Headache, tired, eyes are strained from VR

[Gone Guru In The Subaru]

I honestly don't enjoy VR because of it. Anyone experience similar? May be because I run everything on lowest...

[necrophonic]

Sounds like your headset isn't adjusted properly or you're not maintaining solid frame rates.

[Mr Eos]

Wrong IPD set. Low FPS, Reprojection, Screen Door Effect.

These are the culprits.

Get a better PC and an HMD with less SDE.

90hz was minimum. But honestly, 120hz or better is what you should be shooting for.

[IanL]

It differs a lot from person to person, I typically run at 90 fps but I can happily play for hours at a steady 45 fps, it doesn't effect me. But the higher the maintained frame rate generally the better, and as others have already said ensure your IPD is set correctly.

As Mr Eos mentioned heavy reprojection can cause discomfort too and is normally a sign your graphical settings are to high or your PC is not really capable enough.

Worth checking you have your headset viewing position set correctly both horizontally and vertically too.

You don't mention how long you've had VR, are you fairly new to it or have you had it for some time? What headset are you using and how long are you typically playing for?

[Mr Eos]

One other thing.

If possible. A Halo headstrap. Sometimes just the pressure of the strap sitting on the wrong spot on the back of my head eventually stacks up into a headache. Getting a headstrap that puts the majority of the weight on the forehead helped alot in that regard as well.

Between a Vive DAS, Pimax DAS, Rift S Halo, PSVR Halo, Quest 2 default strap, upgraded strap from VR cover, or some chinese knock off Halo Strap. It will always be Halo for me from here on out.

On of the reasons for this is because on a Halo strap the HMD hovers in front of your face. Which allows you to remove the face gasket. Which allows 2 things, get closer to the screens for better FOV and might actually help with your headache....... and airflow. The only downside is that you'll want to play in a dimly lit room, so you don't get light reflection on the lenses from outside sources.

It's also not recommended to remove the face gasket if you're playing a game with A LOT of fast head movement. Unless you want your nose to play boxing with the HMD.

[SilentCaay]

If you're running at lowest settings, your rig probably isn't able to deliver the smoothest experience which is very, very important for comfort in VR. You need to be able to run at the headset's native res or better and a stable 80-90fps, at minimum.

[IanL]

Originally posted by Mr Eos:

One other thing.

If possible. A Halo headstrap. Sometimes just the pressure of the strap sitting on the wrong spot on the back of my head eventually stacks up into a headache. Getting a headstrap that puts the majority of the weight on the forehead helped alot in that regard as well.

Between a Vive DAS, Pimax DAS, Rift S Halo, PSVR Halo, Quest 2 default strap, upgraded strap from VR cover, or some chinese knock off Halo Strap. It will always be Halo for me from here on out.

On of the reasons for this is because on a Halo strap the HMD hovers in front of your face. Which allows you to remove the face gasket. Which allows 2 things, get closer to the screens for better FOV and might actually help with your headache....... and airflow. The only downside is that you'll want to play in a dimly lit room, so you don't get light reflection on the lenses from outside sources.

It's also not recommended to remove the face gasket if you're playing a game with A LOT of fast head movement. Unless you want your nose to play boxing with the HMD.

I'd never considered using a halo strap, so that's interesting. What headset do you have and was it easy to fit a halo strap?

[temps]

I've been playing on my Valve Index with the refresh rate set to 90 and haven't noticed any of these issues. My only complaint is not having a big enough play area to walk around in (standing in one place without walking for extended periods of time makes my feet/legs feel bad).

[Psychotic_Frog]

1) Make sure your IPD is set correctly. You can measure it in front of a mirror
2) Make sure your headset straps are properly adjusted and doesn't strain your neck too much
3) Get an app displaying the FPS, make sure it is _always_ above 90. If it isn't, lower the resolution or get a better PC. 90fps is the minimum to not feel sick usually.
4) If you don't have your "VR legs" yet, take frequent short pauses to avoid getting tired and avoid feeling sick

[bronsky]

What are your specs? I had the exact same problem with Serious Sam 3 VR, and only this game (it was one of the most demanding at that time). It was a performance issue and I solved it... by upgrading my rig.

[LemonyNebula]

As everyone is saying, performance and things like IPD is the likely culprit.

It could also be blur if your resolution is put too low too via sub sampling, as blurrier things can cause headaches, or the warping of the motion smoothing being overused due to dropped frames from it being too high.

Keep an eye on your framerate and also check your motion smoothing activity. As motion smoothing can bump up the frames artificially but cause visual disturbance if relied too much upon.

If your hardware is at least the requirements, you should easily be able to keep the frames up without motion smoothing on lowest settings.

[Ayanami]

low fps isnt an issue tbh, i finished the game with a i5 7400, that's below minimum requirements, so 30-40 fps were the norm, 45 at best.

the bad thing u might be experiencing is stutters, lags?

[necrophonic]

Originally posted by Ayanami:

low fps isnt an issue tbh, i finished the game with a i5 7400, that's below minimum requirements, so 30-40 fps were the norm, 45 at best.

the bad thing u might be experiencing is stutters, lags?

Higher is better, but absolutely it's inconsistency that's the really bad thing.