First impressions on starting a game on Oculus Rift DK2 (Windows)

Let's try to start a fancy game to see if the virtual reality is really that impressive.

Stuff about the hardware we use and our graphics card settings you can read in the article of Juergen.
After installing the Oculus Rift, we wanted to see the magic stuff. Like Juergen mentioned before, there are 2 different ways to start the game:
- Extended Mode
- Direct to Rift Mode

We tried to find games which have a native support for oculus rift, that means the games are developed directly for oculus rift and do support the new Direct-to-Rift-Mode.

Before we explain the different games and how they worked, we have to mention that we the last 3 runtimes of oculus (0.4.4, 0.4.3 and 0.4.2) and there are really huge differences comparing the game performances we found out by starting one game with several different runtimes and Nvidia Driver versions:

Setup best driver and runtime for the games:

We tested different Oculus Runtimes and drivers with the game Affected v1.55 (direct-to-rift): 

Nvidia graphics driver 347.52:

0.4.4:
35 FPS and very lagging

0.4.3:
same performance like 0.4.4 around 35 FPS and the text gets doubled when you move your head quickly.

0.4.2:
75-80 FPS and it is a huge difference and a way better gaming performance!
in the game it is possible to stop the game on the monitor and only show it on the oculus rift, then the game some small lagging issues also disappear.

We were not satisfied with the result because of the small lags when you moved your head to quick, so we tried an older version of the nvidia graphics card driver: 344.75 again with 0.4.2 runtime and the
small lags also disappeared. The FPS were now at 75 but much more stable. So now it doesn't matter if you press M to switch off the monitor or not. The game performance is perfect now!

So it really does matter which graphics card driver you have installed and which runtime of oculus you use. At first we thought omg how bad is this and we felt sick after a few seconds of playing affected. Now it is a completely different performance and the game is awesome!

Overall: We recommend: 0.4.2 Oculus Runtime and Nvidia Graphiccard Driver 347.52
In other games (i mention later at the game) the higher Oculus Runtime Driver occurs different errors and on 0.4.2 every game started and had a good performance.

Here are the first free games we found in the net (and the first impressions):


Affected: [Download]
I think affected is the best direct to rift game of all. it has a impressive graphic and it is a really funny and scaring game. if you want to show a friend how cool oculus rift is, then affected is definitely the game you want to show.

Affected supports direct-to-rift and extended mode, but we tried the extend mode and the FPS were at 35 instead of stable 75 FPS at direct-to-rift!



Bullet Evasion: [Download]
A very funny little Ballgame for the Oculus Rift. Graphics are very simple but the game itself is very funny and it doesn't need a highend graphic because of the simple game principle. Many balls get thrown on you and you have to avoid the balls by moving your head with the oculus from left to right and other way round.
Bullet Evasion isn't working with 0.4.4 & 0.4.3. It crashes at the start. If you start it with 0.4.2 runtime it works perfectly fine! Very cool is if you press M then friends can want your game on the monitor!

RiftCoasterHD: [Download]
0.4.4: It crashes at the beginning.
0.4.3: It runs but at very low performance.
0.4.2: The performance is much better than at 0.4.3 but also not very acceptable. It is lagging at medium and low settings and if you switch to low then it also looks very ugly compared to the high settings. So we will try to get the game working with better performance later, because i think the graphics at high could be very special if the game runs stable and without lags. The game itself is a normal rollercoaster game.

Elevator Horror: [Download]
This game we only tried at 0.4.2 an it is working. Interesting is that the game performance is very bad although the graphics is compared to affected very very simple. The game principle is also as simple as the graphics. You stand in an elevator and drive from level to level and if the door opens something happens. Should be shocking but try it yourself and hopefully you will be shocked! Hopefully not from the graphics! :)

So that were all games that we tested for direct to rift and now we will test some games with extended mode and try to get the best performance out of the games. In our next post we will try to find the best way how to setup Oculus Rift Games in Extended mode.

Thanks for reading our blog and have a nice weekend!

Stay tuned, greez Micha!