A month or so back, I got to spend an hour with the Oculus Rift VR headset — most of which I spent swooning over Portal 2. Ever since that time I’ve been dying to get the Rift wrapped around my head for a larger chunk of time. And when that dream turns to reality, the question becomes — what game do I play?
According to RiftEnabled.com, a database of games and apps being developed to work with the Oculus Rift, there are currently 216 projects that have been announced (and there are likely many more that have never been added to the website). Of these, more than half have been released.
Many of these projects are small tech demos or proof-of-concept games specifically designed for the Rift. However, as you can see from the following list, there are more than a few big name titles that work (or will soon work) with the device as well.
AaAaAA!!
Assassins Creed
Batman Arkham City
Battlefield 3
Bioshock
Bioshock Infinite
Black Mesa Source
Borderlands
Borderlands 2
Call of Duty Black Ops
Crisis 3
Dead Rising
Dead Space
Dear Ester
Deus Ex Human Revolutions
Dirt 3
Dishonored
Dragon Age II
The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion
The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim
Fallout 3
Far Cry 3
Far Cry 3: Blood Dragon
*Half Life 2
*Half Life 2: Episode 1
*Half Life 2: Episode 2
*Hawken
Left 4 Dead
Left 4 Dead 2
Mafia II
Mass Effect 2
Metro 2033
Minecraft
Mirror’s Edge
Myst V: End of Ages
Portal
Portal 2
Quake
Quake 3
Slender
Splinter Cell 3
S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Call of Pripyat
*Surgeon Simulator 2013
*Team Fortress 2
The Witcher
Tomb Raider Underworld
Of the above games, however, few (those with asterisks next to their names) have been actually reworked by the game’s original developers for Rift support. The majority of them support the 3D headset through the use of independently created drivers.
Currently, there are two of these drivers getting most of the press. The first is Vireio. It is free and regularly updated with new games. The second is VorpX. And while it supports more of the games listed above than Vireio, it is not available for free download. Rather, upon the release of the consumer model of Oculus Rift, VorpX will be released as a commercial product.
But as for my original quandary — what game to play when I next get some quality time with Oculus Rift — the answer is really a no-brainer: Dishonored, which I picked up at the Steam sale last week. I’m going to play that sucker for like 15 hours straight.
Comments
12 responses to “The Big Name Titles Playable On Oculus Rift”
Half Life 2 working on oculas support rather than Half Life 3?
Half Life 3 confirmed?
I dont know…
If you look closely, you’ll notice there are THREE (3!) entries with ‘Half-Life’ in front of them on that list. Oh yes, my friend… HALF-LIFE 3 CONFIRMED.
You MUST play Lunar Flight; the current beta on Steam has very good Oculus Rift support. I’m sitting here at work thinking about getting back home so I can keep playing that game.
I believe that AaAaAA!! is also getting *native* Rift support. Haven’t had much luck myself with trying to get Vireio to work well on my system.
Also try War Thunder; it has native Rift support. As will iRacing (hopefully in their next update; they released an update with support then pulled it back as it caused some compatibility issues that they had to fix up) Can’t wait to drive race cars around in VR 🙂
Don’t understand the 3rd Person games listed unless they are modded for a 1st person view?
I would think that 3rd person wouldn’t be as immersive and would be far more jarring…
Yeh that’s what I was thinking too. You would feel like a giant sitting behind the player.
i agree with you there, while i love the mass effect cover system combat in 3d would be odd
Mirror’s Edge was a bit meh with the PAX demo. It’s not so much integrated as tacked on.
I dare say anything with the developer involved will be a superior experience over games that just use it as a substitute for current input/output via drivers.
You forgot to add War Thunder to the list… FREAKING AWESOME GAME!!! And with Oculus Support!
Tf2 is supported to there is a console command for it.
are there any plans to release any flight simulator games? how about microsoft flight or IL2 sturmovik? I am very interested in this after seeing the macross video, any information would be greatly appreciated!
I played TF2 on it at PAX. As I was waiting second in line, the guy currently using it was shooting the walls and playing like he was drunk. I assumed he was a terrible player, but when I put the goggles on myself, it was all blurry, the sensitivity was insane and it was virtually impossible to play. Maybe it was just glitching out or my eyes are broken, but I wasn’t very impressed.
They’ll be bringing out the Consumer edition sometime in the future, which will have more resolution, it’ll hopefully solve most of the blurriness. Not sure about the sensitivity.
I recommend Half Life 2 (+ episodes) but they are a bit fiddely to configure (have to steal the settings from tf2), and the settings are reset each time steam loads. You get major head-aches and nausea if its not set right.
Hawken will have oculus rift support ‘eventually’ and I believe with a few hacks you can get it working, but it looks bad. I remember reading the official support will be available at the end of the year, but can’t seem to find the post atm.
Ive only tried a few 3rd person demos, and I can’t say I like them anywhere near as much as the FPS ones.
Half life 2does really kick ass though. I can’t wait until its supported a little better, and eventually the HD consume version comes out. Its 5 billion times better than nVidia 3D vision 🙂
Quake is a lot of fun and looks good as it was designed for a low res.