OpenXR/Oculus support

[phobos2077]

This game desperately needs OpenXR mode. As Oculus dominates PC VR market these days, all those players have to deal with running this game (demanding on it's own right) via ugly multi-layer setup, which results in laggy controller tracking as well as system/graphics memory overhead. There seems to be no real fix for this. The only way is for developers to step in and port the game to OpenXR (which SteamVR itself already embraced last year) or add it as an option. This would allow to run game "natively" using Oculus platform (if it's set as OpenXR default).

Here I am being optimistic and hopeful for developers to make a little effort and make sure most people can experience their game in all it's glory.

[IanL]

Hey, great idea. You might want to ask Oculus to do the same and make all their games run natively on SteamVR rather than having to use a far from optimal multi-layer setup too.

[phobos2077]

Originally posted by IanL:

Hey, great idea. You might want to ask Oculus to do the same and make all their games run natively on SteamVR rather than having to use a far from optimal multi-layer setup too.

Well I'm not going to ask them because I don't own a SteamVR headset. But yeah, basically it's the same issue other way around.

[necrophonic]

I agree with IanL.

The fundamental thing is that Valve built their SteamVR on open standards as far as possible to enable the widest range of headsets to be able to use those same open standards and play PCVR games.

Oculus (and in particular Facebook) chose to build more proprietary in an effort to coral gamers into a walled garden under their control.

I, too, wish for interoperability between stores and headsets without hacks, but one company here made an effort to make that happen from the start, and it wasn't Oculus.

[IanL]

Exactly. If people are genuinely interested in open system game development for VR consumers then it shouldn't matter which company's headset you currently own. Instead it should be incumbent upon us all to encourage developers to support everyone's else's hardware through adoption of common frameworks and removing proprietary locking mechanisms.

[TommyLove]

Originally posted by phobos2077:

This game desperately needs OpenXR mode. As Oculus dominates PC VR market these days, all those players have to deal with running this game (demanding on it's own right) via ugly multi-layer setup, which results in laggy controller tracking as well as system/graphics memory overhead. There seems to be no real fix for this. The only way is for developers to step in and port the game to OpenXR (which SteamVR itself already embraced last year) or add it as an option. This would allow to run game "natively" using Oculus platform (if it's set as OpenXR default).

Here I am being optimistic and hopeful for developers to make a little effort and make sure most people can experience their game in all it's glory.

Blame Oculus. Not Valve. Oculus is the one with the hard on for a walled garden. Dont buy facebook headsets and stop supporting bad business practices

[phobos2077]

Originally posted by TommyLove:

Blame Oculus. Not Valve. Oculus is the one with the hard on for a walled garden. Dont buy facebook headsets and stop supporting bad business practices

This sounds noble and right, but you forget one important detail. There is no competition on PC VR headset market. Valve gave up on affordable VR. In my country, you either buy Quest 2 or you don't play VR at all. Third option is only for the rich.

Don't get me wrong, I hated Quest 2 last year when it came out, I thought it would ruin PC VR. But year later, it turned out I couldn't be more wrong about it. It's #1 headset on Steam. However much you want Facebook to disappear from the market, it won't happen. This is just reality until somebody else steps in and makes a competitive hardware.

So now it's a matter of properly supporting the vast majority of hardware by the only Valve AAA VR game to date. Let Valve decide if they want to do it.

PS: I didn't "blame" anyone. I just stated facts.

[phobos2077]

Originally posted by necrophonic:

The fundamental thing is that Valve built their SteamVR on open standards as far as possible to enable the widest range of headsets to be able to use those same open standards and play PCVR games.

Oculus (and in particular Facebook) chose to build more proprietary in an effort to coral gamers into a walled garden under their control.

I, too, wish for interoperability between stores and headsets without hacks, but one company here made an effort to make that happen from the start, and it wasn't Oculus.

The issue with this line of reasoning is that it's not helpful whatsoever. What happened - happened.

As of right now, open standard is OpenXR which both Oculus and SteamVR support. However, HL: Alyx was built using what they call "OpenVR" which in this day means tightly integrated to SteamVR. There was a project called OpenComposite that allowed to play some games w/o SteamVR (by redirecting OpenVR calls to Oculus), but it never worked for HL: Alyx because it's just too tightly integrated with Valve's SteamVR.

[LemonyNebula]

I don't get it. When it comes to Oculus and its games not supporting other headsets, you say "What happened - happened.".

But when it comes to Half Life: Alyx not supporting OpenXR, having been developing before it, you ask for change?

Valve has literally gone out of their way so you can run the game on Quest already. They already made a "little effort" ...

[phobos2077]

Originally posted by LemonyNebula:

I don't get it. When it comes to Oculus and its games not supporting other headsets, you say "What happened - happened.".

But when it comes to Half Life: Alyx not supporting OpenXR, having been developing before it, you ask for change?

Valve has literally gone out of their way so you can run the game on Quest already. They already made a "little effort" ...

Exactly because I have faith in Valve, I'm hopeful they can do this additional "little effort". Alyx cannot be compared to any Oculus exclusive game in terms of numbers of players, it's in another league. And in today's situation that means most players are using Quest 2 via Link/AirLink.

I'm not blaming anyone nor demanding anything, I'm just expressing my hope and maybe get some useful inside knowledge from community.

I understand everyone's feelings towards Facebook predatory policies, but maybe you can discuss them in an appropriate topic? This one is about adding OpenXR support. So I would politely ask everyone to stay on the topic.

Thank you.

[LemonyNebula]

It's very appropriate to the topic due to the existence of differing SDKs.
It was Oculus' decision to have their own that caused the issues you claim to be experiencing now. OpenVR was specifically designed to be universal between the HMD types, but Oculus wished to be independent.

OpenXR has come about now after the fact, and you wish Valve to retroactively change the SDK.
Something that isn't always just a "little effort" to change by the way.

It's not people taking the opportunity to just dump over Oculus's practices, it is the reasoning of your problem being a direct consequence from Oculus, so is unlikely to change this end.

As Valve has already stated that they will be using OpenXR, future titles will likely have what you are after at least. So it's not due to them being resistant to taking steps to remain open.
They also took steps to ensure the game to be open and playable on all systems using the current method and it seems the issue's Oculus has is due to how Oculus chooses to run it.

You should really ask Oculus to improve how they handle OpenVR applications.


I'm not saying there is anything wrong with asking either, you just have to expect this sort of discussion when posting it on a discussion board. As you said yourself, you are hoping
to "maybe get some useful inside knowledge from community."

This is that information.

[phobos2077]

Originally posted by LemonyNebula:

Something that isn't always just a "little effort" to change by the way.

Nothing personal, but I would rather wait for a possible info from a developer how much effort is this exactly, no point in speculation.

Originally posted by LemonyNebula:

As Valve has already stated that they will be using OpenXR, future titles will likely have what you are after at least. So it's not due to them being resistant to taking steps to remain open.

And again, you seem to try and project some kind of blame against Valve. I don't understand where this is coming from. All I did was asking if this is possible. Until developer comments on this possibility, all posts like which corporation is to blame for what are completely off-topic.

Originally posted by LemonyNebula:

As you said yourself, you are hoping to "maybe get some useful inside knowledge from community."

This is that information.

Generic Oculus hate I've read 100 times already is not the knowledge I was hoping for :)

[LemonyNebula]

Originally posted by phobos2077:

Nothing personal, but I would rather wait for a possible info from a developer how much effort is this exactly, no point in speculation.

If it helps at all, I am a VR developer who specifically had this problem with their recent project, where updating OpenVR to OpenXR caused a huge set back as it affected most of our input systems and almost all code had to be updated.

We are only an indie startup, and a group of like three people, so I would expect a larger established team to do a much much better job than we did in the situation, but it is also not unreasonable to assume a bigger game like Half Life: Alyx would have a whole lot more conflicts.

And again, you seem to try and project some kind of blame against Valve.

This means nothing as I have done nothing of the sort. I am simply telling you the situation and how Oculus is the better avenue to fix the issues.

Generic Oculus hate I've read 100 times already is not the knowledge I was hoping for :)

I'm not even sure if it's worth dignifying this with a reply.

[phobos2077]

Originally posted by LemonyNebula:

If it helps at all, I am a VR developer who specifically had this problem with their recent project, where updating OpenVR to OpenXR caused a huge set back as it affected most of our input systems and almost all code had to be updated.

Are these API's differ so much that you can't just map/replace calls? Is it similar OpenGL->Vulkan transition?

[LemonyNebula]

Originally posted by phobos2077:

Are these API's differ so much that you can't just map/replace calls? Is it similar OpenGL->Vulkan transition?

Like most updates, it could likely be a case by case basis. I don't know how normal our situation was.

In theory, and as we thought, it should have been pretty straight forward. But vital scripts we used for SteamVR input were apparently reliant on OpenVR which took us quite some time to hunt through and fix. We ended up changing the input system.

Now obviously I can't talk for Valve's situation at all, and possibly you could be right and it could actually be easier for them, but going from our own experience and the idea that Alyx was likely worked on for years before the quest release, I would imagine there is a lot more to go wrong.

Though, I honestly can't give much more information, as I am not actually the one who dealt with the update, so my knowledge is pretty limited. I only really know what outcome we had rather than why.

But, if I am being honest, I was kind of glad it happened as it gave us a push to rework our entire input system, which while took a lot of work, seems to be for the better.

[g95613e]

I wonder how desperate Valve are to make it easier for people to enjoy using the main competitor's hardware and giving people less reason to look at PC VR as an upgrade from Standalone. What with exclusivity deals and one-way incompatibility between PC VR and Quest, seems like Valve would have little to gain from solving this problem for Oculus. It's more of a lure to get people over to PC VR again if they have something you can't get if you are on Oculus. Why would they do more work, only to hand over their other work to the competition? If Oculus want Half Life Alyx on the quest, seems like they should be the ones to find a way to support it.