POLL: Do you play NWN in true 3D?

Remove all ads!

When you are playing NWN the image that is on your computer monitor is a 2D one. Since the game engine is actually a 3D one it is possible to actually see the the game in 3D, if you were to use a special software driver, and either the red and blue glasses method (poor) or a set of special 3D glasses from eDimensional (reportedly jaw-droppinly great).


I just found out about eDimensional's game display and ehancement products yesterday. Their stuff is very expensive (except for the hardcore gamer) but what it can do is pretty close to being able to bring my game immersion fantasies to reality.

Things like;

1. Making game objects as convincingly 3D as the the coffee mug on the players table.
2. Allowing depth perception so the player can gauge the correct in-game distance to their enemies or to the corners in racing sims.
3. Allowing the player to control camera movement by tilting your head (i.e. fiegning to look in the direction you wish the camera to point).
4. Being able to use a wireless joystick handle (independant of a base) as you would a sword hilt.
5. Feeling the force-feedback built into the player's chair thunk them in the back when the PC is struck.
6. Feeling the bass rumble of ambient sound effects reverberate through the player by being conducted through their chair.

Admittedly, 3D games will take a 10%-20% performance hit when using the 3D glasses, but according to numerous 'ED Glasses' reviews on the web it results in being able to view unbelievably believable environments that even breath new life into old 3D games.

There are are some reported problems with the hardware. If the game developer used 2D shortcuts in the game (for road signs and such) then these entities will look out of place (newer games use entirely 3D engines). Sometimes minor ghosting occurs, although apparently this happens too infrequently to be a concern. The glasses will not work with LCD screens (different technology).

The E-Dimensional website is a bit dry and modest, but that is in stark contrast to the pages upon pages of praise that have been heaped upon their products by web based reviewers.

I am surprised that ED's stuff does not appear on the shelves of my local computer superstore, or come bundled with the Nvidia video cards with which it is said to be flawlessly integrated (although they have just set up a courier based distribution centre in England). So, even though I am itching to purchase the ED Glasses, I have come here first to see if anyone else has used any of eD's stuff and what people's opinions about true 3D game viewing are.

[ February 08, 2004, 03:27: Message edited by: Bluin ]

Poll Information
This poll contains 5 question(s). 5 user(s) have voted.

Poll Results: Do you play NWN in true 3D? (5 votes.)

Do you have any game enhancing controllers or accessories? (Choose 1)
* Yes - 20% (1)
* No - 80% (4)

Do you have a means of viewing 3D games in true 3D (glasses etc.) ? (Choose 1)
* Yes. - 0% (0)
* No. - 100% (5)

Do you own any of eDimensional's gear? (Choose 1)
* Yes. - 0% (0)
* No. - 100% (5)

Can you see yourself buying a piece of eD's equipment in the future? (Choose 1)
* Yes. - 40% (2)
* No. - 60% (3)

Do you think that eD's game hardware is a waste of money? (Choose 1)
* Yes. - 60% (3)
* No. - 40% (2)

 

I got some very popular 3d glasses some 8 months ago.

And yes, it is true against what one might believe, that they can affect any 3d game, making it completely 3d to the eye. Games such as Flashpoint, Anarchy Online, NWN etc were incredible.

But, I don't use them anymore. Firstly there're the driver problems. They caused severe instability in the display / monitor drivers. The drivers for the glasses themselves were poorly designed and allowed for far less control and customizability than they should have. They work by taking the refresh rate of your monitor and putting that in half, dividing the other half to the monitor and the other half to the glasses. While you can't see the lowered herz rate through the glasses, the FPS gets lowered to your current maximum monitor refresh rate. That means, no more 50-100 FPS in games, somewhere that matters.

And most importantly. When you finally do get a game to work (yes some of them require considerable changes in settings to make the graphics seem normal, not all of course, many games operate fine right away), you'll be dependant upon your own ability of stereo vision.

You can set the range of distance from the setup coming for the glasses. The longer the range, the more incredible what you see becomes. But the more it will require of your stereo vision. Without to brag, my stereo vision was enough to give me a spot as a fireleader (don't know the term in english) in the army, which also meant I could use extremely high range settings and still get used to the glasses within a matter of a minute or two. But my roommate needed some 5-10 minutes to get used to little below mid-range. Simply put, before your eyes don't adjust to what you see, you can't tell any surface range from another, which means the graphics look like a horrible changing scene of jutting blocks that makes no sense whatsoever. Even when you've adjusted to most of the scene before you, there will still be some small details that take even more time to adjust to. Which makes some particular first-person-shooters for example more difficult to play than normal.

All in all, while they would be nice eye-candy if they worked properly (that's all it is, eye candy, it doesn't help you in anything, range estimation or otherwise, afterall it's exactly the same picture as before, only boosted with an illusion to make it appear more real), the glasses are just far too much trouble to really be worth it. Before they come up with glasses that give you a screen that is the equivalent of a huge dataprojector, with the addition of instantaneously adapting stereo vision, I don't suggest you go buying any.

Because I was wondering the same thing you were before I got the glasses, "why, if they're so good, aren't they in everyone's possession already"? The answer is simple: while they work, it isn't all that great once you get used to it. And when they don't you'll be spending no end of time and trouble in getting them working. Often with no success.

 

Thanks for the info Foradasthar. What you said about having to let your eyes acclimatise reminded me of an eye test that I took once were I had to look into a binocular style device and pick out a raised letter from groups of five letters. It took about ten seconds of staring for the 3D illusion in the last test to happen.

Even so, I'm certain that my brain can be easily tricked by optical illusions as even the cross-eyed techninque for viewing 3D web pictures is pretty easy for me. There is an example here. (Ignore the fractal mumbo-jumbo and the nonsense about using your thumb), if you can cross your eyes then you just have to look cross-eyed at the pictures until the illusionary third picture comes into focus between the two real ones for the effect to work.

I'm pretty sure that if the eD glasses were used with an Nvidia card (and therefore requiring no new drivers) a lot of the setup difficulties could be avoided. But what I think you are saying is that the inconvenience of using the glasses outweighs the visual rewards provided by them.

Can you remember the name of the manufacturer and the price of your glasses Foradasther?

 

I'll check them by tomorrow. As the box with its contents are in my storage and I haven't bothered to go check there yet.

That was 5 tomorrows or something, it seems.

Anyway, the glasses are "3D Revelator"s by "Elsa".

[ February 16, 2004, 16:08: Message edited by: Foradasthar ]