hours I think, that's the longest amount of (consecutive) free time I have available.

I remember in the beginning (First version of Oculus I think?) I could play for something like 20 minutes before being tired from it. Not sure if it's because of the HP Reverb G2 I have now, or because I got used to it.

What flight simulator game would consider existing VR resolutions good enough? Reading tiny dials on a virtual cockpit? Not really. Visual IFF in a combat sim? Not a snowball's chance. That leaves us with arcadey games that put everything you need conveniently in some not-sim-at-all HUD overlay, and perhaps some paragliding sim where the only instrument is the variometer and that is mostly read through audio cues. Now racing sims, that's a different beast: two large dials and huge demand for spacial awareness. I'd be surprised if screens where still around in that scene five years down the line.

I'm using a Pico 4 with Il-2, no assists. Dials are 100% a non-issue (headset resolution has been good enough to read them easily for years). Spotting and recognition are fine.

Is the Index that far behind? I basically bought it with IL2 as my main excuse (mostly hoping for some magic hack to repurpose lighthouse for desktop head tracking, but I never got around to adding a Vive tracker) and for me it was a clear not even close to acceptable. Tolerable for some quick "blow up some AI targets" but super far using a screen with my old webcam wannabe-trackir.

I've never used the Index so can't personally compare them. vr-compare.com shows it as having about 30% less pixel density, which is substantial; the pancake lenses of the Pico 4 also offer a large sweet spot. (The Reverb G2 is perhaps the most popular headset for Il-2, and sacrifices a little FoV for a little more pixel density than the Pico 4). The only annoyance with the Pico is that it's not really intended for PCVR, so you'll need to pay $10 for Virtual Desktop. But once set up I've found it to work well.

Trading FoV for density would certainly be the correct choice for flight sim, not much value in peripheral vision while scanning horizon or instruments.

Do you spend much time zoomed in, losing the angular 1:1 mapping of the viewport? I did that a lot with a headtracker (makes you really strive for precision, I had a custom build of freetrack with generous per-pixel hystheresis), but under the headset zooming felt more wrong than expected.

FoV is still very valuable for general situational awareness, IMO.

I spend very little time zoomed in. Mostly when trying to pick up a ground target. I agree it feels very wrong in VR.

I use a HP Reverb G2, with X-plane and Microsoft Flight Simulator. I can read the dials (yes, even the tiny ones) just fine with the built-in controls. But most of the stuff I do is programmed with keyboard shortcuts/my HOTAS flight controller.

I would not be able to go back to standard 2D-view-of-3D experience again after getting used to VR. Can't even effectively look around your shoulder, and a bunch of other things.

I still remember the time when airspeed and altimeter reading on the HUD on a Rift DK1 were literally just ":::" and "::::", they just were. But that's a long time ago.

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