Crytek are keen to ensure that CryENGINE is seen as a leading development opportunity for virtual reality (VR). Following the launch of official VR support in the latest update, 3.8.1, the company have announced plans to incorporate a solution that will allow for developers to create experiences compatible with multiple input solutions without requiring the knowledge of programming for each specific device.

In a livestream held yesterday, Frank Vitz, Creative Director of CryENGINE, was very vocal about VR input devices: “We’ve seen at least 5 different prototypes of different control systems, all of which fundamentally have you getting your hands in so that when you’re in the [Oculus] Rift and put your hands in front of your face you can see them. Even if the model of your hands doesn’t look like your hands, it’s amazing what a difference that makes.”

Regarding Crytek’s plans for CryENGINE’s support of these solutions, Vitz revealed that the company intend on keeping things simple for developers whilst leaving consumers the opportunity to make up their own minds about which devices to purchase: “Basically what we’re doing on a low level with CryENGINE… I mean, there’s going to be all these different devices with different framerates and different fidelity and different numbers of buttons; you can imagine gloves that would actually input the position of your hand and the gestures of your hand. So we’re putting in a layer of software like a ‘device independent’ API – which is a programming interface – which will allow us to connect to any of these different devices. Hopefully so that we can design our games to be dependant on the devices that are connected to the computer. The point of that being that people should not be forced to by one specific type of equipment or device over another. If you create a game that will work with different devices, then that’s better because it provides more options for the consumers and also allows game designers to take advantage of new developments.”

There are a number of different input devices aiming to launch alongside the first wave of VR head-mounted displays (HMDs), be it the recently revealed Oculus Touch or the potential re-launch of PlayStation Move. VRFocus will keep you updated with all the latest details on these devices and their implementation in VR.