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Disclaimer: These are my very FIRST impressions of Explore. I have used it a grand total of one day. I am sharing this experiences in the hope that more experienced users can provide words of advice or tips they have found useful. I fully expect that some of my impressions may be wrong or ill informed.
Background: for the last month I have been using my Oculus Rift, exercise Bike and Google Earth to do a virtual ride across Japan. I'm currently about 800 miles and 50% through my trip. While I've enjoyed The experience thus far... There have been more than a few bugs with my makeshift process. For one thing...I have to use a hand controller to steer and to advance photos click by click. Google Earth wasn't made for this type of project either. It is clunky and often takes a while to start working. About every 15 minutes or so, I have to restart the software in order to maintain performance. Otherwise...pictures will start "shaking" in the headset, and I will be forced to go to my computer to manually reboot the software. Google Earth Street View will often unexpectedly teleport me on side streets, tunnels, or street view will unexpectedly stop working, not being able to continue loading the next photo. It is also hard to know where I am. It is easy to get lost as there is no HUD, so I am periodically stopping to check my phone and see where I am at.
After hearing several folks discuss the virtue of VZ Fit, I decided to give it a try. I have an Oculus Go, I have a few bucks to spare, and thought it might be an upgrade over my current experience.
Installation only suffered one minor hangup, because the directions specifically told me to look for the Explorer and play apps via the store to download, and I could not find them anywhere. I was a bit confused as to why the instructions would ask me to do this, as I just finished entering the redemption codes in the Oculus store. Eventually, Looking at the "uninstalled" apps on my Go, I realized that Explore and Play were already there waiting for me to download. Once I figured that out... the rest of the installation was fine.
I already had some experience creating maps using Google. Thank goodness, because the software wasn't particularly intuitive to me. I had already watched the sample video that VIRZOOM recommends... and that was the video that taught me the basics...so I found it fairly easy to create my own map and import it. I created a 40 mile map which included the next planned segment of my journey.
First Impressions:
The very first thing I noticed was the difference between the FOV on the Rift and that on the Go. Of course...spec-wise, I always knew this was the case, but being a "bike riding" app, and already using Google Street view, the loss of peripheral vision was noticeable. I got used to it. It isn't a big deal...just something that I noticed. It may be something worth appreciating when VZFIT is available on future headsets.
The next thing I noticed was that the standard viewing experience for Explore, just simply wasn't going to work for me. Buildings looked giant and distorted. Cars stretched in odd shapes as my ride advanced, Bridges looked like they were wallpapered with long distance scenery. I really liked the locomotion effect, but the rest was a real turn-off, especially while riding through the city. I eventually turned on "Comfort Mode", and while the locomotion was much more like my previous experience, I found the experience to be much more desirable. POV is a bit high for a bike, but the scale of buildings, cars and people is much better. I did find the forced third person perspective to be a bit annoying. I would have preferred to have the option to turn off the animated avatar.
I really liked that my route was planned out ahead of time. I spent much less time worrying about where I was at. The HUD told me how long I had been riding, How many miles were left, and what percentage I have traveled. I was able to focus much more on the experience, and I was definitely getting a better workout this way, than I was with Google Earth. Unfortunately... I was lulled into a false sense of security. Over an hour into my ride, and about 60% into my journey...The map froze and I could not continue. I waited for a while, tried different settings, but nothing was working... The Go would not let me close the app, and I was required to do a hard reset. Upon getting back into Explorer...I found that I was only 30% through the route... and there did not seem to be a way to advance where I left off. This meant that completing my ride meant an extra hour added to my journey...covering ground I had already covered. I was not very happy.
VZfit was certainly an upgrade to my own hobbled together system. Even on "comfort mode", the pictures advanced much more regularly and faster than I could manually advance them in Google Earth. Pedaling to advance certainly adds to the experience. That said...the journey was not exactly bug free as I mentioned above. At some points, slides failed to advance, even though I could still see dots ahead of me. One workaround that I discovered was switching the settings to the regular viewing mode would allow me to start riding the route again...and then I could switch settings back to the "comfort mode" a minute or two later. For some reason the menu would not come up until RMP was zero...so this required more stopping and going than I would have liked.
Similar to my Google Earth experience, pictures on the ride fluctuated between right and left side of the road. Usually with Google Earth I had better control over which side of the road I was on...especially on divided highways. The experience on VZ Fit seemed much more random.
Many of the "bugs" I was hoping to avoid by switching to VZFit, still exist here, and are likely a function of the Google Earth and Street View Software. I found my self teleported unexpectedly to sidewalks, side streets and pedestrian tunnels. On this journey I even found myself in a subway station. For the most part... I liked the way VZFit handled the routing, but it could still be confusing. Sometimes the white dots would lead to a left turn while I was on a one-way overpass. Sometime the dots would act like a slalom course, right then left then right again...but the picture transitions didn't follow the same course, and this could be a bit jarring. Sometimes things would just stop..and I had no idea what the problem was.
Using Google Earth VR, when pictures stopped advancing, or when I got transported to a pedestrian tunnel, I would have to exit street view, re-position over my desired position, and re-enter street view. I could also easily exit street-view, save my position, and see where I was on a terrain map. In VZ Fit The app automatically corrects and teleport me to the right place, but sometimes it would take longer than I would like... and my anxiety at losing another hour of my ride was constantly gnawing at me. I would have been much more comfortable knowing that even if there was a technical glitch, I could easily find my place again. Because of the instability of Google Earth on the Rift, I frequently saved my place. I don't have the same luxury with VZ Fit.
I acknowledge that many of these "bugs" and experiences are a limitation of the Google Streetview software itself, and I appreciate all the work that the VZFIT team has done to address some of these issues to the best of their ability.
I wasn't happy with the pause menu. When I clicked the compass, the Clock continued to move forward, even with the menu open. When I left to use the restroom and came back, the clock and spins started all over, but at least my position on the street was not lost. What should have been a 2 hour maybe 2.5 hour ride, turned into a 3 hour ride...but I finally made it through my journey.
Some enhancements I would like to see:
- Ability to actually pause the timer and keep the Spin number for the entirety of the workout...and not lose it because I had to answer the phone, use the restroom, etc.
- Ability to advance to a specific point on the route. If I'm at 30%, could there be a way to advance the percentage to say...50%? maybe as part of a longer ride that folks have created...some might have a specific section they enjoy more than others...just a thought. It also helps address situations like mine... where a glitch added an hour of my time. I would hate to think How I would have felt if it was an 8 hour course...and a glitch added even longer.
- Ability to remove third person avatar on comfort mode. I find it a bit more immersive to not have the avatar there at all.
-Make notification of turns at intersections more noticeable (Perhaps the white dots become yellow at intersections?).
-Click on miles in HUD and transition between "miles traveled" and "miles to go".
-2D map in HUD like GPS, or 2D map location or progress in pause menu
-Ability to turn off HUD completely. Sometimes, it is more enjoyable to look at the scenery without all the clutter and distractions.
-Map and export progress: this is more of a stretch really...I'm mapping my journey through Japan, and would love to import my progress, perhaps in the same format we export google map routes in? As it stands now...I'm concerned about creating a route in game, because I want to be able to map my route. On the flip side, I'm not happy with the route finding on Google Maps. I wish it would natively avoid highways...it would make planning much easier.
Conclusions:
Well...I haven't drawn any yet, as I said...this is just my first ride. It definitely seems an upgrade over my own hobbled together experience...but I have my doubts that it was as major a step in the direction I would have liked. I'm just not sure the enhancements are worth the monthly subscription fee and extra expense for the sensor and controller vs what I was doing with the equipment I already owned, but time will tell. It does seem the VZfit team is actively working on addressing as many issues as they can, and I suspect that this experience will only improve over time. I also think that as my own familiarity with the software increases, I will be better able to deal with bugs, etc. As much as I have my concerns...I do think the small monthly fee is a low price to pay in an effort to continue financing the development of this project. Maybe my doubts really revolve more around my extreme dislike for monthly subscriptions?
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