Decline VR Sickness Rate is 40-70 percent after only 15 minutes

[Gregz]

"With contemporary commercially available VR systems, the incidence of motion sickness after only 15 minutes is anywhere from 40 to 70 percent," said Thomas Stoffregen, a kinesiologist at the University of Minnesota. For some applications nearly 100% of users get sick, he said.

https://abcnews.go.com/Technology/feel-motion-sickness-virtual-reality/story?id=65153805

 

[J_C]

Why you feel motion sickness during virtual reality

Because you are a subhuman. Superior beings like myself doesn't feel motion sickness.

 

[Dexter]

"The existing interactive technologies are sexist in their effects. That is to say, they are more likely to make women sick than men," said Stoffregen. "But this is not limited to technology -- in general, women are more susceptible to motion sickness than men, anytime, anywhere."

But he argues that since VR-related motion sickness is caused by hardware and software that humans design -- unlike the environmental causes of seasickness, for example -- we need to be responsible for finding a way to fix these "sexist" effects.

Nice article you've found there

 

[Delterius]

40-70 percent of the general public, I'd imagine.

Most people who don't play games get motion sickness from plain, old 3D worlds.

 

[Dexter]

Also some more Fake News indicators, trying to find out where the "40 to 70 percent" number comes from, this paper of his from 2008 seems the most pertinent result: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4030407/

We examined motion sickness in an oscillating virtual environment presented via a video projector system.

Standing participants (3 men and 9 women, 20–22 years of age) were exposed to oscillation of a virtual room. The stimulus was a computer-generated simulation of a laboratory device that is known to induce postural instability and motion sickness. Participants viewed the simulation for up to 40 min and were instructed to discontinue if they experienced symptoms of motion sickness.

Five participants (all women) stated that they were motion sick (42%), and they constituted the sick group. Of these, 3 participants discontinued during Trial 4 (i.e., the second sum-of-sines trial), at 4 min 56 s, 5 min 56 s, and 6 min 27 s after the beginning of the trial. The remaining 2 sick participants discontinued during Trial 5. One participant discontinued 48 s after the beginning of Trial 5, and the other discontinued after 2 min 29 s. The remaining 7 participants (3 men and 4 women) stated that they were not motion sick, and they constituted the well group. Each member of the well group completed the experiment.

It begs the question where the "70%" number comes from (30% is a huge interval difference), what a "Virtual Moving Room" is and how this indicates anything about "contemporary commercially available VR systems" when the Oculus DK1 was only available in Mid-2013 and there's a huge difference even between the Oculus CV1 from 2016 and the Valve Index or HP Reverb G2 from 2019/2020 (both of which came out after these quotes are dated).

This particular researcher also seems to have some sort of obsession with "Postural Instability" going as far back as 1991, even though most of the available research doesn't point to that having any influence at all, which the article shortly mentions:

A lesser-known theory that may describe individual differences in cybersickness involves something called postural instability, which Stoffregen first published in 1991 to explain motion sickness in general. He has found evidence that some people experience a "wobbliness" in their stance during the beginning of a VR experience or boat ride that, for some reason, predicts who will feel nauseated later on. Stoffregen believes this is a more comprehensive explanation of motion sickness than sensory conflict theory.

"If I put you on a ship at sea, or if I put a head-mounted display on you, that mandates changes in the way that the body moves and the body is controlled," he said. "Some people will make those changes quickly because they have the gift of natural fluency and skill -- you know, they’re coordinated -- and some of us will do it more slowly."

However, other researchers at the workshop didn’t buy Stoffregen’s theory – for example, one showed data from his own experiment that showed no correlation between postural instability and cybersickness -- and so it appears the debate on the origins of cybersickness will continue.

You'd think if this "40-70%" number was anywhere close to true you'd see a lot more "motion sickness"-related posts or posts discussing the mitigation of such anywhere discussing VR instead of it being barely mentioned and a lot of "Here is my dad/grandpa/grandma trying VR!"

 

[Alex]

Twelve also seems like a very small number to draw any conclusions from. Especially since the group doesn't seem to represent any kind of population distribution (otherwise, why would they have 3 times as many women as men?).

 

[Jvegi]

Most people who don't play games get motion sickness from plain, old 3D worlds.

I don't know about that, but Fez gave me unbarable motion sickness after only a few minutes. It was weird, never happened before or since.

 

[Grampy_Bone]

but an investor guy who doesn't play games said VR was the future

 

[Gregz]

40-70 percent of the general public, I'd imagine.

Most people who don't play games get motion sickness from plain, old 3D worlds.

I've been playing games for 40 years, and I was sick for 5 hours after my first and last VR session.

 

[Lemming42]

Laughable. Remember those people who claimed Half-Life 2 was giving them motion sickness? LOL

The article is right though in that top priority should be finding a way to fix this for as many users as possible, because VR has enough problems getting off the ground and drawing in talented game devs already. If 40% - 70% of users end up shitting and vomiting after 5 minutes of Anime Office Cleanup Sim 2020 then VR's a dead end.

 

[Silly Germans]

How do these headsets work for people with glasses ? Do you keep them on or can you adjust the screen for different dioptric values ?

 

[J_C]

How do these headsets work for people with glasses ? Do you keep them on or can you adjust the screen for different dioptric values ?

Most headsets have enough room for the glasses, but some of them can be a bit uncomfortable if they push the rim of the glasses on your nose.

 

[Delterius]

40-70 percent of the general public, I'd imagine.

Most people who don't play games get motion sickness from plain, old 3D worlds.

I've been playing games for 40 years, and I was sick for 5 hours after my first and last VR session.

you and I, we are old

the zoomers and their kids shall live in digital worlds of their own making

immortal meta-beings who get to slay true dragons

while we roll dice and eat cheetos forever

then we die

 

[Jenkem]

never felt VR sickness at all, it's a nigger thing apparently.
pure white people don't feel it.
if you get vr sickness, check your genes.

 

[Butter]

never felt VR sickness at all, it's a nigger thing apparently.
pure white people don't feel it.
if you get vr sickness, check your genes.

 

[Renevent]

If you get sick playing VR you are a weak bitch. Dozens of people have tried VR at my house, a single solitary person got sick...my 70 year old mother. Anyways the study is terrible, for reasons already mentioned.

 

[Gregz]

Dozens of people have tried VR at my house, a single solitary person got sick...my 70 year old mother.

The others were just being polite, your mother will tell you the truth.

 

[Renevent]

Dozens of people have tried VR at my house, a single solitary person got sick...my 70 year old mother.

The others were just being polite, your mother will tell you the truth.

No, the others were all fighting each other trying to play more and having a blast. Just face it, you have the constitution of an old woman.

 

[Mortmal]

I just preordered an HP reverb G2 , to get 4k in VR , my first headset ever. I am worried by that too, but when i read half life alyx forum i am not reading about people getting sick. If there's a game that made vr sell it's this one . if VR is really unplayable you would hear of it , reviews are extremely postive, something indeed extremely rare too .
Maybe soon we need a VR subforum.

 

[Renevent]

I just preordered an HP reverb G2 , to get 4k in VR , my first headset ever. I am worried by that too, but when i read half life alyx forum i am not reading about people getting sick. If there's a game that made vr sell it's this one . if VR is really unplayable you would hear of it , reviews are extremely postive, something indeed extremely rare too .
Maybe soon we need a VR subforum.

You don't need to worry, it's a minority of weaklings that can't handle VR. I'm not exaggerating, I've had 30-40 people try out VR at my house and only 1 person got queasy which was my 70 year old mother. I love her of course but she can't handle even mild amusement park rides.

And you're correct, if half of players (or even more than that) got sick that's all you would ever read about VR 24/7. You don't because it's nowhere even remotely that high percent of players, and instead is a small minority of weaklings and women that can't handle it.

 

[rusty_shackleford]

Before I opened this thread I knew exactly who would be posting here to justify their $1500 purchase

 

[Naraya]

I probably won't find it now but I've read a VERY interesting article about why VR will never go mainstream because too much of a % of people (humans) are unable to cope with it. It was written by a guy who researched VR for US Army.

edit: Actually found it, kinda... It was on Quora but mysteriously the article is no longer available. You can read the digest below:

https://www.csoonline.com/article/3...ert-doesnt-see-an-easy-fix-for-vr-nausea.html
https://movietvtechgeeks.com/virtual-reality-headsets-banned

“I’ve been working with helmet mounted displays in military flight simulation for several decades – I am an expert in the field… IMHO – these devices should be banned – but that may not be necessary because after the first wave of early adopters I think it’ll go the way of 3D televisions. But that’s just my opinion. Let me explain why.

Everyone thinks these things are new and revolutionary…but they really aren’t. All that’s happened is that they dropped in price from $80,000 to $500…and many corners have been cut along the way. There are several claims that the nausea problem has either been fixed, or will soon be fixed, or that application design can be used to work around the problem.

The claims that it’s been fixed are based on the theory that the nausea is caused by latency/lag in the system, or by low-resolution displays or by inaccurate head motion tracking…all of which can (and are) being fixed by obvious improvements to the system. Sadly, the $80,000 googles we made for the US military had less latency, higher resolution displays, and more accurate head tracking than any of the current round of civilian VR goggles…and they definitely made people sick – so this seems unlikely.

The problem is that the people who make those claims are either ignorant (or are deliberately ignoring) the evidence collected over 20 years of flight simulation experience with VR goggles (only we called them ‘Helmet Mounted Displays’ – HMD’s – and what we did was called ‘simulation’ and not ‘virtual reality’). Worse still, there is strong research evidence that the harm they cause extends for as much as 8 hours AFTER you stop using the goggles. Considerable disorientation after prolonged exposure to VR. The US military recommends that users avoid flying or driving for up to 24 hours…”

— Steve Baker, through Quora

 

[ADL]

How do these headsets work for people with glasses ? Do you keep them on or can you adjust the screen for different dioptric values ?

You can install custom lenses in all the major VR headsets. I have these for my Index and I can pop them out in like 30 seconds whenever someone else wants to play.

 

[one_hit_point]

I've tried VR once. I played:
- Beatsaber - no problems at all, however you're not walking in this game, just rotating your view a bit, and movement is what's supposedly making you naseous.
- Boneworks (i think it was that, I've played some arena mode against slow zombie-like creatures) - no sickness as in nausea or something, but when I did rapid turnarounds just by using joystick, not head movement IRL or when I suddenly had to walk backwards (especially when an enemy was pushing on me) it threw my balance off and I had to make steps IRL or else I'd fall down. Didn't notice any prolonged effects after removing headset. I guess it'd get better with exposition.

Also I thought melee would be cool in VR but it kinda sucks, cause you expect hits to provide resistance. Works in Beatsaber, cause you have lightsabers and hit objects that don't feel solid.
Aiming with guns on the other hand felt natural, but reloading with ~0.5-1h of gameplay was at this awkward spot whereas the novelty worn off but it didn't become just an automatic thing encoded in muscle memory for me yet, so it was tedious. (The fact that I am way taller than my cousin who owns the device and we didn't change the user height in settings didn't help, as I had the holster awkwardly high, above the navel, so it was harder to reach for the magazines).

 

[Dexter]

I have found out where the "70%" number comes from, from a paper titled "The virtual reality head-mounted display Oculus Rift induces motion sickness and is sexist in its effects" from 2016, although it's weird that they went with 40% instead of 20%: https://toseethesea.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/04/2016_MDS.pdf

Abstract: Anecdotal reports suggest that motion sickness may occur among users of contemporary, consumer-oriented head-mounted display systems and that women may be at greater risk. We evaluated the nauseogenic properties of one such system, the Oculus Rift. The head-mounted unit included motion sensors that were sensitive to users’ head movements, such that head movements could be used as control inputs to the device. In two experiments, seated participants played one of two virtual reality games for up to 15min. In Experiment 1, 22% of participants reported motion sickness, and the difference in incidence between men and women was not significant. In Experiment 2, motion sickness was reported by 56% of participants, and incidence among women (77.78%) was significantly greater than among men (33.33%).

"contemporary commercially available VR systems" apparently means DK2, which wasn't commercially available:

Our focus was on the Oculus DK-2 head-mounted display system, commonly known as the Oculus Rift.

We used the second version of the Oculus development kit, known as the DK-2, or the Oculus Rift. The device comprised a lightweight (0.44kg) headset that completely covered the field of view. The headset included separate displays for each eye, each with 960×1080 resolution, yielding a 100° horizontal field of view.

There were apparently two "experiments":

Participants were instructed to discontinue participation immediately if they experienced any symptoms of motion sickness, however mild. They played Balancer Rift (share.oculus.com). The goal of this game was to roll a virtual marble through a virtual maze on a board that could be tilted using head movements. Participants were informed that the Oculus Rift used head movements to control the display, and they would need to use head movements to solve the puzzle.

The overall incidence of motion sickness was 22% (8/36). Two of 18 men (11.11%) and six of 18 women (44.44%) stated that they were motion sick.

https://www.vrfocus.com/2014/11/balancer-rift-released-oculus-rift/

But wait, 6 of 18 is not 44.44% but 33.33%, if they can't get a simple percentage calculation right, this doesn't exactly imbue their overall results with any kind of trust.

The method for Experiment 2 was the same as for Experiment 1. The sole difference was that in Experiment 2 participants played a different game, Affected (games.softpedia.com). In this first-person game, participants navigated an environment of hallways and rooms. The goal was to reach a designated end point in the virtual layout. The translational component of navigation was controlled via a hand held controller.

The overall incidence of motion sickness was 56% (20/36), which was greater than in Experiment 1 (22%), χ2=8.42, p=.004. Six men (33.33%) and fourteen women (77.78%) reported becoming motion sick.

Neither game seem to be available anymore, although the second seems to have some sort of sequel:

By contrast, motion sickness associated with console video games typically occurs after 20–35min of exposure (Chang etal. 2012; Stoffregen et al. 2008).

Motion sickness occurs among players of console video games (e.g., Stoffregen et al. 2008), among users of tablet computers (Stoffregen et al. 2014), and, anecdotally, among users of cellular telephones (Grannell 2013).

We conclude that the Oculus Rift, as a technology, is sexist in its effects. To say that a technology is sexist in its effects does not implicate the intentions of its designers. The Oculus Rift is sexist in its effects because it has disparate impact on women and men (boyd 2014). Documentation of these sexist effects, as in the present study, can motivate manufacturers to search for design changes that eliminate the discriminatory effects.

In conclusion, don't play shitty unoptimized Indie games on experimental HMDs and who knows what hardware and be less of a womanlet, Gregz.