First Look: Oculus Touch and The Climb





At this year's E3, we're showing off The Climb with Oculus Touch support to select members of the press for the first time. We're really excited to hear people's take on the experience, and of course, when these peripherals launch we'll have a game update so that every player can use them. We asked Onurhan Karaağaçlı, Producer on The Climb, to give you the lowdown on the experience of playing The Climb with Oculus Touch:

“First, Oculus Touch makes The Climb a standing experience. Sure, you can play sitting down, but it's much more immersive and engaging to be standing up, so we recommend playing this way when you're using it.

“One of the key features about the Oculus Touch controllers is that they are completely tracked in the game world. This means that in order to climb, you're actually moving your hands and arms. It's a very physical experience, and it could be tiring for some – in fact, if you played for an extended period of time with wrist weights, it could be a workout. Your hands are often above your head or to your side as you lean, reach, and jump. But because it's so physical, it's also very intuitive. When you jump or reach, it really feels like you are reaching out to the next grip, swinging across monkey bars, or using your arms to throw yourself from one ledge to another.







“That can make it challenging at first. Because you're controlling your in-game hands with actual movements, you need to be a bit more precise and to have the hand-eye coordination to make the moves and jumps you want. But in the same way that muscle memory builds up when you use a pad or a mouse and a keyboard, your hands, arms, and upper body get used to this quickly, and it is a really rewarding experience. The fact that it feels like you're really climbing, mastering your own movements in a virtual world to the point that it becomes intuitive, even natural – we find that really satisfying. You can reach out and ring the bells we use for checkpoints, brush your hand across plants along your path, and shoo away bugs too. And as you're reaching out for a grip or to ring a bell, the power of VR really puts you in that moment of movement.

“Because the Rift tracks your hands accurately in the game world, we had to consider the physical size of a player and how that affects gameplay. So to ensure that people with a physically longer reach than other players don't have an advantage, we made sure that every path you can take always has grips within reach. The competition will always come down to technique, rather than a physical advantage.











“We're really pleased with how it works. The movements in The Climb use real-life physics and are physically similar to reaching up or leaning across as you would to climb in real life, which is part of what makes using Oculus Touch with The Climb such a great experience. There's no sickness from the movement, even though you are performing extreme moves, such as swinging off grips and making huge leaps, such as jumping from a cable car to a cliff face with only a chasm under you. The most exciting thing is that it just feels so real, like you're really there in the game world."

We hope that gives you an insight into what you can expect with Oculus Touch launches for The Climb, and we'll have more as we get closer to launch.





The Climb Team







