Source
r/virtualreality•
QuantumPi

VR Educational Design and You.

Out of curiosity of VR (Virtual Reality), today I thought about the educational application of such technology. It's finally making strides and becoming more funded and developed as we move forward. My question however is this. Could something that is mainly focused on games be used for educational means and do any of you think educational VR would ever take off?

The applications for it could be endless, and one thing I would like to see is an interactive "Mars" VR where the user is able to walk around at known areas and literally be able to click on icons on "points of interests" to gather known data. Everything from temperature, soil composition, radiation analysis, and maybe even building a small habitat to simulate growing plants and working on mechanical systems in the form of puzzles. Mathematical challenges that could bring back nostalgia of Math Blaster, and older games made for learning.

It wouldn't even have to end there. Field applications like First Aid Simulators, rehabilitation, and focused interaction platforms could be useful in training for many different things if done correctly and made to be on par with current standards. It would be a good way to expand peoples ideas on education, branching out, and learning. Educational games like Kerbal Space Program have gotten a lot of people interested in space exploration, which is a good thing. Now we just need to have more interactive learning platforms with more realistic means of learning through problem solving skill building.

So finally my questions are.

What would you like to see done with VR in an educational format?

What games would you like to see, play, and interact with?

Would you be interested in multiplayer learning scenarios?

And finally, who do you think will have the best VR headset?

Posted Mar 20, 2016, 8:50 PM UTC

46
toasterweasel•

I think VR is great for bringing experiences that are either prohibitively expensive or impossible to the masses. Can't afford to go to Venice? VR can bring you there. Can't see Venice being built because time travel is currently impossible? VR can bring you there too. Puzzle and other logic games will also benefit from VR. It's wide open. Multiplayer games should be better too. Trivia games, distance learning as well. Facebook VR will be huge too on Oculus but they will open it up to other headsets as well. For now I think Vive is the front runner due to the lighthouse room scale VR and integration with Valve. Oculus is more of a slow burn but I think they will be great too.

2
QuantumPiOP•

Oh man. I can't wait to see what kind of complex yet intuitive puzzle games come out. I love mechanical puzzles where you need to build and operate things to make them function. There is a LOT of potential for this technology to become useful. Only hard part is, I don't know what to buy. Vive, PSVR, or Rift.

1
Globalcop•

Materials science will benefit if the VR dev engines support material properties. Also chemistry, I bet there are more than a few experiments that are just too hazardous to perform that could be replicated in VR if all the variables are part of the software equation. Imagine how cool it would be to simulate the (already known) effect of adding just a bit too much of a substance, or mixing it too vigorously. If the software can mimic the reaction closely, with the whole class watching... it could also save on lab supply costs. I'm biased about "best" HMD because I already pre-ordered a Vive Biology, microbiology... anatomy... physics, astronomy. ART!

2
QuantumPiOP•

I would love a VR "Game" that allows you to walk through a greenhouse or hydroponics habitat that allows you to study, grow, and care for various forms of plant life in real time. Then walk outside in a spacesuit onto the Martian surface and gather materials, operate machinery, and care for various habitat systems like you do in Take On Mars (Note, fun game but still has a lot of stuff that needs fixed before it can be a good simulator.). Everything you do could be broken down into minigames or puzzles based on chemistry, physics, biology, microbiology, and astrobiology. That would be awesome in any classroom, home, and research center long as it has updated material loaded and fixed with every new realistic piece of data monitored. Which sadly would mean you'd need internet to keep up with updates, but most people have that anyways. Either way, it would be a massive learning experience for everyone who bought into it. Imagine how many people would become interested in science and engineering by playing that? Kerbal SPace Program has proven that gamers can get into more than just shootemups, and a lot of players of KSP have found a deeper respect for aeronautics and space exploration.

1
A_Furious_Mind•

I'm going to work on constructing pre-contact Alaska Native villages, accurately displaying the kinds of geography, foliage, tools, shelters, etc. relevant to each. I have no 3D modeling skill, so I'll probably have to contract for what I can't build from existing libraries. Not sure how much I can expect to budget for that, though.

2
QuantumPiOP•

I wouldn't know how much that would be. The first part I'd assume is buying all the books, research, and historical archives needed to come up with what you need and then have your team of developers study and research into it as well and start working on code, images, textures, modeling, and game mechanics in general. Adapting it to VR will probably be more expensive, and thus if this is going to be an indie title then you'd need to have a set budget, timeline goals, and end game completion date. No easy task and I hope you can pull that off as a game like that would be very interesting to play, especially if it goes into history and how people survived.

1