Head movement in first person games

[Nash]

What are your thoughts about first person games that ship with head bobbing as a default feature for the player movement? Do you hate them or do you think it adds to the immersion? Any of you with severe medical conditions where basically head bobbing is off limits?

[wildweasel]

I love it. I like when games like Borderlands or Call of Duty add mild head movement to reloads and melee attacks, because it adds a lot to the feeling of weight and power. But I do agree that it's not for everyone, and there should always be an option to adjust the intensity, if not disable it entirely.

[Viscra Maelstrom]

seems like a cool idea, and it'd definitely help with the immersion, which is a big part of FPS games. however, i agree with WW that it should be an option.

[Athel]

I like it, but only when its used the "correct" way. The Lost Valley vid does it right, while the UE4 just does it a bit too much, IMO. When its used right, its perfect, and I wish I was a coding genuis to add it in a doom mod.

[YukiHerz]

I like both real and exaggerated head motion, agree it should be an option, i only get "weird eye feelings" when i bump into a wall in front of me in pixelated games, and i don't like linear filtering on games that weren't made for it.

[Caligari87]

This is something I've given a lot of thought to. There's right and wrong ways to do head bobbing. Arma, for example, does it wrong. The head behaves more like a handheld camera than anything, which leads me to turn head bobbing off. Most other games seem to just offset the view slightly, like Doom does.

Now, IMO the view should reflect how your eyes work. Namely, your focus or whatever you're looking at should remain the same. Now, the head camera can bob around, but it should also pivot to maintain your view centered on the focal point. I don't think I've seen a game that does this, or if it does the effect is more subtle than I picture, but I'm not sure why it's not common sense. Anything else would just be rather unnatural.

I also think that eye, head, torso, and whole body movement should be modeled separately. I.e., moving the mouse moves your eyes, if the eyes move past a certain point the head follows, etc. Would require lots of tweaking to feel fluid and realistic, but could be really cool if done right.

[hitmanx]

I like the concept but I haven't seen a game do it properly ever. It's either too subtle and just a boring movement or its too much.

The most common problem I find is the camera rolls too much or bobs in an unnatural timing. The bob should be tied to the player animation, but people don't roll their heads while walking, most of the time humans try to keep their head straight and level automatically. Its a hard effect to master and I would rather see more focus on the first person weapons/arms being animated from movement. Blood is still the best game for this in my opinion. the simple act of jumping and crouching moves your weapon around in an exaggerated but realistic manner

[Nems]

I don't mind it but I do like for there to be options to adjust it in the event I encounter any headbobbing that makes me sick/nauseous. It's really not one of those things that adds or detracts immersion for me in shooters.

[SyntherAugustus]

I agree that it should be an option. It's a bit nauseating and distracting when it comes to a competitive shooter.

For some reason I thought this was a thread about adding Head Tracking (TrackIR, Rift) into FPS games.

[Nash]

Some games do head bobbing completely wrong to the point that it's just pointless and I want to turn it off completely. Deus Ex 1 and STALKER come to mind. Also some games annoyingly don't do it at all and again it annoys me (the immersion is completely broken because I feel like I'm a floating camera). Half-Life 2 and Oblivion, for instance.

Does anyone have any experience playing first person games with view animation with an Oculus Rift? What does it feel like when the game is forcing camera movement while your head isn't physically moving?

[MetroidJunkie]

I love it. I like when games like Borderlands or Call of Duty add mild head movement to reloads and melee attacks, because it adds a lot to the feeling of weight and power. But I do agree that it's not for everyone, and there should always be an option to adjust the intensity, if not disable it entirely.

A simple on/off switch would probably suffice, like how Metroid Prime can turn the 'helmet lag' on/off.

[Trance]

Don't like it. Gives me eye strain. I turn it off whenever I can.

[Ixnatifual]

Depends. It gave me a headache in S.T.A.L.K.E.R to the point I couldn't play it. But I've played many games where I didn't mind it.

[Marisa the Magician]

Ah yes, yet another one of those overused gimmicks... I'm fine with traditional bobbing, but the new fad of having the camera attached to the head bone of the player model is just... ugh. Unless the animation is flawless, please don't.

[GooberMan]

The good thing about VR is that the option to disable things like this should become more common. Anything that isn't the player's own physical head causing head movements tends to be massively disorienting.