Your next Kentucky camping trip may be as easy as slipping on a headset, thanks to a new virtual reality game being developed by Lexington-based video game development company Super Soul.
The game, Daydream Blue, immerses the player in a panoramic lakeside environment, where he or she can interact with the virtual world by lighting a campfire, skipping stones, or going fishing. There’s even a playful robotic canine companion to keep the virtual campers company.
Super Soul recently won a Gold Prize, along with $100,000 in seed money, for Daydream Blue in the Oculus VRJam 2015, a global competition launched by Samsung and Oculus, the virtual reality company recently acquired by Facebook. The contest’s mission was to spur the development of games and apps that incorporate the companies’ latest VR headset, with the promise of more than $1 million in cash awards for the combined victors. More than 1,000 developers responded, with over 500 games and experiences submitted. Daydream Blue, which was inspired by Super Soul co-founder Richie Hoagland’s childhood camping and hiking experiences in Kentucky, garnered one of the contest’s top four awards.
The Gear VR headset, developed in partnership by Samsung and Oculus, resembles a high-tech scuba mask with a smartphone snapped in front to serve as its display. The equipment enables immersive panoramic and 3-D visual effects from the comfort of one’s own couch. The technology has opened up a bevy of new applications, said Super Soul co-founder John Meister, and rapid improvements in the industry are making it more affordable and creating more opportunities to engage users with the virtual reality experience.
“VR is really new, and this is an amazing opportunity for us to be there early, when everything is happening,” said John Meister, one of the co-founders of Super Soul, which was started in 2012. “Games make it really approachable, but it doesn’t just have to be games. You can apply that technology to other areas as well.”
Super Soul has developed games for consoles, phones, tablets and computers, but with the opportunities presented for Daydream Blue, the company is currently transitioning into a focused VR development house for both games and application development. In addition to Hoagland and Meister, professional game programmer Shea Rembold and writer and visual artist Amanda Wallace were also key contributors on the Daydream Blue project.
The game prototype was developed for the competition in roughly two months, Meister said, and since then, enhancements in the technology are already spurring them to add refinements and new features, such as enhanced sound. Meister said the prize money will enable Super Soul to expand and complete Daydream Blue and bring it to additional platforms.
“This is really a second act for the company,” Hoagland said in a release on the award announcement. “For the first time, we can develop our own game without extreme financial pressure. This is necessary for innovative independent game development, and we can’t wait to further spread our wings into the virtual reality space.”