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For more about virtual reality (VR) please refer to our blog about What is VR? This blog is about free roam VR.
There are different types of VR Experiences. We will start with the elementary applications and build up to the more advanced experiences.
The most basic is putting a mobile phone into a VR headset. This is generally just to watch a VR video that gives you a 360-degree view of the surroundings.
Next would be a seated VR experience, where you are seated and put on a VR headset, and tethered by a cable. This cable is generally connected to a computer. You cannot move out of the seat and can sometimes only move around in the VR world by moving your hands which are tracked by a device attached to the headset.
After that, you would have a standing VR experience where you are tethered to a cable and you generally can take a step in either direction depending on the length of the cable. With this type of experience, you also get hand controllers and can move or pick things up in the virtual world. While this is a better experience than the 2 mentioned above, it can be limiting to not be available
Next is Free Roam Virtual Reality which is considered to be the latest in VR technology for location-based entertainment. With free roam VR, you can walk around freely just like you would in the real world, without being limited by being stuck to a cable. There are 2 options for free roam VR, one is with a VR backpack and the other is with a wireless adaptor.
Free roam VR is considered to be the ultimate and latest technology for location-based VR entertainment. This is because you are not limited by space or movement and can walk around and move freely which adds to the immersion which is what makes the VR experience seem so real.
There is now new technology that enables free roam VR without the need to wear a VR backpack. This is done by adding a wireless adaptor to the VR headset. This also enables you to walk around freely in the virtual world, within the designated space. You can pick things up, pass things to your teammates and move things in the virtual world.
This is a preferred option for many people as they do not need to wear a backpack, which some people find becomes to get heavy after wearing it for long periods. As such you only need to wear the VR headset with the wireless adaptor, and use the hand controllers. This option is best for longer games and adds to the immersive experience. However, there is a limitation in that you can only have 3 players in a single area when using the wireless adaptors which is why VR Kingdom still uses the backpacks for some of its games due to the area required for these games. The VR Escape Rooms at VR Kingdom all use the HTC Vive Pro headsets with wireless adaptors.