SIF: Hands-on with Spheres, Buddy VR and much more!

I’ve returned to Italy, but there is still so much I have to tell you about the Sandbox Immersive Festival in Qingdao! Are you ready for some new reviews?

Spheres

I know the name “Spheres” since a lot of time. This experience created some buzz because it has been the first virtual reality storytelling experience that has been acquired for a seven-figure amount. Some months ago, it has been showcased in an exclusive location in New York and people even paid $50 to be able to try this 3-episodes content set in space.

That’s why when I discovered that Spheres was available at SIF, I did everything I could to be able to experience it, praying people in Chinese to let me see how this fantastic experience was. I put the headset on with much excitement, and my impression has then been

I mean, Spheres is a good experience, but it has not been my favorite VR experience at Sandbox festival, not even in the group of the first three. I would never pay $50 to watch it, but maybe just because it is not my genre. Let me explain why.

Spheres is an experience by Eliza McNitt that talks you about the solar system and the whole universe. The name “Spheres” clearly alludes to the shape of the planets, that are just spheres in the outer space. The first episode is about the solar system and lets you see all the planets of our system. The second is about the universe and the black holes. The third one… well, was not available at SIF.

It could be defined as a mix of art and education. It is a real-time rendered experience (I guess they have used Unreal Engine), in which you can navigate in the cosmos and see the planets, the stars, etc… You can hear the sounds of the universe, you can see things that you are not able to see in real life (e.g. you can see the electromagnetical fields of the Earth, represented as abstract colored waves surrounding it), you can try things that you will never be able to try (like navigating into a Black Hole).

While you explore the universe, a soothing voice narrates you what you are seeing and what you should learn about it. For instance, in the first episode, the voice described all the planets of the solar system: their name, their features, their orbits, etc… The voice narrating the experience is different in every episode. The first one is narrated by Millie Bobby Brown, the second one by Jessica Chastain and the third one by the popular singer Patti Smith. Voices are very calm and relaxing, and are perfect for an experience that is set in such a relaxing environment like the outer space.

The experience also features various interactions: for instance, when the voice talks you about the various planets of the Solar System, you are then able to take your Oculus Touch controllers and swing the planets in a sense or in the other one. In the second episode, you can make a star grow by moving your hands. Interactions all happen in a binary, in the sense that you can’t interact with the visual elements as you wish, but just as instructed by the voice. Their purpose is to make you feel less as a passive viewer in the experience.

What I loved of Spheres have been the quality of the multimedia assets: the graphics are top-notch ones and the visuals effects are crafted with astonishing particle systems. Waves, clouds, rays, are all created with stunning quality, a quality you won’t probably find in other experiences about the cosmos. The part that I loved the most has been when I have been able to enter a black hole: it is something that I will never be able to do in my life and it had been depicted with amazing colors and visual effects. I started entering the orbit of the black hole and then I got sucked slowly, completely, until I entered the hole. I was able to see the rays emanating from my hands being attracted towards the hole, from which nothing could escape. It has been a memorable experience.

Also, the audio quality is awesome and the voice makes the experience more complete: it is always relaxing and explains to you what you are seeing with elegance and clarity.

After all this highlight of mine on the high quality of the experience, you may wonder why I have not liked it. The answer is: I think that it is a high-quality experience… but it is not an experience I have pleasure in being in. First of all, it is too slow. Everything happens in a very slow time-scale: exactly as the Universe only moves very slowly, also the experience moves very slowly. Even the initial credits shown before every episode take a lot of time to be seen. This slow pace makes me incredibly bored. It is a matter of taste, of course: probably the creator wanted to make the experience more relaxing, probably wanted to show that it is slow like the rhythm of the universe, probably wanted it to be slow so that to make people learn few concepts in an efficient way. In any case, the pace felt really artificial to me: there was no reason to go THAT slow and this made me feel bored and irritated.

Furthermore, I couldn’t understand what was the point of the experience. I mean, it contains some educational notions, but what it teaches about the universe is absolutely not enough: just few concepts here and there, without offering a full astronomy lesson. It could be considered an artistic experience, but at this point, I don’t get the need of adding interactions and a voice explaining some scientific topics. I have not even understood completely the reason for many of the included interactions, that felt to me sometimes to not be completely blended into the experience. For instance, when I had to make the planets rotate around the sun with my hands, rotating them actively didn’t give me any advantage over if they had rotated automatically. This didn’t give me more sense of presence.

I think that if you like the idea of traveling the outer space, Spheres can be seen as a very good relaxing experience. Thanks to its slow rhythm, the soothing voice, and very high-quality visuals, I think that it is ideal to relax. In fact, many videos on Youtube about Spheres are tagged as ASMR (that is something like a relaxing technique). If this is your genre, then Spheres is something you will love. If instead, you are not into slow relaxing experiences, then it is not for you. And it is not for me, either.

Buddy VR

Buddy VR is an experience by the Korean director Sooeung “Chuck” Chae, that has been awarded as “Best VR experience” at the 75th Venice Film Festival.

It narrates the story of a little mouse, Buddy, that lives in a small concession stand in a theme park in 1962. You save his life by removing the cheese from a trap that is in this place and letting him enjoy the food in peace without dying. After that, you become as little as him and you can start having some little adventures with him.

What you will do with him won’t be incredible, you won’t fly on a unicorn shooting laser rays at zombies (even if that would be cool), you will just live together some funny and less funny moments, as all friends do in real life. When you become little, Buddy introduces itself by writing his name on a little piece of plastic and then it gives the same object to you so that you can write your name with your controllers. After you have presented yourselves, you will start having fun with Buddy, eating stuff, playing the drums with the objects that you have around you and fighting against a little angry fat annoying girl that enter the stands and that wants to eat the candies.

The experience is about friendship: Buddy is a nice mouse and you spend some time together with him, becoming his friend. As I’ve told you, there’s nothing particularly special you do together, but thanks to the fact that he is very friendly, that you have fun together and that at the end you fight to save his life from the evil girl, you will start feeling a bond with this little creature. And the final moment (spoiler alert!) when Buddy makes for you a drawing depicting you two together, using the name that you wrote for him at the beginning, makes you also move a bit.

Regarding the technical features, the experience has a cartoon graphical style and the visuals are very good (I loved especially the lighting), exactly as the sound. Maybe personally I would have modeled Buddy a bit in a different way, but this is a matter of taste. I appreciated the interactions because they felt really well integrated into the story: it is an experience about doing things with your virtual friend, so it is natural that you will have to interact with various stuff. Even the first interaction that requires you to write your name, and that feels useless in that moment, reveals to be incredibly powerful in the end with the final drawing.

I loved being at the beginning as big as in real life and then becoming very little. It was magical seeing all the normal-sized objects (e.g. a chocolate bar, or a fork) suddenly appear as enormous. It was scary to see the hands of the nasty girl moving towards me because they looked like the dangerous hands of a giant. The magic of VR let me see how it is living as a little mouse, with all the fun and all the dangers.

In the end, I liked Buddy VR, especially for the bond that it made me create with this little lovely mouse.

Kobold

Kobold is an experience that I’ve been able to try only in part. It is a thriller horror adventure: a boy has disappeared and you have to investigate to find him.

Of course, it won’t be easy and especially, it will be quite creepy: I started the experience into a house that looked abandoned, in the middle of nowhere. There was no electricity and I had to find how to activate it. Since there was no light, I had to use a flashlight, and strange noises from all around me scared me all the time. The objects that I found during my adventure where all creepy and this increased my level of discomfort a lot.

Unluckily, I have been able to try it only 15 minutes because the SIF venue had to close. But in that time, I realized how the horror atmosphere has been crafted perfectly: I was always scared, thanks to a wise combination of lighting, creepy sounds, scary visuals, etc… In my time enjoying the experience I found no real danger (e.g. a killer), but I was always uncomfortable. I also loved the fact that you can find a lot of materials (videos, photos, etc…) inside the experience that will let you feel more into the story.

Speaking with other people at Sandbox, I discovered that no one there has been able to finish it: the experience is long and it is very easy to die, because every action in this game has its consequences. And some of them are really bad.

I love horror and so I loved the horror vibes of Kobold. Unluckily, I have not had a full hands-on with it, so consider this just a first impression on the experience.

Common Ground

Common Ground is a long journey inside the crisis of UK’s housing system. As the author describes it

Common Ground explores the notorious Aylesbury Estate, home to thousands of South Londoners, and a concrete monument to the history and legacy of social housing in the UK. The Aylesbury Estate is undergoing a massive regeneration scheme that will see big changes to the community of thousands that live there and call it home. Common Ground mixes 360 video and real-time environments to allow people access to areas of the estate itself and personal spaces of residents, in order to examine how design, planning, dreams of utopian living and the political will of the day has affected the ordinary people caught in its midst. Utilising stereoscopic 360 video, photogrammetry, 3D modeling, and archive the viewer enters the world of the estate from its birth in 1960’s, through its decline and up to its controversial regeneration today. This multifaceted documentary questions notions of community, examines the dis-enfranchisement and demonization of the working class, and ask whether current housing policy today is destined to repeat the mistakes of the past.

While I loved the idea of giving voice to people that are usually un-heard, I have found the experience mostly boring. It was very slow and without an actual climax. I haven’t even understood completely why it should be in VR. “VR is an empathy machine”, but I think that to explore this topic, a 2D video would have been enough. 30 minutes is also too much for it, IMHO.

That’s it for today! Have you tried these experiences? If yes, let me know your impressions in the comments or on my social media channels!