From: ml89@ecs.soton.ac.uk (M Luscombe) Subject: The Complete W Industries (long) Date: 4 Jul 91 15:22:58 GMT Message-ID: <8396@ecs.soton.ac.uk> OK, Ok! Please stop! Since I posted that article about W Industries and VR games I have been getting about 10 mail messages a day asking me about them. There are also some articles on the board asking about them and I've now found out that the mail system is not always getting through (sorry if you mailed me and didn't get an anwser), so here it is - everything I know about W Industries and their games. I am a second year computer scientist at Southampton University, and for next year's personal project I thought I would have a go at a VR game. The general idea is a dungeon combat game with a visor (I hate the term goggle) and a glove to control your sword in any way possible, exactly as you would move a real sword in fact. You would go up against various monsters in your effort to get out of the dugeon complex which you would fight using the sword. If I had time later I would add in some puzzles such as pit traps and locked doors, eventually making a Virtual Reality Dungeon Master (by the way, now that I have 'published' this idea so to speak, it is my copyright, so no nicking the idea and making a game before I have finished mine!!! :-) ). To my immense surprise the project "Ok, you can go ahead"er (I don't know what you would call him - he's not really a co-ordinator, and the term supervisor is already used for something else), said "Yes, it sounds like a really good idea" (mind you, my original begging mail message was so immpressive, I'd be surprised if he said no). Anyway, back to the plot. Unfortunately, the department dosen't have any equipment but because this idea is obviously going to really take off in the next few years and they wouldn't want to be left out of this revolutionary new area (quoting from my e-mail), they offered to donate the price of a cheap PC to buy some equipment for me. He never said exactly how much but I assumed about 500 to 1000 pounds (hope he doesn't read this - he probably meant 100!). (I will get onto W Industries eventually, have patience. I did say it was long). But, I didn't know any companies so I went out and scoured the magazines for any mention of VR and I found Computer Shopper (June 1991). Here is a short summary of the relevant bits of the article: Leicester based W Industries recently lanuched the world's first VR system intended for the leisure market. The Virtuality 1000SD is a three-part system comprising of Visette (the visor), Animette (the core software/OS) and Expality (the brains of the unit). Visette incorporates two colour LCDs with a resolution of 300x200 (I think - the resolution was given when describing VR systems in general, but as they probably only knew about one system, it's reasonable to assume that everything refers to Virtuality). Each screen is sent a slightly different images, one for the left eye and one for the right. The images are what each eye would see if it was in the virtual-world, therefore giving true binocular vision (I am resonably new to VR so I don't know if this is standard, but I haven't heard of VPL's system having it). The helmet also has four speakers (so that you can tell which direction a sound is coming from. Also, of course, you can have four sounds simultaneously), and a microphone. The whole thing weights under 3kg (7lb), and feels rather like a motorbike helmet, except that one size fits almost any head. It is a pleasure to use, and the tracking system works superbly. Animette manages the entire system, including doppler-shifted sampled sound, networking machines together for player interaction and all the graphics involved. Expality is the star of the system, and certainly packs some punch. The system incoporates an entire Amiga 3000, CD Rom and/or hard disks, 16+ Mb of memory and two very advanced graphics boards, each using the TMS34020/TMS34082 chip set to produce graphics at up to 30,000 shaded polygons per second - quite a stunning specification compared to anything in the arcades. Indeed the arcade unit is a cutdown version of a scientific/engineering machine to be launched at a later date. The whole unit is completely modular, and more or less any part can be replaced when better technology becomes avalible. A high degree of parallelism is also inherent in the design. Because it would be impractible (and dangerous) for players to run around a video game arcade blind and deaf inside a Visette the SD in the 1000Sd stands for 'sit down'. Games are played from a huge plastic armchair, and controlled by two convetional joysticks mounted on the arms. The two games with which the system has been launched are, however, something of a letdown. the first game VTOL, is a Harrier-style jet fighter game. By blowing apart successive waves of enemy you win more fuel, or at least the opportunity to try refueling. However the game gains little from the 3D environment avalible, and could quite easily run on a normal arcade machine. Battlesphere is a much better effort, and begins to exploit VR properly. A space shoot-'em-up, it features head-up display targetting, allowing your guns to track your gaze. It quickly becomes second nature to sweep your head around to track the enemy craft, or to shoot down ships trying to get on your tail. With practise, you are soon flying through swarms of enemy craft, shooting in all directions. The other controls, however are rather complex, so reading the info sheet before inserting your coin is recommended. It's certainly an experience worth trying, but VR, even at the current level of avalible technology, has much more than this to offer. Contacts : W Industries (0533) 542127 Now I've read through it again, I want to play it even more, but I am a poor (emphasis on the poor) student at the end of the academic year with 50 pounds in the bank and 500 pounds rent due over the summer before I get my next grant cheque (any donations for much needed research? :-) ). Anyway, I immediately called W Industries to ask how much a single visor was. The recepionist was rather unhelpful saying that they only sold the entire unit (for about 20,000 pounds) and I would have to talk with sales. Sales was in conference all day and I couldn't talk to him so I'd have to send a letter (if the recepionist doesn't deal with sales what do they do? Oh, well). So I sent off a letter. The address wasn't in the article and I forgot to ask so I found it in the Yellow Pages (a business directory) for Leciester - W Industries Ltd, ITEC House, 26-28 Chancery St, Leicester, LE1 5WD. A coulpe of days later I saw another article about W Industries in Computer Fun (Issue 3). The new stuff is : One of the advantages of the system is the ablity to link machines. This means that several players (the number can be as high as twenty five) can play together in the same airspace and communicate with each other via the microphone in the Visette. More details on Battlesphere : This time the joystick control system requires a little more practise as the number of options increase. You have a number of shot types, plus hyperspace, and the ultimate weapon the choas charge. Combine these options with the movement of your craft and things really start to get confusing, thank heavens for the practise scenarios which allow you to shoot it out in hostile asteroid environs before attempting the full game and the enemy motherships. More games are planned and not just using the joystick control method. For racing fans there will be (or probably is by mow) an add on steering wheel which replaces the joysticks. One future development to look out for is the Visette II which will allow eye tracking (you can change your view just by moving your eyes as you do in real life). Taking a step away from the arcade game is the stand-up unit. In this version of Virtuality you see not only great potential for games but the more serious application the product is capable of. For a start you can walk around. This is achieved by sensors in the helmet which register in a magnetic field (at the moment that is generated by a ceiling mounted unit). The range is not great as yet, about 1.5 meters from the central position but again that will be increased in the very near future. So now you have this ability to walk around in a computer generated environment what can you do there? On show (the article doesn't say that it was a general press conference or a demostration just for them) was a room around which you could walk containing several areoplanes. These models could be grasped, rotated and thrown. The bouncing ball simulation gave you the same room containing a ball which could be caught, thrown and bounced off walls and other surfaces. Another development is the Virtuality Force Feedback Glove. the version I (the author of the article) tried on was a little primitive but it was in the early stages of development. By using little airbags which inflate on command from the main unit, the glove simulates contact with a solid object. It does not feel like the object touched (that is to come later with a technique known as texture mapping which allows different surface areas of a solid to have their own texture) but you know your hand has hit a solid object. Even in its primitive pre-production state the glove was sensitive enough to let you know which fingers were actually in contact with an object i.e.you could poke things. The sense of touch is still in its early days of development but don't be surprised if you see an exo-skeleton with full touch capabilities before the end of the year. So far we've seen the positive side of Virtuality but what about all those nasty little germs that can pass from head to head as each person clamps on the head unit and the possiblity of losing your mind and becoming a virtual junky? The high density foam in the Visette is a new polmer developed for the Visette. Unlike conventional materials bacteria and other nasties are unable to adhere to the surface and thus spread from person to person. As to losing your mind that is up to you, but the health and saftey people have passed the machine. This all started with the birth of Jon Waldern. A graduate of Loughborogh university with a degree in Industrial Design and a Phd in Spacial Imaging, Jon decided that the every day computer aided design program lacked a little something, like 3D and decent object manipulation. This coupled with work in '82-'83 with IBM and their tests into human/computer interaction brought about the idea of a virtual reality design system. From there Jon developed a simple virtual reality machine in '86. It looked like something from a Doctor Who episode with a TV perched on a stalk. By moving the set around the room it would act as a window through which you could view the computer generated room. The geaphics were simple line drawings and the hardware cost half a million pounds. This led to the creation of W Industries in '87, a company dedicated to bringing virtual reality to the mass market. Early products included the Super X bounce around and rattle your bones simulator and a very odd virtual reality machine known as the giraffe. This early version of the Virtuality system won W Industries the Design award and a twenty thousand pound prize, which is also the price of a brand new Virtuality system, a bargain if ever there was one. Contacts : (0533) 548222 (this is actually their fax number!!) I'm not really interested in the company's history but I know some of you are so I typed it out as well (aren't I kind?). A week went by with no repsone to my letter and the deadline for the projects had just gone (I had an extension because I had a good excuse), so i phoned up W Industires again. This time the recepionist was more friendly (I don't want to give the impression that they are all horrible :-) ) and I asked what their address was so I could check. She said it was : W industires Ltd, 3 Oswin Road, Brailsford Industrial Park, Leicester, LE3 1HR. I was so shocked by this that I fogot to ask her why the address was different and when I had composed myself the line was busy. I sent another letter to this address so we shall see which is correct. After my first post to sci.virtual-worlds (done just after reading the second article), there has been some more information posted: There is one of their units at the Trocadero in Leicester Square in London (interesting conincedence huh?). The main people to contact are: Managing Director : Dr. Jonathan D. Waldern and Administrative Officer : Ms. Linda M. Deal. And that is my total knowledge of W industires and their games. When I find out anything more (like the correct address) I will post again and I will be quite happy to try and answer any more questions but please no more messages saying "Please tell me about W Industries". I will give you all some time to read this and any I get after will just be sent this file. Now I've hepled all you out maybe you could help me : First of all just a general request for info about programming games in Virtual Reality (from what I've seen it's just an awkward exercise in controlling interfaces and often involves delving into electronics). A list of mailing-lists would also be nice. Also, as I said above the mail system hear isn't working too well so I don't know if my message to Mark A. Deloura got through. If not I'll repeat it here. Our version of ftp doesn't recognise 128.95.136.1 (the sci.virtual-worlds archive). It probably just needs another number on the (or start) to direct it to America, but I don't know what it is.It's a very simple question but I don't use ftp much. I'm so sorry about wasting valuble bandwidth to ask this question. I make no appolgies for any spelling mistakes, this took long enough to type out as it is. _ ________ _____ _____ _____ __ _____ __ __ ______ Martin Luscombe \ _ _ \ _ \ _ \_ _\ \ _ \ \ \ ml89 @ ecs.soton.ac.uk \ \ \ \ \ \ \ \ \ \ \ \ \ \ (yes *uk* - you know,that \ \ \ \ _ \ _ \ \ \ \ \__\__\ little triangle off the _____\__\__\__\__\__\__\__ \__ \__\__\__\__\__\__ coast of Europe)