Status: Complete
Type: Game, VR
Technology: C#, Unity
Step into a chilling world where fear lurks in every shadow and survival is your only option. In this VR horror shooter game, you are plunged into a nightmarish environment filled with relentless enemies and spine-tingling suspense. Armed with an array of weapons, you must navigate through dark, twisted corridors and eerie landscapes where every corner could hide unspeakable horrors. The immersive VR experience heightens the tension, making every heartbeat count as you face off against terrifying creatures and unravel the sinister secrets that haunt this forsaken world. Do you have what it takes to survive the nightmare?
Developed in three months in 2024 Halved-Life was a project as part of my Unity VR certification, Halved-Life is a fully featured VR Shooter game built in Unity.
Diving into VR development was an exhilarating journey that quickly revealed just how challenging and complex this field can be. As I began working on my first project, I realized that creating immersive experiences involves more than just traditional programming—it demands a deep understanding of spatial computing, human perception, and user interaction in a three-dimensional space. From optimizing performance to prevent motion sickness to managing the intricacies of tracking and rendering in real-time, each step presented novel issues that I hadn’t encountered before. These challenges taught me that VR development requires a unique blend of creativity, technical prowess, and a willingness to explore uncharted territories in order to deliver truly compelling experiences.
Some of the unique and interesting challenges that I had faced while developing Halved life are:
Performance Optimization: VR applications require high frame rates (usually 90 FPS or higher) to prevent motion sickness and ensure a smooth experience. This demands careful optimization of graphics, physics, and interactions.
Motion Sickness: Reducing motion sickness involves managing factors like latency, frame rate, and ensuring natural movement patterns within the VR environment, which can be tricky to balance.
User Interface Design: Traditional 2D interfaces don’t translate well into VR. Developers must design intuitive 3D interfaces that users can interact with naturally within a fully immersive space.
Spatial Audio: Implementing spatial audio to accurately reflect the 3D environment is essential for immersion, but it requires a deep understanding of sound design and audio processing. In Unity this required me to carefully design the sound environment and ensure every sound fit the space that I was in.
Tracking and Latency Issues: Ensuring accurate and low-latency tracking of the user’s head and hand movements is crucial for maintaining immersion, but it can be technically demanding.
Device Compatibility: With various VR platforms and hardware configurations, ensuring compatibility and optimal performance across different devices adds another layer of complexity.
Comfort and Usability: Designing experiences that are comfortable for long periods of use, considering factors like user ergonomics and physical space, is a critical yet challenging aspect.
Content Creation: Developing high-quality 3D assets that look good in VR and don’t compromise performance requires specialized skills in 3D modeling, texturing, and animation.
Testing and Debugging: The immersive nature of VR makes testing and debugging more complicated, as issues may only become apparent when experienced in the headset, necessitating more thorough testing processes.
Interactivity and Physics: Creating realistic interactions and believable physics in a 3D space can be much more complex than in traditional game development, as the user expects a high level of realism in VR.