Doom 3 BFG mod brings the game to virtual reality

Virtual reality and first person games are often thought to be the perfect pair. After all, both try to let you experience virtual worlds from the point of view of a character, rather than watching from behind or above. In reality, the perfect VR FPS is harder to pull off than you’d think, because of frame rates, controls, and game mechanics. modder Codes4Fun, however, might have just stumbled on the perfect formula to make that happen, with a mod that makes the Doom 3 BFG edition actually playable on the HTC Vive.

Unlike the upcoming Xbox One Oculus Rift streaming, this isn’t simply a matter of projecting an existing game onto a flat virtual screen. The Doom 3 BFG mod integrates completely with the Vive’s room scale sensors as well as the two motion controllers. It almost feels as if it were an official port of the game, done by both id Software and Vive together. Who knows, maybe they’ll even hire the modder to do just that.

Navigating through the game works as you might imagine from any VR game, with one difference. The mod doesn’t make any shortcuts in how you have to “walk” through the maps. Of course, you won’t physically be walking and will be using the controller’s touchpad instead. Still, it’s the opposite convention that many VR games employ, which simply takes you immediately to the area where you need to be. Now where’s the fun in that?

As the Vive can track two controllers at the same time, the game also does likewise, where you can hold a gun and a light simultaneously, with both always visible in front of you. According to YouTube SweViver who took the mod for a run (or walk), the 90 FPS rate of the game kept him from puking his guts out.

Despite how long consumer VR has been in development, there are still few serious and full-length games that fully immerse you in that artificial world for various reasons. One would be because of how taxing prolonged VR use is believed to be and another because of the difficulty of porting over conventional PC or console game mechanics to VR. So it is indeed impressive that a third party mod would be able to achieve a feat such as bringing one of the most popular gaming titles almost, but not quite, perfectly to the world of VR.

VIA: Motherboard