Virtual reality is changing at an incredibly fast pace, and Unity has been one of the vanguards in this revolution. So, as a developer for Unity, entering the world of Virtual Reality isn’t about just creating games or applications, but rather it’s about creating entire worlds and experiences. It’s exciting on one hand but is also very challenging since you have to consider many things before moving forward.
I remember distinctly putting on a VR headset and actually walking into a world that I created. It was just an easy space: just an extremely peaceful forest scene with ambient sounds of the wind blowing and birds chirping; but it felt indescribable. It makes me think of what it is like when something clicks: When that clicked, that I can create spaces that actually people could step into, it’s exhilarating but also daunting. How would I know that what I make does not just look right but feels right?
The Art of Performance: Balancing Beauty and Speed
In the new medium of VR, not just performance is about having a silky-smooth application running smoothly-it’s stopping motion sickness and holding that illusion of presence. In this respect, Unity gives us really powerful tools to help it, but it is up to us as developers to use them wisely.
The most important is achieving a high and consistent frame rate. You want, at minimum, 90 fps – less than this and you’re compromising to the point of possibly shattering immersion or worse: sending your users running to the bathroom. This often comes at the price of hard choices on visual fidelity; do you really need that complex shader on those distant objects? Could those dynamic shadows be baked instead?
I learned that the hard way when trying to port a visually stunning non-VR game to VR initially. It tanked on frame rate, and play testers couldn’t even survive for more than a few minutes without getting dizzy. It was back to the drawing board, optimizing everything from draw calls to polygon counts. The end result? A game that may not have won any beauty contests but was comfortable to play for hours.
Designing for a New Dimension
Forget everything you know about traditional UI design when it comes to user interfaces in VR. The things you need to display aren’t on a flat screen-they’re part of the world. Exciting possibilities abound, but also unique challenges.
The best VR interfaces are those that feel intuitive within the game world. Rather than that floating menu, why not let the player pick up and manipulate physical objects? Need a HUD? Attach it to the player’s wrist or integrate it into equipment.
Remember, in VR, you’re not just designing visuals-you’re designing interactions. Every button press and every menu navigation should feel intuitive and satisfying. It’s not about what the player sees, but how they might move and interact through the space.
“The best VR interfaces are those you barely notice-they just feel right.”
Moving Without Moving: The VR Locomotion Puzzle
One of the greatest challenges in developing VR is how to let a player move through large spaces while being physically confined to a small area. That’s a kind of problem that has sparked thousands of discussions and experiments in the VR dev community.
Teleportation is the magic solution, and good reason exists for this: for most users, it is quite comfortable and easy to implement. However, it is often not the most immersive option. I have used a mix of approaches that has been well-suited to my needs. Teleportation should be used for long distances; smooth locomotion should be used for shorter distances and with comfort options like vignetting so that the user can get precision movement.
Don’t be afraid to think outside the box. We played with a “gravity gloves” mechanic in one project that allowed players to pull themselves onto objects in the environment. It took some fiddling to get right, but the players loved it-it felt instinctive and really added a fun, superhero-like element to movement.
The Importance of Audio in VR
In the boom of perfecting visuals and interactions, it’s easy to overlook the significance of audio in VR experiences. Audio could make a huge difference, though, in creating a sense of presence and immersion, with good design.
In this final lecture, I want to introduce you to the audio spatializer in Unity. This is a fancy feature that can be very easy to understand if you take the time to properly set up 3D audio for all of your sound sources-it’s the difference between flat stereo sound and true 3D audio in VR.
But it is more than just putting sounds in 3D space. Consider how a game’s sound changes with player interaction. Does that chest sound any different opening underwater versus on land? Does the sound of footfalls change depending on what you are walking on? All those little details add together to make that truly believable virtual world.
Conclusion: The VR Developer’s Road Trip
This journey toward developing inside Unity, therefore, is essentially one of learning and experimentation. What will work on a flat screen is not definitely going to work in VR, and what sounds like such a great idea on paper might just not work at all when brought to life. The best method, therefore, is to constantly iterate and test, always open for feedback.
We are still in the early days of VR. The “best practices” of today may be yesterday’s news by tomorrow due to new hardware and software capabilities. Keep exploring, experimenting, and pushing the envelopes of what is possible.
Most important, have fun! There’s no experience quite like stepping into your own world and seeing others enjoy it, too. Happy VR developing!
