Revolutionizing VR Gaming

Virtual Reality (VR) provides new innovation and growth potential for games and other interactive software, especially with recent advances of low-cost but highly capable headsets such as the Meta Quest 3. Through exergames and fitness apps that motivate people to move, VR also holds tremendous potential for improving health and wellbeing. However, moving in VR causes VR motion sickness due to a perceptual conflict: The user's eyes signal that they are moving virtually, conflicting with information from other sensory organs such as the inner ear. Motion sickness remains a bottleneck for widespread adoption of VR, limits what kind of games and interactions can be enjoyed in VR, and also discriminates against female VR users who are more susceptible to motion sickness than males.

To remedy these problems, this R2B project investigates novel VR interaction and visualization techniques that manipulate the perception of virtual movement and thus enable novel ways of moving and interacting in VR without motion sickness. The project builds on the applicant's recent publication, prototype, and patent application, with the aim of validating the technology's commercialization potential and establishing a technological foundation for a wide range of VR games and applications that have heretofore not been possible without motion sickness. For instance, in collaboration with Finnish game companies, we seek to enable successful VR adaptations of their games.