Bonus Content: My first impressions on PlayStation VR

          

You'll never be as cool as this guy

         

          I know I’m pretty late on this, but considering there hasn’t been much content on the blog this week I figured, why not? So on a trip to the mall today I stumbled upon a try-out booth for the PlayStation VR. This is my first time experiencing any kind of virtual reality headset thus far, so I was pretty excited to try it out.

          I didn’t have much time with the set, considering they only offered one 5-minute demo per person and there was a lineup behind me, but I feel I have a slim but good grasp on the device.

          The headset itself fit pretty comfortably and snugly on my head, although it did take a bit of readjusting to properly see the screen with no blur. I chalk that up to my wearing glasses, but it only took about a second before everything was clear. As for the graphics themselves, they were pretty impressive all things considered, but I did notice things did get a bit fuzzy when a lot was happening on the screen.

          The demo I played was called Scavenger’s Odyssey, which I believe is available in the PlayStation VR Worlds game bundle. It was played with the standard DualShock 4 controller. The basic premise was that you’re playing as an alien in a sort of mech that allows you to shoot and grab and throw stuff. While it was simplistic, it was fun and makes me wonder what the potential could be for a full-on VR adventure game.

          From what I’ve heard, some people have found Scavenger’s Odyssey very disorienting and even sickening to play, but I didn’t experience that at all. In fact, I never felt any motion sickness whatsoever with the device. To be fair, I’ve only ever had motion sickness once before in my life, and that was when I made the mistake of trying to watch Iron Man 3 in those fancy movie theatre seats that vibrates during the movie, while at the same time recovering from a bout of flu. That was…unpleasant, to say the least. And the movie wasn’t much better.

          And that was it! I got about 5 minutes of game time, and to be honest, most of them was spent sitting around listening to the in-game voice talking to me. But just 5 minutes was enough to impress me enough to seriously consider picking up one of those expensive headsets. And even if VR is currently out of your budget, I would highly recommend seeking out one of these demo kiosks and trying it out for yourself. It was worth my time, and I’d say it’s well worth yours.