Wednesday, May 22nd 2013 / Gaming

Day Eleven With The Oculus Rift - Zombies

Just a small update today compared to previous days since I had a lot of work to do. I was going to try out my old Doom 3 maps but saw in my downloads directory I had a demo called Zombies On The Holodeck.I was surprised I hadn't tried this one yet so unzipped it and had a quick go. This is another little game made in Unity but it's actually a pretty nice wave-based zombie survival shooter.The arms on the player character look a bit wrong since they look very long for some reason. Almost makes you look like a zombie yourself with your arms outstretched. On first loading the game it also brings up various options for use with Hydra and other stereoscopic displays which is pretty cool. Unfortunately I don't have a Hydra to test with but it seems a lot of these demos are combining Hydra and Oculus Rift but luckily this one still works with controller or keyboard and mouse.The first wave of zombies begins and you are confronted with a handful of slow moving enemies. I mash the buttons until I figure out how to switch to my pistol and begin shooting away. Aiming seems a little weird since you don't seem to aim towards the centre of the screen, It was trial and error trying to hit the zombies with the left and right pistol.The zombies look pretty cool, nicely modelled and animated and when surrounded by a few of them you do get a sense of urgency as they start attacking you.I managed to find a few more guns and found a few more areas and buildings to explore. This all looks pretty cool but when the waves start it can sometimes take a while for the zombies to reach you. I only had a few minutes to play but I think I'll try this some more as it was fun. Just before finishing this post I'll share a pic of crawling zombie, these guys fall to the ground after being shot then drag themselves along which is a nice touch but the animation doesn't quite look right yet.