VR F18/Controls

[Thorian]

I am wondering if anyone has ditched the Hotas and gone straight vr controllers and how has their experience been so far. Personally I have found it clunky and a bit uncomfortable, however I like having that direct control in the cockpit. I also play a game called VTOL and as exciting as it can be and alot of fun, its not quite the realistic feeling I get in DCS. However the needing to memorize my keyboard, and KB binds for everything we do in DCS is also a bit daunting. Im still working on finding my personal best settings so I am open to others input that way into how they are setup and play.

Thanks in advance

[startrekmike]

Even if Eagle Dynamics were to lean in on VR controls (they haven't), it still would by its very nature be a rough experience. The only reason that VTOL VR's controls work as well as they do is because the entire game was designed from the ground up with VR controls as the focus. DCS can't really work like that and still properly model the aircraft.

At best, there will be a time when one can use their hands to manipulate switches and buttons in the cockpit but you will still want a HOTAS and even rudder pedals to allow for proper control of the aircraft and all its various systems.

[unknown]

Originally posted by Thorian:

I am wondering if anyone has ditched the Hotas and gone straight vr controllers and how has their experience been so far. Personally I have found it clunky and a bit uncomfortable, however I like having that direct control in the cockpit. I also play a game called VTOL and as exciting as it can be and alot of fun, its not quite the realistic feeling I get in DCS. However the needing to memorize my keyboard, and KB binds for everything we do in DCS is also a bit daunting. Im still working on finding my personal best settings so I am open to others input that way into how they are setup and play.

Thanks in advance

I have seen vr gloves being used in this game. So essentially it allows you to grab onto your hotas and let go and activate buttons. I would think that would be the best way of doing things. But currently those gloves are expensive. So perhapse an item to wait for

[startrekmike]

Originally posted by unknown:

Originally posted by Thorian:

I am wondering if anyone has ditched the Hotas and gone straight vr controllers and how has their experience been so far. Personally I have found it clunky and a bit uncomfortable, however I like having that direct control in the cockpit. I also play a game called VTOL and as exciting as it can be and alot of fun, its not quite the realistic feeling I get in DCS. However the needing to memorize my keyboard, and KB binds for everything we do in DCS is also a bit daunting. Im still working on finding my personal best settings so I am open to others input that way into how they are setup and play.

Thanks in advance

I have seen vr gloves being used in this game. So essentially it allows you to grab onto your hotas and let go and activate buttons. I would think that would be the best way of doing things. But currently those gloves are expensive. So perhapse an item to wait for

That works in theory but it is one thing to use the gloves to kinda roughly move a stick or move a throttle grip back and forth, it is another entirely to precisely manage multiple hat switches that are clustered together or buttons or analog slew hats. You are getting into a level of precision that just isn't practical unless you can actually FEEL the controls under your fingertips via a physical HOTAS of some kind.

[unknown]

Originally posted by startrekmike:

Originally posted by unknown:

I have seen vr gloves being used in this game. So essentially it allows you to grab onto your hotas and let go and activate buttons. I would think that would be the best way of doing things. But currently those gloves are expensive. So perhapse an item to wait for

That works in theory but it is one thing to use the gloves to kinda roughly move a stick or move a throttle grip back and forth, it is another entirely to precisely manage multiple hat switches that are clustered together or buttons or analog slew hats. You are getting into a level of precision that just isn't practical unless you can actually FEEL the controls under your fingertips via a physical HOTAS of some kind.

NO the glove you just wear and press the buttons on your PHYSICAL hotas. Like they are normal seeming loves. For hotas commands the gloves do nothing. The gloves are to do everything that isn't bound to your hotas.

essentially the idea is that your fingers are tracked which allows you to click buttons in the cockpit like the apu start function or jettison weapons while the hotas commands are still mapped to your physical hotas joystick. Its a hybrid system to utilize the best parts of hotas setups and VR controllers.

[unknown]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fZrL6HOtmUI

[醉仙望月]

Originally posted by unknown:

essentially the idea is that your fingers are tracked which allows you to click buttons in the cockpit like the apu start function or jettison weapons while the hotas commands are still mapped to your physical hotas joystick. Its a hybrid system to utilize the best parts of hotas setups and VR controllers.

Unlike VTOL VR where you use the trigger on the motion controller to press buttons and pinch switches, in DCS anything your gloves happens to collide with will instantly be actuated.
Obviously that's far from ideal because it leads to numbers of accidental presses on your way to activating the control you wanted and feels completely detached from the movement you would perform in real life.
See how hard he interacts with the cockpit with VRfree gloves
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B6TDv1m4lAk
And how smooth the cockpit interaction with motion controllers in VTOL VR in the video 4 years ago
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rEPChAt9AsM
That is why VTOL VR, which does not support HOTAS, received Overwhelmingly Positive (97%) reviews.

[SSerponi76]

Ditch my HOTAS warthog for VR controller?
No way.

[vJIG SAW]

I use my hotas but controllers to interact with landing gear flaps etc. Throttle, stick, rudders are hotas. I have some keys binded, I put them in easy to reach easily remembered keys i.e. num pad enter = call the ball. I tried using just controllers but we are not there yet, was clunky for me as well. Hope my input helps, In the end what works for me might not work so well for you.

[unknown]

Originally posted by 醉仙望月:

Originally posted by unknown:

essentially the idea is that your fingers are tracked which allows you to click buttons in the cockpit like the apu start function or jettison weapons while the hotas commands are still mapped to your physical hotas joystick. Its a hybrid system to utilize the best parts of hotas setups and VR controllers.

Unlike VTOL VR where you use the trigger on the motion controller to press buttons and pinch switches, in DCS anything your gloves happens to collide with will instantly be actuated.
Obviously that's far from ideal because it leads to numbers of accidental presses on your way to activating the control you wanted and feels completely detached from the movement you would perform in real life.
See how hard he interacts with the cockpit with VRfree gloves
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B6TDv1m4lAk
And how smooth the cockpit interaction with motion controllers in VTOL VR in the video 4 years ago
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rEPChAt9AsM
That is why VTOL VR, which does not support HOTAS, received Overwhelmingly Positive (97%) reviews.

vtol vr isn't really a full on simulator though. it has simplified physics designed to work with vr. Everything about it is designed for VR. DCS world was not intended to be a VR game. its a flight sim. And a long running one that has existed in some form or another since the 90s,

VR technology is the new stuff and for DCS world, the gloves are the best you can get. There is no way to make DCS world work well with the controllers like vtol VR because vtol vr designed the game around the intereaction and physics. While I would expect that button pushs can get better, actually controlling the aircraft will not.

[醉仙望月]

Originally posted by vJIG SAW:

I use my hotas but controllers to interact with landing gear flaps etc.

Levers and knobs in DCS require horizontal movement instead of vertical or rotation movement to manipulate. You can't grab them and move them up/down, but move the thumbstick left/right. Obviously that's far from ideal because it feels completely detached from the movement you would perform in real life to actuate each kind of control.

Originally posted by vJIG SAW:

I have some keys binded, I put them in easy to reach easily remembered keys i.e. num pad enter = call the ball.

Why not use voice recognition to call the ball?

Originally posted by vJIG SAW:

I tried using just controllers but we are not there yet, was clunky for me as well. Hope my input helps, In the end what works for me might not work so well for you.

In DCS, when the player grab the throttle or joystick, it jumps to the hand position, causing unexpected (often dramatic) input to the aircraft if the hand was a few centimeters away from the control when pressing the grip.
In VTOL VR, the hand jumps to the control, not the other way around. And it uses the tilt of the motion controller instead of its position as the input for the joystick, which allows you to move your hand to a more comfortable position even if it is longer aligned with the virtual stick. This means you can easily rest the bottom of the motion controller on your thigh or knee for support and to serve as a pivot.

Originally posted by unknown:

VR technology is the new stuff and for DCS world, the gloves are the best you can get. There is no way to make DCS world work well with the controllers like vtol VR because vtol vr designed the game around the interaction and physics. While I would expect that button pushes can get better, actually controlling the aircraft will not.

In the VRfree cockpit interaction in DCS video demonstration, he could not even flip the switch accurately. When he touched the switch, it either did not move or moved twice instantly. You can't pinch the switch and move your hand up and down to flip it like in VTOL VR.
Furthermore, since the glove has no buttons, you can’t just move your fingers to interact with the virtual buttons like using the trigger on the motion controller. Instead, you have to move your entire arm to make the virtual hand collide with the button, causing anything your gloves happens to collide with will instantly be actuated.

[unknown]

Originally posted by 醉仙望月:

In the VRfree cockpit interaction in DCS video demonstration, he could not even flip the switch accurately. When he touched the switch, it either did not move or moved twice instantly. You can't pinch the switch and move your hand up and down to flip it like in VTOL VR.
Furthermore, since the glove has no buttons, you can’t just move your fingers to interact with the virtual buttons like using the trigger on the motion controller. Instead, you have to move your entire arm to make the virtual hand collide with the button, causing anything your gloves happens to collide with will instantly be actuated.

You can now accurately do it. One of my buddies has one of these and the drivers and tech has come a way since that video. Still far from perfect obviously, but you can operate everything pretty easily after a little bit of usage. But it is definatly a more detatched motion. Which is why I mentioned that DCS will never really be vtol VR. it wasn't designed for it and therefore the process in which things need to happen are backwards for proper VR support.

Instead of building the game around the controls (which is really necessary for a good vr game right now) they are compromising the controls for the game.