Lets take the "Wayback Machine" to 1992. Your system is probably a IBM 386 clone, perhaps you are really styling with a lighting fast: 486DX2-66. Programs come on either 5.25" 1.2mb floppy disks or the newer 1.44mb 3.5" diskettes. CDs for software do not yet exist. A Soundbaster or Adlib card provides your audio and your operating system is blessed MS DOS 5.0. Rumors are just beginning to circulate about something taking the business world by storm... called Windows.
It's summer, August. You've just got your fresh copy of Computer Gaming World, #97. Stunt Island is the big news... Microprose's Civilization and Origin's Wing Commander II top the charts as two of the most popular games. Lets read!
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(Page 60)
There's An Editor That Shapes Game's Ends
A Look at Domark's Virtual Reality Studio
by Charles A. Smith
System: IBM
PRICE: $89.95
GRAPHICS: VGA EGA CGA or Tandy Graphics
SOUND: Ad Iib or PC speaker
PROTECTION: None
PUBLISHER,- Domark
Distributor: Accolade San Jose, CA
As one of the few computer programs
which allows users to create their own
3D interactive environments, the mis-named Virtual
Reality Studio Reality Studio is a baby
step towards this technological future. Domark has
taken the "Freescape 3D System" underlying
such games as Dark Eclipse and Darkside, given
it a high tech name (albeit an unfortunate and
deliberate marketing misnomer) and a friendly
user interface, and served it up to the public as
a "virtual reality" construction set. In spite of
the name, this product does not allow consumers
to create total immersion experiences.
It is a 3-D construction set, nothing more and
nothing less.
The world is divided into areas which designate
cubes of 8192 X 3 "units" or "steps."
One can have up to 254 areas in a "custom"
reality. Such areas can represent rooms, yards
or, even, interiors of vehicles, but the areas
have no geographical relationship to each
other. One cannot, for example, look out the
window of a house to see the backyard (unless
these objects are placed in the same single
area).
After areas are defined, objects of different
sizes and shapes can be placed into an area to
fill out an environment. Basic object types are
called primitives (cuboids, pyramids, rectangles,
lines, triangles, quadrilaterals, pentagons,
hexagons, and sensors). A sensor is a single
point that can detect a user's presence within a
defined distance and, if programmed to do so,
will fire on a user. Primitives can be resized
and moved throughout the 3D area. Primitives
can be combined to form a group of more
complicated objects like homes or vehicles.
Unfortunately, without circles, curves, or
spheres, Virtual Reality Studio worlds tend to
be blocky and angular.
Objects can be defined as visible, invisible, or
destroyed. Invisible objects can be triggered
and made visible. Destroyed objects can be
triggered and, as a result, permanently removed.
Objects can be painted and shaded
from a palette of 256 color VGA, 16 color
EGA or 4 color CGA.
Animation and interaction with objects are
achieved by writing short programs called conditions.
Fifty-one conditions use instructions
which make up the Freescape Command Language.
To program a cube to move both up
and down as well as side to side, a user would
edit the conditions to read as follows:
INCLUDE (2)
START
LOOP(20)
MOVE (40,0,0)
AGAIN
LOOP (20)
MOVE (-40,0,0)
AGAIN
RESTART
The animation begins when the user shoots
the floor. There is also a bank of memory
(variables) which can be used to store and view
information relating to the environment and
in effects. "Variable Manipulation" instructions
will set a value, add and subtract values
to and from variables, or compare values.
"Object Manipulation" instructions make
objects visible or invisible. "Vehicle Commands"
affect movement rates. "Conditional"
instructions allow the execution of a program
when an object is shot, involved in a collision
or has its sensor activated. "Miscellaneous
Commands" print text messages, set colors,
play sounds and set a timer.
The editor employs clear icons and pull-down
menus. Upon loading the program, a
user is greeted with the Main Screen composed
of a menu selector, view window, an
info bar identifying the current location, short
cut icons, mode irons, and Freescape icons
which allow the user to walk or fly in any direction.
If this sounds complicated, that is because it
is, indeed, complicated. The Virtual Reality
Studio is not for the Fainthearted or the boot-
up-and-play-without-looking-at-the-manual
crowd. Each area has to be painstakingly created
and assembled, one object at a time.
I was shocked to find a library of only one
large object, a single helicopter, for placement
in an area. This is the only one of numerous
objects illustrated on the from and back of the
program package as being readily available to
the user. Since a more complicated object like
an automobile will require creating, sizing, and
placing approximately 14-20 primitives, this
oversight is no small matter, especially for
those with limited time and little artistic talent.
There is also no library of conditions that
users can port easily into their "worlds."
A "Studio" game is included as part of the
program package to illustrate the types of environments
a user might create. The object of
this game is to escape from a mysterious world
and return to Earth. This reviewer failed to
find any way to cut objects from this sample
world for use in other 3-D worlds. Why these
items we not made more readily available in a
library accessible to the user is a mystery itself.
The size of the program on disk is surprisingly
small: approximately 300K. In an era of nine
megabyte and more games, users are certainly
shortchanged here. Requests on the Domark
BBS as to whether an online library of objects
or conditions exists or not, went unanswered.
The sample game is rather lame. Once the
novelty of having unlimited control over
movement wears Off, there is little there. Ultimately,
however, it is the Freescape world itself
which this reviewer found unsatisfying. What
is initially interesting to visit, soon becomes a
heartless and barren place. Users wander from
one space to the next as though exploring a
deserted city long abandoned by all forms of
life, whether human beings or their monstrous
foes. Objects like robots or vehicles may appear
and move along rigid paths, but these
things are nothing more than zombie machines
created and then, apparently, abandoned by their masters.
Users with no interest in programming are advised to stay well away
from Virtual Reality Studio.
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Ouch! That last paragraph was a killer, don't you think? Actually, I believe the author did a pretty good job with most of the review, then felt he had to go for the throat for a big finish. Computer Gaming World magazine seemed to do more of this style of final wrap up: "yay/nay" than Computer Games Strategy Plus did - who were slightly more descriptive and less judgemental overall.
I think the author was really miffed about not seeing more objects immediately available for use (they take patience and skill to make), and I doubt if he had any interest in programming.
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You really have to spend quite a bit of time with VRS before it really begins to shine in your mind... (i.e. Hmmmm, I think I could use a few flexible pyramids to make that...)
However, what really bothers me about this piece is that he fails to tell you what a wonderful creative and fun outlet this thing is... and how it was (and still is) one of the few programs that truly empower the user!
Don't always believe everything you read. Create!
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| Here is another small review / product announcement that was published in | the 1992 Washingtonpost Newsweek Intereactive:
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February 18, 1992
Virtual reality software allows users to create new worlds
- Domark's Virtual Reality Studio - Product Announcement
Newsbytes News Network, Feb 18, 1992 by Linda Rohrbough
Vitual Reality Software Allows Users To Create New Worlds
02/18/92 SAN JOSE, CALIFORNIA, U.S.A., 1992 FEB 18 (NB)
Domark claims users can create their own virtual reality world,
then move through it or give it to others to enjoy, with a new
product for the IBM personal computer and Amiga platforms called
Virtual Reality Studio.
The company says a user can create games that are retail quality,
or use the studio to design a house, a car, or an airplane. Once the
three-dimensional world is generated, the user can move in from location
to location and explore the creation from any angle, Domark maintains.
Caryn Mical director of U.S. operations from Domark says much of what the
user needs to design objects is built in. "Most 3-D object generators
are time consuming and require laborious work to create even the simplest of
shapes. With Virtual Reality Studio, all of the tools and commands for creating 3-D
worlds and objects are found on a simple, icon-driven panel," Mical added.
Once the objects are created they can be stretched, shrunk or rotated in any direction
as well as copied, animated, and colored using a palette of 256 color shades. One
of the included shades is a clear "color" for creating invisible force fields,
Domark said.
Manipulation of the environment created is done by applying a set of conditions to
the "world" or to specific objects in the world using a Freescape Control Language.
For example, Mical said objects can be defined as sensors which can detect the presence
of a user. "You tell the computer how to respond to the user's actions, such as
opening doors for him, which he can literally walk through into a
completely new environment."
What users create is up to them, however, a world can contain several
environments to explore. One could be a village with houses, each house with rooms,
each room with furniture, and the furniture drawers with compartments that have
secret boxes, Domark explained. The world can then be created and explored down to
the tiniest detail, the company asserts.
Users can chose to walk, fly, look up, down, or around a corner by pressing buttons
on the screen. The commands are explained in a manual, and a video tutorial with the
software adds an introduction to the capability available in the product, Domark added.
Additionally, the user is able to take anything created with Virtual Reality Studio
and distribute it to others. The company suggests users might want to create an adventure
game to give away, or a create a layout of their home for friends who live elsewhere.
Domark is based in the U.K., but its products are distributed in the U.S. by Accolade.
Retail price of Virtual Reality Studio is $89.95, Accolade said.
1992 Washingtonpost Newsweek Interactive
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