[MUD-Dev] Viewpoint and motion sickness was:Neverwinter Night s

[Brian 'Psychochild' Green]

As a person that gets motion sick from 3D games, let me give some input.

I've been playing a bit of Unreal Tournament lately, so this is a
topic currently near and dear to my heart, er, ...stomach?

Anyway, an interesting paper dealing with the subject can be found
here:

  http://www.hitl.washington.edu/projects/vestibular/dis1.html

Derek Snider wrote:
>> From: Hans-Henrik Staerfeldt, June 13, 2001 3:34 AM
 
>> As far as I recall, adding realistic movement in the screen helps
>> your brain accept the virtual environment. I think this is part
>> of the reason the 'walking' motion of the point-of-view was
>> introduced (Doom?).

The first thing most of the people I know that get motion sick from
games do is turn OFF the head bobbing.  That only seems to make it
worse.

> Nothing influences motion sickness more than a slow frame-rate,
> and also (and especially combined with) a claustrophobic scene
> where there's too much stuff right in your face (which often
> causes the frame-rate to drop).

I will have to disagree with this vehemently given my personal
experiences.

I was able to move around in 2.5D games fairly easily without the
general sense of nausea I get when playing more modern games.  I was
able to DOOM all night in college, and I played Meridian 59 without
any nausea.

Even certain 3D games don't give me a problem.  I was able to play
EverQuest without too many problems, and Asheron's call didn't even
make me ill in the slightest.

What does set me off?  Fast motion in the more modern games,
especially first-person shooters (FPSes).  Chatting with some
friends that get video game induced motion sickness, they all agree
that this seems to be the biggest culprit.  Low frame rates don't
make the nausea worse.
 
> It's not that things are moving slowly as much as that they end up
> being "jumpy".  When your vision becomes jumpy, you brain gets the
> idea that you may be poisoned, and decides that maybe it's a good
> idea to make you toss your lunch.  (Better hungry than dead).

>From what you can read at the paper linked above, there are a few
theories about "simulator sickness".  One theory is that your eye
and inner ear don't agree with what's going on ("sensory conflict
theory" to put it in snooty academic terms).  Remember, the inner
ear is what helps you keep your balance.  Your eyes see you moving
around, while your inner ear senses you staying still.

I read somewhere else that when the two inputs disagree, your body
worries that this is a symptom of poisoning, as Derek said.  Time to
get rid of that pesky poison through any means necessary.

This makes sense that lower-tech and slower games don't make you as
sick.  The slower games don't require that your eyes and inner ear
disagree as vehemently.  It also makes sense that the additional
motion of the head bobbing would cause even more problems than it
solves if the disagreement between eyes and inner ear are the cause
of this problem.

Some information to chew on.

--
"And I now wait / to shake the hand of fate...."  -"Defender", Manowar
     Brian Green, brian at psychochild.org  aka  Psychochild
       |\      _,,,---,,_      *=* Morpheus, my kitten, says "Hi!" *=*
 ZZzz  /,`.-'`'    -.  ;-;;,_   "They're not bugs, they're 'place-
      |,4-  ) )-,_..;\ (  `'-'    holders for code that works.'"
     '---''(_/--'  `-'\_)         - Andrew Kirmse, Meridian 59 creator
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