I guess what it is, is different people want different things from vr. I want to feel as close to what a real pilot would feel. So the fatigue of turning my neck to keep a bandit in my sights is what i want to experience. The danger, the discomfort, the tension of losing sight of a bandit. If you want a high kill score, then a track ir is probably the correct option. but vr does convey a smidge of what a pilot experiences, awareness wise. And considering the pilot is also wearing a helmet, the field of view is probably more limited than if they were not wearing a helmet.
I agree 100%. Flying in VR is just a different animal than flying in 2D. It's more immersive and more "real" to me. But there are definitely tradeoffs, which is why DCS adds in some "cheats" for VR flyers, such as the black dots to increase your ability to spot planes at a distance. Labels helps a lot too, but some servers will disable those. All in all, I fly in VR and use the minor cheats to help spot and identify things. Without them, you can fly for hours and never find a target (especially in ground attacks). VR has some advantages, though, such as depth perception and a greater perception of speed at low altitude... so canyon runs are easier and a lot more fun! And of course, if your neck can't take the strain, then there's always 2D... or stay out of dogfights ;-)
I'm glad you got there in the end with VR, kinda upsetting how much easier the Q3 is to get going than the Pimax, but that's the joys of also trying to get the recordings to look good lol
I just looked it up and the Quest 3 offers 4,557,312 pixels per eye. Call it 4.5k per eye - the Crystal Light is over 8.3 million pixels per eye, so it’s not really surprising I had to tweak it more to get a playable frame rate. Pimax gear is definitely for the tinkerers/tweakers rather than the plug and play-ers, the Quest is like a console to Pimax’s PC - more faffing about for the best result. (Though the base audio and mic is severely lacking.) I don’t think there’s hardware available to get it running to its max potential though, I doubt a 4090 is enough orders of magnitude better than my 4070ti to pick up the amount of slack necessary for a seamless experience - at least in DCS. Quest 3 sounds like a solid buy, but the Pimax is like future proofing your VR experience.
@@Bullet4MyEnemy 4090 just involves a lot less compromises. 5090 will likely be able to crank. It's easy to fall into the trap of chasing DCS VR performance via hardware upgrades, but also it does tend to work.
Flying in VR made my back more flexible again after doing some pretty labour heavy jobs. Also having a headset with foveated rendering and eye tracking made a big difference too because it meant the sweet spot would transfer to the edge of the displays when checking 6
Yeah I can imagine eye tracking makes quite a bit of difference, here’s hoping Pimax will also send me the Crystal Super for a comparison when it releases
In VR your field of view is typically much smaller compared to flat screen, not larger. Because you cannot increase it artificially like you can in 2D. Also, you can add software like NeckSafer (or a DIY version using OVR Advanced Settings) to allow button-press to check six or even just to rotate, if you are having stamina or mobility problems.
For the same “zoom level” VR’s FOV is definitely far larger, in flat screen when flying form if I want to keep tabs on my wingman when they’re off my side, and keep an eye on my heading at the same time, I have to expand the FOV a lot which means the fish eye effect comes in and I lose a lot of the spacial awareness that I need to fly accurately. Whereas in VR both can be visible at once with no fisheye at all. 2D feels like seeing everything through a window, whereas VR is like poking your head through the window, the “frame” is no longer a limitation of your field of view and the “wrap around” sensation of physically being present in the environment makes the scale of everything feel much larger. Perhaps it’s just this headset though? I don’t have any other VR experience - the spec sheet says it’s 130°
@@Bullet4MyEnemy Different user experiences, possibly. For 2D DCS, 20-140 degrees is the settable hFOV range. And yes, of course you will get more fish-eye at extreme 2D zoom - that's a given. I personally don't like it either, although it's pretty common in DCS dogfight videos despite the weirdness of it. Yet fisheye is not possible in VR unless something's very broken. It seems VR "zoom" is really just magnification, which is why it feels awful if you hold it on for a while. I've owned 3 different HMDs over the years, the widest of which was a Pimax Artisan originally advertised at 170 degrees dFOV, and 140 degrees hFOV. Unfortunately it actually tested out at about 100 degrees visible hFOV on my face, even using special thinner pads. And it also only ever actually rendered 127 degrees hFOV anyway, so Pimax simply lied when it first came out. If you have the new Pimax Crystal Light then they claim that's got 130 degrees dFOV and 115 degrees hFOV. That's much less than DCS 2D at max zoom setting, even if it actually performs as advertised this time. And from what I've read, users are reporting visible hFOV of just 103 degrees. YMMV. But there are definitely some other makes/models out there with real hFOVs larger than 140 degrees.
Perhaps I misspoke then, but the lack of fisheye at wide FOV is the benefit of VR. For form flying the fisheye effect and wide FOV only happen when effectively “zoomed out” a long way, losing a lot of detail that helps with spacial awareness - the fisheye alone does a lot to completely ruin spacial awareness such that I can’t hold form as well. I don’t fly “missions” much, so aerial refuelling is only something I’ve done about 3 times, all 3 being a struggle with head tracking - tried it in VR for the sake of comparison and managed it first try only disconnecting once whilst adding 4k lbs to fill up the Viper. Whether the FOV is better or worse, it’s the lack of fisheye that makes all the difference.
Have you tried XR necksafer by Fred Emmott? Otherwise the best rear vision is to get a swivel chair and one that easily tips back. In a turn you get pretty good eyes on target by leaning back rather than twisting your head. Much less pain than keeping your neck twisted.
I was hesitant to switch to VR and lose the "owl" ability that 2D gives you plus I'm 63 years old, the old neck is not as flexible as it used to be. Necklaces solved that problem😊
@@Bullet4MyEnemy , It wont. It has taken me 2 Months to Finally get XRnecksafer working Perfectly Every time !..It can be a night mare to set up but when its working good, it beats Track Ir !..I didnt get a chance to finish my post in DCS . Now I have Necksafer sorted,I am going to post my Results in DCS Forums this week with tips to set it up. Love your channel mate...Look up Jaydee in DCS .
Glad VR settings are working ok for you. The joy I find with VR is that it's harder than 2D to dogfight, as it should be in real life. It shouldnt be easy to dogfight and you should be a little grunty and sweaty after a good fight.
Try XR necksaver, it increases the turn rate of your head with custom settings in VR, so past 90 degrees left or right I'd have an increased rate of turn to save my sore neck!
I dont have a Pimax, just a Quest 3, but I realized my PC was not strong enough to really get a "worth the effort" experience.. but damn if flying helicopters with it was not amazing.. Waiting to upgrade some parts to give it another good try
@@lois87 I need to give the Hind another look, haven’t touched it since my last couple videos which must be getting on for a year ago now… Flying it was fun but fighting with it… Not so much.
One of the things I used to do in VR for the sake of footage was reset my view slightly to the opposite side of the eye I was recording from. Obviously for me it meant I was slightly misaligned but people watching would see it from the center. Possibly something to consider.
I've been dogfighting exclusively in VR on the DCS Dogfighters server since Spring. I use the Pimax Crystal and I'm getting the same FPS rates that you're experiencing. I think that flying in VR gives me an edge in a fight. I just wish that my FPS wouldn't drop after I respawn.
How do you think it gives you an edge? Did you never try dogfighting with head tracking before getting VR? A large part of my issue is knowing how well I would be doing in fights with a more familiar view control medium, VR for me is orders of magnitude more difficult relative to my experience. But if VR is your normal, it does make sense that you’d feel more competent using it than anything else.
@@Bullet4MyEnemy My kill scores tell me that VR gives me an edge. I had been using Track IR for almost 20 years in flight sims son. It may be difficult for you, but it’s closer to reality than head tracking and it helps me to determine positions and angles in 3D space.
@vampolascott36 Pilots all have the same limitation, are physically at the top of their game, and can actually brace themselves on parts of the cockpit. Most of the people we fight will be using head tracking, letting them see backwards a ton easier, I’m not remotely athletic and there nothing but empty space around me so I can’t push against my surroundings to help me twist further or hold a position easier. It’s less of a competitive edge in a sim by a long way.
Spend enough time in vr, and you can feel your jet/helo through your sensitive area. Your brain does some fascinating things in vr, research should be done.
@@qboid4763 I agree, I often call it gamer’s intuition - being able to translate visual and audio cues into physical sensations that you can develop an understanding of. Applies to way more than just VR too, like knowing whether you can access certain areas in shooters without having to try etc
The pop up text is really annoying in VR, but I do have a text size mod that significantly reduces the size. Different subject but it’s sad ED can’t make a good awacs and we need text awacs calls now
Even with a lot of preparation, the constant checking six with a regular headset is tiring. I used to match sprint competitively, which if you've ever seen the olympics involves a lot of looking over your shoulder, but even that wasn't as bad as DCS in VR for neck contortion! I think it's because you can't really move your eyes in VR, unless you have a headset with a massive FOV or eye tracking, so you have to twist your head further like an owl to see over your shoulder.
@@tinglydingle I do actually feel like the entire FOV is usable with the Crystal Light, I can use my periphery to track things without having to full on “OWL” at them. But even using my periphery looking straight back is pure pain. I hate how it’ll occasionally clip through the canopy glass as well, makes you appreciate how much harder and more cramped it would’ve been doing it for real - especially with a helmet on.
@@timogrimminck7076 For me the biggest and most difficult issue to solve was getting the eye alignment correct - I found a guide on TH-cam by an Indian guy who said to use the hand controllers to align their virtual position perfectly with their real life position by taking the headset on and off. It’s been pretty nice since then.
@@Toshminosh There’s a program called Neck Safer XR that people keep mentioning but I have a feeling it will just trigger extreme motion sickness, it took me a good few hours to get used to VR with 1:1 tracking, I don’t think my brain would deal with curves very well when my surroundings are blocked from view. …But I am feeling a draw towards it, I am missing my competence, but at the same time I feel like using it would devalue the point of VR. I also find myself in an awkward position of knowing I don’t have this set permanently, so I don’t want to stray too far from my existing control set up, to retain the ability to keep switching to and fro. If I knew it was to keep I’d be able to radically change keybinds to be easier to find with my eyes covered, and perhaps even adjust my stick position to centre to make twisting easier. At that point I might as well give Neck Safer a go, because it could be a more permanent change than something I’d have to swap back from. But for content creation VR isn’t quite there yet in performance or clarity, and I don’t really like that I can’t properly centre the camera view either - some sort of software that could blend the two eye pieces together for a central view would be great for that.
@@Bullet4MyEnemy I don't think the point of VR is to simulate to the point of developing physical issues that a real pilot might develop too 🤣, you probably owe it to yourself to try it out (unless it's super expensive). I prefer the pancake mode content anyway, your TrackIR setup seems almost flawless to me and is a pleasure to watch (it doesn't jump around like my budget solution does)
@@Bullet4MyEnemy I don't use curves with XRNeckSafer, but snaps. So it's like sitting sideways in the pilot's seat and you get 1:1 tracking from that position.
@@nazradu I did hop on briefly a few weeks ago, had quite a bit of fun - fully intend to give it another look for a video, do you have a specific aircraft recommendation?
@@Bullet4MyEnemynot really but the most fun is in the mid WWII birds like Spits, Mustang, 109s and 190s, Zeros. The classics with good old energy fighting. Also flying in tank battles and doing CAS has always been a lot of fun. I did not play WT for like three years or so, so I don't know nothing about top tier, but I guess it sucks.
it's hard to go back to 2D if you've got VR BFM in you. you can tell what the position of the two ships are relative to one another depending on where you're physically looking. your neck is telling you what you need to know almost. it's easier to lose tally and regain it very quickly with VR. depth perception is also much better. now we just need for VR to actually run properly
What I’m really enjoying about it is that I get to experience the struggle of learning how to fight again - it feels different enough due to my perspective shift that I feel like I’ve just got into dogfighting for the first time again - VR feels like I’m there, whereas 2D on a monitor feels almost like seeing it happen through a window; it’s really been fucking with my perception of where to look to anticipate a contact appearing when I’ve briefly lost them whilst they cross my 6 or pass through a cloud or whatever. TrackIR’s curves have trained my muscle memory to only have to turn my head 25° to track someone passing behind me, so suddenly having to look literally at them… It sounds dumb but I’m losing my sense of orientation so often in clouds because the amount of head movement doesn’t match my learned expectation. Like I know they crossed my six, and that I’ve rolled… But somehow I can’t compute where I need to look anymore, or how to manoeuvre to make looking in the right place easier. It reminds me of the transition from Realistic to Sim battles in WarThunder, losing that 3rd person camera and not being able to see under my plane anymore, having to learn how to manoeuvre to maintain vis - the reset switch on my tracking logic has been flicked again. But despite it feeling like I’m starting fresh, I have the knowledge of how to fight still to help make sense of the situations I’m in. It’s kinda like starting a New Game+ run and losing my equipment, but keeping my skills 😅 But the satisfaction I’m getting from adapting my fighting style to account for where I can’t easily look, manoeuvring in ways to keep contacts from flying to those areas, it’s like adding a new layer of difficulty. And there’s nothing more satisfying than succeeding with a handicap.
@@kizvy Basically, yes - my hardware is in the description and I’ve had to reduce the headset’s “pixels per degree” from the native resolution of 35 to around 24 to get a workable frame rate. That’s about 70% of the max clarity the headset can offer and I’m averaging about 40fps with a 4070ti… I’d wager even with a 4090 you’d still want to reduce it a bit. I can’t really lower it more without it looking terrible. But it has at least allowed me to keep textures and view distance on high.
Maybe make a video about switching settings back and forth between vr and 2d. I tried it in 2017 and it was… crap. Then they added clouds so performance was so bad
At least in terms of your graphic settings, you can save up to 3 presets now, so I have a 2D and VR preset. Means it’s just a case of hitting the preset, hitting “Apply” and then launching in VR/2D - the new game launcher is actually quite nice, impressed there haven’t been any issues with it. It even retained my settings when I transitioned from Steam to Standalone.
@@Bullet4MyEnemy The "aura" around the sun and even broad daylight reflections. I don't fly MP so don't know whether it's IC compatible. But I can't imagine watching that lightsplosh ever again during flying.
Necksaver makes me sick and its an massive immersion-breaker for me. I use a swivel chair and after a view weeks of "training", my 62-years old head swivels good enough in most cases. With the 8KX checking six was easier because of the wider fov. But it was also more blurry. So I prefer the crystal. In my 2D-days I used TIR since version 1.0. Seems like cheating to me now. 180 degrees owlview forever.... Top video. Highlightes the pros and cons of competitive vr well.
I started back with Oculus and fly on 8KX now as well. Unfortunately, I keep it on 120 degrees as anything past that is just blur so I rather save some performance. It takes more effort to look back, but I do quite well if the aircraft is so constructed. It is easier than in actual jet as you can turn you can lean forward and turn shoulders, but IRL you are strapped into the seat. Though you have full FOV IRL. What I hated in TIR is that you easily lose track on where you are going. With 1:1 head movement you have better situational awareness about your aircraft's attitude.
@@jansvoboda4293 I used 120 degrees too because of the same reason. Still plenty more than other headsets. Strappet in: The swivel-chair is my compensation for not having irl fov :)
DCS VR is honestly for the guys from South Park that sniff their own farts. It's just annoying. The setup, constant babysitting, and cords all over the place. Is it more "immersive"? Yes. Does "immersion" exist in an environment where you feel nothing? No. I did VR for over a year, I went 2D and it's just too hard to go back. I do not have 3hrs to set up every session and sweat in a pair of goggles by the time real life is done.
This was my initial take as well, it’s more effort than it’s worth if it’s not something you maintain regularly. I tend to just leave the set out on my desk all the time so it’s just a case of plugging it in and putting it on. The tweaking was easily the biggest pain in the arse, it took me about 2 months to fully understand it. But now if anything changes I have some idea of where to look first. The one thing I really can’t get over though, is that it makes me perform worse because it’s more difficult to look around, and as a content creator, that combined with it looking worse in general, is a step beyond acceptable for me to make the switch from head tracking.
Ha for me it’s less my phone and more my keyboard, WarThunder plays like FC3 so the keyboard only really comes out to call people bellends in chat 😂 In DCS I need it for all sorts and it becomes a massive chore having to feel around instead of just pressing it right first time. Frustration is VR’s Achilles heel, because there’s none with TrackIR5 once you’ve set it up properly.
How do you have it set up? Another commenter mentioned snap views but I think that would be quite jarring to watch back on TH-cam. Can you add curves like with TrackIR?
@@Bullet4MyEnemy i started with snaps, basically the setup that comes out of the box, because at that time the other option was on the verge to make me sick. But since I do not have issues with motion sicknes anymore (btw this is a thing of training really), I switched to accelerated movement again. Default settings work for me.
I guess what it is, is different people want different things from vr. I want to feel as close to what a real pilot would feel. So the fatigue of turning my neck to keep a bandit in my sights is what i want to experience. The danger, the discomfort, the tension of losing sight of a bandit. If you want a high kill score, then a track ir is probably the correct option. but vr does convey a smidge of what a pilot experiences, awareness wise. And considering the pilot is also wearing a helmet, the field of view is probably more limited than if they were not wearing a helmet.
I agree 100%. Flying in VR is just a different animal than flying in 2D. It's more immersive and more "real" to me. But there are definitely tradeoffs, which is why DCS adds in some "cheats" for VR flyers, such as the black dots to increase your ability to spot planes at a distance. Labels helps a lot too, but some servers will disable those. All in all, I fly in VR and use the minor cheats to help spot and identify things. Without them, you can fly for hours and never find a target (especially in ground attacks). VR has some advantages, though, such as depth perception and a greater perception of speed at low altitude... so canyon runs are easier and a lot more fun! And of course, if your neck can't take the strain, then there's always 2D... or stay out of dogfights ;-)
Woot, nice, glad I was able to assist in getting your settings dialed in!
I'm glad you got there in the end with VR, kinda upsetting how much easier the Q3 is to get going than the Pimax, but that's the joys of also trying to get the recordings to look good lol
I just looked it up and the Quest 3 offers 4,557,312 pixels per eye.
Call it 4.5k per eye - the Crystal Light is over 8.3 million pixels per eye, so it’s not really surprising I had to tweak it more to get a playable frame rate.
Pimax gear is definitely for the tinkerers/tweakers rather than the plug and play-ers, the Quest is like a console to Pimax’s PC - more faffing about for the best result.
(Though the base audio and mic is severely lacking.)
I don’t think there’s hardware available to get it running to its max potential though, I doubt a 4090 is enough orders of magnitude better than my 4070ti to pick up the amount of slack necessary for a seamless experience - at least in DCS.
Quest 3 sounds like a solid buy, but the Pimax is like future proofing your VR experience.
@@Bullet4MyEnemy 4090 just involves a lot less compromises. 5090 will likely be able to crank. It's easy to fall into the trap of chasing DCS VR performance via hardware upgrades, but also it does tend to work.
The 4090 and Crystal are a match made in heaven !
Flying in VR made my back more flexible again after doing some pretty labour heavy jobs. Also having a headset with foveated rendering and eye tracking made a big difference too because it meant the sweet spot would transfer to the edge of the displays when checking 6
Yeah I can imagine eye tracking makes quite a bit of difference, here’s hoping Pimax will also send me the Crystal Super for a comparison when it releases
@@Bullet4MyEnemy that or a 5090 so one doesn’t have to worry about foveated rendering while your wallet cries
If my power supply is still good for it then I might bite the bullet… That said I haven’t seen a price yet
I have OG Crystal, combining DFR with XRNS is a life saver. That said, I’m running a i7 with 4090
In VR your field of view is typically much smaller compared to flat screen, not larger. Because you cannot increase it artificially like you can in 2D.
Also, you can add software like NeckSafer (or a DIY version using OVR Advanced Settings) to allow button-press to check six or even just to rotate, if you are having stamina or mobility problems.
For the same “zoom level” VR’s FOV is definitely far larger, in flat screen when flying form if I want to keep tabs on my wingman when they’re off my side, and keep an eye on my heading at the same time, I have to expand the FOV a lot which means the fish eye effect comes in and I lose a lot of the spacial awareness that I need to fly accurately.
Whereas in VR both can be visible at once with no fisheye at all.
2D feels like seeing everything through a window, whereas VR is like poking your head through the window, the “frame” is no longer a limitation of your field of view and the “wrap around” sensation of physically being present in the environment makes the scale of everything feel much larger.
Perhaps it’s just this headset though? I don’t have any other VR experience - the spec sheet says it’s 130°
@@Bullet4MyEnemy Different user experiences, possibly.
For 2D DCS, 20-140 degrees is the settable hFOV range. And yes, of course you will get more fish-eye at extreme 2D zoom - that's a given. I personally don't like it either, although it's pretty common in DCS dogfight videos despite the weirdness of it. Yet fisheye is not possible in VR unless something's very broken. It seems VR "zoom" is really just magnification, which is why it feels awful if you hold it on for a while.
I've owned 3 different HMDs over the years, the widest of which was a Pimax Artisan originally advertised at 170 degrees dFOV, and 140 degrees hFOV. Unfortunately it actually tested out at about 100 degrees visible hFOV on my face, even using special thinner pads. And it also only ever actually rendered 127 degrees hFOV anyway, so Pimax simply lied when it first came out.
If you have the new Pimax Crystal Light then they claim that's got 130 degrees dFOV and 115 degrees hFOV. That's much less than DCS 2D at max zoom setting, even if it actually performs as advertised this time. And from what I've read, users are reporting visible hFOV of just 103 degrees. YMMV.
But there are definitely some other makes/models out there with real hFOVs larger than 140 degrees.
Yes you can justrt increase FOV like a flat screen you will go fish eye and with the quest 3 you need to use the devloper settings.
Perhaps I misspoke then, but the lack of fisheye at wide FOV is the benefit of VR.
For form flying the fisheye effect and wide FOV only happen when effectively “zoomed out” a long way, losing a lot of detail that helps with spacial awareness - the fisheye alone does a lot to completely ruin spacial awareness such that I can’t hold form as well.
I don’t fly “missions” much, so aerial refuelling is only something I’ve done about 3 times, all 3 being a struggle with head tracking - tried it in VR for the sake of comparison and managed it first try only disconnecting once whilst adding 4k lbs to fill up the Viper.
Whether the FOV is better or worse, it’s the lack of fisheye that makes all the difference.
Have you tried XR necksafer by Fred Emmott? Otherwise the best rear vision is to get a swivel chair and one that easily tips back. In a turn you get pretty good eyes on target by leaning back rather than twisting your head. Much less pain than keeping your neck twisted.
Yeah, aware of it but haven’t look into it yet - worried it’ll give me motion sickness.
There is an option to snap change angle if motion sickness is a problem
I was hesitant to switch to VR and lose the "owl" ability that 2D gives you plus I'm 63 years old, the old neck is not as flexible as it used to be. Necklaces solved that problem😊
@@Bullet4MyEnemy , It wont. It has taken me 2 Months to Finally get XRnecksafer working Perfectly Every time !..It can be a night mare to set up but when its working good, it beats Track Ir !..I didnt get a chance to finish my post in DCS . Now I have Necksafer sorted,I am going to post my Results in DCS Forums this week with tips to set it up. Love your channel mate...Look up Jaydee in DCS .
I think you’d be surprised how well XRNS is implemented. I’ll have to share my settings sometime.
Glad VR settings are working ok for you. The joy I find with VR is that it's harder than 2D to dogfight, as it should be in real life. It shouldnt be easy to dogfight and you should be a little grunty and sweaty after a good fight.
Another great video mate and the music of doom at the end….😂😂😂
Sometimes I live at the end, just keeping you on your toes 😅
@@Bullet4MyEnemy …but where’s the fun in that right? 🤣 Looking forward to the next one mate 🫡
Try XR necksaver, it increases the turn rate of your head with custom settings in VR, so past 90 degrees left or right I'd have an increased rate of turn to save my sore neck!
I dont have a Pimax, just a Quest 3, but I realized my PC was not strong enough to really get a "worth the effort" experience.. but damn if flying helicopters with it was not amazing.. Waiting to upgrade some parts to give it another good try
@@lois87
I need to give the Hind another look, haven’t touched it since my last couple videos which must be getting on for a year ago now…
Flying it was fun but fighting with it… Not so much.
That edit of the pfp is awesome 😂 good one
I’ve flown in VR for a long time, my neck. Hurt in the beginning, but you do get a good rotational movement as time goes by. Stick with it.
And neck warm-up 😉
One of the things I used to do in VR for the sake of footage was reset my view slightly to the opposite side of the eye I was recording from. Obviously for me it meant I was slightly misaligned but people watching would see it from the center. Possibly something to consider.
I have been thinking of doing this actually, great minds.
ralfidad coming in clutch as always😂
@@Dragonsix1 thanks dad!
Quadview - it's working without eye tracking - you could check for better performance and some necksafer app, without it you gonna be hurting.
I've been dogfighting exclusively in VR on the DCS Dogfighters server since Spring. I use the Pimax Crystal and I'm getting the same FPS rates that you're experiencing. I think that flying in VR gives me an edge in a fight. I just wish that my FPS wouldn't drop after I respawn.
How do you think it gives you an edge?
Did you never try dogfighting with head tracking before getting VR?
A large part of my issue is knowing how well I would be doing in fights with a more familiar view control medium, VR for me is orders of magnitude more difficult relative to my experience.
But if VR is your normal, it does make sense that you’d feel more competent using it than anything else.
@@Bullet4MyEnemy My kill scores tell me that VR gives me an edge. I had been using Track IR for almost 20 years in flight sims son. It may be difficult for you, but it’s closer to reality than head tracking and it helps me to determine positions and angles in 3D space.
@@vampolascott36
Can we swap spines/necks?
@@Bullet4MyEnemy How do you think pilots do it? And you don’t have to worry about G forces.
@vampolascott36
Pilots all have the same limitation, are physically at the top of their game, and can actually brace themselves on parts of the cockpit.
Most of the people we fight will be using head tracking, letting them see backwards a ton easier, I’m not remotely athletic and there nothing but empty space around me so I can’t push against my surroundings to help me twist further or hold a position easier.
It’s less of a competitive edge in a sim by a long way.
Spend enough time in vr, and you can feel your jet/helo through your sensitive area. Your brain does some fascinating things in vr, research should be done.
@@qboid4763
I agree, I often call it gamer’s intuition - being able to translate visual and audio cues into physical sensations that you can develop an understanding of.
Applies to way more than just VR too, like knowing whether you can access certain areas in shooters without having to try etc
The pop up text is really annoying in VR, but I do have a text size mod that significantly reduces the size.
Different subject but it’s sad ED can’t make a good awacs and we need text awacs calls now
Even with a lot of preparation, the constant checking six with a regular headset is tiring. I used to match sprint competitively, which if you've ever seen the olympics involves a lot of looking over your shoulder, but even that wasn't as bad as DCS in VR for neck contortion! I think it's because you can't really move your eyes in VR, unless you have a headset with a massive FOV or eye tracking, so you have to twist your head further like an owl to see over your shoulder.
@@tinglydingle
I do actually feel like the entire FOV is usable with the Crystal Light, I can use my periphery to track things without having to full on “OWL” at them.
But even using my periphery looking straight back is pure pain.
I hate how it’ll occasionally clip through the canopy glass as well, makes you appreciate how much harder and more cramped it would’ve been doing it for real - especially with a helmet on.
All the best fighter pilots switch to a wide angle go-pro at the top of the canopy on the merge
Hey my pimax crystal light doesn’t give me good clarity at all? Do you know anyone who is good with VR and willing to troubleshoot?
@@timogrimminck7076
For me the biggest and most difficult issue to solve was getting the eye alignment correct - I found a guide on TH-cam by an Indian guy who said to use the hand controllers to align their virtual position perfectly with their real life position by taking the headset on and off.
It’s been pretty nice since then.
Is there not some calibration you can do where you map the 360 degree rotation to a 180 degree range of motion so you don't have to break your neck?
@@Toshminosh
There’s a program called Neck Safer XR that people keep mentioning but I have a feeling it will just trigger extreme motion sickness, it took me a good few hours to get used to VR with 1:1 tracking, I don’t think my brain would deal with curves very well when my surroundings are blocked from view.
…But I am feeling a draw towards it, I am missing my competence, but at the same time I feel like using it would devalue the point of VR.
I also find myself in an awkward position of knowing I don’t have this set permanently, so I don’t want to stray too far from my existing control set up, to retain the ability to keep switching to and fro.
If I knew it was to keep I’d be able to radically change keybinds to be easier to find with my eyes covered, and perhaps even adjust my stick position to centre to make twisting easier.
At that point I might as well give Neck Safer a go, because it could be a more permanent change than something I’d have to swap back from.
But for content creation VR isn’t quite there yet in performance or clarity, and I don’t really like that I can’t properly centre the camera view either - some sort of software that could blend the two eye pieces together for a central view would be great for that.
@@Bullet4MyEnemy I don't think the point of VR is to simulate to the point of developing physical issues that a real pilot might develop too 🤣, you probably owe it to yourself to try it out (unless it's super expensive). I prefer the pancake mode content anyway, your TrackIR setup seems almost flawless to me and is a pleasure to watch (it doesn't jump around like my budget solution does)
I have been assuming it’s free, but maybe you do have to buy it…
Might have to look into it finally just to satisfy my curiosity 😅
@@Bullet4MyEnemy I don't use curves with XRNeckSafer, but snaps. So it's like sitting sideways in the pilot's seat and you get 1:1 tracking from that position.
@@aapje
That sounds pretty jarring for TH-cam content, is there a way to smooth it out rather than snapping?
You might not want to go back, but try War Thunder in VR. The WWII, early jet fights are awesome
@@nazradu
I did hop on briefly a few weeks ago, had quite a bit of fun - fully intend to give it another look for a video, do you have a specific aircraft recommendation?
@@Bullet4MyEnemynot really but the most fun is in the mid WWII birds like Spits, Mustang, 109s and 190s, Zeros. The classics with good old energy fighting. Also flying in tank battles and doing CAS has always been a lot of fun. I did not play WT for like three years or so, so I don't know nothing about top tier, but I guess it sucks.
it's hard to go back to 2D if you've got VR BFM in you. you can tell what the position of the two ships are relative to one another depending on where you're physically looking. your neck is telling you what you need to know almost. it's easier to lose tally and regain it very quickly with VR. depth perception is also much better. now we just need for VR to actually run properly
What I’m really enjoying about it is that I get to experience the struggle of learning how to fight again - it feels different enough due to my perspective shift that I feel like I’ve just got into dogfighting for the first time again - VR feels like I’m there, whereas 2D on a monitor feels almost like seeing it happen through a window; it’s really been fucking with my perception of where to look to anticipate a contact appearing when I’ve briefly lost them whilst they cross my 6 or pass through a cloud or whatever.
TrackIR’s curves have trained my muscle memory to only have to turn my head 25° to track someone passing behind me, so suddenly having to look literally at them… It sounds dumb but I’m losing my sense of orientation so often in clouds because the amount of head movement doesn’t match my learned expectation.
Like I know they crossed my six, and that I’ve rolled… But somehow I can’t compute where I need to look anymore, or how to manoeuvre to make looking in the right place easier.
It reminds me of the transition from Realistic to Sim battles in WarThunder, losing that 3rd person camera and not being able to see under my plane anymore, having to learn how to manoeuvre to maintain vis - the reset switch on my tracking logic has been flicked again.
But despite it feeling like I’m starting fresh, I have the knowledge of how to fight still to help make sense of the situations I’m in.
It’s kinda like starting a New Game+ run and losing my equipment, but keeping my skills 😅
But the satisfaction I’m getting from adapting my fighting style to account for where I can’t easily look, manoeuvring in ways to keep contacts from flying to those areas, it’s like adding a new layer of difficulty.
And there’s nothing more satisfying than succeeding with a handicap.
Does dcs need like a 4090 to run good in vr lol
@@kizvy
Basically, yes - my hardware is in the description and I’ve had to reduce the headset’s “pixels per degree” from the native resolution of 35 to around 24 to get a workable frame rate.
That’s about 70% of the max clarity the headset can offer and I’m averaging about 40fps with a 4070ti… I’d wager even with a 4090 you’d still want to reduce it a bit.
I can’t really lower it more without it looking terrible.
But it has at least allowed me to keep textures and view distance on high.
More like a 6090 currently.
Maybe make a video about switching settings back and forth between vr and 2d. I tried it in 2017 and it was… crap. Then they added clouds so performance was so bad
At least in terms of your graphic settings, you can save up to 3 presets now, so I have a 2D and VR preset.
Means it’s just a case of hitting the preset, hitting “Apply” and then launching in VR/2D - the new game launcher is actually quite nice, impressed there haven’t been any issues with it.
It even retained my settings when I transitioned from Steam to Standalone.
@@Bullet4MyEnemy thanks. How is the “vr” preset?
@@MusicSoundPlayer its just basically a medium/low-ish preset, and its settings are pretty dogshit out the box tbh.
@@MusicSoundPlayer
I didn’t try it, honestly - best way to set things up is described in Ralfi’s video linked in the description of this one
Wow. The mig-21, feels like flying a tube in vr. As it should
7:10 Get rid of that ridiculous bloom with a mod from user files.
You mean that reflection on the canopy glass? I did think it was a little excessively obtrusive…
@@Bullet4MyEnemy The "aura" around the sun and even broad daylight reflections. I don't fly MP so don't know whether it's IC compatible. But I can't imagine watching that lightsplosh ever again during flying.
Necksaver makes me sick and its an massive immersion-breaker for me. I use a swivel chair and after a view weeks of "training", my 62-years old head swivels good enough in most cases. With the 8KX checking six was easier because of the wider fov. But it was also more blurry. So I prefer the crystal. In my 2D-days I used TIR since version 1.0. Seems like cheating to me now. 180 degrees owlview forever.... Top video. Highlightes the pros and cons of competitive vr well.
I started back with Oculus and fly on 8KX now as well. Unfortunately, I keep it on 120 degrees as anything past that is just blur so I rather save some performance.
It takes more effort to look back, but I do quite well if the aircraft is so constructed. It is easier than in actual jet as you can turn you can lean forward and turn shoulders, but IRL you are strapped into the seat. Though you have full FOV IRL.
What I hated in TIR is that you easily lose track on where you are going. With 1:1 head movement you have better situational awareness about your aircraft's attitude.
@@jansvoboda4293 I used 120 degrees too because of the same reason. Still plenty more than other headsets. Strappet in: The swivel-chair is my compensation for not having irl fov :)
DCS VR is honestly for the guys from South Park that sniff their own farts. It's just annoying. The setup, constant babysitting, and cords all over the place. Is it more "immersive"? Yes. Does "immersion" exist in an environment where you feel nothing? No. I did VR for over a year, I went 2D and it's just too hard to go back. I do not have 3hrs to set up every session and sweat in a pair of goggles by the time real life is done.
This was my initial take as well, it’s more effort than it’s worth if it’s not something you maintain regularly.
I tend to just leave the set out on my desk all the time so it’s just a case of plugging it in and putting it on.
The tweaking was easily the biggest pain in the arse, it took me about 2 months to fully understand it.
But now if anything changes I have some idea of where to look first.
The one thing I really can’t get over though, is that it makes me perform worse because it’s more difficult to look around, and as a content creator, that combined with it looking worse in general, is a step beyond acceptable for me to make the switch from head tracking.
Ha for me it’s less my phone and more my keyboard, WarThunder plays like FC3 so the keyboard only really comes out to call people bellends in chat 😂
In DCS I need it for all sorts and it becomes a massive chore having to feel around instead of just pressing it right first time.
Frustration is VR’s Achilles heel, because there’s none with TrackIR5 once you’ve set it up properly.
Ах этот ламповый Миг-19❤
XRNecksafer is saving my neck in VR, cant recommend it enough!
How do you have it set up? Another commenter mentioned snap views but I think that would be quite jarring to watch back on TH-cam.
Can you add curves like with TrackIR?
@@Bullet4MyEnemy i started with snaps, basically the setup that comes out of the box, because at that time the other option was on the verge to make me sick. But since I do not have issues with motion sicknes anymore (btw this is a thing of training really), I switched to accelerated movement again. Default settings work for me.
@radovanthefoley
Thanks, I’ll give it a look then