What is it? What’s the formula, the secret ingredient to make a VR game bring pure excitement and adrenaline to the players? How can we make them smile and go “wow” after they take off the headset? For us devs at Something Random working on Harpagun, it all comes down to a few simple elements. Let’s take it from the top.
Movement that matters: Speed, control, and immersion
Action games are all about movement. An issue mostly already solved in flat screen games but still problematic in VR. Some forms of locomotion allow for precision but are pretty slow and unresponsive. Others let you zoom around the locations, but can be uncomfortable. Those that are, are limiting or take you out of the illusion of “being there”.
In Harpagun we needed a system with a clear set of goals: comfort, simplicity, responsiveness, speed and immersion. In a proper arcade game players have to be able to react in a blink of an eye, immediately focus on what’s the most important, change their position to avoid danger or get a better shot at an enemy.
We managed to achieve that with our “pylon and anchor” system. Players move between sets of points with their eyes anchored to points of interest such as a path forward or center of the combat area. The movement is smooth but fast enough to be comfortable while allowing for total control of the battlefield.
Grab, smash, throw: The power of the Magnetic Ray
The first thing everyone wants to do in VR is to grab something and throw it. Sadly it requires the player to come very close to an object and can sometimes be very finicky and actually ruin the illusion of presence due to the limitations of the medium (mass of objects, pressure on hands etc.). But you need to do it. You need that interaction with the world and enemies, that’s what VR is for. So how can we have a cookie and eat a cookie? Use a Magnetic ray of course. (not for the cookie, for the interactions).
Distance grabbing is a well-known concept in VR at this point so the challenge here was to make it as juicy and essential to the gameplay as possible. You can use it on enemies and each will react differently. Some may be squashed on the ground, others reveal their weak point or may part with parts of their bodies. The ray can also grab projectiles, move around elements of the environment from as small as tin cans to as big as fridges and tractors. Of course all of them can then be used to smash some more enemies.
Juice it up: Impact, chaos, and a soundtrack that slaps
It wouldn’t be much fun if you zoomed around and squashed grey boxes in grey locations now, would it? You need “juice”, a lot of it. Animations that show personality and intent. Hit reactions give you a sense of impact and power of weapons. Splashes and explosions telling you that an enemy turned into a pile of marmalade under a falling sentry turret. Add to that audio and music. A proper squeak of an alien jumping on your face, followed by a thud of a tv set hitting it and a splat when it, well, splats all over the place. In terms of music for Harpagun we settled with a mix of army marches, jazz, balkan beats and a touch of slavic folk. Hey, stop, don’t close this page – I assure you, it all works – the soundtrack slaps.
A quirky universe to unravel
Two important elements of the experience – a “what?” and “where?” If you want players to continue playing beyond the first few minutes you need to give them a reason. Places to discover, people to meet, quest to complete. Going too “over the board” wouldn’t serve an action game though. Who wants to read lengthy lore snippets when there are enemies to unalive? You might want to make it a bit simpler, something like – a team of space junkers wanting to strip an abandoned planet from natural resources loses contact with an expedition member and sends a deck hand on the planet to check it out. Seems basic enough.
Now let’s add to it alien plant-mushroom-creatures, Slavic retro-futurism, dark humour, incompetent crew “helping” the hero, some happy-go-lucky attitude and voila. A world full of quirky characters and colorful locations is ready and waiting to be discovered. “Smacznego”.
Stir it up and serve hot! Smacznego!
Pretty simple, isn’t it? Just follow those few steps for three years – working hard, putting effort and love into what you’re doing. Then, hopefully, you’ll end up with an action game that VR enthusiasts enjoy and cherish as much as you do.
Incidentally we’ve just made a thing like that – it’s called Harpagun and you’ll be able to play it as soon as April 10 on PlayStation VR2. Give it a go and tell us if any of our theories are actually true. See You Space Junker!
