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Minimalist gaming on the horizon for Oculus Rift

There’s an article floating out on the web that might just strike your fancy – it certainly struck ours. OMNI’s Missions to the Edge of Inner Space covers three upcoming games that have aligned themselves to be available on the upcoming Oculus Rift VR technology- and while none contain your typical gameplay, they offer perspective on the kind of gaming magic you can find in games like PSN’s Flower or Journey. Here’s a snippet from the article.

While ultra-realistic military simulations and sandbox worlds like Grand Theft Auto flood the consumer market and seem to dictate how gaming is understood by the masses, the world of independently-made videogames is creating its own artistic niches. A new and untainted platform, like the Oculus Rift, with its entirely different set of parameters, can provide a space for the independent game community to experiment and thrive.

[…]  Another important disruptive quality of the ‘Rift is that the deeply entrenched game genre of the first-person-shooter is wholly ill-suited for it. The dissonance between being able to look around an environment with your head, but then run using a keyboard instead of your real body, makes vertigo a common problem. New play styles are needed, styles which don’t heavily rely on the fast-paced running-and-shooting mechanics that are now such an American cultural institution.

It’s an interesting read, and while the three indie games showcased (MirrorMoon EP, Paranormical, Eleven) are using Unity3d, they seem to be more concerned with presentation over technical complexity. We recommend you check it out. Enjoy!

Born and raised in Winnipeg, Canada, at a young age I was forced to decide whether the harsh northern winters were going to claim my fingers, or to turn to the safer pursuits of indoor activities. Little did I know that a little game called Ninja Gaiden would bring my digits more pain than frostbite ever could. Starting with Vectrex and C64 games and moving forward through the era of electronic entertainment, I sampled as much as I could in the different platforms, and began my interest in PC gaming from wrestling with DOS memory management.

While console games were a part of my earliest gaming memories and I certainly had played on most platforms including 3D0, all things Nintendo, PS1 and the like, truly the PC was my domain until the Xbox. As an old PC gamer, I ever chased the cutting edge technology. Eye of the beholder with CGA 4 colors was my first step down the the path of blowing thousands of dollars on PC upgrades over two decades. Ultima 7, with the Guardian talking to me through my monitor, still haunts my dreams and keeps me ever hoping for a decent Ultima 8 and 9. From the 3DFX SLI VooDoo2s and Aureal to today's GPU driven DirectX games, the new and shiny pictures seem to keep me going. My PC gaming has slowed down with the market shift though, and although I have choice games that will ever be on PC, I have found myself in console gaming with a bit of portable gaming in my life.

Back around the turn of the millenium (and long before fatherhood), I had fired off an email offering to help Ron with a little-known site called ConsoleGold. Little did I know it would be be a part of my life to this day. While I've seen my fair share of shovelware (thanks Ron!), I manage to try and find the fun in most games. Leaning towards sandbox and action titles, I've grown to love games for their potential to reach art. Console agnostic and excited for the progress of tomorrow, I fancy the latest and greatest, but still enjoy the good old classics ... as long as they've been revamped from their 8bit graphic roots.

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