E3’s VR line-up showcased variety, cool peripherals and dinosaurs

The first time I put on a virtual reality headset, it was an early Oculus Rift dev kit in a private meeting room at E3 2012. It was only a tech demo, made to show what the technology could do, rather than a full game concept. It was cool for sure—I was shocked at how quickly I forgot the real world around me and started pointing at things that weren’t really there. But as the Oculus reps explained how the VR headset could be used for all types of genres and experiences, I didn’t really believe it. Maybe it was the early, nausea-inducing hardware or that my imagination was woefully limited, but I couldn’t imagine VR’s place in gaming beyond a novelty idea for a few specific titles.

Four years later, virtual reality was a massive presence at E3 2016, from the press conferences to offsite events to the sprawling Los Angeles Convention Center floor. On top of Oculus Rift’s massive booth, many demos used HTC’s Vive headset and controllers, and PlayStation VR dominated Sony’s space. There were big names showing off big games – you’ve probably heard all about Fallout 4, Resident Evil VII, and even Batman in VR – but the show’s off-the-beaten-path ways to explore virtual worlds further highlighted just what this technology can do for gaming.

With PlayStation VR due out later this year, it’s no surprise that Sony’s booth was packed with compatible titles. One of my favorites was Here They Lie, a first-person surreal horror title from indie studio Tangentlemen. It looked like pretty standard psychological horror at first, right down to the trope of the mysterious woman who’s somehow the key to the whole story. But then things started getting weird. Hammerhead sharks swimming through subway tunnels weird.

Like with REVII, Here They Lie uses VR to enhance the horror game experience. The demo’s finale had me being chased through the tunnels by a large creature of undetermined origin who slowly tailed me as I became more and more unsettled. At one point, Tangentlemen’s Corey Davis told me to look behind me, and I replied with something along the lines of “I don’t wanna!” Here They Lie didn’t need cheap jump scares — just being in that bizarre place made things creepier from the start.

Another highlight in Sony’s press lounge was Crytek’s Robinson: The Journey. After surviving a spaceship crash, the preteen Robinson and his robot BFF are stranded on a strange, primitive planet, looking for signs of human life.

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I didn’t find people in my demo of Robinson, but I did find something better: dinosaurs. I scrambled up trees to avoid a pack of raptors and helped a long-necked herbivore get some fresh food. Pterodactyls flew through the air and I couldn’t help but stand and stare. I’m still curious as to what else is going on in Robinson, but I’d be lying if I said the dinos weren’t the highlight.

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Farpoint also had an interesting juxtaposition of technology and nature, but it was the gun-like accessory that made it stand out. Impulse Gear’s Randy Nolta told me they worked with Sony to create a contraption that could fit a PlayStation Move controller and feel like a two-armed gun in the player’s hands.

 Pulling a trigger to shoot is obvious, but Farpoint’s other motion controls were also intuitive; motioning back towards my shoulder switched weapons, as if I was grabbing a different gun, and picking up a new gun was just a matter of lowering and lifting the peripheral. I didn’t feel lost without a traditional controller at all.

Despite all three of these being first-person exploration titles, they all felt completely different. It’s worth noting that after three PlayStation VR demos in a row, I was feeling a bit disoriented. It wasn’t straight-up nausea, and I’m not sure if one of the games specifically caused it or it was a result of jumping in and out of VR for a solid half-hour, but relief washed over me the last time I took off that headset, despite the fact that I’d been having fun up until then.

Over at the Oculus booth, Zen Studios’ Castle Storm showed how an existing mobile game could benefit from a VR boost. Running on the Samsung Gear headset, Castle Storm didn’t have the advanced technology of more expensive models, but it still gave a nice 360-degree 3D view of the tower defense/strategy RPG hybrid.

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I didn’t get to try out the Oculus Rift version, but Director of Communications Steven Hopper told me that iteration would use head-tracking to let users get really close to the battlefield. A fun mobile title in its own right, Castle Storm adds more depth (literally and figuratively) to the experience in virtual reality, and I had a blast during my few minutes in battle.

Devolver Digital may be known for its library of wacky indie titles, but the publisher cut its teeth on the Serious Sam series, so it’s only fitting that its first VR game returns to Devolver’s roots. 

Serious Sam VR is an arcade-style shooter; I played on the Vive using the Vive controllers, which were a perfect fit for this particular game. Instead of moving, enemies from various Serious Sam games came to me in waves, and with each controller representing a weapon, it was up to me to take them out.

This probably would have gotten tired fast if not for the variety and silliness of the arsenal. I started out with two handguns, shooting conservatively, and ended with a cannon on one arm and a chainsaw in the other, spewing cannonballs at the horizon and slicing apart anyone who got too close, waving my arms around wildly and not caring who was watching. I wasn’t sure what to expect, but Serious Sam VR ended up being one of my favorite virtual reality experiences of the week.

I can’t say any one VR game I saw is a system-selling killer app, but as a total package, they make the concept much more convincing. I may have had my doubts before, but E3 2016 really showed off the technology’s potential for more immersive gaming experiences. Even if it’s not perfect yet, the possibilities are exciting.