Everest VR

redrevis · 21 Jul 2016 at 08:06

“In forming this VR expeditionary force with RVX, our mission is to construct the definitive experience of what it feels like to summit Mount Everest, an epic feat that most will never attempt in the real world,” said Kjartan Pierre Emilsson CEO and co-founder at Sólfar. “By combining incomparable visual fidelity with real player agency and interactivity, EVEREST VR will immerse you in a virtual reality that feels both real and emotionally stunning.”

The premise of EVEREST VR is simple. Preparing for your expedition at Basecamp, you will traverse the Khumbu Icefalls, scale Lhotse Face, ascend the Hillary Step, and finally conquer the summit of Everest. You will learn to respect the mountain, you may even survive the encounter. You will leave the experience feeling like you were there.

Using NVIDIA‘s GeForce GTX TITAN X GPU to churn through over 300,000 high resolution images of the mountain range, a highly detailed 3D point cloud of the whole area was created. They then generated a 3D mesh and textures made to measure for the demands of a real-time VR application.

http://uploadvr.com/everest-vr-review-breathtaking/

Scheduled to release on July 28th on Steam for $24.99

$25 for a 30 minute experience must be the most expensive VR experience to date. I've been really looking forward to this for a while, but I've spent so much on games and experiences recently I may have to wait to see if people think it's worth the cost.

I'd imagine sticking a rotating fan in the corner of the room will add to that extra immersion as well

Metalface Mark · 28 Jul 2016 at 15:41

This is the game I bought my vive for - says on steam though its august 2016

hyperseven · 28 Jul 2016 at 16:08

Buy experience, watch three times within 14 days, refund, result.

redrevis · 28 Jul 2016 at 17:40

Damn that uploadVR article that said today for the release. Talk about getting people's hopes up! Unless it's a genuine last minute delay, who knows as the Company making it, Solfar, hasn't said a word recently.

I think they need to fix their recommended specs though

smilertoo · 28 Jul 2016 at 18:48

Result being they don't develop anymore VR stuff?

hyperseven · 28 Jul 2016 at 20:59

smilertoo said:
Result being they don't develop anymore VR stuff?

no, result being they consider changing the pricing or amount of content for the price.

JanM · 29 Jul 2016 at 02:00

Always wanted to climb Everest but too chicken to try it.
Now I can

sunshinewelly · 29 Jul 2016 at 11:23

hyperseven said:
Buy experience, watch three times within 14 days, refund, result.

thats what i will be doing

redrevis · 29 Jul 2016 at 12:14

The release has been pushed back to August 2nd due to the VR Weekend Steam Sale. :rolleyes:

bazzatron · 29 Jul 2016 at 14:19

sunshinewelly said:
thats what i will be doing

If you don't want to pay the money wait for it to drop in price. Paying and then refunding does not help development for the Vive, something we should all be supporting.

sunshinewelly · 29 Jul 2016 at 14:55

They should charge a realistic price then. Same as the blue. Happy to pay the blue developers their fees

hyperseven · 29 Jul 2016 at 14:57

bazzatron said:
If you don't want to pay the money wait for it to drop in price. Paying and then refunding does not help development for the Vive, something we should all be supporting.

Here is a novel idea, say the developers released a restricted, short version, for lets say, free.

I will call this idea a demonstration or demo for short.

Wonder if this concept will catch on?

ttaskmaster · 29 Jul 2016 at 15:45

redrevis said:
our mission is to construct the definitive experience of what it feels like to summit Mount Everest

Not very "definitive" on the feeling side... visuals, sure, but until they have me actually feeling hypothermic, frostbitten, knackered and severely short of breath, it ain't so...

redrevis said:
$25 for a 30 minute experience must be the most expensive VR experience to date.

Nah - We drove for hours to OCUK HQ for the quick 15-minute Vive demo, as well as back again. That wasn't cheap on the fuel... or on the wallet of the guy who pre-ordered a Vive there and then!!

redrevis said:
I'd imagine sticking a rotating fan in the corner of the room will add to that extra immersion as well

Sit in the freezer and play it!

redrevis · 2 Aug 2016 at 10:56

Looks like it'll be released about 5pm today

http://store.steampowered.com/app/384750

But it looks like it may be bad news for AMD users. Quote taken from Tom's Hardware Article

Everest VR was built with Nvidia-specific technology that doesn’t work with AMD hardware. Sólfar Studios said that it is currently working on stabilizing the experience on AMD hardware, but at the present time, AMD GPUs aren’t working properly. We did try out the game on an XFX R9 Fury and a Sapphire R9 390 Nitro, but the experience was unplayable. Textures were missing in the intro sequence with either the R9 Fury or the R9 390 installed. Objects you have to interact with to get through the tutorial were not rendered at all.

So unless they have managed to fix these AMD related issues, it's only going to be playable for Nvidia folk.

Brun · 2 Aug 2016 at 11:51

I'll wait and buy it in a sale in six months time. Then play it with all the windows open.

ZeroG · 2 Aug 2016 at 18:47

I really like the look of it but reading reviews it's a very short experience for almost £20 so I think I'll wait until it's on sale or something. I just don't feel buying something to try knowing I would just refund it.

Metalface Mark · 3 Aug 2016 at 08:13

I purchased it - its decent but its not spectacular, i went for a refund as it wasnt something i felt was worth the money, although if it drops in price under a tenner Ill pick it up again.

Nice in places but just far too short with no replay mode at all. Ive never felt tempted to refund a steam game before so this was a first. I trekked to Everest base camp in May this year and wanted to be able to look around and see what i saw with my own eyes but it was unfortunately a poor representation with the mountains being not quite in the right places either.

dalepearson · 3 Aug 2016 at 08:16

Was so looking forward to this VR experience, but its a proper let down for the money. The Blu is still my favourite VR experience so far, and The Gallery my favourite game.

Marky · 3 Aug 2016 at 10:42

Yeah this seems really overpriced...

A lot of Steam reviews said they could play it multiple times over and still be under 2 hrs for their refund :eek:

dalepearson · 3 Aug 2016 at 18:46

yeah its about 30 - 40 mins including the tutorial.