VRMonkey, formerly known as Naked Monkey Games, embarked on a journey into VR a decade ago. Although their activities initially evolved around developing smartphone games, in 2015, after encountering Oculus Rift DK1, they decided to pivot fully into VR and AR development. Today, this indie studio comprises 40 dedicated team members who work on their own IPs and collaborate with renowned VR studios worldwide, including The Munky – creators of Drunkn Bar Fight.

Among VRMonkey’s portfolio, their co-development of Drunkn Bar Fight stands out as one of their most successful ventures. This game is among the top 20 selling VR Games of all time, and it maintains a steady audience, with more than 100,000 MAU. During peak seasons and featured store placements, this number rises to 200,000 MAU.

Harnessing the Power of Analytics

VRMonkey recognized that they must fuel their decisions with data to scale their games. After considering other analytic tools such as Flurry or Google Analytics, the team ended up choosing GameAnalytics primarily for its ability to provide a visual and comprehensive way to derive actionable insights and it focus on games:

We wanted to have a tool that would enable us not only to track specific events but give information about these events in a way that we could visualize and draw conclusions from these data.

To develop Drunkn Bar Fight, the two studios have been using the Unity3D engine. Following GameAnalytics’ integration documentation, VRMonkey was able to connect the analytics tool quickly and efficiently. The real task was determining what events the designers wanted to track and improve.

One compelling use case of analytics was the ability to assess popularity and player engagement with specific weapons. Custom events enabled developers and designers to understand how players interacted with the game and where they faced challenges.

We have several dashboards that enable us to analyze our custom events. But having custom dashboards for specific events is a king for us.

Acting on their analytics findings, VRMonkey initiated changes to encourage players to explore more levels and interact with different weapons. By optimizing level transitions and weapon placement, they were able to boost players’ engagement and overall gaming experience. These adjustments led to a 30% surge in players exploring levels beyond the initial one, highlighting the tangible impact of analytics on gameplay and user engagement.

Following these changes, the studios quickly observed improvements in user satisfaction metrics. The game’s average rating experienced a positive shift, climbing from 4.1 to 4.5.

Words of Wisdom for Aspiring VR Developers

We asked the team for valuable advice for developers transitioning from mobile to VR game development. They emphasized:

Forget everything you think you know. VR is not like mobile. Interactions are unclear, monetization isn’t the game, and the clients aren’t the same.
But always remember, the goal is to make the players have fun.

The studio encourages developers to embrace data analytics and beta testing. Testing, analyzing, iterating, and improving are critical steps to understanding the nuances of player behavior in the VR realm.

VR games are growing in popularity – with predictions that 23 million VR-related jobs will hit the market by 2030. And with better technology and increased interest, more and more developers are shifting towards this new field.

But even with better tools, online tutorials, and a larger community, making a VR game is still a challenge in the park. It’s very different from what you may be used to building. To get ahead, we’ve been doing our own research and interviewing the best VR devs to get their top-tier advice. So, here’s what we learned and what you need to know.

Controls being second nature

Depending on your audience, you can expect your players to have some experience with games in the past. They should understand controls and button layout, which may be different for VR.

For starters, VR controllers are a new concept. PlayStation and Xbox controllers have been around for decades and are usually the first thing people think of when you mention gaming. But unlike other platforms, your players can’t see their hands with VR. Saying ‘Press X’ isn’t enough in this situation. They can’t remember where it is or see their hands to figure it out.

Think up creative ways to lend them a hand. ‘Show, don’t tell’ is a handy tool here. You could have a semi-transparent image of their controller pointing out which button to press and showing exactly where it is on their controller. Seeing where the switch is on their controller can help them understand what they should be pushing. That’s what Half-Life: ALYX did, and it worked well for them.

Playing for hours upon hours

Unlike other platforms, people can’t wear their headsets for long periods. It’s very easy for players to experience eye strain, headaches, and motion sickness if they play their VR for too long.

So you may want to think about a target session length. Too long, and your players may quit halfway through with a pounding head. If you’ve created hyper-casual games before, then the rules of ‘keep it short, sweet, and satisfying’ can easily transfer to VR.

With that in mind, it depends on the type of game and players you have. Ramen VR’s Zenith MMORPG game saw players spending two hours at a time in their title. So take this section as a guide rather than a strict rule. Use data to listen to your players and find what works for them.

Cutscenes or forced camera perspectives

Cutscenes can be great to help tell your story or highlight important events. And in traditional gaming, it’s fine to shift your player away from first person and into a cut scene or even certain camera perspectives. But the sudden shift of perspective in VR can be very jarring and disorienting, if not done correctly.

The unique element with VR is that your players are always in a first-person view. So rather than watching from the sidelines, your players can be in those cutscenes, experiencing them first-hand.

Quick-time events

Quick Time Events, where players are prompted to press specific buttons within a time limit, are great for adding tension to your games. But not so great in VR. For one, the sudden change can break their immersion and slap them back into the reality of they’re just playing a game. And keep in mind that your players can’t see their controls, so they may struggle to react quickly if they’re also processing which button to press.

Focus on more natural and immersive mechanics to add tension. Or, if you want to add a time-based element, run focus groups to see if that’s what your players like. You’ll probably need to test this quite vigorously to find the right balance of fun and challenging without being overwhelming and disruptive.

HUD elements

In most games, you’ll have some key information on-screen (like health bars, mini maps, objective markers), which convey crucial information to your players. But in VR, these elements can hinder their immersion and obstruct their view.

So consider how you’ll relay this information without overloading your players. We recently interviewed Halfbrick Studios, the developers behind the Fruit Ninja series. When designing their HUD, they opted to instead create a pad with all of the info their players needed in the form of a ninja scroll. It made it so much more natural for the player and kept it in the game’s theme.

Don’t underestimate the power of level design here, too. You don’t always need to spell things out for your players. Having clear objects, buildings and landmarks with certain colours and shapes can help intuitively guide your players to where they need to go without relying on a mini-map. This technique has been used many times in open-world games, too.

Nintendo devs actually revealed that they use this technique in their Zelda games. Key landmarks were always in a triangular shape. When players saw those shapes (usually mountains), they had two options: walk around or climb up them. Both actions led the players in the right direction. This same technique can be used in VR, too.

Written information

The screen of your VR is right in front of your eyes. And that can sometimes be uncomfortably close, especially if you need to read things. Having too much text for your players to read can break the immersion, add to their eye strain, and cause headaches.

So you’ll want to get creative when relaying information. Using auditory or visual cues whenever you can keeps the players immersed but also eases up on their eyes.

Precision controls

When playing games on consoles, PC, or even mobile games, your players can get pretty precise with their aiming. When playing multiplayer games with a mouse and keyboard, a flick of the wrist is all your players need to do to target their enemies. With mobile, you just slide your finger across the screen.

VR games can be a little trickier. You will be directly mapping a player’s hand movement to virtual weapons, so they may not have the same level of precision. Consider what limitations you’re working with. And depending on your game, perhaps give the option to increase aim assist or develop mechanics that feel natural and responsive.

Robo Recall, one of the first games to come out on Oculus, tackled this quite nicely. Here’s what we could see:

• They used very clear visuals: You can grab weapons, enemies, and even bullets out of the air easily. There’s a clear white circle around where you can grab them, so you know exactly where to point your controller.
• Time slows when catching objects: In the game, all of the bullets coming at you are slowed down. One, to help you dodge (otherwise, you’d be overwhelmed). But you can also catch bullets and fling them back to the enemy. Lots of fun. But impossible to do in real time.
• They use larger hitboxes for items: You don’t need to be precise when catching or picking up objects. If you’re close enough to a weapon or object, you can easily summon it by pointing in its rough direction. This is very common in VR, considering how restricted players are when moving around.

Lots of assets

In most games, you’ll have lots of background objects to fill the scene. Otherwise, the game can feel bare and barren. The issue with VR, everything needs to be rendered twice (as you have essentially two screens). Not only that, but every object should arguably be interactive. If a player tries to pick something up and can’t, well, that’s just another reminder that they’re just in a game. It can be confusing to know what’s interactive and what’s just background stuff when you have loads of objects. And think about the frame rate and CPU power – the more you have, the more power you’ll need.

So you’ll likely have less clutter and objects in the background. But that’s okay. Just make sure that whatever you have in your levels, your players can engage with them in some way. Even if it is just picking up a mug and throwing it across the room.

We recently interviewed Schell Games, the creative minds behind ‘I Expect You To Die’ and ‘Among Us VR’. They had items in their game that didn’t do anything and were just there. But after testing, they noticed their players trying to interact with it. It led them to decide to make it a unique object that they could pick up and break.

Get started making VR games

Some of these techniques and rules may not always apply to you. That’s where data comes in. Sign up for free and download our SDKs to get going.

An analytics tool that works across all platforms

As HyperVR sought to create a fun, accessible VR experience for all players, they needed an analytics tool that could work across all platforms. With GameAnalytics, they can quickly and easily track metrics across all their different games, builds, and platforms.

According to Ģirts Ķesteris, Studio Lead at HyperVR, the metrics he tracks the most include session count, item usage, locomotion usage, actions, and events. These help him quickly identify issues and make improvements on the fly.

“GameAnalytics is the glue for our games. We’re able to see all of our data across our different games, builds, and platforms quickly. Something we just didn’t find with other tools out there.”

Making the game immersive

To create an immersive VR game, it is important to identify any glitches that might break the player’s immersion. VR’s biggest strength is its ability to make players lose themselves in the game.

“VR is all about having an immersive experience,” Ģirts explained. “People like to grab stuff and interact with things. And that’s free in VR. While for other games, developers need to come up with special mechanics when picking items up. If you build around that and make it dynamic, then you can make a good game.

“It’s easy for something to go wrong. With VR, you need to be aware of your limitations. The top two are how much physical space your players might have, as well as any potential motion sickness. You need to do everything in your power to cater to these.”

Tracking all these metrics is key to offering players a personalized experience. HyperVR uses data to identify what works and doesn’t work for their players and to fix any pesky bugs in the code.

Keeping a swift and responsive approach to issues

Crashes in games are easy to miss without data. And in VR, these bugs can break the immersion, make your players sick, and ruin your game.

“We monitor errors and crashes all the time,” Ģirts said. “We need to make sure the experience is smooth and seamless for all our players. Otherwise, you’ll ruin their experience, and even make them feel unwell. Keeping an eye on your bug report is paramount.”

Fixing bugs fast to keep reviews positive

“All of our games are premium. So if something breaks, and our rating drops, then there’s a lot of backlash, immediately. Bugs are much more noticeable and personal. You see it in your view, right in front of you. And you’ll have a much more serious reaction. If your game isn’t flawless, then your players are more likely going to leave a bad review and ask for a refund.”

A clients review of Shave&Stuff on the Meta Store.

Keep the gameplay short, simple and satisfying

Wearing a VR headset is pretty intensive. Unlike some PC or console titles gamers play for hours on end, VR sessions are notoriously shorter – similar to that of a casual mobile game.

“You need to create cleverly saturated games. After some quick testing in our games in the past, we noticed that our players enjoyed shorter sessions. Your players can’t sit in VR for hours playing games. After 20 minutes or so, they’ll get tired and want to take a break.

“You want to track what users are doing in your game to perfect your core loop. Analytics is concrete here when adjusting your meta gameplay. Once you have that loop down, you can build on it.”

Understanding the platform is a part of perfecting your game. HyperVR kept a close eye on engagement metrics like Session Length and Playtime to understand their audience and find that sweet spot for their games’ levels.

Market test early on

“We market tested Shave&Stuff early on. It helped us figure out what worked, and what didn’t work with our players before we put in loads of man-hours investing in specific gameplay and features. We didn’t want to end up wasting any time.”

By doing earlier market testing, the team could decide what to focus on. Testing and building a VR game is a lot slower than any other type of game out there. You’re constantly looking for issues and bugs to squash. And every change you make to your game takes up valuable development time. So it’s good to figure out the important parts early on.

“Testing is slower and takes more energy since it involves a device on a face that occludes vision. While interactions are a lot easier to do (than say in a PC or mobile game), they require more fidelity and more budget and time.”

Get started with GameAnalytics today

GameAnalytics works across all VR platforms and can help you squash bugs and make data-driven decisions about your own titles, rather than guessing in the dark. Check out our SDKs and start using our free tool today.

At the start of June, Apple announced the Vision Pro – a headset that marks the “era of spatial computing”. We’d call it a mixed-reality headset. Part VR, part desktop computer, part entertainment system. You can either fully immerse yourself in a virtual world or you can blend the image of your apps over the real world.

This week, Apple also announced the release of Apple Vision Pro developer kits, with developers able to apply to receive a kit. Developers will be provided with an Apple Vision Pro “loaner” that will allow them to develop and test apps.

Pretty interesting. It’s not entirely new, of course. There are other headsets out there already that promise similar features. But these haven’t quite broken into our day-to-day lives.

The Vision Pro will likely become commonplace

At a starting price of around $3,500 – we won’t see it in the wild until the beginning of next year. So it’ll take a while before everyone starts buying one. But Apple’s brand recognition alone is likely to catapult the technology into quite a few people’s homes. It’s also very likely that Apple will focus heavily on the actual experience and make it feel as slick as when the first iPhone launched.

They’re also pitching it quite differently to other headsets – which are usually exclusively targeted at gaming or enterprise. Instead, Apple is focusing on an addition – potentially a replacement – for your desktop and TV. That’s likely to appeal to quite a few people and will help Apple gain a lot of ground. It’s a better use case for the majority of people.

We imagine that we’ll soon see lighter and cheaper versions – eventually replacing our phones with sleek glasses. By then, most of the apps that people use day to day will already be developed. So it’ll just be about making the device itself more portable. Sure, it’ll take a while. But that price is bound to drop.

This creates a lot of opportunities for gaming

According to The Verge, Vision Pro will have at least 100 Apple Arcade games when it first launches, which bodes well for other developers.

In fact, it’s likely the Vision Pro will appeal to techies and normies alike. Sure, at first only the hardcore people will afford it. But that’ll soon change. As soon as it’s affordable, it’ll be the people who want a massive TV but don’t have the room. Or people who just want to relax and browse the internet.

Wccftech reports that Apple originally had a target to sell one million devices, but that they’ve lowered that to 150,000. While it’s a big drop, it seems a sensible decision. And the next iteration could be far cheaper and far more ubiquitous.

And as that number grows, we’ll start to see people play around with the fact that it’s a mixed reality. Apps will start to interact with the real world. Simply, at first. And then growing in complexity.

Like with the smartphone, these people won’t see the Vision Pro as a ‘gaming’ device. But they’ll start to use it for games. The casual and hardcore gamer alike will get one – and they’ll both want to see what it can do. That’s where the opportunity lies for developers.

What will you create?

We see three kinds of game that will come out of the Vision Pro:

1. The immersive game. These will likely be big, intense games that use the hardware to its full potential. Games that completely immerse you in the world, while letting you interact with the real world. It’ll probably take a year or so before we start seeing these, though. They’ll take a long time to design and develop.
2. The ported games. These will be the games that are already out in the world, but ported over to the Vision Pro. Some will just need some adjustment to work with the new controller system (the Vision Pro uses a gesture-based approach). But these games will essentially be played on a virtual screen projected in front of you. So we’ll see mobile and console games alike being ported over to work on the Vision Pro.
3. The innovative games. There’s a whole realm of opportunity here for fun, casual games that interact directly with the world. Even something as simple as being able to bounce a ball off the wall or toss virtual paper into a real bin to score points.

These games will be small at first. Maybe little more than time-wasters and prototypes. Single mechanics that bring people a little joy. But they’ll mark a shift in how we interact with games in general. Those mechanics will bleed over into the big immersive games, as players begin to expect them as standard.

In the same way that we saw an explosion of games when the first computers were released – and again with the smartphone – we’ll see a huge surge of exploration and experimentation.

A lot will likely be on the casual side, until the hardware is beefy enough to handle the quality we’ve come to expect from our computers and consoles. They’ll be the Minesweeper and Solitaire of the future.

Get familiar with Unity

If you want to get started developing for Vision Pro, you should get familiar with visionOS. But one interesting note is that they specifically call out Unity. You can even check out Unity Beta for spatial experiences.

You’ll need to create your own benchmarks

As with any new technology, there won’t be standards and best practices for quite some time. You’ll need to track and analyze your own data to find what works and what doesn’t. If you’re using our tool, we recommend learning how to create custom events, so that you can make sure you’re getting all the data you need.

We also have a ‘Heatmaps’ feature currently in Beta, which should help you begin to track spatial analytics for AR/VR games. To request access, just get in touch via our contact form. In the meantime, sign up for our newsletter to keep up to date with anything we release to help you on your journey.

According to Statista, the VR and AR markets are steadily growing. In the next five years, almost a third of people will have a headset of some description, and there’ll be about 2.5 billion players. The average revenue per user? Likely around $14. Far higher than the $0.13 that hyper-casual games get.

But making a VR game? Well, the process isn’t all that different. It’s a lucrative opportunity for developers. So we asked Ed Lago, executive producer at Cloudhead Games, for his advice on entering the market.

Who are Cloudhead Games?

Though they were founded back in 2013, their founder – Denny Unger – has been in the VR industry since the 90s. A self-proclaimed “VR garage hacker”, he made friends with Palmer Luckey, founder of Oculus, and managed to get his hands on some prototype hardware. Since then, Cloudhead Games has created multi-award-winning titles like Pistol Whip and The Gallery series. And collaborated with industry giants like Meta, Sony, HTC and Valve.

With that in mind, what’s been the secret to their success?

Ask if your game makes sense for VR

While there are some similarities between VR and mobile games – they should be easy to learn and have straightforward mechanics – a VR game is really all about fantasy fulfilment. The player should feel like they have become someone else in another world.

“As someone who made the jump from mobile games to VR, it’s all about understanding the technology and the best use cases for it,” Ed explained. “Not all types of games work properly in this medium because of the different types of hardware. Mobile developers will typically have an easier time making games for hardware like the Quest 2, because they’re used to making games on less powerful tech. Going from mobile, to mobile VR, to PC is easier than the other way around. Devs who have only worked with PC VR and consoles will often struggle making games run properly Quest 2 hardware.”

This is particularly true when it comes to how the player actually controls their character and interacts with the world.

“In mobile games, you need to focus on the key strengths, which include using the touch screen, swiping, tapping,” Ed added. “In VR, you need to take into consideration the comfort level of the user, the physicality of your experience, the amount of load cognition, and the immersion factor when the user puts on the headset.”

So developers need to think about how their mechanics can translate across to VR. What do they need to do to get the same result? Take an endless-runner style of game. On-screen, it’s simple enough to swipe left and right to make the turns.

But how will that work in VR? Does the user physically move? That might mean the levels need fewer turns, so the player doesn’t feel sick. Or do they swing their hands? If so, does that really feel immersive?

Learn from your mistakes

Whenever you enter a new market, you’ll have teething problems. You’ll be too ambitious or create a mechanic that’s just a little too complicated for VR. That’s fine. It’s a new space; everyone is still figuring out the best practices.

“With The Gallery series, we really wanted the player to have agency and feel like they were the hero in a movie,” Ed said. “In retrospect, these games were too advanced for VR at the time. The onus was on us to not only teach the player how to play the game, but how to use VR.”

By 2019, though, Cloudhead Games applied that lesson to Pistol Whip, their latest title. The core philosophy is the same – help the player fulfil a movie hero fantasy – but the gameplay itself is much more refined.

“How could we make something that was fun, super easy to just pick up and play, but hard to master?” Ed said. “These questions resulted in us developing Pistol Whip so the controller scheme is dead easy and uses one button or motion to do multiple things. We wanted a game with low cognitive load – the opposite of what came out of The Gallery series.”

Get to know the hardware

The main limitation and challenge of all VR games is the hardware itself. In fact, there are three types of hardware you should be aware of:

• Standalone headsets. These have a mobile chipset and can be worn anywhere in the house.
• Console headsets. These are powered through a specific console.
• PC headsets. These plug directly into someone’s computer.

It’s not simply that you need slightly different versions of your game to run on each of these, but the hardware itself can vary significantly.

“Making a product for all these types of hardware – which are so different from each other, with their own set of controllers and exclusive features – and making the game look and feel good is a big technical challenge,” Ed said. “This is especially true because the users of each one of these platforms are concerned about their platform being the best for the version of the game they’re playing.”

Know the process is the same, but harder

Once you’ve decided how to tackle the hardware and design challenges, the process itself isn’t all that different from what you’re likely already familiar with.

“Everything is pretty similar,” Ed said. “We always go through the cycle of ideation, prototyping, pitching, market research, funding, getting the greenlight, pre-production, production, etc…”

But throughout that process, you need to bear in mind that the players themselves are a different beast to mobile gaming. Mobile gaming is quite familiar to almost everyone. VR? Not so much.

“Your product can literally be someone’s first-ever VR game. And it could be their last if they have a bad experience with it,” Ed explained. “We still need to convince a lot of people that VR is legitimate and that you actually can have a good time playing it. So if there’s a bad experience, there’s a big chance this person won’t believe in the medium anymore.”

Reach out to the community

While making a VR game is harder, it’s still worth the effort. The opportunities in VR are endless, and the market is much less saturated than the mobile industry. It’s much easier to get spotted. But how do you get the word out and market your game?

We spoke with Cloudhead Games’ marketing team, Alex Blahout (digital and social media marketing) and Lindsay Sherman (marketing manager), to get their advice on the next step. Their first piece of advice? Get involved with the community. There are a lot of specific VR communities you can become a part of and learn from.

“Our players’ feedback has been invaluable and helped build the foundation of our success,” Alex pointed out. There were three main areas that they focused on:

• Discord. This is where the Pistol Whip community mainly resides.
• Social media and Reddit. Here they can have fun conversations with players.
• Store platforms and forums. This is where they talk about news, support and suggestions.

Once you’ve engaged with your community, it’s time to build hype around your game.

“To understand a game like Pistol Whip, you need to see it in motion,” Alex explained. “Teaser videos and trailers have typically been the marketing priority. As we continue into 2023, we plan on making more video content than ever, so our players can really get a sense of how much playing Pistol Whip is like being dropped into an action movie.”

In those videos, the key is to develop a narrative around what it’s like to experience the game. It’s not all about the mechanics.

“Building an advertisement for any title requires telling a story,” Alex added. “Your marketing strategy requires language and visuals that clearly communicate the value: getting fit, feeling like a movie hero, enjoying the action-rhythm, etc…”

Track data inside and outside your game

Your in-game analytics will help you spot where to improve your design, just like with a mobile game. But with VR, you need to track data from more sources.

“To gauge player satisfaction and the kind of experience they want to be immersed in, we use things like store reviews and comments,” Alex said. “For example, between May and September of last year, the engagement rate for our social posts on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter doubled. That shows we have a healthy relationship with our growing community.”

What you track is subjective. But there are some useful metrics that everyone should keep an eye on. And consider data from VR stores, social media platforms alike.

“We look at our Active User data (DAU, WAU, MAU) to see how many people keep coming back to Pistol Whip, as well as to see what time periods had the most in-game engagement,” Lindsay said. “We also track data within store platforms for general performance, demographics, User Acquisition, and Marketing Attribution.”

But know that the results might not always be what you expected.

“The key difference for VR versus any other platform is, primarily, the high adoption barrier to owning a headset, combined with the (relative) newness of VR,” Alex added. “This leads to fewer opportunities to gather important data and find relevant benchmarks.”

Keep improving your design

Those metrics can help you iterate and evolve your game. For Cloudhead Games, they were able to keep track of how players were responding to their updates and new content. Back in June 2022, they released Contracts – new ways of playing Scenes (levels) and adding in new challenges every day, week and month.

“We analyze certain in-game analytics to track progress,” Lindsay said. “How many players are participating? What are they engaging in? Which Contracts are they completing? Are they going through the more vigorous monthly Contract?”

With that information, Cloudhead Games can figure out which of these challenges are successful and where they can improve them to be more fun, comfortable and challenging.

Start your journey

If you need help with keeping track of the data in your games, our free tool has SDKs that work across all the major VR platforms. So plug in and get to developing your first prototype. Get started.

If you’ve been keeping up with the news, you’ve likely seen a surge of articles about new wearable technology. Similar to Google Glass, these devices let people project a virtual world over the top of the real world.

As more and more of these devices hit the market, VR developers are seeing an opportunity to branch out and create mixed-reality experiences. So we spoke with the co-founder and president of Resolution Games, Paul Brady, to ask him his thoughts on the VR and AR world.

Resolution Games was one of the first gaming studios to enter the VR market. And recently, they started focusing almost a fifth of their efforts into mixed reality games. This year, Paul says that’s rising to almost half. But why? What’s so exciting about mixed reality? Let’s see what he had to say.

What’s the difference between VR and AR?

Virtual reality games are where the player is completely immersed in the experience. They replace the real world with a virtual one, and the headsets typically block out your view of the outside world.

On the other hand, augmented reality is where the player can see the real world – but there are virtual elements overlaid on top of it.

“In VR, you have the whole environment to consider,” Paul explained. “You get to control the whole experience – the environment and gameplay. While in AR – mixed reality – you don’t have that control. You have more restrictions. But what’s amazing is that you can relate and integrate with the environment.”

This allows players to interact with an environment they’re familiar with in completely new ways. You could hammer a hole through a wall and open a portal to a different dimension.

Resolution Games recently showed the portal wall concept in mixed reality at the Game Developer Conference (GDC) when they shared for the first time a room-scale prototype of Spatial Ops. (The open beta of Spatial Ops that requires a larger player space is currently available on SideQuest.)

Or it could be something simpler. For example, Demeo is Resolution Games’ answer to the tabletop role-playing scene, and the studio has recently integrated a mixed reality mode. You have your pieces, fully animated, on your actual dining table. If you’ve ever played a board game, often a lot is left to the imagination. But mixed reality brings that to life.

“With mixed reality, you can stay engaged with the environment. You get the best of both worlds,” Paul said. “Whereas with VR, you’re getting fully immersed. Which you choose really depends on the experience you want to create.”

What makes a good VR or AR game?

While there’s a fundamental difference between VR and AR, there are also quite a few similarities. For one, the game design principles behind them. The key, Paul explained, is making sure that they’re accessible.

“When we first started making VR games, lots of developers were making jump scares and shooters,” Paul said. “We believed there could be experiences that relaxed people, rather than scared them.”

This is why they released Bait! as one of their first titles. A simple fishing game that’s still one of the most popular VR games to date. Largely because it’s so simple to dive in. It doesn’t need to be all about hardcore action, they learnt.

Use board gaming as a starting point

“A good area of inspiration is with traditional board games,” Paul explained. “These can easily be reimagined for VR and AR as the design principles have a lot of similarities.”

Game design in the board gaming world is different from traditional gaming. They shouldn’t last too long – a few hours at most – and they don’t need to necessarily have direct conflict between the players. This makes them quite fertile ground for developers to find inspiration.

“The average playtime for Demeo is around three hours,” Paul said. “That’s actually longer than the battery life of some headsets. People will actually plug in and recharge halfway through a session.”

People tend to only want to wear a headset for a short period of time. It can often get uncomfortable after a few hours. So getting people to plug in the charger and want to stay in the world just a little longer is quite an accomplishment. But it highlights the need to have very clear limits on a session length – much like in board gaming. A couple of hours is great. But all-day sessions, like a PC or console game, aren’t likely to work.

Get into the action quickly

Another key to successful VR and AR games is making sure your player gets the content as quickly as possible.

“One of the requirements of all our games is that you need to be able to get into the game within minutes,” Paul said. “There’s a lot of preambles – checking the space, putting on the headset, launching the game – and we know there’s a clock ticking. How long are people really willing to wait before they start having fun?”

Make it social

When immersed in a different world, people naturally want to share that experience with someone else. VR has now got to the point where there are enough players to justify creating multiplayer titles, even if it’s only a handful of players at once.

“We feel like when people are in these virtual environments, they want to hang out with other people in these spaces,” Paul said. “That’s why most of our games are social multiplayer.”

Don’t feel like you need to move around a lot

A common misconception is that the player should be moving around all the time. But that’s just not true. People are happy to stay in a single space, as long as the mechanics themselves are fun.

“In most of our games, you’re just sitting or standing,” Paul said. “We don’t have a lot of locomotion. A large part of that is because we’re trying to avoid giving people motion sickness. And this has led to a lot of positive feedback from our players.”

What are the challenges of AR?

While there are more and more headsets that allow for augmented reality gameplay, there are still quite a few challenges to overcome. The processing power of the devices isn’t quite enough to cope with modern graphics, they’re expensive to buy, and there isn’t a huge audience just yet.

“There are problems to solve and standards to set,” Paul said. “But that’s what makes it so exciting. It’s untapped ground.”

One example is that you’ve got to be hyper aware of the player’s physical living space. They might only have a small space. If you assume they’re going to have a large room, you could create an environment that’s too big and clips through their real-world walls. This completely kills the immersion.

Problems like these will inevitably be solved. There’s plenty of new ground to break for those excited by the prospect of carving their name into gaming history.

Mixed reality is the new frontier

Developers have the opportunity to break into a completely new gaming segment if they start early. We can see the potential on the horizon. It’s only a matter of time before it arrives.

“AR potentially has a much bigger gaming market than VR,” Paul said. “The headsets coming out will need enough productivity apps – navigation and task management – to see widespread appeal. But it’ll get to the point where you won’t need your phone anymore, you’ll just have the glasses instead.”

At that point, AR games will likely explode in popularity. We’re not quite at the mass adoption stage right now, Paul admits. But developers can start to experiment with mixed reality now. For example, Quest 2 VR headset has the Pass Through feature. This is a perfect way to prototype and get ready for the surge of mixed-reality devices.

By experimenting using the Pass Through feature, developers can get to grips with the design principles and port those experiences over to true mixed reality headsets later down the line.

Either way, AR and VR are more accessible than ever, particularly with tools like Unity and Unreal that make building games for multiple platforms much easier. Paul’s recommendation? There’s never been a better time to get started.

About Ramen VR

Ramen VR was started by Andy Tsen and Lauren Frazier in the San Francisco Bay Area in early 2019. Together, they wanted to create an immersive Open World VR MMORPG – “the type of game they had always wanted to play but didn’t exist yet.”

With a small team, Ramen VR launched “Zenith: The Last City,” by January 2022. It was an instant hit, becoming the #1 selling game on Meta Quest and Oculus Rift, the whole Steam platform (not just SteamVR), as well as a top-selling title on PlayStation VR.

About Zenith

Not only was Zenith a top selling game across multiple platforms at launch, but it even beat out preorders for Elden Ring, and sales of Dying Light, God of War, and Beat Saber.

Zenith quickly grew a community of hundreds of thousands playing more than 2 hours per day. And, off the back of these KPIs, investor excitement grew and Ramen VR’s founders were able to raise extra capital to help them scale their studio.

“The incredible launch meant that we made all of our development costs back. And then, a couple of months later, we successfully closed a $35M Series B round,” said Ramen VR CEO and Cofounder, Andy Tsen. “This funding allowed us to grow our team and double down on Zenith.”

Ramen VR now has over 20 employees and is still growing. “Even so, we work hard to preserve the culture that got us to this point — Do Right By The Player is and continues to be our credo,” Andy adds.

Why be data-driven?

When asked why they value being data-driven and why they chose GameAnalytics to help them in this pursuit, Ramen VR’s other Cofounder and CTO, Lauren Frazier, explained:

“Without data, we knew it would be difficult to identify problems and learn what changes would have the biggest impact on our game. That’s why GameAnalytics was one of the very first tools that we integrated – so that we could understand our players and make better game design decisions. We wanted to do this quickly.”

Breazy setup

GameAnalytics can be initialized with just a single line of code, making it incredibly quick and easy to start seeing useful KPIs in pre-built dashboards.

“Another big plus about GameAnalytics was the ease of integration with our Unity-based game. At its most basic level, it could be set up in just a few minutes. That was a big benefit as we wanted to get up and running quickly without having to spend too much time on integration,” said Lauren.

This is a critical advantage for developers who want to start collecting data as early as possible in the development process – even at the soft launch stage. It means that they can focus more on improving their games and less on setting up custom data processing, allowing them to iterate faster, make more informed decisions, and ultimately deliver a better gameplay experience.

Powerful, out-of-the-box

“What’s great about GameAnalytics’ dashboards is that they can be used out of the box or customized in a flexible way. That makes them really powerful,” said Lauren.

“We can easily select the KPIs we want to track and customize the visualization of the data, like for example choosing different time ranges or segmenting by event type. We can also save these custom views for later use and our team can revisit and analyze Zenith’s performance over time,” Lauren added. “Also, seeing daily active users, returning users and retention metrics on these different dashboards is extremely helpful for high level goal setting.”

GameAnalytics offers a wide range of pre-built dashboards and flexible event types that track all of the essential KPIs that any studio needs to understand the health of their titles. These dashboards cover everything from player engagement and retention to monetization and conversion rates, giving game makers a clear and comprehensive view of performance, for individual games or even across large portfolios.

No leaky funnels!

When asked what other GameAnalytics features had the biggest impact for their team, Ramen VR highlighted ‘Funnels’. A funnel is a visual representation of the steps a player takes to complete a specific action within a game. This can include anything from making a purchase to completing a quest.

“When working on our First Time User Experience (FTUE) in early quests, we used the data from a funnel we made to show where people were dropping off,” said Lauren. “We noticed that an outsized number of people churned at one specific quest, and that spurred us to take a closer look at it, and also connect with players to better understand the reason for churning.”

By tracking the number of players who complete each step in the funnel, it’s much easier to identify areas where players may be struggling or losing interest in a visual and intuitive way. These insights can then be used to inform design decisions, including adjusting level design and progression systems. Funnels are powerful tools and, with GameAnalytics, they only take a few seconds to set up and start seeing results.

Final advice

When we asked Ramen to share any final thoughts or advice:

“Collecting feedback from real players early and often is crucial for the success of any VR game. VR is a unique platform that relies heavily on individual interactions and the moment-to-moment experience,” said Lauren. “It’s therefore essential to get your game into the hands of real players as early as possible to gather feedback and iterate on both the larger game design and smaller interactions.”

If you’re a VR game developer, it’s important to prioritize player feedback and use tools like GameAnalytics to understand player behavior. By doing so, you can improve your game design, optimize gameplay, and create an engaging and immersive VR experience that will keep players returning day after day, for hours at a time. What better way to Do Right By The Player?

Start your data-driven journey

Looking for an easy and seamless way to integrate analytics into your game? We’ve got you covered! Simply sign up to our free tool to get started, check out our SDKs and instrument your platform of choice with a single line of code. And, as a preferred partner, we make it easy to integrate with Meta Quest via one of our official SDKs. We also provide a robust Collection API that can serve all platforms, including VR.

If you’re looking for even more flexibility in accessing and processing your game data, don’t forget to check out DataSuite. When combining our free web tool with DataSuite features you can easily set up your own custom analytics stack – in a fraction of the time and cost of building it from scratch. All with the peace of mind that your data is stored and processed with the highest standards of information security.

So, what are you waiting for? Start your data-driven game development today.

VR is all about immersion. It’s about allowing players to lose themselves in more than just a game, but a new world. You have to build VR experiences the right way to make this happen. This goal is always top-of-mind for Schell Games. In this interview, we spoke to Schell Games’ Vice President of Product, Charlie Amis, to learn their story.

“For VR, you want to make the player feel like they’re actually in the world you’ve created. This isn’t as true or a high priority in PC and console games. If people start to lose that sense of presence and immersion, then a lot of the reason they put the headset on is hurt. They want to go to another world or be someone new. So you need to help them feel like they’re really there and really that new person.”

With that in mind, here’s what Charlie had to say.

Let people play out the fantasy

Simulation is key for a successful VR game. Much more so than other consoles. People want things to feel real.

“It’s clear that simulation, as both a genre and concept, is far more popular in VR than in Console and PC games. It’s also defined a bit differently. VR players generally want to experience things as close to reality as possible.”

Take your players’ imagination and turn it into a reality

When chatting with Charlie, he said one of the biggest reasons why they went with the concept for I Expect You To Die was because they asked the question:

“Would it be cool to be a spy in VR? Among Us VR is similar here, too. Being able to actually play as an Impostor or Crewmate in first person was just so appealing to players.” 

If we were to play Among Us as a real-life physical game, how would we do it? We would run around the ship and complete the tasks with our hands. That’s what the VR version should be.”

So if you’re ever stuck for ideas, think about what roles or fantasies your players will want to experience, and take it from there.

Make the gameplay satisfying

Helping a player experience their fantasy is only half of the work. You have to make the game satisfying to keep them hooked.

“Wouldn’t it be cool if you could be [fill in the blank]? So many games have that question baked into their core. Then it’s about how satisfying those interactions you can do in that new role. Does it feel good when playing? Are the interactions intuitive? Is it fun to do these interactions a ton of times?”

There’s the distinction. Start with the fantasy. And then make it satisfying and fun. That was Schell Games’ mindset when they started work on Among Us VR.

“For Among Us VR, a camera above the map facing down (like in the PC version), playing in third person, wouldn’t have worked. Players want to walk through the hallway and be physically in the game. Otherwise, what’s the point of a VR version?”

Your players won’t notice missing objects

But they will notice objects they can see but can’t interact with. If they can’t pick up or mess around with items, it can break the experience. This was especially the case with I Expect You To Die.

“There was a champagne bottle in the first level that didn’t do anything originally. But players were picking it up. And you should be able to pop the cork. You should be able to drink it. You should be able to break the bottle. And then the broken bottle shards should be able to cut things. Otherwise, you’re breaking immersion, hurting how intuitive your interactions are, and missing out on a lot of fun.”

“There are many objects in PC and console games that are just… there. Which is fine. It’s background stuff that fills the room, and you do not expect it to be interactive. But you’ll see in many VR games that there’s less junk. But the stuff that is there, the player can and should be able to interact with,” Charlie added. 

With the champagne bottle, they had a choice to make: either make it interactive or remove it altogether. Schell Games chose the first option (and they made it part of the level). But for you, if it’s too much work to develop further, then remove it. Otherwise, you’ll break the immersive experience.

You need fresh techniques to direct your players

In most flat games, you can layer different techniques to help guide your players through the level. VR, however, is more complicated. Your player could be shorter and not see or reach something. They may not know to look up. You have to give them an extra hand in places to help them progress.

“There are problems in VR where the player may not look where you want them to. And you don’t want to be too obvious; otherwise, it’s too easy and less immersive. But you can layer in techniques. So for I Expect You To Die, rather than saying ‘look up’, we had a bit of dust fall from the ceiling. We found our players naturally looked up to that. 

“In one level, we had a water tower that the player needed to interact with. Because it was far away from the player, they didn’t notice. We added a light, but it didn’t help. So we added a slow blinking light, which did catch our player’s attention. But we had to do it in a natural way,” Charlie added. 

You may have to get creative. Playtesting is crucial at this point. Getting live feedback from your players when they get stuck can help you come up with creative ideas to get around the problem.

Don’t bite off more than you can chew

Once you have the base gameplay sorted, your next job is to decide what other features to add. If you’re adapting an existing game, what changes do you make to the original version?

When recreating Among Us for VR platforms, Schell Games only made two major changes to the original game.

“We started with simple changes. Aside from making it first person, which was incredibly important, the next big one was adding spatial voice chat. It made the game feel more real. You don’t want to hear every player at the same time, but being able to hear a conversation from around the corner is exciting. You wonder, can I trust them or not? That’s interesting and new gameplay for Among Us”

There were plenty more features and mechanics the team considered adding. One, in particular, was having multiple floors on a level for players to explore.

“There’s so much more we could have done and could still do. We thought about adding multiple vertical levels to the map for players to climb to. But we decided to focus on small things first and see how the community responds before taking on more changes to the original.“

It’s better to start small and then layer in more post-launch. Not only does it help your team manage the workload, but it means you can roll out more content to keep your players engaged later. You can see what Schell Games has on their roadmap for Among Us VR to get an idea of what pace they work at.

VR takes double the time and double the tech

VR is much more demanding. It’s an entire 3D world your players can explore and get lost in. And many of the regular tricks that devs use to save on rendering costs are lost when building VR games.

“It does take much longer to build a great VR game. One example on the visual side is that players can pick up many more objects and look at them from every angle and up very close. Having your objects be static or only rendering the visible sides to save processing power doesn’t work as much in VR because of this.” 

And you can’t lose out on quality. VR games, although they’re now much better quality, can still make your players ill.

“If you’re not careful with how you develop your VR game, you can make your players physically sick. If the frame rate drops too much, or there’s a problem with the floor collision, and you fall off the map, it can be extra bad for the player. A collision glitch like that in a PC game that may be funny or silly is a lot more intense in VR.”

You’re rendering everything twice

You have two screens you’re working with. Double the screens, double the render. And at a high framerate (anything under 72fps in VR can make players uncomfortable). This is another reason you’ll find fewer objects and extraneous visual detail in VR titles.

“You have a screen for each eye, and you’re basically doubling the amount of performance costs for VR games. But it won’t be long until better tech is released and the ceiling on what’s possible rises.”

Players can move their camera into odd spots, bring objects close to their face, and the GPU needs to render two versions. So it’s demanding on the graphics card. It’s like running two copies of Fortnite on your computer – one for each eye. And unless you have your VR headset hooked up to a beefy computer, you’re working with a mobile CPU to manage all that.

Use analytics to make informed decisions

“We use analytics in a few different ways after we launch. For our I Expect You To Die games, analytics helps us prioritize and iterate which features to use for our sequels. If we know from playtesting that players generally really enjoy specific features, but we see from analytics that players aren’t engaging with them, perhaps it’s a good idea to make them more accessible in our next game.

“Analytics played a big role for Among Us VR liveops. As a multiplayer PvP (player versus player) game, it’s critical to get the balance right between crewmates and imposters. Finding out who is winning more often, when, and why, helped us to make changes to the balance and create a better experience for everyone.”

When we asked Schell Games what they’re using, they recommended User Testing for their playtesting, and GameAnalytics for collecting quantitative data.

You can’t treat AR/MR the same way as VR

Schell Games recently started building games using AR and MR technology. A lot of developers go in thinking they’re the same. But after speaking with the team, they told us that isn’t always the case.

“Mixed reality and VR have very different design aspects. You can’t control the level design much in MR and AR. Your game experience has to adapt to every player’s own space. They put the headset on to go beyond reality, but they’re still in the same room. So you have to make it extra special.”

AR games need a lighter touch than VR games. They’re much more stripped back.

“It’s tempting to add a lot to your experience. But it’s often better to add small elements that change the real world in a dramatic way. You need to work with the environment that is there and “augment” it. The more virtual objects you add, the less mixed reality it is.”

Keep it simple with small changes that make a big impact. If you add too much to AR/MR, ask yourself: Should I be making a VR game instead?

Use analytics to perfect your VR world

We have an SDK that works with VR. It’s easy to get set up and going with your own VR titles; it’s the same process as installing our normal SDKs. Sign up for our tool to get started today.

Building video games has never been a simple task. You can have a brilliant idea for a game, but without the right skills, tools and resources, it can be near-impossible to tackle by yourself. Especially if we consider something as complicated and new as virtual reality.

Not that this stopped Sergio Hidalgo. Being a one-man studio, Sergio managed to produce, release, and publish two successful VR titles. His first title, Dreadhalls, sold up to 250,000 units worldwide, and hit over 60,000 concurrent viewers on Twitch. (For comparison, Team Fortress 2’s highest was around 80,000.) While Cosmodread has had approximately 25,000 players on Steam alone. So to get his advice and learn his secrets, we sat down to hear his story and journey as a solo-game developer.

Here’s what he had to say.

1. You don’t have to have it all figured out

“I always wanted to make games – I even did small projects when I was a teen and carried on while studying computer science. But I didn’t enter the industry professionally until 2007, where I worked at a couple of small studios as a gameplay programmer. And I always had a side project on the go.”

Having a full-time job ate into Sergio’s personal dev time. It’s tricky to have enough energy to keep up with work, hobbies, friends, and life – let alone an entire game.

“One of my coworkers brought in their Oculus Rift DK1 one day. I loved it, and immediately ordered one for myself. And the timing was perfect. I just happened to start my vacation, which gave me enough time to experiment with it.

“Oculus was also running a game jam at the time, which I entered. And that resulted in the first prototype of Dreadhalls. It thankfully gained enough attention when I released it for free that I realized I could keep working on it and turn it into a full game. And so, I quit my job, and created White Door Games.”

There was never a master plan from day one. Sometimes, it’s about following your gut and what you enjoy.

2. You don’t have to start from scratch

Being a solo developer means you have very few resources to hand. So you need to be clever and use what you have wisely.

“Dreadhalls was the first VR game I made as White Door Games. It came from a project I had worked on when I was younger. A 2D, top-down stealth dungeon crawler. The player had no weapons, and had to sneak around to avoid detection.”

“So I had a game there. A good idea that I knew worked. I just had to translate it to a 3D environment. And when I played it in a VR headset, I realized just how scary it was. And I could use that to my advantage. I focused on the horror aspect to make it more engaging, and it pretty much designed itself after that. Just by asking, ‘what would make this scarier?’”

3. Build on your strengths

That doesn’t mean you shouldn’t take risks. But the same risks to a studio with a team, money and time are ten times greater to you. So it’s good to stick to what you know, and take it from there.

“I learned a lot from making Dreadhalls and all the feedback I got from players. And a lot of those lessons I carried over to my second game, Cosmodread. It’s another dungeoneering game at heart. But this time, I focused much more on the interactions and gameplay. I especially focused on having interactions that meshed well with hand-tracked controllers.”

Sergio’s first game, Dreadhalls, didn’t have such interactions. So rather than coming up with an entirely new concept for his second title, he stuck to his guns and layered in more elements – like in-game combat and the use of limited resources – to get people more engaged.

4. Understand the tech’s limitations

Technology is always evolving. And this is especially true with virtual reality. But the tech is still in its infancy, so there are limits to what you can do.

“Developing Dreadhalls was a challenge in itself. VR was in its early stages, so the platform was unstable. It’s progressed a lot, but there are still a lot of technical challenges. For example, the Oculus Quest is technically a mobile device, and so has limited power. It definitely puts a restraint on graphics, CPU use and stuff like that.”

It’s important to understand what limitations you’re working with. Otherwise, you could be facing more bugs, challenges, or a game that just won’t run well.

5. Put more focus on your design

“One of the biggest differences between VR and other devices was how similar to real-life VR is. And you need to have so much more thought when designing interactions for weapons and other gameplay elements. It’s much closer to real-life design than with more traditional games.”

A bad experience can put your players off. And even more so in VR, considering how immersive these games are compared to mobile, console and PC.

“You need to take into account things like ergonomics and hand placement. Items and weapons should be comfortable to use, and not put too much strain on the player and break their experience.”

“You even need to think about their height. If your environment doesn’t work for a taller or shorter person, or say an item is out of reach with a player with shorter arms, then you’re potentially alienating a big chunk of your player base. inclusivity is so important for VR. You should design for every body type, not just yourself.”

6. Get to know the VR market

“The VR market seems to exist as a separate entity from the main console and PC games. Especially with press outlets. Many traditional game websites simply won’t cover VR games at all, or only cover the major titles.”

This could be down to just how new the VR market is. And although it’s growing in size and popularity, it still has a long way to go when compared to its other types of gaming.

“So I try to target the few websites that specialize in VR content, plus social networks where the VR community gets its news from. The main storefronts (such as the Quest’s) are, of course, critical. So make sure you have a captivating trailer and gameplay footage.”

7. Don’t underestimate the power of your community

“When I launched Dreadhalls VR, I already had a nice following. I released a free early access version, which earned its place in the VR community. Streamers picked it up and created content around it, which gave me plenty of free publicity. When I finally released the full paid game, I had a lovely following to reach out to.”

It’s easy to be secretive and precious about your game. But the longer you wait to start talking about it, the harder it is to get the word out. Releasing a free version of your title can help you get the hype you need to climb the charts.

8. Figure out what you want to track early on

“I would say if you’re thinking about analytics, then make sure you try and track anything to do with the player’s comfort. So which locomotion options your players prefer, how they use the controls, if they prefer sitting or standing. Anything to make their experience better and more immersive.”

It’s not just your game’s metrics you want to listen to. Sergio went on to say that any information he can get about his titles can help influence his decisions.

“I use the data from the different stores, which helped me figure out what languages to localize my game to, what promotions to apply, etc… But there’s also a lot to be said for listening to the players directly. Read reviews, watch gameplay videos by content creators, and listen to what they’re saying online.”

9. Make your games immersive and interactive

Unlike any other platform, your players are there, entering a new world, completely disconnected from reality. So you want to make it special.

“Focus on interactions. Encourage your players to manipulate the world around them. I used to believe a VR headset was like a teleportation machine, where it could take the player to a completely different world – and that you should focus on designing that place. But that’s just an incomplete idea.”

“The first thing your player will do is interact with the world in some way,” he added. “Whether that be by picking up objects or trying to open doors and so on. So you’ll want to support those natural interactions, and make the world feel more real. Reward their curiosity, surprise them, and make the whole experience more immersive.”

10. Give yourself some structure

“You need some structure if you’re working alone. You need to find some way to hold yourself accountable and try not to get distracted or demotivated. As you don’t have a team that relies on you, it’s much easier to procrastinate.”

Structure is only one part here. Sergio goes on to say that you need to know how to focus and prioritize, otherwise you could spend all your time on unimportant tasks.

“It’s very easy to fall into the trap of ‘productive procrastination’, where you spend a huge chunk of time on very specific features just because you enjoy working on them. You can end up ignoring more important parts of your game. You feel productive, but you’re actually wasting your most precious resource: time.

“Keep in mind, being a solo dev doesn’t mean you’re completely alone. Find someone you trust to bounce ideas off, or even just chat about your work. A fresh perspective always helps.”

11. Keep an ideas journal

Sergio’s last piece of advice is all about saving your ideas. Having an ideas journal means you always have a place to refer back to – whether you’re starting a new project or need fresh ideas for the one you’re buried in.

“Lastly, never throw away an idea. I have a long backlog of game ideas and concepts. Even ideas for environment settings and other design elements that come from random inspiration. This could be from other games, films, books, to simply just browsing artwork on websites like ArtStation.

“It’s good to have a gameplay-first approach. I always prototype the core gameplay first, and then tackle the environment, background story and all those other elements later. Cosmodread was supposed to take place in a suburban home. But I later switched it to a sci-fi setting, since it was a much better framework for some of the gameplay interactions I found interesting (like using battery cells to power rooms).”

That’s all from Sergio. If you have a spare moment or two, make sure to check out his games, Cosmodread and Dreadhalls. There’s plenty to learn from these two titles to help get your creative juices flowing.

Obsessed with making games that people will remember for a lifetime, Halfbrick decided to convert their hit title, Fruit Ninja, into a VR game. It was a natural evolution – people apparently really enjoy slicing fruit and swinging swords. After that success, they created Fruit Ninja VR 2 – adding more features and exploration to the game.

“Making a game for VR is very, very different,” said Liam Potter, one of the lead gameplay programmers on Fruit Ninja VR 2. “There are a lot of things you need to take into account that you just don’t for console or mobile.”

With that in mind, let’s dive into those challenges and see what Liam advises.

Show players the play space early

In a VR experience, it’s incredibly difficult to make sure that players are looking where you want. Gamers notoriously fail to look up in regular games, but in VR, it’s even more of a problem. Players can look anywhere at any time. So getting them to focus on the correct place is tricky.

“If we don’t direct the player properly, they could look at it from the wrong angle or completely miss something that’s outside their field of view,” Liam said. “So we needed to let the player see the play space before anything happens. If they know where things will happen, they’re more likely actually to see it.”

So prepare your players. Show them their local surroundings, before dumping them into the action. Otherwise, they might easily get lost.

Use audio clues to grab their attention

Another method to make sure that players are looking the right way is to remember that VR isn’t just a visual experience. You can use directional sound, too.

“Audio is another major strength of VR,” Liam said. “It’s a very useful tool for directing the player’s attention. If you hear something outside your field of view, you know where it’s coming from and naturally turn your head. It’s very distinct.”

Enemy footsteps, powerups, item drops, or even oncoming danger needs these audio clues – otherwise, the player is going to miss them. Think about how frustrating it would be if you were playing a shooter game in VR and could never tell where the enemies were. So maybe in that situation, the player hears the sniper’s gun cock, before they fire.

Strip back your user interface

In VR, you can’t really have a heads-up display. It’s strange and disorienting. Instead, you’ll need to come up with other workarounds to show that same key information – in a much more immersive and natural way.

“This really changes based on what you want people to experience,” said Liam. “But if you want an immersive experience, you can’t have a HUD. It’d be floating in the corner, and you’d have to only move your eyes if you wanted to look at it. People just don’t like doing that.”

On the first Fruit Ninja VR, this wasn’t too much of an issue – there wasn’t much need for a HUD anyway. But for the sequel – where the player can explore – it presented a key challenge for Halfbrick to overcome.

“We wanted to make it more immersive,” Liam said. “So we moved all that HUD onto a physical pad – a ninja scroll. You pull it out, and it’s like a real-life tablet. You press buttons with your other hand and interact with it in a much more natural way.”

As Liam mentioned, every game is different. And you might need to come up with clever ways to show specific pieces of information. Guns can have their ammo count on the model itself. Health could be written on the back of your hand. Settings and meta-features might be on a watch. The key is making it something that feels natural to the player.

“But remember,” Liam added. “The player can’t see the controller. You can’t rely on them to remember simple button prompts. It needs to be really simple and intuitive.”

Play with immersion and interaction

One of the core mechanics of a VR game is being able to interact with the world around you. It’s such a fundamental mechanic that it feels strange if your game doesn’t include it.

“Mobile’s strength is being able to pull the game out instantly and start playing,” Liam said. “VR’s strength is immersion. So you should play with that idea. You might as well attempt to incorporate more immersive things into your game if you can. The more you are playing to the strengths of the platform, the better.”

And immersion leads to interaction. Being able to reach out and feel like you’re touching a physical object is key to VR experiences.

“But don’t mould your interactions around your design. Mould your design around the interactions,” Liam said. “Look at what’s fun – you can pick things up, throw them, look at them. Those might not change your design, but it’ll improve the immersion.”

Cater to all audiences

VR is a huge expansive arena, and there are plenty of gladiators that want to step in and try their hand at it. But the motivations of those players can vary wildly.

“One of the key motivations is exploration,” Liam said. “Some players want to really explore the map and travel around. But others want to jump right in and explode some fruit for a while.”

It’s important to cater to each of these audiences. Halfbrick navigated this challenge in more ways than one by adding a fast-travel system to their ninja scroll.

“We initially didn’t have a fast travel system,” Liam said. “But some players don’t want to walk around; they want to get into the action straight away. Why exclude those people? Now, once they’ve found an area, you can get out your scroll and boop – you’re there.”

Make sure they can physically do it

It’s really important to make sure that you think about the physicality of the game itself. In VR, people are actually moving around. There are actually three parts to this.

1. Be wary of making people feel sick

“Realistically, VR is a demanding space,” Liam said. “You can get tired and even sick while playing VR. And people’s comfort levels are very different.”

Halfbrick found this was particularly true for movement mechanics, where there are three usual ways to move around:

• Blink. The view disappears, and the user teleports to another location.
• Dash. The view surges forward and feels like it’s moving, but in a set amount for each button push.
• Smooth. The player moves around like a typical first-person game.

“Make sure you give people the option to change how the movement feels,” Liam said. “We initially didn’t have those movement controls. And we really saw that retention in the onboarding phase wasn’t doing too great. We were using analytics and saw that a decent amount of people were only using dash. But if you can’t use that mode – and that’s the only mode you think is available – you’re cutting those people off.”

Halfbrick realized that some people were just feeling sick and taking the headset off before they even really started. So they ended up showing people the movement options before the rest of the tutorial.

2. Make sure your actions don’t overlap

It’s not just moving around the map that you need to be careful with. It’s how people move their arms, too.

“When you’re in VR, you might want the player to go really crazy,” Liam said. “But they need to be able to physically do it. We could throw fifty fruits at the player, but can they physically slice those? How do we design the waves to be satisfying?”

Halfbrick needed to be constantly aware of where the player’s arm was and in what position it would end up in.

“Where is the player’s arm? If they slide across, you don’t want them to need to make the exact same action again,” Liam said. “Generally, we design our waves so that it’s fun to do combos. You want to have the player slice like seven fruit in one swing, without getting all tangled up.”

3. Consider the player’s body size

Another aspect is the player’s physical height and the length of their arms. This can affect how you design your levels.

“In normal gameplay, it didn’t really matter how tall or long someone’s arms were,” Liam said. “People can just step backwards or forward. But with archery, we had a real problem with people’s heights. If you were too short, you’d have to hold the bow up in the air to hit the angle.”

In the end, Halfbrick had to normalize the height during this section of the game – to make sure that everyone was on a level playing field.

“We also think about how we designed the space,” Liam said. “How long should the blade be? How long is the general person’s arm? That’s important, because you don’t want to be slicing the fruit at the base or the tip – and you don’t want it coming too close to your face.”

This affected how far away the fruit should be when it was flinging past the player. It had to be at that perfect distance that felt natural.

Be aware of what platform you’re using

While VR often feels like its own platform, it actually varies quite significantly between devices.

“Are you going to be on PC or console? Or are you using a standalone platform, like the Quest, where it’s not connected to anything?” Liam said. “If it’s the latter, you have to recognize that it’s essentially a mobile device. Powerful, sure. But it still has limitations.”

And those limitations might seriously affect how people feel while they’re playing your game.

“Bad performance might not kill a game on PC, but if your game runs poorly in VR, you’ll make people physically ill,” Liam said. “Imagine every time you walk through the door, and you have a frame drop. You might not notice that, but your brain will. And you’ll start to feel ill. Even small drops.”

So test thoroughly to make sure that you’re not getting any delays or lag. If there’s just a little bit, your players might stop playing.

Track how people interact with objects

“Analytics are great for every game, but those interaction analytics are super important for VR,” Liam said. “Being able to track what they’re enaging with and how long they’re interacting with it – it’s important. Once you have that info, you can ask the questions like: Are they missing anything? Is there anything they’re avoiding? Do they stick to just one interaction?”

So it isn’t just about metrics like retention. There’s far more to look at when it comes to VR.

“There are lots of metrics that can give you important insights. But what people are doing with their hands is a hugely important aspect of VR, “Liam added.

Start your own VR journey

Halfbrick uses analytics to track what’s happening in their game. If you want to get set up quickly and start developing VR games yourself, you can use our free analytics platform.

Virtual reality has been a hot topic for a few years now. And although there are a few kinks to iron out, VR is starting to take its seat in the gaming industry – it now boasts around 171 million VR users worldwide. We actually support VR games. Our SDKs work out of the box for Oculus Quest games. You just need to download our SDKs as usual, but with one extra step. (But more on that below.)

It still comes second place to most other types of gaming in the industry. (Mobile gaming is easily one of the top dogs, having generated $93.2 billion in 2021 alone.) But VR is a space to keep your eye on (or even dip your toes into).

But how do you even get started developing VR games? What tools and skills will you need? And how can you take your existing mobile titles and apply them to VR? Let’s take a look.

The good, the bad, and the VR

First of all, what are the pros and cons of developing VR games?

Pro: New space means less competition

Despite a large amount of money VR is making, it’s a small sliver of what the whole industry is making. It’s ripe to be tapped and you’ll be entering a new space with less competition.

With such promising predictions and growth, it makes sense to get a head start now.

Con: VR is trickier

It’s no secret that VR is more complicated. Engines are still building software and support for this new technology. And there’s so much more to develop, build, and test when working in a 3D environment.

But as Dr Kelso in Scrubs said: “Nothing in this world worth having comes easy.”

Pro: VR can bring life to an existing game

Adapting your best mobile game to VR can bring in a new source of revenue and audiences to your franchise. It can be less risky than starting with an entirely new and unproven project. And it can help keep your current players engaged and loyal.

Image source: Fruit Ninja VR 2 (we actually interviewed Halfbrick, have a read through here)

Con: There’s a higher risk with VR

Crafting a great VR game will need a lot more time, resources, and budget. So if your project doesn’t hit off, then that’s a lot of investment lost down the drain.

A good way to get around this is to create it as a mobile game first. Test the gameplay, try out different mechanics, and see how it performs to a select group. If it kicks off, then you know it’s worth investing. And it could also help build your following, so you already have loyal customers when your launch your VR version

Pro: VR opens up opportunities to work with brands

The metaverse is happening. We may not see it properly happen for a few years. But brands and businesses are already turning their attention and brainstorming ideas on how to enter the space.

Image source: Roblox blog

Take Gucci and Roblox. In May 2021, Gucci debuted a two-week art installation called the Gucci Garden, hoping to target young customers inside Roblox. The same could easily happen when the metaverse kicks off. And they’ll need developers and studios to work with.

Taking your mobile game to VR

It’s safe to say that most games don’t convert directly into VR. Studios have to recreate their games with new visuals and models in a brand new environment for VR.

Sure, it’s not impossible to use what you already have. But the reality is you’ll need to build your game from scratch to transform it from mobile to VR.

So here are a few steps to get you off the ground:

• First things first, you’ll need to make it 3D. A lot of mobile games start out with a 2D style. So unless you originally designed your game in 3D, you’ll need to map this out.
• Research the right engine. There are a ton of engines and platforms out there for mobile games, but only a few support VR / AR. So research which engine will be best to hold up your vision.
• Adapt your mechanics. Angry Birds is a prime example of this. On mobile, it’s a ‘tap, hold, and aim’ movement. Whereas in VR, they replicated the motions of using a slingshot. Otherwise, it wouldn’t be fun.
• Keep it short, simple, and fun. Virtual reality demands so much more from the player in terms of senses and spatial awareness. It can be pretty alarming and overwhelming for new users. So it’s crucial to keep gameplay simple and easy to understand.
• Sort out your analytics. We’re kind of experts in this. But take it from us, mapping your event tracking and analytics in a VR game versus your mobile game is trickier. Our platform supports VR and you just need to install our SDKs to get started: Unity, Unreal, or Android.
• Think about what you want to track. Moving to VR means that you’ll need to think about how you should track spacial metrics. How do players look around? How are they moving around the space? Do your players prefer to stand still or duck and weave?

You might need to team up with a VR studio

It depends on how big of a project you want to take on. VR games are a lot more demanding than traditional mobile titles. So partnering up with experts could get your title to where it needs to be. To give you an idea of what we mean, when the team at Resolution Games built Bait! VR, they had around eight people working on the project.

Looking for some inspiration? Check out these five games that nailed shifting to VR.

Download our SDKs to get started

Our GameAnalytics SDKs support VR games (we have a few up and running already). It’s the same process as installing our normal SDKs, with one extra step. Read our documentation for each to get started: Unity, Unreal, or Android. We also took the time to guide you through integration for Meta Quest 2.

Fancy some more reading about VR? Check out these articles:

• 5 mobile games that nailed shifting to VR.
• How to build successful VR games as a solo developer
• Among Us VR dev talks about how to create immersive worlds

Virtual reality is no new concept. Have you ever heard of Sword of Damocles? It was invented by Ivan Sutherland and Bob Sproull, it was arguably the first VR / AR head-mounted display connected to a computer. That was in 1968. Today mobile games are at the start of shifting to VR

But it wasn’t until 1987 that Jaron Lanier used the name ‘virtual reality’ for the first time. He coined the term to help better describe his research. His company was the first ever to sell VR goggles, called the EyePhone, which cost upwards of $250,000 (including the computer to run it).

Image source: Flashbak

Of course, technology has come a long way since 1968.  In 2021, the global VR market size was just under $5 billion, and research shows that we’re now predicting the market to increase to more than $12 billion by 2024. There are over 200 titles available on the Oculus Quest 2, and of course, you can rule them all on this platform using our 100% compatible GameAnalytics Android SDK. The PSVR counts over 500 titles as well. Many of our existing, well-supported SDKs work with VR games, and we’re already enabling some of the hottest VR developers to get usage and gameplay insights. But more on that later.

So there’s potential to enter this space early. But what about mobile titles that have turned to VR? What’s been working? Well, here are the best mobile games that switched to VR.

1. Fruit Ninja VR by Halfbrick Studios

Originally launched back in 2010 on Apple devices, Fruit Ninja was one of the first excellent smartphone app to enter the market. It quickly helped set the scene for what mobile gaming could achieve. And honestly, it was a no-brainer propelling this title inVR.

VR opened new opportunities for Halfbrick

Halfbrick first decided to test their game on the HTC Vive in 2016. Like the mobile version, you need to hack and slash fruit in the air to get as many points as possible. The most significant difference is that you’re equipped with two samurai swords in the VR version, rather than just swiping with your finger. And to keep it fresh, they layered in a new mode, where robots shoot fruit at you, rather than it flying up from the ground.

It’s been such a success that the studio has gone and developed Fruit Ninja 2 – where players can experience a range of new challenges. And instead of hacking and slashing, they use a bow and arrow to hit all those pieces of fruit.

We actually interviewed Halfbrick recently to get their insights into taking mobile to VR. Have a read through the interview here.

2. Angry Birds VR by Resolution Games and Rovio

Another veteran is having a go at VR: Angry Birds by our friends at Rovio. It first came to VR in early 2019 on PlayStation, and Rovio partnered up with VR specialists Resolution Games to tackle this title.

Simple mechanics and traditional gameplay

One of the best things about Angry Birds is that it’s beautifully simple. It was one of the first casual games to hit the market in 2009. Players could immediately pick it up and within seconds, know exactly what the game is about.

The same applies to their VR experience, too. The main changes they introduced were turning it 3D but also adapting controls. Players have to pull the slingshot back to hit the target physically. Meanwhile, players can also travel around the area and hit the structures from different angles. This was a brilliant addition to the game to make it truly feel 3D, without distracting away from the core gameplay happening in x,y,z.

Psst… A little while back, Rovio’s Elif Buyukcan gave us a talk on how they optimize rewarded ads in their Angry Birds games – with help from machine learning and artificial intelligence. This is what we learned.

3. Space Team by Cooperative Innovations

Space Team is one of the most chaotic co-operative mobile games out there. Each player downloads the game on their phone, and they get a specific set of cards and instructions. Players need to work together to overcome whatever anomaly they’re up against.

Big changes that just made sense

Despite the game initially launching in 2012, Cooperative Innovations saw an opportunity to move the title to VR. They launched the new version on Playstation 4 in May 2020, just in time for lockdown.

This game needed a ton of work to shift to VR. Originally a card game, they had to create a whole new environment for gamers to play in, as well as avatars, controls, and more. But they did it well. And made the right choice.

4. Temple Run by Turtle Rock Studios

The classic title, Temple Run, it was one of the first mobile games to make its way to VR truly. It was released on the Samsung Gear VR headset in December 2014. And considering how old this title is (well, for the gaming world), we’re pretty impressed with how Imangi Studios transformed this popular mobile title into VR. They stayed true to the core gameplay, making it almost identical, the only difference being that it’s now first person.

One annoying thing about the game is that you need a touchpad to play. This makes sense, as the tech for VR was nowhere near as good as it is now.

Runaway VR is what Temple Run VR should have been

The kudos (or at least some of it) should actually go to Panoramik Inc. They created Runaway VR back in 2017 for HTC Vive, a replica of Temple Run. But with much better controls and smoother artwork.

In this version, players have to actually physically jump and move from side to side to avoid obstacles and collect coins (rather than use a touchpad or controller). This really adds to the gameplay and experience. And we imagine if Imangi Studios were to recreate Temple Run VR now, we’d probably see them do the same thing here. (In fact, they’ve been creating some pretty cool VR games over the years.)

5. Five nights at Freddy’s: Help Wanted by Steel Wool Studios

FNAF is a classic PC horror game. Although not originally built for mobile, we still reckon this is worth a shout-out in this article, as the developers behind this series did a stellar job at reworking this title across multiple platforms.

The series originally came out in 2014 for PC and mobile and eventually made its way over to VR in May 2019. It was easily one of the most anticipated horror VR games to come out, and rightfully so.

Take full advantage of the VR space

While keeping true to the core gameplay and story, Steel Wool Studios did a brilliant job layering in new mechanics and using the entire space around the player. Physically reaching to press a button adds to the player’s level of anxiety, as they have to turn their head to watch the panels and doors. VR adds to the experience for this type of game, so really, it only needed a few tweaks to perfect the experience.

If you’re thinking of switching, we’ve got your back

Not everyone will want to switch over to VR completely. Which is fine. It’s still a new and emerging space. But for those who do, it’s an excellent opportunity to be the first on the ground.

If you make the switch, the one big thing we learn from all these games is that things are different in VR. Players act differently than they would on mobile or even on PC, and they explore the space differently, and the usual tricks to force them to spot certain items don’t always work.

This means you’ll need to track different metrics. Thankfully, one of our 35 Integrations and SDK already works out of the box with Oculus Quest. You just need to download them as usual (with one extra step to get them to work with VR). Read our documentation here: Unity, Unreal, or Meta Quest 2 SDK.