Observatory: A VR Variety Pack

Release Date: 2016-05-12

Developer: 2DArray

Genres: Adventure, Indie, Racing, Early Access

Price: 6.99

Observatory is a four-pack of VR content for the Oculus Rift HTC Vive and potentially other headsets later on. It includes three games and a music video - but were halfway through a (hopefully) two-year development cycle so all of the items in the pack are in different stages of development. Two have been cleaned up to be suitable for launch and these are accessible by default ("Phantasmagoria" and "Hamster Slide"). The other two are only available if youre curious enough to opt in as they are significantly less developed. These will be added to the default branch over time. (More info above in the Early Access section)Our overall intent is to test out some different in-game uses of VR headsets by making small-but-still-substantial experiences with as much variation between them as we can:A musical trip through spaceA procedurally generated downhill racerA microscopic spacejet-horror gameAn animal-based island puzzlerThe pack will also include a (short) eBook which provides some extra backstory (the packs overall narrative is related to our previous game Not the Robots and to our older Flash games) - if thats your kind of thingStatus: CompleteVertigo: Medium"Phantasmagoria" is a song by Icky Blossoms from their latest album Mask (Saddle Creek Records). We made the official music video by taking a description of a trippy space-traveling sequence that the band wrote and approximating it into a realtime cutscene. A 360-panorama version of Phantasmagoria will also be available for free but we earnestly recommend the real-time version if you have a headset. The free demo for Observatory contains the music video in full!"Trust me its worth the journey." - Ben Kuchera Polygon"The bold creative revelations of MTVs yesteryear are clearly being reborn in VR by folks like 2DArray. Amazing work!" - Job J Stauffer Telltale Games____________________________Status: BetaVertigo: Spicy"Hamster Slide" is a downhill racing game where you generally try to spend as much time as possible in the air. A combination of in-air boosting and gliding lets you skip huge sections of tracks (like on a certain road that is also a rainbow) - as long as you can still hit all of the checkpoints. A new track is procedurally generated every day and todays race always has live high scores with automatic replay sharing - so even though its not live multiplayer you can still see other real players racing by.____________________________Status: PrototypeVertigo: Medium"Antibody" is a spooky spacejet-style game about microscopic submarines acting as medicine. At the beginning of each round the player acts as a scout by quietly sneaking around an infected area and identifying as many threats as possible. When the reinforcements arrive the player is given more friendlies if they spotted more targets - and everyone gets into an asymmetrical dogfight.____________________________Status: PrototypeVertigo: Mild"The Island" is a puzzle game (you guessed it - on an island) thats focused on interactions with strange physics-based animals. It has two primary goals: First to be a short-but-satisfying sequence of puzzles and second to be a pleasant setting for relaxation and sandboxing.____________________________We havent designed the currently-available games for motion controllers because our main focus has been on on the headset itself. Over time we will be adding support for motion controllers for certain parts of the pack but well be avoiding motion input in places where it isnt adding something special. Specifically The Island stands out as having great potential for motion controls because it focuses on close-up interactions. The other games will support the wand controllers for convenience but most likely wont depend on motion input for gameplay.So far weve been designing the games to work with a standard gamepad but if you somehow have a headset and not a controller the keyboard and mouse will also work. Everything in the pack will also work on a normal screen.