The New Era of Virtual Reality Locomotion: A Systematic Literature Review of Techniques and a Proposed Typology

Abstract

Abstract:The latest technical and interaction advancements that took place in the Virtual Reality (VR) field have marked a new era, not only for VR, but also for VR locomotion. Although the latest advancements in VR locomotion have raised the interest of both researchers and users in analyzing and experiencing current VR locomotion techniques, the field of research on VR locomotion, in its new era, is still uncharted. In this work, VR locomotion is explored through a systematic literature review investigating empirical studies of VR locomotion techniques from 2014-2017. The review analyzes the VR locomotion techniques that have been studied, their interaction-related characteristics and the research topics that were addressed in these studies. Thirty-six articles were identified as relevant to the literature review, and the analysis of the articles resulted in 73 instances of 11 VR locomotion techniques, such as real-walking, walking-in-place, point and teleport, joystick-based locomotion, and more. Results showed that since the VR revival, the focus of VR locomotion research has been on VR technology and various technological aspects, overshadowing the investigation of user experience. From an interaction perspective, the majority of the utilized and studied VR locomotion techniques were found to be based on physical interaction, exploiting physical motion cues for navigation in VR environments. A significant contribution of the literature review lies in the proposed typology for VR locomotion, introducing four distinct VR locomotion types: motion-based, room scale-based, controller-based and teleportation-based locomotion.

Rapid, Continuous Movement Between Nodes as an Accessible Virtual Reality Locomotion Technique

“…Teleportation regained traction as a locomotion technique as part of the new wave of headsets [25]; a revival which was fueled by the provision of an arc-based point-and-teleport system in Steam's (free) VR plugin for Unity and Unreal. First-person games will typically offer teleportation as a default locomotion technique for novice VR users and continuous free motion for the more experienced.…”

WRD: an approach for evaluating the performance of training program in virtual reality

“…It was shown that VE has an influence on emotional states and stress resistance [3]; thus, this one could activate the corresponding behavior like in the real world [4]. The analysis mentioned above shows the potential of VR in the context of increasing the effectiveness of learning and simulation training.…”

3D visualization of 2D/360° image and navigation in virtual reality through motion processing via smartphone sensors

“…The purpose of our model is to make a better Virtual Reality Experience bringing new elements that has not been introduced in mobile virtual reality [1]. Generation 3D virtual experience from a single 2D image through a computer generated system is highly unlikely, due to the lack of depth information and dimensional limitations [2].…”

“…Rollmann 1st introduced the idea of 3D anaglyph through viewing a yellow blue drawing with red and blue glasses [5]. He also found that with a red and blue drawing the outcome was not as perfect as it is with the yellow and blue drawing because the red and blue line drawing are not visible with the yellow and blue glasses [1,6]. In 1858, Joseph D'Almeida projected the 1st 3D magic lantern where the audience wore green and red Google to view the 3D lantern [1/6].…”