For those who have been playing or developing VR content for years, it might seem ‘obvious’ what kind of settings are expected to be included for player comfort. Yet for new players and developers alike, the confusing sea of VR comfort terms is far from straightforward. This has lead to situations where players buy a game but find it doesn’t include a comfort setting that’s important to them. So here’s a checklist and glossary of ‘essential’ VR comfort settings that developers should clearly communicate to potential customers about their VR game or experience.

Update July 24th, 2024: Road to VR now offers developers private comfort design audits for XR apps. Your app will get an overall ‘Comfort Grade’ with a straightforward list of comfort issues and suggested fixes. Reach us at consult [at] roadtovr.com for details.

VR Comfort Settings Checklist

Let’s start with the VR comfort settings checklist, using two example games. While it is by no means comprehensive, it covers many of the basic comfort settings employed by VR games today. To be clear, this checklist is not what settings a game should include, it is merely the info that should be communicated so customers know what comfort settings are offered.

Want expert insight on your app’s comfort design? Reach us at consult [at] roadtovr.com to discuss a personalized comfort design audit for your XR app.

We chose these two examples because a game like Beat Saber, despite being an almost universally comfortable VR game, will have many ‘n/a’ on its list because it completely lacks artificial turning & movement. Whereas a game like Half-Life: Alyx uses artificial turning & movement and therefore offers more options for player comfort.

	Half-Life: Alyx	Beat Saber
Turning
Artificial turning
Snap-turn		n/a
Adjustable increments		n/a
Quick-turn		n/a
Adjustable Increments	n/a	n/a
Adjustable speed	n/a	n/a
Smooth-turn		n/a
Adjustable speed		n/a
Movement
Artificial movement
Teleport-move		n/a
Dash-move		n/a
Smooth-move		n/a
Adjustable speed		n/a
Blinders		n/a
Adjustable strength	n/a	n/a
Head-based		n/a
Controller-based		n/a
Swappable movement hand		n/a
Posture
Standing mode
Seated mode		not explicit
Artificial crouch
Real crouch
Accessibility
Subtitles		n/a
Languages	English, French, German […]	n/a
Dialogue audio		n/a
Languages	English	n/a
Adjustable difficulty
Two hands required		For some game modes (optional)
Real crouch required		For some levels (optional)
Hearing required
Adjustable player height

If players are equipped with this information ahead of time, it will help them make a more informed buying decision.

VR Comfort Settings Glossary

For new players, many of these terms might be confusing. Here’s a glossary of basic definitions of each VR comfort setting.

Want expert insight on your app’s comfort design? Reach us at consult [at] roadtovr.com to discuss a personalized comfort design audit for your XR app.

Turning

• Artificial turning – whether or not the game allows the player to rotate their view separately from their real-world orientation within their playspace (also called virtual turning)
  • Snap-turn – comfortable for most
    Instantly rotates the camera view in steps or increments (also called blink-turn)
  • Quick-turn – comfortable for some
    Quickly rotates the camera view in steps or increments (also called fast-turn or dash-turn)
  • Smooth-turn – comfortable for least
    Smoothly rotates the camera view (also called continuous-turn)

Movement

• Artificial movement – whether or not the game allows the player to move through the virtual world separately from their real-world movement within their playspace (also called virtual movement)
  • Teleport-move – comfortable for most
    Instantly moves the player between positions (also called blink-move)
  • Dash-move – comfortable for some
    Quickly moves the player between positions (also called shift-move)
  • Smooth-move – comfortable for least
    Smoothly moves the player through the world (also called continuous-move)
• Head-based – the game considers the player’s head direction as the ‘forward’ direction for artificial movement
• Hand-based – the game considers the player’s hand/controller direction as the ‘forward’ direction for artificial movement
• Swappable movement hand – allows the player to change the artificial movement controller input between the left and right hands
• Blinders – cropping of the headset’s field of view to reduce motion visible in the player’s periphery (also called vignette)

Posture

• Standing mode – supports players playing in a real-world standing position
• Seated mode – supports players playing in a real-world seated position
• Artificial crouch – allows the player to crouch with a button input instead of crouching in the real world (also called virtual crouch)
• Real crouch – allows the player to crouch in the real-world and have it correctly reflected as crouching in the game

Accessibility

• Subtitles – a game that has subtitles for dialogue & interface, and which languages therein
• Audio – a game that has audio dialogue, and which languages therein
• Adjustable difficulty – allows the player to control the difficulty of a game’s mechanics
• Two-hands required – whether two hands are required for core game completion or essential mechanics
• Real-crouch required – a game which requires the player to physically crouch for core completion or essential mechanics (with no comparable artificial crouch option)
• Hearing required – a game which requires the player to be able to hear for core completion or essential mechanics
• Adjustable player height – whether the player can change their in-game height separately from their real world height (distinct from artificial crouching because the adjustment is persistent and may also work in tandem with artificial crouching)

– – — – –

As mentioned, this is not a comprehensive list. VR comfort is a complex topic especially because everyone’s experience is somewhat different, but this is hopefully a useful baseline to help streamline communication between developers and players alike.

For developers exploring various locomotion methods for use in VR content, the Locomotion Vault is a good resource to see real-world examples.

For players with disabilities who want more options for VR game accessibility check out the WalkinVR custom locomotion driver.

Spatial design and prototyping app ShapesXR (2021) just launched its 2.0 update which better streamlines cross-platform support, letting team members more easily edit and collaborate in both mixed or virtual reality, but also now the web.

ShapesXR 2.0 is packing in a number of new features today to enhance the cross-platform app, which not only supports Quest 1/2/3/Pro and Pico 4, but also now standard flatscreen devices with the addition of a web editor for users joining with mouse and keyboard.

Check out all of the things coming to ShapesXR 2.0 below:

Enhanced UI/UX : Shapes has been fully refreshed with an entire new interface that takes unique advantage of depth and materials. The information architecture has been simplified to enhance ease of use and learnability.

Interactive Prototyping: New triggers and actions have been introduced to help designers explore more robust interactions, allowing them to use button presses, physical touch, and haptics to design dynamic and engaging spatial experiences.

Spatial Sound Prototyping: Users can now import sounds and add spatial audio to interaction triggers, creating more immersive experiences and prototypes that win the arguments and green lights

Procedural Primitives and New Assets Library: A new library of fully procedural primitives provides a diverse range of 3D models and templates for users to build with.

Custom Inspector: The custom inspector allows for precise adjustments, optimizing the design process.

Performance Optimization: Significant optimizations ensure smoother experiences and faster load times, enhancing overall efficiency.

Flexible Input Support: The new architecture and UI support any input type, including controllers, hands, and mouse and keyboard, making the design process smoother and more intuitive.

Released in 2021, ShapesXR founder and CEO Inga Petryaevskaya calls the addition of the new web editor “a strategic move to extend the time users spend in the product and to enable co-design and editing with those who do not have an XR device.”

To boot, a number of VR studios have used ShapesXR over the years to collaboratively build their apps, including mixed reality piano tutor PianoVision, physics-based VR rollercoaster CoasterMania, and XR platform for molecular design in the Drug Discovery and Materials Science industries Nanome. You can check out the company’s full slate of case studies here.

The app is a free download on supported platforms, including both a free and subscription-based plans. ShapesXR’s free plan comes with its core creation tools, three editable spaces, 150 Mb of cloud storage, 20 Mb import cap on files, the ability to import png, jpg, obj, glb, and gITF files, and export glTF, USDz, and Unity files.

Both its Team and Enterprise plans include unlimited editable spaces, respective bumps in cloud storage, and a host of other features that ought to appeal to larger teams looking to integrate ShapesXR into their workflow. You can check out all of the subscription plans here.