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Rift S - Please read before you buy - Tracking problems with realistic FPS sims & Archery

SkScotchegg
Expert Trustee
EDIT: NEW UPDATE PLEASE READ - Read this first before continuing - Oculus has now released a new beta update called 1.39 which fixes many of these issues - I have eddied my main post of this thread so newcomers to Rift S can read this good news on how to fix their issues before continuing...You have to go into your Oculus software, click settings, click the Beta TAB at the top, click the button next to "Public Test Channel" which will automatically download Oculus software 1.39 and restart Oculus. Once you have installed this software update you will see that tracking has been massively improved for FPS games when holding two handed rifles and aiming down scopes. I have tested this on Onward today and played for over 3 hours and now the game is very playable. Before this update I couldn't play any FPS with two handed weapons, now they all seem to work fine!! Well done Oculus devs and thanks for the software update!  🙂


Original post below:
Hey everyone, I got my Rift S on launch day and was initially really impressed. But since then I have tried a wider verity of games and have since discovered a glaring issue with Rift S which is the tracking.

Before Rift S launched I was worried about the sound, that was my only concern, and yeah the sound isn't great but when I used my own headphones that solved the problem so when I was playing Robo Recall, Beat Saber, and Audica etc it all looked and performed fantastic and I soon forgot about the sound as I was enjoying the games so much.

But last night I bought Contractors on Steam which appears to be a great multiplayer FPS with great graphics but unfortunately is completely unplayable on RIft S! There's simply no other way to say it.

FPS games like Onward, Contractors, Pavlov and Archery games like In Death/Sacralith just aren't going to work with Rift S. You can't aim down the sites, soon as you hold your right hand up to your face in the normal position to look down the sites of a rifle or to look down an arrow the tracking freezes in place and stops working and makes it impossible to aim.

So after playing with Rift CV1 for the past 2.5 years this is completely dreadful. And btw the first year or so with CV1 I only had 2 front sensors which worked perfectly, the only reason I bought a 3rd sensor in the 2nd year was for pavlov so I could pick up weapons from the floor, so since then I used 3 camera setup in my dinning room and the Rift tracking was 100% perfect and never lost tracking for me.

If your planning on only playing Arcade games like Robo Recall, Superhot, Beat Saber and Audica, you will be fine, go ahead and buy Rift S and enjoy the amazing clarity of the optics and increased resolution.

But if you want to play FPS games or Archery games, your basically buying a product that does not work, your wasting your money and would be better buying a 2nd hand Rift CV1 off ebay/amazon.

Of course we heard in the past that Oculus could enable the old CV1 room sensors through software, I desperately hope they do this, otherwise for people like me that enjoy FPS/Archery games as well as the usual Arcade games, I'm stuck between a rock and a hard place, because I like Rift S, but what am I suppose to do? Use Rift CV1 for half my games library??

I'm quite shocked and hugely disappointed by this, I think maybe what other people were saying about Lenovo was right, I don't think Oculus/Facebook should have partnered with them because if this is the outcome then, well, no thanks.

I feel sorry for everyone who has pre-ordered expecting to play Onward/Contractors/Pavlov/In Death/
Sacralith etc and expecting this to be good. I think we need to all sign a petition to Oculus to enable the old CV1 room sensors for proper tracking otherwise they will have a lot of refunds going in and also this is very bad for people new to VR. In fact I'd go as far as to say that all FPS and Archery games should be taken off Oculus store for Rift S owners until this is resolved because otherwise what's the point? Everyone buying those games will have to refund I suppose.

Sorry for the rant guys, but I felt compelled to inform the community of this. People need to know how bad this tracking really is.

And also before Rift S was released people were saying the future is inside/out tracking. Well I'm sorry guys, but you couldn't of been more wrong. Inside/out tracking only works for Arcade games, sim racing games, elite dangerous and maybe Quest if Quest mainly uses Arcade games too? I'll leave that part for Quest users to comment on.

I own Rift CV 1, Oculus GO and now Rift S, was planning on buying Quest too but I'll hold off on that for a while until I read more reviews. 
UK: England - Leeds - - RTX 2080 - Rift CV1 & Rift S - Make love, not war - See you in the Oasis!
356 REPLIES 356

SkScotchegg
Expert Trustee
Hey guys I'm back! I've just tried a whole heap of games and I'm sorry to say but this is completely FUBAR!  :'(

These are the games I've just tried today:

Skyrim
Pavlov, 
Apex Construct
Onward
Gun Club VR

===Tried last night===
In Death
Constructors

And I'm sorry to say but all of these games are now unplayable in Rift S due to the poor tracking. As well as the ones I mentioned previous which were In Death and Contractors. So that's 7 games in total I've tried.

4 games with rifles and 3 games with Archery, if you play Skyrim without using a bow then I guess you won't care if you just play melee and/or spell casting then Skyrim would be ok for you but using the bow to hunt out in the wild is one of my most favourite things to do in Skyrim.

When playing Pavlov, Contractors, Onward and Gun Club, I just can't use any kind of rifle for zooming in or even a basic sight like red dot doesn't working either. It's really bad guys, like just wait until you try it for yourselves, you'll see what I mean. It's terrible and ruins the game play and immersion. 

Oh man, this is depressing. I'm glad they enable the use of two headsets in Oculus software (perhaps they knew about this and predicted this! lol) because I'm going to have to play all FPS and Archery in CV1 from this point onwards and play all other types of games in Rift S. I'm glad I didn't sell my CV1 now, otherwise I'd be screwed.
UK: England - Leeds - - RTX 2080 - Rift CV1 & Rift S - Make love, not war - See you in the Oasis!

RattyUK
Trustee
Thanks @SkScotchegg  - sad about Skyrim archery :s
My S arrives tomorrow so I'll play around with various games and share anything new I find.
PC info: AMD Ryzen 9 5900X - Sapphire 7900XTX - 32GB DDR4 4000 - 3 NVMe + 3SATA SSD - Quest 2 & 3

SkScotchegg
Expert Trustee

RattyUK said:

Thanks @SkScotchegg  - sad about Skyrim archery :s
My S arrives tomorrow so I'll play around with various games and share anything new I find.



Yeah please do. I feel like we're going to need the whole community to pressure Oculus to sort this out.
UK: England - Leeds - - RTX 2080 - Rift CV1 & Rift S - Make love, not war - See you in the Oasis!

MowTin
Expert Trustee
Maybe there's something wrong with one of the cameras on your HMD. How else can you explain how your experience is different from so many people? 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UQJNop_K1Dg
i7 9700k 3090 rtx   CV1, Rift-S, Index, G2

SkScotchegg
Expert Trustee

MowTin said:

Maybe there's something wrong with one of the cameras on your HMD. How else can you explain how your experience is different from so many people? 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UQJNop_K1Dg



I'm not sure what you mean by lots of people, I've not read of more then 2 people who said they could aim in Skyrim and Apex. 

And even in that video you just linked if you look at the uploaders comment under the video he wrote this:

"Another Pavlov Rift S tracking test. In these tests, I wiggle the rear hand while backing my hands up to the headset. Watch for the sudden halts of the wiggling. This should give you an indicator of how far into the sights you can get before you lose tracking. Tested with 3 weapon types and 3 scopes."

If you watch the video you can even see the halts when it gets stuck and freezes, that is what I have experienced too. Also he is purposely holding the riffle further away then you would naturally when playing these types of games.

I promise you 100% when everyone gets their hands on Rift S who has pre-ordered and they try the 7 games I mentioned we're going to have a shit storm. 

All I want to do is run around in Onward, aim my rifle and shoot! Same with In Death I just wait to aim, shoot and get a HS with my bow and arrow but I can't now because your constantly fighting the tracking, it constantly freezes and get's stuck when it loses tracking due to the hand been so close to the head.

I can play Robo Recall, Superhot, Beat Saber, Audica etc fine, it's just these 7 games. The games that do work are the games where you hold your hands out in front and not constantly bringing your hands close to your face.

EDIT: Also I'm not trying to be arrogant when I say this, I'm really not but there's no other way to say it, if anyone uses a bow in In Death and try's to do long distance HS and tells me it doesn't freeze or get stuck then they're either lying or don't know what they're talking about.

Same goes for Onward & Constructors etc, there's no way you can run around, hold up your rifle with your hand at your face and aim and shoot, there's simply no way without fighting against the tracking cutting out.

EDIT 2: Also one last thing, I find that aiming from the hip or lower chest works ok in these games, using pistols is ok too because you hold them out in front. It's just any kind of rifle that you hold up high with any type of scope/sight where the problems start. 
UK: England - Leeds - - RTX 2080 - Rift CV1 & Rift S - Make love, not war - See you in the Oasis!

RuneSR2
Grand Champion



MowTin said:

Maybe there's something wrong with one of the cameras on your HMD. How else can you explain how your experience is different from so many people? 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UQJNop_K1Dg



I'm not sure what you mean by lots of people, I've not read of more then 2 people who said they could aim in Skyrim and Apex. 

And even in that video you just linked if you look at the uploaders comment under the video he wrote this:

"Another Pavlov Rift S tracking test. In these tests, I wiggle the rear hand while backing my hands up to the headset. Watch for the sudden halts of the wiggling. This should give you an indicator of how far into the sights you can get before you lose tracking. Tested with 3 weapon types and 3 scopes."

If you watch the video you can even see the halts when it gets stuck and freezes, that is what I have experienced too. Also he is purposely holding the riffle further away then you would naturally when playing these types of games.

I promise you 100% when everyone gets their hands on Rift S who has pre-ordered and they try the 7 games I mentioned we're going to have a shit storm. 

All I want to do is run around in Onward, aim my rifle and shoot! Same with In Death I just wait to aim, shoot and get a HS with my bow and arrow but I can't now because your constantly fighting the tracking, it constantly freezes and get's stuck when it loses tracking due to the hand been so close to the head.

I can play Robo Recall, Superhot, Beat Saber, Audica etc fine, it's just these 7 games. The games that do work are the games where you hold your hands out in front and not constantly bringing your hands close to your face.

EDIT: Also I'm not trying to be arrogant when I say this, I'm really not but there's no other way to say it, if anyone uses a bow in In Death and try's to do long distance HS and tells me it doesn't freeze or get stuck then they're either lying or don't know what they're talking about.

Same goes for Onward & Constructors etc, there's no way you can run around, hold up your rifle with your hand at your face and aim and shoot, there's simply no way without fighting against the tracking cutting out.


You're definitely not alone, check out Reddit, several users are experiencing severe tracking issues in fps and archery games.

Well, I plan to keep CV1 too for games that need it, Index for the rest - unless Index reviews reveal serious problems...

Oculus Rift CV1, Valve Index & PSVR2, Asus Strix OC RTX™ 3090, i9-10900K (5.3Ghz), 32GB 3200MHz, 16TB SSD
"Ask not what VR can do for you, but what you can do for VR"

SkScotchegg
Expert Trustee

RuneSR2 said:

You're definitely not alone, check out Reddit, several users are experiencing severe tracking issues in fps and archery games.

Well, I plan to keep CV1 too for games that need it, Index for the rest - unless Index reviews reveal serious problems...



Sounds like a plan mate. Well if I come across negative in my post I don't mean to, I just wanted to express my disappointment and help the community out by letting them know what to expect if they're already pre-ordered Rift S. I've got 4 hours before bed so I'm going to spend the majority of that time playing Audica/Beat Saber and maybe some Robo Recall. I'm sure I'll have a great time with Rift S and these 3 games.

I'm not going to let it bother me, I'll just wait a few weeks/months and see how Oculus responds.

And yeah I'm also very interested in Valve Index, one of the reasons I didn't pre-order was because I don't like god rays and I heard it has bad god rays due to two layers of optics on top of each other, so we'll have to wait and see but the main reason I want Index is for the extra FOV and refresh rate. If the reviews turn out fantastic I'll no doubt buy that too.
UK: England - Leeds - - RTX 2080 - Rift CV1 & Rift S - Make love, not war - See you in the Oasis!

Morgrum
Expert Trustee
Honestly I think its a software issue rendering what is picked up.
I am hopeing a update fixes the issue because such an issue is a manor problem with the ammount of FPS style games for VR
WAAAGH!


Morgrum said:

Honestly I think its a software issue rendering what is picked up.
I am hopeing a update fixes the issue because such an issue is a manor problem with the ammount of FPS style games for VR



Now that's what i call hedging your bets mate     😄

By the way, this sounds pretty awful and needs sorting as soon as possible.  This must have been noticed during testing!
Big PC, all the headsets, now using Quest 3

rVRcloset
Heroic Explorer
Tried Onward today and worked fine to aim for me, haven't tried skyrim yet.
The Closet Sim Rig
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