Virtual Reality (VR) in gaming is starting to take off. While the technology can enhance gaming experience to a degree unmatched by any other means, at this time, it's still far from reaching widespread market penetration.
While avid gamers can play games for hours, or even days long, users of VR tend to take breaks. This is because the increased physical activities required to play VR games can be very tiring, or even nauseating for some.
The reason for this is because VR's immersive interactive experience requires the user to blocks the visuals and hearings of the users from the outside world (real world), With senses obscured from the real workd, it can result in a mismatch between the player's feelings and what the body thinks is going on.
This essentially prevent VR games to play for long stretches of time.
Regardless of the hurdles, a YouTuber took the challenge.
As reported by YouTuber Apollow, from the Disrupt YouTube channel, he decided to play Minecraft in virtual reality on his PC for 24 hours straight.
He documented the experience in a video, explaining what happened to his mind and body after a full day of virtual reality gaming. Early on the game, he ran into some issues with the controls, but when he eventually got the hang of playing Minecraft in VR, Apollow built his first in-game home.
After that, he felt he had really gotten used to living in VR.
But to make the experiment real, Apollow created and followed one simple rule he put in place.
The rule was: the VR headset stays on.
What this means, when he took meals and sleep, while doing these, he kept the headset on his head, trying to mimic his real-world actions with those in game. For example, if Apollow wanted to take a couple of hours nap in real life, he would make his in-game character to be at home and in bed.
Apollow took three sleep breaks during his 24-hours gaming, with his headset and headphones on the whole time.
While he was able to sleep, he instantly regretted building a chicken coop so close to his in-game home, as it made it hard for him to sleep. But even with less sleep, Apollow didn’t experience much trouble waking up in virtual reality.
Waking up in VR was only odd for him for a few moments, only before his brain readjusted to the VR condition.
He also didn’t get sick or queasy while playing. The major exception was when his in-game character traveled in boats, as movements were fast and caused him to feel queasy.
It's worth noting that while Apollow spend 24 hours playing Minecraft in VR, the game's time is actually shorter. In Minecraft, 24 hours in real-life translates to 72 hours in-game.
During this lengthy play session, Apollow managed to reach Minecraft‘s traditional ending, which involves his in-game character in slaying a boss known as the Ender Dragon.
And closing to his 24-hour stunt, Apollow lit some in-game fireworks and watched the digital sunset, to then spent the last hour sitting on a small mountain waiting for the digital sun to rise.
After his virtual reality experiment, he explained that "the next few days went so slow," and that he felt like he "skipped" a day of his life.
Apollow chose Minecraft because the game offers players many different things to do and this would help him from getting bored.
