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Watch This Behind-The-Scenes Look At Fallout 4 VR's Development

Watch This Behind-The-Scenes Look At Fallout 4 VR's Development

Fallout 4 VR is fast-approaching with a slated December 12, 2017 launch on the HTC Vive (reportedly the only platform at launch as it remains to be seen whether or not Rift can play it via Steam VR or not) and it’s bringing the entire, massive world of the Boston Wasteland to the immersive confines of VR headsets. Lots of people are excited for good reason and it could end up being better than Skyrim VR.

Even though our latest demo brought up some concerns we have with polish (although it’s worth stating that by launch the build we played last week at VRDC will be about 6 months old) we’re still eagerly awaiting the release so we can dive back into the world of Fallout 4 and re-explore our favorite locales in VR.

Bethesda recently released a developer diary-style video that sheds light on some of the game’s biggest changes and alterations when compared to the non-VR version from 2015. Andrew Scharf, Lead Producer at Bethesda Game Studios for both Fallout 4 VR and The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim VR, had a lot to say.

The first topic was the VATS system. “We’ve redesigned how VATS is gonna work in VR,” Scharf says. “In Fallout 4 you queue up your shots and a playback camera plays that shows all the carnage but that takes camera movement away from the player and that sort of thing can make you feel pretty uncomfortable in VR. So what we do instead is slow-down time and the player can teleport around in real-time. It’s like being Quicksilver from X-Men.”

The concept works great in practice and it was one of the best things about the demo I played. Being able to freely move around and swing melee weapons as well as throw grenades is a big benefit of VR as well. It’s much more visceral than just pulling the trigger on a gamepad.

“In workshop mode we’re attaching the menus to the controllers,” Scharf explains. “So you use one to cycle through the items you’re going to build for your settlement, then you use the other one to rotate and choose where it’s going to go. You can also scrap items. You can go into Sanctuary and spin around with a sort of scrapping laser and just scrap everything.”

Mass-scrapping sounds like a major upgrade over the slow and tedious individual selection process in the non-VR version of the game. With this new mechanic it’ll be easy to quickly scrap entire settlements for rebuilding if you want.

“VR is very immersive and it changes the game emotionally when you play it,” Scharf concludes when referring to Dogmeat, your canine companion. Let’s hope that emotional attachment shines through when the game releases this December 12th for HTC Vive.

Let us know what you think and what you’re most excited about regarding Fallout 4 VR down in the comments below!

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