IBM Announces New VRMMO "Sword Art Online"

[Zoner]

'Sword Art Online: The Beginning' goes into alpha testing next month, plans on it being powered by IBM's supercomputer Watson. Sign up for testers from the Tokyo metro area are being accepted now.

http://www.engadget.com/2016/02/23/i...-online-vrmmo/

[Robertfb]

Inbefore it was an elaborate scheme to trap players in their game and fight for their lives! In all seriousness though, will be VERY interesting to see how close to the anime they get with this.

[Nem0]

Someone should tell them they're 6 years too early.

[SamanosukeShiva]

they said the project will take at least 5 years to complete, so they are right on time.

[Virg]

Not going to lie, pretty hyped about this. Tho it´ll prolly take 10 years to hit the NA/EU market.

[SamanosukeShiva]

well, it is IBM sponsored, it it's going to launch, it'll probably launch internationally.

[Zetanio]

The show has taught me that this is a fucking trap.

[BerenTebogo]

Couldn't have happened to worse source material! Thanks IBM.

[Gokulo]

Seeing as it will be first/one of the first games like that, it will probably be pretty weak, they should have waited longer to make a SAO VR MMO, but I guess they want to ride the name

[Shenrien]

I would have it rather happened to .hack//sign

[Silenka]

.hack certainly would have been the superior source material, but everything in that series is incredibly generic. I have yet to see a "sucked into an MMO" title that isn't simply generic fantasy though. I guess that's the easiest or else you need to make a pretty complex story within a story. Hmm...I would accept Dog Days as a VR world, lol.

[6souls]

Not a real game, Marketing stunt by IBM
http://www.roadtovr.com/sorry-intern...mmo-isnt-real/

[Zetanio]

Damn, that's fucked up.

[Cantih]

Honestly, it makes sense. VR isn't even going to have a large enough install base to have an "MMO" userbase, for many years.

And it's going to take that long to even iron out how best to start implementing control schemes and gameplay that's actually good.
(Go back and play games from the 2D->3D transition era, like Tomb Raider or Resident Evil for example. It took a while for devs to internalize that rotating a character along the vertical for turning kinda blew, and lead us to the schemes we use nowadays.)

[Dantrag]

We'd all have to get those "run in place" machine things... Were they planning on it mimicking our physical movements or was it just going to be a headset but still mouse and keyboard type deal?

[Cantih]

That's a main issue. The more you're moving but not moving, the more likely motion sickness and rejection happens. That's why EVE:Valkyrie is focused on being in a cockpit, the character is sitting in one place just like the player.
So if you wanted to walk a pedestrian character around in the least disruptive manner, you either need the tread pods, or a bounded room. You could implement something like FFXI / FFXIV controls, but there's going to be a percentage of the userbase that will have an actual unpleasant reaction using it.

And while motion peripherals are the focus for controls (because we just don't really have haptics far enough along yet), everything I've looked into so far puts a gamepad controller as the most accessible scheme.

[arus2001]

Joke or not, I'd say good VR tech is still too early, myself. In the end, I think we're going to have to come up with affordable tech that can read your brainwaves in order to outright replace physical input like controllers or the walking stuff. It may not be full sensory immersion like these various MMO animes depict, but my general stance on gaming is I want to be comfortable while doing it. Not standing up, not waggling shit around like a Wii-mote, or really doing more that some alternative scheme could've allowed more easily (analog controller vs. wasd, for example).

Unfortunately, I'm skeptical this would come in my lifetime, or at least early enough for me to really enjoy it.

[Kachiko]

Not to mention the time it will take to add in the security not to tamper with the user's brainwaves and create a real SOA. >_>

In the mean time, those 208 people can look forward to an even higher resolution of Asuna ,sleeping under a tree, on a bright, sunny day.

[Lucavi]

This doesn't appeal to me because I don't have a hot RL sister who secretly wants to bang me while I'm trapped in a virtual game/prison.

[6souls]