VR Fitness Insider Podcast – Episode 5: Cix Liv – Part 2 - VR Fitness Insider

Welcome to a caller occurrence of the VR Fitness Insider Podcast!

Join america arsenic we invited backmost Cix Liv of LIV, YUR and REK for Part 2 of our interrogation with him. He is simply a integer fittingness pioneer utilizing XR technologies to amended the satellite of sports and fitness.

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Transcript: 

Episode 5 – Cix Liv – Part 2

Preston Lewis: [00:00:00] Welcome to the VR Fitness Insiders podcast, for the creators who are gathering the aboriginal of the VR and AR sports and fittingness industries that volition revolutionize the mode the satellite volition play sports, enactment retired and get acceptable with your hosts. Preston Lewis and Ryan DeLuca, the founders of Black Box VR, who are gathering the world’s archetypal afloat fittingness VR gym and bring decades of acquisition from creating immoderate of the largest fittingness exertion companies successful the world. They’re bringing unneurotic the champion and brightest minds to assistance you and your institution win successful the VR fittingness revolution.

All right. Welcome to portion 2 of our interrogation with Cix Liv, who is simply a VR, AR XR guru and pioneer. In our erstwhile Part 1 Episode with Cix, helium explained his background, which truly shed airy connected however creators request to person a passionateness for the tech and manufacture they are looking to interruption into, and besides to physique rapidly and enactment adjacent to the dependable of the lawsuit to truly recognize what they’re loving and hating.

Let’s prime up with our past question from the erstwhile podcast wherever Cix shares insights arsenic to the champion mode to cod idiosyncratic feedback for a [00:01:00] product.

Do you person immoderate tiny tips arsenic acold arsenic however you spell astir intelligently collecting that feedback? Is it conscionable consecutive up scouring the Facebook posts, mounting up a Discord? Or bash you person circumstantial things that you do, for illustration make surveys, bash absorption groups, oregon however does that process spell for you with collecting the feedback?

Cix Liv: If you pass with a person, like, directly, it’s benignant of similar the quality betwixt talking to idiosyncratic done 4Chan and talking to idiosyncratic done their face. Like face-to-face. Right?

if you’re connected 4Chan, you’re gonna crap connected everything. It’s astir similar consecutive from encephalon stem to face, right? Like “this fucking is terrible, that crap blah, blah, blah, blah.” And past erstwhile they speech to you, they’re gonna beryllium like, “well, I deliberation you should, you know, amended this” oregon whatever. Right? So, I deliberation it’s getting some of those perspectives. Right? Because what you miss erstwhile you’re speaking to their users are those who didn’t adjacent attraction capable to speech to you, right? Usually [00:02:00] the users that you’re talking to are determination betwixt existent users and pro users. Right?

And you’re usually getting not a batch of the feedback of the radical that conscionable turned instantly. Right? They don’t wanna fucking respond to you. They don’t springiness a shit, they don’t privation to archer you what their acquisition was. So you’re gonna person a unsighted spot connected that class of imaginable users. Right?

So for those, you’re gonna person to, like, find it anecdotally through, like, Facebook posts oregon atrocious reviews, and this is wherefore I would ever pursuit the atrocious reappraisal people. If you’re gathering that user merchandise to recognize what’s churning radical from the opening and what improvements tin I marque for those casual users, and past the pro users, should we cater to them oregon not? So I deliberation that getting those 3 perspectives and possibly bucketing radical successful those 3 things, is simply a bully mode to iterate connected your product.

Preston Lewis: That’s bully advice.

Ryan DeLuca: And it sounds like, I mean, the hard part, of people is conscionable having that unfastened [00:03:00] mindset. Right? It’s truly casual to, similar you said, discount the antagonistic reviews, oregon erstwhile somebody’s telling you thing you privation to similar explicate it. And alternatively than get much accusation astir wherefore bash they deliberation that, and what would they like, however would we alteration it? Sometimes you instantly wanna spell into, like, antiaircraft mode. But I hold with you, like, interacting with the assemblage arsenic overmuch arsenic you perchance can. Creating opportunities for those interactions, like, through, like, places similar Discord, online, oregon for america really successful the gym. Taking users retired to meal oregon lunch, and truly digging into it. And doing it from a spot of learning, not a spot of conscionable trying to marque them accidental bully things, and taking that mindset backmost to the product.

Preston Lewis: Some of our champion feedback has travel from our benignant of squeakiest wheels, if you will. People that, erstwhile they bash attack it, it’s similar this, you know, they’re possibly rage quitting connected an acquisition oregon thing similar that. And it’s, to your point, it is bully to person those radical that are astatine slightest passionate capable to springiness america the feedback that we tin perceive to and past iterate. Because it’s usually, it’s usually connected the people for larger groups of our users. So, yeah. Appreciate that advice, man. That’s awesome.

Cix Liv: Yeah.

Ryan DeLuca: Well, let’s get into breathtaking caller things [00:04:00] that you’re doing. So, um, nary longer with YUR, um, and present you’ve started a caller AR sports institution called REK and we’d emotion to larn a batch much astir that. So how’d that travel about? What made you determine to commencement that and, uh, archer america a small spot astir the product.

Cix Liv: The latest institution I started is REK. So it’s benignant of a operation of the 2 anterior companies successful the learnings that I had there. So, LIV, the biggest learning was however bash we scope the radical extracurricular the headset? How bash we marque it absorbing for radical to watch? If you harvester that with fitness, which you know, is successful my sentiment the biggest usage lawsuit of headsets, the information suggests that retention for fittingness related apps is doubly arsenic precocious arsenic thing other successful VR.

Yeah, actually, that’s 1 tiny constituent to notation astatine YUR that we noticed. So we had an underlying tracker that worked connected the headset nary substance what. Right? And what we recognized is that erstwhile radical utilized their headset for fitness, they utilized it implicit doubly arsenic long.

So the mean usage [00:05:00] magnitude for a headset was astir eighteen minutes. But erstwhile they utilized it for fittingness it went up to forty. That was a immense learning for me, right? So the large learning from LIV was we request to amusement what radical are doing and we request to marque it chill for different radical to watch.

The biggest learning from YUR was headsets being utilized for fittingness person the champion retention. And, you know, I judge fundamentally it’s the biggest usage lawsuit of HMDs. Um, truthful if you harvester those 2 learnings of fittingness and spectating, you create, you cognize what is fundamentally sports. Right?

I started this institution nether this premise that, you know, sports are going to beryllium the adjacent large thing. And the crushed I judge that is due to the fact that I did immoderate ideation successful augmented world and it benignant of fell into the aforesaid issues of VR, which is, like, wherefore the fuck bash I enactment connected a headset? Right? And a batch of AR apps person that aforesaid situation wherever they’re like, “okay, I enactment connected a headset truthful I tin play puzzles with my person who’s besides physically there.” And past astatine that point, I’m conscionable like, “why don’t you conscionable fucking [00:06:00] enactment a puzzle there?” Right? Like, wherefore are we digitizing that acquisition erstwhile it’s thing that you tin bash successful existent life?

Or like, “you privation to bash augmented world basketball? Why don’t you conscionable play basketball?” Right? Like, the person’s already there. A hoops is, you know, similar 20 bucks. Right? It’s similar exertion trying to lick a occupation that doesn’t exist. Right?

So, you know, determination was a batch of radical who were doing VR sports and for me, I was like, “well that’s not gonna enactment successful AR, due to the fact that you’re yet conscionable gonna churn retired and bash the existent thing.” Right? This is wherefore I person a occupation with VR sports; I judge that the occupation with VR sports is that the eventual extremity is erstwhile you go bully capable astatine it, you crook into the existent thing.

What I became fascinated with is, like, Tron. Let’s marque a athletics that doesn’t beryllium successful existent life. You ticker immoderate sci-fi movie that’s ever existed. Right? [00:07:00] And erstwhile they amusement the aboriginal of sports it is usually comparatively similar. Right? People doing worldly and similar dueling each different and sidesplitting each different digitally, doing worldly that you can’t bash successful mean sports. Like, you can’t termination your person successful basketball.

Sci-fi movies benignant of demonstrated what the aboriginal of sports could look like, and sometimes you don’t privation to combat against the taste zeitgeist of thing and conscionable travel done with it.

I started this institution with my co-founder Bart.

He was a elder AR technologist astatine Apple. And you know, 1 of the things he’s ever been truly funny successful is, what are valid usage cases of AR that tin really beryllium close now? And truthful helium built a laser tag crippled that won the fig 1 spot for an unfastened machine imaginativeness contention past year.

And fundamentally I reached retired to him and I was like, “hey, you know, like, we should deliberation astir what is gonna be, like, the Beat Saber of AR? As we determination to AR, what is gonna beryllium a due usage lawsuit of headsets?” So erstwhile we archetypal came together,[00:08:00] we were investigating things similar Space Pirate Trainer Arena.

So Space Pirate Trainer Arena, it’s 30 by 30 feet, and it’s similar a laser tag crippled wherever you tally astir and you sprout astatine each different successful VR. Right? And truthful we were investigating games similar that, and archetypal of all, it was specified a fucking symptom successful the ass to find a spot that was 30 by 30 feet exactly. And past the mode that you gully the Guardian with the Quest was a monolithic nightmare. So it had to adjacent beryllium adjacent bigger than that. And if it was outside, we’d person to hotspot it, and it would lone enactment during definite times of the time and each this nightmare. But past different immense happening that we noticed, is that erstwhile you really physically tally successful VR, it’s truthful uncomfortable. Your encephalon starts freaking out.

It’s like, “where the fuck are you? Like, are you gonna tally into something? Is idiosyncratic gonna mug you?” It has to beryllium AR erstwhile you’re running. Once you present running, determination has to beryllium augmented reality.

Ryan DeLuca: [00:09:00] Like, I agree. Like, I’ve ne'er experienced really moving successful VR. Um, yeah, but you’d person to, like, person a ridiculous magnitude of trust.

Cix Liv: Yeah. I mean, if you’ve played immoderate boxing crippled successful VR and punched anything, right? I retrieve I punched a array 1 clip and my full manus was bleeding, but I didn’t recognize until I took disconnected the headset and I was like, “holy shit.”

Preston Lewis: Oh, wow.

Ryan DeLuca: There is little symptom perception, truthful I conjecture that could beryllium bully and bad. There’s a full subreddit of VR to ER. Right? Uh, for a reason.

Cix Liv: Oh, is it truly called VR to ER?

Ryan DeLuca: Oh yeah. People are showing them destroying things oregon hurting themselves.

Preston Lewis: It messes with the immersiveness. Right? As well. Because, yeah, similar you said, like, erstwhile you bash that 1 time, past you’re not reasoning astir being successful the experience. You’re reasoning astir hitting something. Same happening happened to maine erstwhile I was, uh, I was playing 1 of the shot games and it miscalibrated my presumption and truthful I was, like, inches from a partition and went to plaything for a transportation and conscionable slugged the partition arsenic hard arsenic I perchance could. Yeah, I’m not playing that anymore.

Cix Liv: The 2nd you present [00:10:00] running, that fearfulness becomes truthful overmuch much realized.

Preston Lewis: Interesting.

Cix Liv: Your assemblage truly starts freaking out. Cause it’s, like, is that a existent partition oregon is that a virtual wall? The mode these games sync, they interlace the avatar connected apical of the person. Right? But if that’s disconnected by immoderate important degree, you’re conscionable gonna tally caput archetypal into you’re a friend. And conscionable slam into them. Right? I fundamentally judge that erstwhile you turn retired of the constricted footprint of VR, it has to beryllium AR, if you’re similar moving and doing worldly similar that.

But there’s massive, monolithic challenges with AR. One of the astir evident ones, if you commencement gathering for this, is that, like, immoderate of these walk done headsets, they don’t really conception the players properly. So what ends up happening is that everything renders successful beforehand of the person. So accidental that you’re, like, competing against idiosyncratic else. Right? And that idiosyncratic is determination and you wanna enactment a extremity down them. Oh, it sounds simple. Right? But you [00:11:00] can’t, due to the fact that the extremity would person to render successful beforehand of them. It can’t chopped the idiosyncratic retired and render the entity down them.

So you person to bash immensely analyzable method worldly to lick thing that wouldn’t beryllium successful VR. Right? Because you don’t person that aforesaid occupation successful VR wherever you person to, like, conception the idiosyncratic out. So you person to present an invisible avatar that renders connected that aforesaid person, wherever the idiosyncratic is, and past you person to marque definite that the idiosyncratic is synced properly.

And then, you’re creating that cutout successful beforehand of the extremity that’s down them. Otherwise, you’ll spot the tiny goal, but it’ll render successful beforehand of the person, adjacent if they’re, like…

Preston Lewis: That’s interesting. So it’s similar real-time rotoscoping slash masking. That’s interesting.

Cix Liv: This is why, you know, erstwhile we announced REK, oregon whatever, we did a truly elemental thing. We did spell duals. Right? And the crushed we did spell duals were, okay, you’re punching. This is simply a mechanic that anybody tin understand. [00:12:00] And 1 of the biggest things for maine that I find arsenic a occurrence criteria, is the simplicity of archetypal adoption. So erstwhile you enactment connected a headset, the magnitude of clip that it takes idiosyncratic to recognize however to play a crippled is incredibly important. Cause I’ve demoed VR for hours and hours and hours, and the longer that clip takes, the higher accidental that they’re gonna churn out. Right? So that has to be, like, arsenic constrictive arsenic possible.

So we started, okay, you’re punching astatine the person, nary buttons. Very simple. Right? And past the crushed it’s a spell duel, is due to the fact that you don’t person to render immoderate objects down them. So it wasn’t conscionable like, hey, we woke up and we were like, “Hey, let’s bash a spell dual similar Harry Potter oregon immoderate shit.” It was based disconnected the limitations of the Quest headset. Right?

Like, we can’t person goals down them. We can’t bash each this different fancy worldly without a monolithic magnitude of engineering effort. So the lowest barroom for america were just, “well, let’s punch Fireballs astatine each other.” And truthful that’s benignant of the crushed wherefore that archetypal demo was [00:13:00] the mode it was.

Preston Lewis: Small small enactment determination for our users, benignant of putting a pin successful the information that we talked astir you getting scrappy with idiosyncratic feedback and letting that benignant of usher merchandise decisions. That was a bully illustration you conscionable gave of playing successful the sandbox of what the exertion tin really bash and execute and uncovering fun, arsenic accelerated arsenic imaginable successful the experience. So, that’s good.

Ryan DeLuca: A large portion of REK, and wherefore radical look to similar america truthful overmuch also, is being capable to spectate. Right? So they tin really ticker it from the outside. What you truly enactment a absorption connected with REK, was making it truthful that different radical tin ticker it successful existent clip and cheer them connected successful existent clip similar you would a sport. And however did you get that to enactment and what person you recovered from that kinda ability?

Cix Liv: We realized from beauteous aboriginal connected that having immoderate benignant of important obstacles, would not lone beryllium confusing for the players, but make ocular conflicts for spectators. Right? When you’re watching a shot crippled oregon you’re watching a shot crippled oregon [00:14:00] something, they don’t person similar walls. Right? Hypothetically if a camera existed successful shot and they had each these walls everywhere, you wouldn’t beryllium capable to spot what the players are doing. It’s plan challenges similar that that are important, but they’re besides limiting. Right? Now you can’t bash a batch of the crap that you’ve done successful VR with each these chill environments. Basically the situation astir disappears astatine that point. Right? You can’t person a analyzable situation if you’re trying to spectate. So, I deliberation that that’s besides gonna beryllium thing to deliberation astir that we’re gonna person to fig out. We whitethorn person to render thing antithetic for the players wrong the headset than what radical extracurricular see. So, like, successful the headset you would spot opaque pillars, but successful the spectator presumption they’re transparent. Right?

Like, each these plan decisions that you’re gonna person to make, that you wouldn’t person to adjacent deliberation astir successful VR, if you’re designing intentionally for spectating. The eventual merchandise that [00:15:00] we’re gonna merchandise is not gonna beryllium a spell duel crippled successful the aforesaid capacity. Um, but yeah, we were just, you know, what is the astir basal happening that we tin do? And what is the mechanic that anybody successful the satellite tin understand? And yeah, that’s benignant of wherever that came.

We’ve been moving connected rather a fewer antithetic crippled concepts and successful the adjacent fewer months we’ll denote that, uh, and it’s not gonna beryllium rather the aforesaid arsenic the spell duel for the last product, so.

Ryan DeLuca: Well, present I’m excited to perceive much astir that.

I don’t cognize if there’s thing other you wanted to accidental astir creating REK and similar the decisions that were made astir that.

Cix Liv: So we primitively came successful this idea, like, “hey, we’re gonna bash LBE and stuff”. Right? And past we really went done the process of trying to get into the LBE crippled and, uh, whew, man, I bash not…

Ryan DeLuca: Location based entertainment, truthful existent retail footprint. Right?

Cix Liv: Yeah, yeah. So we looked astatine Sandbox and we were like, okay, Sandbox has each these locations, [00:16:00] but they’re superior expensive, you know? So past we were like, “okay, truthful we’ll vessel radical hardware and person them acceptable it up astatine their venue.” And we were like, “okay, but past we’re gonna person similar a 15 twelvemonth aged caller outta precocious schoolhouse trying to negociate this shit. So that’s gonna beryllium a nightmare and a fractional trying to, like, negociate that remotely.” Um, truthful we were just, you know, we tried to enactment immoderate transmission partners connected it and we conscionable realized the LBE strategy is thing that we conscionable couldn’t afford, honestly. You know, we couldn’t spend to adjacent effort it.

So we’re going backmost to approaching it arsenic creating user product. That’s besides similar wherever my specialty comes from, similar gathering successful VR, is connected the user side. So we’re gonna person a VR mode that connects to an AR mode, and our biggest absorption is gonna beryllium gathering the span betwixt those 2 worlds. How bash you really get radical to bring a headset outside? And I deliberation that’s an unsolved problem. And the mode I similar to explicate it, successful the astir succinct mode possible, is REK is [00:17:00] trying to bash to headsets what Niantic, you know, Pokemon Go did to phones. Which is get radical to, like, deliberation of their devices arsenic astir similar a fittingness hold of themselves. Or, like, utilizing that to locomotion around.

I bash deliberation that astatine immoderate constituent we whitethorn spell backmost into LBEs, but it’s apt gonna beryllium much similar UFC tournaments, precocious accumulation value, you know, advertisers, whatever. Because, yeah, it is truly costly and we don’t person the, you know, we didn’t person the wealth to bash that. Right?

Preston Lewis: We’ve noticed that arsenic you’re gathering these experiences, 1 of the things you’ve done, you and the squad person done truly good is making them look cool. Not lone successful the experience, but successful the marketing. We benignant of mentioned the viral videos and things that you did aboriginal on. It sounds kinda similar a elemental thing. Right? To marque things look cool. Because this is aboriginal tech, this caller tech, and it seems similar it’d beryllium casual to marque it cool. But, with Black Box VR, we’ve had to combat the cognition successful the aboriginal days, astatine slightest that VR Fitness was lone for [00:18:00] ace techy people.

But you guys person done conscionable an awesome occupation making it approachable and cool. Even looking astatine the REK videos, those are besides getting a clump of attraction and conscionable kudos to you and the squad connected making the tech look cool.

Ryan DeLuca: It’s a specified a bully point. So galore times immoderate caller VR fittingness happening comes retired oregon workout game, and it’s conscionable similar the worst graphics, the worst marketing. And evidently that’s not the astir important thing, you know, successful a batch of experiences. Like, we ever speech astir Minecraft, for example, you know, starting retired much pixelated benignant of stuff.

It’s always, like, man, radical wanna look cool. Like, you know, similar you said, it’s similar cipher wants to thrust a Segway, but we volition thrust a chill vertebrate scooter down the road. Right? You know, it’s similar the aforesaid thing, conscionable a antithetic configuration. So, specified a bully constituent that Preston made is, like, each your worldly looks modern and cool, that radical wanna beryllium a portion of it.

Preston Lewis: It’s awesome. Before we jumped connected here, I was looking astatine immoderate of your worldly and you benignant of poked amusive astatine the, uh, what was it? Horizon Worlds oregon thing similar that. And you have, like, you person the benignant of the dorky benignant of graphics and stuff, and past you person you’re a leader shot. I thought that was truly good. I mean, that’s different happening that’s truly important, again, successful driving [00:19:00] adoption is that instrumentality of contrasting. Right?

And showing people, like, it doesn’t person to beryllium this, it tin beryllium this. Anything that we’ve seen you do, it’s, you’ve done a truly bully occupation with that.

Cix Liv: You’re talking astir the tweet wherever it was similar their Metaverse our Metaverse, and past it was similar the… yeah.

Preston Lewis: Yeah. That was awesome.

Cix Liv: I mean, to beryllium honest, Meta is making it beauteous easy, okay. I person to beryllium somewhat connected their bully graces, truthful I’m atrocious successful advance. But, uh, you truly gotta enactment connected your marketing. The Horizons World stuff, I believe, is truthful atrocious that it’s taking down our full industry.

I judge Horizon Worlds is truthful poorly marketed, and specified a atrocious product, that is taking down the full VR space. Because erstwhile you spell into the taste zeitgeist of talking to radical astir Metaverse. Right? The precise archetypal happening they’re gonna deliberation of is the shitty looking Zuck avatar and, you know, Horizon Worlds And that’s by intention, that Meta is, like, this is the Metaverse, right? And it’s discrediting [00:20:00] what truthful galore chill things that we’ve built successful this abstraction look like. And it’s truly disappointing, due to the fact that I deliberation it’s specified a atrocious allocation of resources, and it’s specified a atrocious look for headsets that it’s really hurting each of us.

Ryan DeLuca: Some of the commercials they marque are amazing. You know, erstwhile they show, like, what it’s similar to beryllium successful VR and enactment the headset on. Now you’re successful this immense happening and conscionable caput blowing. And you’re right, and evidently it’s inactive aboriginal days, truthful we’re each hopeful. Right?

Because I hold with you, like, with the magnitude of concern that they’re putting into it, they tin marque oregon interruption it, you know? And if they bash a large job, the hardware gets to wherever it needs to be. It’s gonna beryllium precise adjuvant for each of us. But you’re right, it could bring america down if it’s not the merchandise that the mainstream wants.

Cix Liv: I would look into the PICO if I were you guys, I don’t cognize if you utilized the PICO 4 astatine all, but, like, this happening is everything the Quest 2 should be. It’s thinner, it’s smaller, it’s much lightweight, it’s designed much for fitness. It’s everything the Quest 2.5 should person been. And instead, they came retired with a Quest Pro, which is $1,500 that has look [00:21:00] tracking and oculus tracking, but it’s adjacent heavier than the Quest 2. And the value was already a large problem. I conscionable I don’t get it.

Preston Lewis: You talked astir the AR, VR experiences that you’ve built oregon are building. What are your favourite AR, VR sports and fittingness experiences today? And what makes ’em good?

Cix Liv: I truly similar this crippled called Blaston. I was playing it a batch successful the pandemic. So it’s a dual game, it’s 1 v. one, and you’re shooting these assorted velocity projectiles astatine each different and there’s nary signifier of locomotion. You’re some connected these tiny pillars, and past what it ends up becoming, is like, you’re having to bash a batch of dodging… it’s truly active. I deliberation I deed similar a 1000 calories an hr playing that astatine afloat intensity. I truly liked that.

The champion sports benignant crippled successful VR close present is astir apt Nock. So if you’ve tried Nock, Nock uses limb locomotion wherever you clasp a trigger and you benignant of alert successful the aerial and past it uses [00:22:00] bows. So you’re shooting arrows astatine a ball.

I deliberation my biggest proposal for radical who physique VR and AR content, is astatine the implicit cardinal of what this is, it has to consciousness good. If it doesn’t consciousness good, thing other fucking matters. You tin marque the champion graphics successful the world, you tin marque a large storyline, you tin marque immoderate the fuck particle effects that are amazing. If the basal mechanics don’t consciousness good, nary of that crap matters.

And you cognize what perfectly, perfectly represents this is Gorilla Tag. If you look astatine a screenshot of Gorilla Tag, you’d beryllium like, “what the fuck are you doing?” They person passed Beat Saber for the astir reviews connected the Quest now. They are present the fig 1 fucking application, and they’re not adjacent successful the store. And the crushed for that goes backmost to the constituent that I made here, astatine its baseline, there’s a locomotion method. And the locomotion method is fundamentally you moving connected your hands. Right? [00:23:00] No buttons, nary complexity whatsoever. And it’s exercise. It’s similar tag, it’s fundamentally similar tag for kids. And the kids are successful determination and it decidedly gets violative a lot, truthful possibly that’s wherefore they’re not successful the main store. But it’s fundamentally kids moving connected their arms, yelling astatine each other. And that became the fig one. I’m not adjacent kidding. They’re conscionable screaming astatine each different and they’re conscionable moving similar this.

Preston Lewis: That’s awesome.

Cix Liv: Feels good. Feels good. It doesn’t consciousness bully thing fucking matters. And your app is going to flop.

Ryan DeLuca: Anytime I’m trying to reload a weapon successful 1 of these analyzable benignant of archetypal idiosyncratic shooters, I conjecture my explanation of VR, they’re each archetypal person, you know?

But it’s like, I’m hitting my controllers together, oregon I’m trying to bash this happening and the guy’s coming astatine me, and I can’t rather get the small parts of reload. It’s like, it kills it for me, due to the fact that it’s like, I’m definite I could get bully at, I’m definite if I played astatine different 10 hours, I’d astir apt like, you know, person nary problem.

But astatine archetypal it’s just, you’re just, it’s precise awkward.

Cix Liv: You cognize Denny from Cloud Head, right? He’s a VR OG and helium is made a clump of [00:24:00] experiences. His archetypal games were benignant of similar Myst, like, Call of the Starseed, wherever you like, would fundamentally lick puzzles successful VR with truly precocious fidelity. And helium built Pistol Whip, you guys cognize Pistol Whip, right? And Pistol Whip is fundamentally conscionable similar Time Crisis connected rails successful presumption of, like, the intelligence mathematics and what you request to do. You know, you’re going from highly complex, and dynamic and astonishing graphics into, like, fundamentally Cel Shaded Time Crisis.

It was his astir palmy title. And, like, I deliberation a batch of crippled developers are huffy astir that. And they go, ” wherefore can’t we person astonishing graphics? Why can’t we person dynamic storylines? Why can’t we person each this different shit?” And it’s like, well, if it doesn’t consciousness good, radical are conscionable gonna usage their console. They’re conscionable gonna spell play their Playstation. Right?

Preston Lewis: You benignant of alluded to designing successful crippled mechanics and enactment patterns that person little cognitive load, right? So that the crippled continues to beryllium amusive and radical enactment immersed. So what bash you consciousness similar [00:25:00] is missing from the AR, VR sports and fittingness manufacture today?

Cix Liv: Well, if I told you that I’d beryllium giving distant my secrets.

Preston Lewis: There we go.

Cix Liv: So I’ve divulged everything.

Preston Lewis: Fine, archer america your archetypal name, then. Fine. Just archer america your archetypal name.

Ryan DeLuca: Yeah, what’s your existent name?

Preston Lewis: Yeah, what’s your commencement name?

Cix Liv: I deliberation that you tin benignant of, like, overgarment the representation of what I deliberation is going to beryllium the aboriginal based disconnected what I’ve said successful the past. Which is, you know, debased cognitive load, casual to understand, crushed to enactment connected the headset is active, you know, absorbing for radical to watch. And past the biggest contented successful our space, by far, is moving astir the limitations of the hardware. Right? Because like, ohio my God, I tin archer you however galore times I ideated connected immoderate shit, and I turned retired as, like, can’t bash it. It’s, like, ninety percent of the crap you physique successful our industry, falls into “sounds good, doesn’t work.”

Honest to God, it’s similar astir each fucking thought that I have, it’s [00:26:00] like, “oh, you know, I can’t bash that due to the fact that of Facebook level control. I can’t bash that due to the fact that we don’t person little assemblage tracking. I can’t bash that due to the fact that the manus tracking wasn’t trained to enactment outside, truthful it lone works successful debased airy environments. I can’t bash that because, you know, the 2nd you enactment a value successful your hand, it can’t observe your manus anymore. So you can’t quantify the fitness.” Right?

Another large contented with processing for AR, is that you don’t person entree to the camera data, it conscionable fundamentally comes successful arsenic a shader. That’s it. And truthful that limits a full clump of worldly that you tin do. And past there’s nary decease camera successful it, truthful you can’t easy conception players out. You know, there’s immoderate similar laser tag concepts that radical person made with the Quest. And they make this video and it makes it look truthful good.

It’s, like, “okay, there’s radical successful their bureau and they’re hiding down boxes and they’re shooting astatine each other, that’s gonna beryllium truthful fucking amazing.” Right? And past you spell astir to bash it yourself and make it, similar thing similar that, and you’re, like, “holy shit, this [00:27:00] is impossible”. Like, archetypal of all, you can’t crook disconnected the guardian for the Quest unless you’re successful dev mode. Okay? How galore radical are successful dev mode. Right? Like, radical connected SideQuest, nary 1 else. So, you can’t marque an AR acquisition that has the guardian off. And you’re gonna what, gully a 30 ft guardian each azygous clip successful your office? Right? So that’s a immense issue. And past I mentioned the contented of, like, rendering radical connected apical of it, and past the information that there’s nary shared SLAM maps?

So, like, if I person a SLAM representation successful my headset, I can’t stock it to immoderate headset astir maine successful the Quest ecosystem. You tin successful the Vive, truthful the Vive has shared SLAM maps. So, I person to spell representation the full country with my headset, and past I can’t stock that SLAM representation with anybody else. So each these concepts that radical amusement are precise conceptual, due to the fact that you can’t really bash a batch of this shit.

The happening that’s aged maine the astir successful this [00:28:00] abstraction is the “sounds good, doesn’t work” shit, which turns retired to beryllium similar ninety percent of thing that you deliberation of.

Ryan DeLuca: It’s interesting, due to the fact that usually what we perceive is “it’s frustrating due to the fact that astir radical don’t person a headset”, you know? So that’s already the regulation that we are dealing with. Is that, it’s not that everybody’s got a headset, but we can’t bash those things. That conscionable adds onto it, and it conscionable creates little reasons for radical to get the headset.

And we tally into the aforesaid things. It’s, you know, we’re stuck in, uh, you know, SteamVR ecosystem. And, you know, we’re utilizing the Vive Pros at, uh, Black Box. Because we person to person immoderate benignant of mode to bash outer tracking of arms and hands, without dealing with occlusion from mean manus tracking for antithetic movements, similar squats and deadlifts and overhead press.

And truthful we’d emotion to beryllium capable to usage a wireless headset. We’re inactive stuck with the wired headset, due to the fact that we request to beryllium capable to person fundamentally the Vive tracking pucks, oregon we usage the Tundra Trackers. And, you know, there’s different things similar Kinect-style cameras that we perchance could use. We’ve tested a clump of those things, but they’re not accelerated enough, you know, due to the fact that we’re doing a batch of punching and slicing and movements, oregon they woody with occlusion arsenic [00:29:00] well.

So, you know, it feels similar everything’s truly close. Like, man, bully manus tracking and, you know, if we could conscionable get that truthful that the tract of presumption is simply a small spot better. Full assemblage tracking, adjacent if they’re conscionable benignant of similar conjecture a small spot around, it could beryllium truly interesting. But, similar you said, these shared experiences are beauteous overmuch intolerable with the limitations of this closed down hardware, and we’re gonna person each that worldly soon, you know? And erstwhile are we gonna person each that worldly we want? It could beryllium tomorrow, it could beryllium an announcement from idiosyncratic tomorrow. It could beryllium 3 years from present and we conscionable don’t know.

You’ve mentioned Beat Saber, similar that modding community. I wholly agree, like, without LIV, without that modding community, and each the different songs and each the different stuff, it wouldn’t beryllium wherever it is today. It’s evidently inactive an awesome game, but it mightiness person been much of an Audioshield and get immoderate traction, but not a batch of traction similar it did. And they’ve taken a batch of that worldly away, specifically speaking astir the Quest platform, which is the biggest level today, of course.

Preston Lewis: The adjacent question was gonna beryllium picture your cleanable AR, VR sports and fittingness experience. But it sounds similar it is staying wrong the sandbox of the hardware that is presently [00:30:00] available. Trying to aboriginal formed a small bit, but not going crazy, due to the fact that arsenic you mentioned, if you physique excessively acold up each you’re gonna person is simply a clump of tears and nary shipped products.

You talked astir the spectator facet of it, which we from time 1 we thought was ace important successful Black Box VR. We ever accidental that the bully happening astir sports, gathering a sports title, is that you tin physique it and it’s infinitely replayable. Versus having to really physique a rubric that is benignant of this linear storyline that has x magnitude of hours and past you gotta physique it again. So, that’s huge. We wholly agree.

And not lone for the amusive of the user, but we truly bash judge that AR, VR spectating modes could beryllium amazing. Right? We’ve each seen the World of Warcraft slash League of Legends, gigantic spectacles of eSports and worldly similar that, truthful sounds similar the aforesaid leafage there.

Of people gives you a workout, of people is immersive, uses patterns that aren’t excessively overmuch cognitive load. And basically, just, we request to someway ace the whip connected the hardware manufacturers and get them to physique worldly faster for us, because[00:31:00] that’s what we tally into.

Cix Liv: I would scope retired to PICO though. The PICO 4, you know, the 2 main focuses they person are fittingness and games, and they look to beryllium taking fittingness precise seriously. There’s besides a truly absorbing crushed for that, by the way.

In China, they person caps connected however galore video, however overmuch you tin play a video crippled per day. And if you tin person the authorities that it’s a fittingness device, you interruption retired of that limitation. So that’s really 1 of the tiny reasons they’re hyper-focused connected fitness, is if they tin person the authorities that it’s a fittingness instrumentality and not a crippled device, they tin really interruption retired of that limitation.

That’s a tiny happening I discovered by going down the way of localizing to China.

Ryan DeLuca: Well, man, we’ve learned truthful overmuch from you. I deliberation we got similar a cardinal notes here. This’ll decidedly beryllium our longest podcast ever, truthful far. So, uh, truly admit it. I deliberation to wrapper things up, what’s adjacent for you? What’s adjacent for REK? We’ve, you’ve heard a batch about, uh, these upcoming versions of the crippled and what it’s not gonna [00:32:00] be, and a small spot of what it’s gonna be, but where, what’s adjacent for you and, and what are you guys, uh, up to next?

Cix Liv: I conjecture you’d person to travel my Twitter.

Preston Lewis: There we go. Call to action.

Cix Liv: C I X L I V. Um, I’m consenting to divulge everything astir the past of however I got up to now, but immoderate of the worldly that we’re moving connected successful the future, I’d similar to support nether wraps until we denote it. We’re decidedly going to beryllium gathering thing that works successful AR and VR, and we’re decidedly going to physique a companion exertion that allows you to spectate that. And then, hopefully astatine immoderate point, determination this into tournaments with brackets and leagues and, you know, each the worldly that sports have.

I deliberation 1 of the large things I wanna permission radical with, that’s thing that, mightiness beryllium a airy bulb moment. Is erstwhile we were doing our tests, we did a pilot, down in, um, Los Angeles. There were a fewer antithetic things that happened that made maine deliberation we’re going connected the close path.

Um, determination was a [00:33:00] fellow and woman who were, you know, the fellow was going to spell play against his friend. And earlier helium played, and helium was putting connected a headset, his woman came implicit to him, gave him a kiss, and said, “you amended win”. And past we had a infinitesimal wherever a dada was watching his son, and helium was playing against his son’s friend, and helium was lasting determination adjacent to the TV like, you know, cheering connected his son, like, very, precise clearly, cheering connected his son. And helium could spot his lad and helium could spot however helium was playing his person and each this different stuff. And truthful those moments were truly important.

But the happening that truly airy bulb this to me, is if this was a video crippled that ne'er would’ve happened, due to the fact that what would’ve happened is, archetypal of all, that woman would beryllium like, “what the fuck are you doing?” Like, “we’re astatine a venue”, like, “why are you going and sitting and playing League of Legends?”

Like, you know, “we’re present to person fun, what the fuck are you doing?” Right? Because she couldn’t enactment successful what was happening, due to the fact that she’d person nary [00:34:00] thought oregon the discourse of what the fuck is happening. Right? And truthful that would’ve happened. And past the aforesaid happening would’ve happened with the dada and his kid. Where if his kid came implicit and sat down and played a video game, adjacent though it was, you know, punctuation connected punctuation eSports, he’d beryllium like, “what the fuck are you doing? We’re retired present to person fun.” Again, due to the fact that helium could not enactment oregon recognize what was happening. And truthful my large obsession with this abstraction is that I judge if we nail this, this is bigger than the full XR space, due to the fact that it breaks retired of the abstraction similar that Beat Saber video did 5 years ago.

And that’s wherefore I bash this. I judge that if this is nailed, XR sports go bigger than the full space, due to the fact that it tin get adoption from radical who aren’t successful headsets. And that’s wherefore I’m like, airy bulb moment. This is it. You know? Now, whether oregon not the hardware is gonna get determination successful clip and, you know, [00:35:00] each this different fucking bullshit we woody with successful our abstraction is different question. But, you know, that’s the hope. That’s the dream.

Preston Lewis: Yeah, so, each right, that’s each the clip we have. Thanks truthful much, Cix for being present with us. I’m definite our assemblage truly appreciates it. And for anyone successful the audience, arsenic always, we volition enactment thing successful the amusement notes to get into interaction with Cix and to get progressive successful what he’s doing. Really admit it. Thanks again.

Thanks for listening to the VR Fitness Insider podcast. Do you cognize of anyone that should beryllium connected our amusement oregon person feedback? Don’t hide to email america astatine podcast vr fittingness insider.com and travel america astatine VR Fitness Insider connected Twitter, Instagram, and YouTube. You tin besides articulation our Discord channel. Until adjacent time, support creating and dreaming up the adjacent large happening that volition revolutionize the satellite of fitness.