This is very intriguing. I can see myself using this during my lunch break where otherwise I just watch YouTube videos. I’d love to hear others’ experience. Anyone else here do this, or know of other articles like this?
I’d prefer not to buy anything from Facebook for privacy issues, though…
VR is a good workout, but to be honest, I still find the headsets unpleasant enough to not want to use this over other forms of exercise. The headsets are too heavy, moving vigorously cause them to move and lose your visual sweetspot, they got hot, the foam interface gets sweaty and gross, etc. And for the amount of time I spend on screens, I’d rather go for a run outside and enjoy the fresh air.
But I could see most of the above being improved in a few generations such that it’s a really great exercise option.
The stock headset definitely needs to be upgraded for this kind of application.
I own a BoboVR headband with an external battery, which helps balance the weight of the headset. I had the elite strap with external battery and the BoboVR is much more comfortable for me. It’s also leatherette instead of foam, so much easier to clean.
I also have a fan (BoboVR F2) attached to the face mask in order to prevent condensation and overall I get a great experience even when I drip of sweat after exercising.
From what I understand, the silicon cover was only added to the Quest in September of last year. Though if you have a model from before then you can get one for free.
I've been using Beat Saber as a cardio mixup, though I agree with the sentiment that the headset gets a little stuffy. My bigger issue with VR in general is that the tethered PC experience has a lot of friction. The Oculus has more "pick up and go" power, but Facebook is a hard pass, so I'm patiently waiting for some other company (anyone, really) to come out and compete with a similar form factor.
VR doesn't replace exercise for me; my regular routine involves weights, but it compliments it nicely on my off days. I think it's good to mix in, but wouldn't want to rely on it as the sole form of exercise. Maybe that's just me; I can't do the same thing every day, and since weight training requires a strict routine, cardio is where I mix things up for spice.
I have an index and have done a bit of beat saber. I wouldn't really recommend it for exercise. Beat saber specifically, can be exhausting, but it doesn't require much more than moving your arms for most levels. You may soon learn to adapt and actually just move your wrists more than your arms. I can do all but 5 or so of the base content songs on expert+ and while I do enjoy and recommend the game, I cannot say its a great idea for exercise.
Being out of breath isn't actually great evidence of of a good exercise. A few things I particularly dislike:
* Headset gets sweaty
* Content that requires you to perform well can be harder to do when tired, so the exercise part gets less and less as you just fail. Yeah, you can tweak settings to not auto lose, but if the gamification of your exercise stops working then you might as well just do real exercise. This goes the other way too in that you may just get too good at the game and the gamification part is gone for all but the most extremely difficult pieces of content.
Beat saber is not an exercise program. It's a rhythm game.
It's not a criticism of the game to say that all of its design elements aren't conducive to a good workout. Novice players will move their arms much more than they have to. As you get better at the game you will probably learn to move your arms less.
This is my point. Playing better tends to result in exercising less. Saying you'll just play suboptimally to get more exercise is counterintuitive and will probably not work as it will force you to ignore all of the feedback that the game gives you, e.g. score and missing blocks.
I do pretty much the same thing. I own a Quest 2 and I play Pistol whip, Thrill of the fight and Moon rider (a free VR game which is played in the browser where you need to hit blocks with your hands synced to music).
The only issue I have with Thrill of the fight is that when I get into it, I hit hard, but find no resistance as I would hitting a punching bad or sparring with someone, so my elbow tends to overextend and I feel some pain for a couple days after playing for about 30 minutes. That’s something that will probably get better over time as I gain more control, but as of now, that’s something I need to be careful of.
If you tie an elastic around your elbow and hold it in your hand or hold one around your back and in both hands, you won't overextend your elbow and it should give you the resistance you are looking for.
I was gifted a punching rig for exactly this type of workout a few years ago. You’ll find them around a few types of gyms sometimes (MMA, Military). It’s similar to what was mentioned elsewhere (elastic wrapped around body) except as an actual rig that is adjustable for resistance and reach.
I loved Thrill of the Fight.
I sweat like a pig on it.
Too bad I get obsessed with fast knockout punches and my shoulders hurt like hell after a couple of days.
I also learnt the hardway you cannot outrun a bad diet. I would routinely burn 600+ callories in Thrill of the Fight only to get extremely hungry after and eat double what I've burnt.
For me weight training is better than cardio because I don't get the same hunger afterwards, on the countrary, if I do it late in the evening I can't eat at all. I also can't sleep afterwards.
I also became obsessed with shooting/hunting simulators and haven't done any exercise in VR for a long time.
Gaim compact, but it's really pricey(I'm just playng the Demo, still trying to justify the price) or if you're ok with shotgun shooting flying things --skeet/trap/sporting/pigeon/pheasant then Clay Hunt VR -- it's an incredible value for money.
If you're looking at land-hunting, take note that Gaim compact is geared towards european style driven hunting.
Pavlov Vr is free, I only used the firing range (which is much better than Contractors).
I also did play quite a bit of Contractors but right now I just play the Ninja mode, hunting bots with bow&arrow.
I also got Onwards, but given that it's very realistic (you die very fast if shot), it's too slow pace for my liking.
Space Pirates is also really nice, but it's not a simulator.
For others that are interested in VR fitness games, here's a few more suggestions:
- SuperHot: while less cardio focused at the higher levels it really has you doing a lot of slow, deep squats and stretches as you dodge and move around. I recommend trying to do the "Whole game in 10 minutes" mode as that's an easy chunk of time to spend. It's been great to loosen up my back after being at the desk for too long or as a quick way to get over the sleepiness of a big lunch.
- Synthriders: a lot of people know BeatSaber already, but I prefer this as the music is more vaporwave and there's a more varied move set and better 360 mode.
- The Climb 1+2: more a pleasant mental break than anything else, but fun.
I’d throw in pistol whip as a cardio recommendation to anyone that enjoys superhot. A few back to back rounds at a higher difficulty will get you moving and squatting a lot
I've really enjoyed "Until you Fall" on the Index.
Most first-person VR games (including Half-life Alex) make me motion-sick. But for some reason that doesn't happen with Until you Fall. I really hope they make a sequel or similar game.
Most people can grind through motion sickness. If you're willing to deal with feeling queasy for a night or two, it's worth the effort. I wasn't able to handle continuous motion in VR until I decided to just play through Boneworks repeatedly until I could handle it. Ended up only taking about 20 minutes and I've been good ever since.
Same with Sim Racing in VR for me - the trick is small repeated exposure I found.
After a couple of days it was absolutely fine and I do 1 hour+ races in VR in iRacing without any issues - although the karussell at the Nordschleife still makes me a tiny bit dizzy for a split second.
RealFit,
Hitmotion Reloaded,
Les Mills Bodycombat,
Thrill of the Fight,
VRWorkout Bootcamp,
FitXR,
PowerBeatsVR,
Supernatural ( if you are in the US),
Holofit or VZFit (if you have a rower/bike),
Happy Run,
Hitstream,
OhShape
Another vote for SynthRiders here. I have the same complaint about Beat Saber as OP. Can be done with wrist flicks and be lazy
Synth Riders forces you to have to move your body and do large sweeping motions, it feels like dancing, AND it has online multiplayer with voice chat which regularly has groups hanging out and playing for fun
That last part makes it so much more enjoyable for me
If you enjoy supernatural, I highly recommend PowerBeatsVR. It's not nearly as polished as supernatural, but the workout configuration options are very effective, plus no subscription fees.
Shameless plug: if you are into VR fitness but you think the existing solutions are missing multiplayer options, my brother and I are building Space Punch [1] which is a multiplayer fitness app. It is currently released in early access on Sidequest, and it’s functional. We are working out Monday to Friday 4:30pm UTC. If you have a Quest and want to work out together as group, then drop into our Discord sever. I’ll personally make sure you get an access key and I will show you the App from within.
Thanks! Yep, I also played Blaston a while and really liked it. We basically replaced shooting with a gun with punching in order to make it even more intense.
In addition we also want to build out the social part and create a community of Space Punchers that work out together and motivate each other to stick to a regular schedule. I find it really fascinating how immersive VR can be and really make you think that you are in the same place with your friends. If we can translate this energy into forming a healthy habit of working out regularly with a community than we are on a good path.
Perhaps because I'm an introvert, but never quite understood the motivation for social exercise in VR. Half the advantage of it is that I can work out on my own time, in private without being coupled to fixed schedules or other people's expectations.
Peer pressure (hopefully in a positive way), fun, distraction from the boredom of the exercise. The better memories you form of the event, the less likely you are to seek excuses to skip the next session.
Fixed schedule is one possible system that will push you to keep going even while you go through demotivated period. Same with "other people's expectations". Seeing other people exercise is motivating for a lot of people. And being seen is one more nudge to actually do it today. Moreover, many people are motivated by competition. That does not need to be official competition or large scale one. Pretty often it is just "I want to keep doing it as long as him" or "I think I could get bigger score then mx123Throwaway". For many people, the social aspect is what turns activity from "boring chore I do because I think I have to" to "I actually like doing it".
Underappreciated aspect of long term exercising is "how to keep doing it long term" and "how to prevent it from becoming yet another annoying dot on my todo list".
So I reckon there's about 50% of the population for whom what you say is true and then a giant slice for whom all those factors work in reverse. They are demotivated / scared by the thought of competition, and social activity is tiring rather than stimulating and intrinsically enjoyable.
What's outlandish about it? Some people wake up on the early side for all sorts of reasons -- disposition, physiology, mix of responsibilities requires it, household functioning, kids, etc., etc.
There are many different kinds of people in this world. It pays to think of all the reasons there might be for even one single behavior.
because waking up and putting your first effort to your job seems misplaced if you have such strong personal goals such as daily working out. what’s more important, your job or yourself?
If you ever want someone to work early, a lot of ex-military just naturally run on an earlier schedule like that. People who run for a hobby tend to start early too.
Been starting work at 5 am (which is now where I live) for a few years now. I was usually the person who would check in for work around 11 am the past 30 years. That was a bit of a mistake in hindsight; my body and mind like this early time far more; I get far more from my day now that my focused coding time ends around 11 instead of starts and the rest of the day I get to do mostly hobbies (including VR workouts). Somehow, in the past 30 years, including when I got up around 8, I missed about 3 hours of very valuable focus time which I was not possible to get for some reason until getting up when the rooster starts crowing (we have a rooster and it's doing that now).
I have to continue during the weekend (obviously as it is Sunday now) or I move out of the rhythm but that works fine too.
I used to do it all the time. Up At 5, at Starbucks around 5:30, out by 7:30. Or wait for the gym to open at 6, or maybe an early morning run. Mornings used to be great, but then I had a kid and the pandemic hit and it will take awhile to go back to see them.
One thing that’s good to point out to anybody looking to get into VR for fitness is that Beat Saber becomes radically more challenging when playing custom community-made maps instead of the stock/DLC maps. The higher difficulty community maps require a lot of speed, precision, and stamina, and I’m only beginning to be able to play them decently after a few months of practice. It’s almost an entirely different game.
Unfortunately, support for custom maps/mods for the standalone Quest version of the game is not great, so it’s best to play the PC version if the community maps are of interest (which can be done with a Quest via PC link).
I wouldn’t personally recommend the official link cable — it’s expensive, and in my case it was flaky. I’m currently using a cable made by Cable Matters[0] that works well.
Most people buy the Steam version, though either can work. I personally lean more towards Steam so if I change headsets to something non-Facebook (like Valve’s rumored upcoming quest competitor), I can still play Beat Saber without a second purchase or weird hacks.
For installing mods, ModAssistant[1] has worked well for me. It’s pretty foolproof; the “standard” mods are pre-selected for installation by default, so for a minimal setup just open ModAssistant, point it at your Beat Saber installation, and install the standard mod set. From there you can search and install custom maps in-game.
I don’t have too many other useful links for you, but r/beatsaber on Reddit is pretty active and good for asking questions that haven’t already been covered by that subreddit’s wiki.
BeatSage's results are hit and miss. I've uploaded a dozen of my favorite trance songs - some turned out completely unplayable, several actually worked out pretty well.
Airlink works surprisingly well and it's so much nicer to play wirelessly. You might need to connect a wireless (AC or better) access point to your computer if your existing wifi AP is in a different room, though.
I tried Air Link but even with all-wifi-6 hardware and the router sitting 20ft away, the video quality was garbage. I didn’t try to tweak settings too much though, maybe there’s some magic trick.
I started with the official cable, but honestly, it's not teenager proof and it's expensive to replace when the USB-C connector on the end is ripped out vigorously.
I'm now using an active booster one from Amazon that was about £20.
I'm several months into using Beat Saber as an exercise routine. Yes, add-on maps are a necessity, not just for the challenge, but also to keep things interesting.
I don't find high difficulty levels to be great exercise. I can keep up fine, but I get lulled into using little wrist flicks instead of sweeping arcs.
The best tracks for me are ones which aren't technically challenging. Instead, I get my whole body into it - dancing the whole time, stepping to the side so I can take a wide swing, shakin' my butt to the groove... That all gets my heart pounding, and works a much wider range of muscles. I've also turned the HUD off so I don't focus on my score, instead loosening up and having a good time.
The Claws mod also helps me a lot. You only get about half the range of the normal sabers so you have to move your arms farther to reach the blocks. It also makes you use a wider range of muscles, which has stopped some of the RSI I was feeling from too many wrist flicks earlier.
It's not perfect exercise. I could feel my body improve a lot early on, but then it plateaued and I don't see an easy way to push it much farther. However, I'm happy with where it's gotten me, and I intend to keep with it for the foreseeable future. It's fun, and it's convenient so I have no problem doing it for 45 minutes every day, and those are valuable attributes.
Interesting, I felt like the better I got at beat saber the less effort I would make, whereas DDR type of games made me sweat to no end. But I didn’t try to apply myself to easy tracks. I think there’s gotta be a better game than beat saber than can be developed that puts you into weird positions. Playing superhot on the quest was the game that really put me into weird positions.
> The best tracks for me are ones which aren't technically challenging. Instead, I get my whole body into it - dancing the whole time, stepping to the side so I can take a wide swing, shakin' my butt to the groove...
Exactly. Once I could beat everything on expert I ended up losing interesting because expert+ felt like a different game: seemed much more wrist-oriented, which I have zero interest in. I'd like to find more maps that optimize around the criteria you've mentioned, but haven't put effort into it.
I actually prefer expert+ for movement, the cubes are more widely distributed in space and you need to make wider moves. For expert there are many cubes, but too grouped together. But probably depends also on the maps you choose. Anyway, for me only the expert+ maps are fun and challenging physically.
Beat Saber isn’t really designed for exercise but you can raise intensity by keeping your wrists fixed and by imagining you are wielding two really having blades.
You have to imagine yourself glaiving the blocks in two rather than simply touching them so they fall apart. The same mental tricks are needed with the more fitness oriented rhythm boxing games.
if you have the stock cloth piece in your headset, it gets disgusting and you'll have acne by day 3. No way to clean it unless you buy the aftermarket eye piece that isn't porous.
I tried working out in VR but realized that working out in RR is way more fun.
haha thanks. Yeah I'm trying to make RR the next big thing. Near zero load times, no suit required for haptic feedback, two 576MP cameras, the list goes on. The birds are still obviously drones though.
The stock foam gasket that comes with the quest is definitely porous and easy enough to wash under water. What headset are you talking about? I can’t imagine how horrible it must have been, was it attached to a PC with a wire?
quest v1 no wire but like 4 hour battery life so the wire gets involved.
You also get a semi permanent line down the middle of your head that lasts proportionally to how long you've worn the headset. Also the sinus pressure of having a 5 pound device drooping from your forehead and the red ring around your face and bloodshot eyes (because you didn't blink at all) means you can't go into public for another hour after you use the thing.
Ok, so I owned two oculus 1s (had to buy a replacement after the first one died after a year of heavy use) and suffered from none of those problems. It is even better with the quest 2. I don’t understand how you could get a mark on your face even after an hour of use, but I’ve never tried using it for more than 2 hours at a time.
You could have special circumstances: sensitive skin, especially acidic sweat, or just different head pressure tolerances. Also, I could never use the VR system if I didn’t have around 3 sweat bands on. I had to move away from simple cloths ones when I upgraded to the quest 2 because they wouldn’t fit anymore, and the smaller elastic ones don’t hold sweat well, so I had to triple up on them. Otherwise my sessions would end after around 10 minutes as I simply couldn’t keep the sweat out of my eyes anymore.
I’ve been doing workouts in VR for over two years now and it’s my preferred for HIIT and Cardio in general. I do mix in elliptical and treadmill sometimes but I’ve found VR far more convenient, just get up turn around put the headset on, start the tracker on my watch and get going versus going out to the gym in my building. Every reduction of friction helps me keep working out. FitXR and Thrill of The Fight are my gotos and I typically maintain 150-170bpm workouts between 3-4 times per week for 40-50minutes. With a resting heart rate in the 50s and around a 7 minute mile time I’d say it’s doing the job for someone who’s not trying to be an elite athlete just keep in shape while working a desk job. I’m 27 for context.
For anyone wanting additional info, the VR Health Institute has been reviewing games by their intensity and estimates calorie burn per minute of playing.
A lot of people love Thrill of the Fight for exercise. It's funny because it isn't really directed exercise, it's a boxing sim. You can take it slow but the game makes you feel like you have no choice but to punch for your life. It gets you really worked up.
I actually ended up with a bit of repetitive strain from throwing hooks and had to switch to Supernatural. It's a monthly fee but it's more purpose-built for exercise.
I recently (today!) started playing vzfit, which is a bicycle simulator.
You get in an exercise bike (with a cadence tracker, which is a device thag measures pedal movement) and ride through 3D environments via google street view. It’s really, really cool.
Also, best saber is great for getting a little sweaty. So is holopoint.
Has anyone solved the ventilation problem for headsets yet? I seem to be convinced that the right light-absorbent baffles that still allow air through are possible, but no one seems to have attempted this in a product
I didn’t really believe it would work until I tried it, but having a fan blowing on you at high speed works to cool your whole body, including inside the headset. I no longer experience fogging of lenses or sweat dripping down into my eyes, which previously would become a problem after 15 minutes of intense activity. An added bonus is that the breeze can give you a sense of which direction you’re facing.
There are face interfaces with the ventilation holes set above that don’t leak light. Must be the hole angles, the ones I use seem to be fine (can’t provide links, they come from a random vendor on Aliexpress).
I believe the versons with fans also don’t leak light.
Can't say ventilation has been an issue for me on the Quest 2, I have a pleather type face cover and there is a hole by the nose area so it's not an air tight seal. I have done many long sessions with it.
What worked for me to avoid fogging is to wear the headset kind of like a visor for a few minutes before starting your workout, which warms it such that I haven't worried about fogging much since (which initially was a problem).
There is, e.g, the BOBOVR F2 which will add a battery-powered fan to your Quest 2 to add some venting, but I haven't personally tried it.
I can't get into VR boxing. I have both Thrill of the Fight and Rocky. It never feels like you're really landing any punches. You're basically shadow boxing, which can really hurt your shoulders if you don't know what you're doing. I'm surprised we don't hear more complaints of injuries.
Almost every console and handheld have been sold at a loss -- including the new Steam Deck. Games, licensing, and access to the platform has always been the money makers.
It isn't really comparable, but the only other real VR competitor out there is the Valve Index, which is considerably more expensive, requires base stations and requires a cord to a (beefy) computer, but on the flip side can support many more games, with much better controllers and is much more powerful.
That's true, I just forgot about them. From what I've seen, the Vive occupies a midpoint in price and quality between the Oculus products and the Index.
EDIT: I hadn't actually seen much of the Vive Pro 2, it looks... comparable to the Index? Both price and feature-wise?
That's still their flagship I think, check out their other lines like the cosmos which has AR/VR type camera integration etc, room scale without the base stations and so on.
Not really a midpoint, but more on a similar level to Index. Generally, people like Index more than the Vive Pros on most points (display, audio, controllers, etc.) except for the wireless capability, and some niche features like eye tracking on the Vive Pro Eye. If you want a wireless high-end headset, Vive is the only game in town (Index is wired-only) so you have to get a Vive. It'll end up being more expensive than Index because the wireless adapter is $350. Since the Vive Pros and Index share the same tracking system, people do mix and match equipment other than the headset though. Many people will buy a Vive Pro headset and use Index controllers with them, since they're better. Index users will buy Vive trackers for full-body tracking because nothing equivalent exists for the Index.
This is simply not true.
It's obviously the same company and will treat your privacy right the same way (i.e. as nonexistant)
Further, you need a facebook account to log in (at least, for now) and it needs to be your real name (if you don't want to run afoul to Meta's terms and conditions).
"Yes. Facebook will use information related to your use of VR and other Facebook products to show you personalized content, including ads, across Facebook products. This could include recommendations for Oculus Events you might like, ads about Facebook apps and technologies, or ads from developers for their VR apps."
Pico Neo 3
IQ Q3 (still in development)
HTC Vive Focus
Lynx R1 ( still in development )
Oculus Quest using Oculess to remove FB ( or just ask Meta support to unlink your headset from your account )
I'd recommend you look at the HP Reverb headset, which has a good performance/price ratio. Technically, it is made for the Windows Mixed Reality ecosystem, but I find it supports almost all Steam VR games and there are work arounds to make it work for oculus games without a FB account. YMMV
1. Some, but if it's well fitted, it's not a big deal.
2. Yup.
3. Yup again, especially around the... face gasket?
4. Haven't broken it yet, but I definitely have windmilled my controllers into various things. Part of that is that I don't really have enough floor space for VR.
I have the Quest I and Quest II. Thrill of the Fight is my main "workout" game, so now I use the Quest I exclusively for that (works just as well), because I do worry about the amount of sweat I get on it. I use the Quest II for the less physically punishing apps to maintain its longevity.
The Quest II actually feels a little more uncomfortable to be for exercise anyway. It seems like the lenses are closer to the face and the unit gets a little warmer.
So to you question, yes the face gasket and head strap can get quite sweaty, but not so much "inside" the device far as I can tell.
To the last point, I've punched the headset with the controllers a few times (usually going for a short inside uppercut), but they seem pretty sturdy. (Or maybe my punches just have no power :-)
1) Games take this into account. There's no "Headbanger Hero VR". The headset holds on just fine with moderate acceleration.
2) The face gasket gets damp with a moderate workout, and sometimes I soak it if I push really hard. It air-dries between uses. It's made of antimicrobial something-or-other which seems to last a long time before it turns funky. When it does, new ones are 2 for $40, so you just throw it away and snap a new one on. The rest of the headset doesn't get wet.
3) I haven't had problems with it, but some people feel it gets too hot and humid. If so, you can get aftermarket fans which fit in the frunk to circulate air through it.
4) I haven't yet! The headset stays on fine. I have clapped the controllers together moderately hard a few times with no apparent damage. Everything seems well-made, and you can buy individual pieces if you do manage to break something.
My experiences are all with the Valve Index. YMMV with other setups.
1. Not if it's fitted well. Some people seem to need aftermarket straps for that. Myself, I'm fine with the stock Oculus Quest 2 strap, as long as I fit it properly. My core game is a table tennis simulator (Eleven), which requires lots of fast sudden movement.
2. It does. I wash the face mask foam regularly with just warm water + soap. The face cover is removable so it's not a big deal.
3. In my case, it's all absorbed by the washable foam.
4. The Quest 2 is pretty sturdy. I did bump the controllers pretty hard against each other a few times, and had a few glancing hits controller vs headset. Nothing broke so far. The controllers have a ring that tends to protect your hand and the buttons when you crash them into something.
2. Not really. The main thing that gets dirty is the face insert, which is detachable and can be washed by hand. I have a silicon layer above that so just wipe it off after each session. The oculus 2 is much better than the 1 in this regard, which had a fabric around the unit that could get really grimy.
3. I’m not sure. My first oculus died from reasons I can’t determine. I thought it might have been because of the sweat. The oculus 2 avoids fabric for the main unit and seems to be more resistant in this regard.
5. No. But I’ve had more than a few accidental controller strikes on either the other controller or on the unit itself at high speeds. Never hurt the hardware, but I’ve hurt my fingers a few times.
What is so bad about just going out and doing sports with people and having real contact?
I guess that everyone is different. In my case I really enjoy participating in HIT workouts with people; the group competition drives me to push myself.
That's one of the reasons for having better results in a marathon than during training: group competitiveness
The second benefit is also obvious to me: socializing. Just the fact of doing sports together gives you a sense of bonding, of going through similar pain and succeeding.
One can argue you can achieve the same with VR meanwhile for me is just a poor replacement.
> What is so bad about just going out and doing sports with people
Inflexible, time intensive, lacks variety, intimidating to those with lower fitness, dealing with annoying people, competition limited to whoever you work out with rather than matching your level, affected by weather, injuries, expense ....
- kinect: I haven’t tried the latest but it’s not really immersive. I find it dull. The feedback/accuracy is also not great
- DDR or games that require a mat: great! I used to have the britney spears one when I was younger (because I couldn’t find DDR) and what a fun workout it was!
- wii fit: really cool experience! Really intense. I think I have more fun with DDR but wii fit feels like a real session at the gym
- VR: best for immersion and feedback, you’re really somewhere else. I’ve only done beat saber, I feel like you tend to quickly understand how to do the less amount of movements to play, so it turns from a workout to a game after some hours. Curious about the other games tho
VR exercise was a bit of a revelation for me. Used to run 8km per day but lockdown convinced me to try exercise at home using VR and I fell in love with it. Apart from being fun (you're literally playing computer games), I got a much better workout, exercising parts of my body that running didn't touch. I actually started bulking up in my upper arms for the first time in my life. Really surprised me and sold me that this could be one of the real "killer apps" for VR if enough people knew about it.
> I actually started bulking up in my upper arms for the first time in my life.
Correct me if I am wrong, but there is no way VR will bulk up your arms in a way that a simple dumbbell won't do better in 5-15 minutes per day, right?
> exercising parts of my body that running didn't touch
Similarly, running will exercise parts of your body that VR won't touch right?
> no way VR will bulk up your arms in a way that a simple dumbbell won't do better in 5-15 minutes per day
True, but you underestimate the most important thing when working out: consistency - doing it regularly over long periods of time. VR/AR trainings will take off in the future, as the "gamification" (read: instant gratification) will help motivate people to stick with a workout routine and achieve that consistency.
I don't think I underestimate it, just in case someone is coming here and thinking that VR is a good way to bulk up their arms, I'm just saying that it won't compare to even the minimum of using dumbbells.
I'm just saying that it won't compare to even the minimum of using dumbbells.
Using dumbbells is the main thing here: It doesn't matter if dumbbells do better if it simply isn't an activity you keep up long term. Daily VR is going to be more meaningful and develop more muscle over time than sporadic dumbbell use. And lets be honest, realistically this is what we are comparing. Fun activity with side effects to an exercise in boredom that has better side effects.
The original guy said he replaced 8km daily running with VR exercise, so I don't actually think we are comparing 'sporadic gym/exercise' with 'constant VR'. But in the case of that, sure you are right.
The fallacy everyone is making here is believing that consistency trumps all else. But it doesn't if you're consistently subjecting yourself to a stress which does not result in any new adaptations--then there will be no change.
An oft repeated example of this fallacy is in the case of tanning. If you go out into the sun for 20 minutes and get a tan, what will happen if you continue to go out in the sun for 20 minutes each day? Will you get more tan? No. You've already adapted to the stress (ultraviolet light exposure for 20 minutes) and so the continued daily stress of 20 minutes of sunlight will not result in any new adaptations.
That is why if you are completely untrained, sure, VR constitutes a sufficient disruption to homeostasis that you'll get some muscular adaptations. But the stress is so minimal (and you cannot effectively increase it) that you will quickly adapt to it and subsequent exposure to the stress in the future will not result in any adaptations, it will only maintain what little adaptation you already have.
"Consistency" in this instance probably means exercising more than once a month. I think you're comparing VR exercise with a hypothetical ideal based on your own exercise routine, when it should really be compared with what a given individual was doing beforehand, which is probably some kind of cardio with no upper-body impact, or absolutely nothing.
I can't really tell you if using a dumbbell would have done more - probably you are right. But there's no way I would persist with dumbbells, I find them excruciatingly boring.
> Similarly, running will exercise parts of your body that VR won't touch right?
Perhaps but not nearly as many as VR hits that running doesn't touch. It certainly forces you to do squats.
I find the best antidote to boredom when lifting weights is to find the right weight and number of reps so that you're pushing through the burn for at least a third of the set. Hard to stay bored when your arms are on fire. Music is the other major component, you have to really amp yourself up and listening to music can put you in that mind set. Maybe even doing some circuit training would be better for you since you don't have to deal with long wait times between sets.
> Correct me if I am wrong, but there is no way VR will bulk up your arms in a way that a simple dumbbell won't do better in 5-15 minutes per day, right?
> I actually started bulking up in my upper arms for the first time in my life.
No you didn't, unless you were completely and utterly detrained (i.e., previously bedridden or something) and even then, the stimulus would've only resulted in adaptation for a short period.
VR exercise is far too submaximal (in regards to strength) to result in meaningful strength adaptations past a short initial adaptation period.
I also build muscles in VR training and I've done a lot of stronglift so I know what progression is like. Pistol Whip is great for building leg muscles. Imagine doing that one more squat you didn't think you had in you when in the squat rack. In Pistol Whip you do that 20 times without noticing.
You don't need progressive overload to build muscles. High rep sets should not be underestimated.
The lower body musculature is too large to be effectively stressed by bodyweight exercise in people fostering any decent level of fitness, i.e., bodyweight squats don't make you stronger.
Just because an exercise is hard or makes you sore doesn't mean it's effective.
I've only ever done body weight and know that get more muscle when training. I think you are doing premature optimizing. I know nothing about exercise theory but I know what gets me fat and what makes me strong, I do not care about what is optimal since I do fun things for exercise, not for strength.
Do you think this is the difference, the mindset we have in our training.
I should've written more explicitly: bodyweight squats don't make people who harbor a decent level of fitness stronger. Like any novel stimulus, they will make you stronger for a short while and then it will stop once you've adapted.
It's pretty obvious that the target audience for VR exercise is not 'people who harbor a decent level of fitness'. You're looking at the wrong baseline.
I'm curious about the precise interpretation here. Are you saying increased strength be lost and I will return to baseline before I started exercising? Or are you saying I will get a certain amount of increase and I will maintain it, but it will plateau there?
Because I'm just fine with the 2nd scenario. The first would be weird and contradicts my experience (nearly 2 years in ...).
I doubt I'll convince the parent, but for the curious about why this comment is utterly wrong and uninformed let's look at how muscles work.
In a given set of muscles you have dozens to thousands of motor units. Each is activated by a motor neuron. When recruited the muscle fibers in a motor unit begin producing (or trying to produce) force. The interesting thing is that they arn't all recruited at the same time, when you use 'a muscle' your actually invoking a complex process of recruitment of sub units within that muscle. Moreover these units are not created equally. Some can produce force for a long period of time and are usually weaker, some can produce force very rapidly but tire quickly. This is why when you try to produce a small static force for a long period of time (e.g. hold your arms out straight) your muscles will eventually start shaking and eventually give out. As one set of motor units begin to fatigue the signal to the whole muscle increases, recruiting fast action motor units which are worse at slow holding, and eventually they and all the units are fatigued and you can't produce continued force.
If you'd like to play around with a simulation of the above process you can, it's older code but it may still check out:
And to specifically address the issue of 'building muscle', as I've noted there are lots of sub components with different roles. Each of those can grow over time for different reasons and fatigue is one of the main signals for growth. Not the only one, but the notion that the only way to build muscle is to 'tear up' your muscles with huge lifts is both outdated and wrong.
I'm having trouble understanding how your comment refutes mine; could you clarify?
> Not the only one, but the notion that the only way to build muscle is to 'tear up' your muscles with huge lifts is both outdated and wrong.
I think you're misunderstanding my point. The bodyweight squat is ineffective because you cannot change the stimulus; the only training variable you can adjust is the number of squats you do. Because it's a relatively easy exercise, this quickly means that you cannot subject yourself to sufficient stress with it, both for myofibrillar and sarcoplasmic hypertrophy purposes. Nobody in the history of the universe has ever gotten big and strong on bodyweight squats. It has never happened and it never will happen.
You sure can change the stimulus. Three options immediately come to mind. First, you can increase the power with which you explode out of the bottom, that is push at the ground harder and faster. Second, you can pause at the bottom for a variable length of time, adding an isometric element and increasing the difficulty of the concentric movement. Third, you can do one legged squats to greatly increase the weight per leg.
Have your heavy barbell back squats made your legs and core strong enough to do explosive pistol pause squats?
Well, I'm not sure if this is about differences in definitions .... I don't know what adaptation means. All I can tell you is it had a significant impact on the actual physical bulk of my upper arms.
The main driver of that was SynthRiders, where you get points for punching targets as hard as you can. To get to the top of the leader board you have to pretty much hit targets with all your strength for 3-4 mins. 30 mins of that a day over several months was enough to make a significant difference.
TIL. I’ve been doing this forever, but it’s kind of nice to have a zeitgeisty label to slap on the activity.
For example, I’ve been doing somewhere between 5 minutes and 60 minutes of yoga every day for about a year now. Some days it’s more, other days (or weeks) it’s less. But I’ve found that needing to do something with no minimum standard every day keeps it top of mind, but never stressful.
And it helps that even five minutes of stretching after sitting in front of a computer all day does help to keep me from feeling terrible.
Also, my wife and I have gotten really into doing Apple Fitness+ strength training videos together. It requires an Apple Watch because Apple, but no weird VR headset. I’m sure you could find any number of comparable videos on YouTube. I don’t think you need to buy a thing to start feeling healthier.
Geez, go outside for a run. Get some fresh air, smell the rain, say hi to the neighbors, watch houses being built, get chased by a dog, check the Little Library for something interesting, swallow a bug, see if anyone has a cool car in their garage.
Going on a walk works for my mind, I can think really well walking or hiking.
But more intense exercise without a novel mental aspect (i.e. a game) interferes with my ability to think hard and I find myself constantly frustrated and/or bored.
Now if I could go on physical exhausting, mentally entertaining, medieval quests in the real countryside that would be great. Maybe sunshine, Vitamin D and augmented reality are waiting in my future.
VR is great. You don't have to spike your risk of skin cancer, you don't have to deal with allergies, you don't have to run along a road that constantly has drunken teenagers crashing into mailboxes, there are no mosquitos that will make your life miserable, and you can play with friends, regardless of the fact that they're traveling, or live elsewhere. You don't have to deal with motion sickness as you're driving to a more interesting location, and you don't have to comply to the schedule of your immediate environment.
But none of that is quite as important as what really matters: The real world is boring. If the parts accessible to everyone were half as interesting as a world defined in silicon, people wouldn't strap an LCD screen onto their face and spend all day in it.
$300 for a device that you can do your work in, watch movies with friends in, play pretty intensive, full-motion e-sports in, meet new people every single night without having to pay a cover fee in, and program your own world around your preferences in is a hell of a deal.
These things are popular because the real world sucks in comparison for 80% of the population. Not everyone's a dotcom bubble millionaire, not everyone attends any university, let alone a good one, not everyone lives in the suburbs or in an urban environment.
It's more fun to see someone stand up on a virtual stage and give a presentation to eighty people on something that wouldn't be significant in real life, like a mainline Linux kernel running in a written-for-this-talk RISC-V emulator inside of a pixel shader inside of the video game you're currently standing in's virtual world[1] than it ever could be to watch birds.
I have one of the best views imaginable in real life, with as much land as a person could want to mess around with vehicles, run, or make impromptu sleds to see how fast you can go down a steep hill without toppling, and it doesn't hold a candle to VR. Most of my hours spent outside now are based in running with my pet or walking through the woods, because there's no point in going outside every day for its own sake. If it weren't for my pet, I probably wouldn't spend more than an hour outside every day.
I run when the sun is lower in the sky because of skin cancer risk. For 6 months of the year, it's low enough that it isn't an issue any time of day. I also wear a hat and long sleeved shirt. I know this works because I don't have a tan. I've never been bitten by a mosquito when running, it's when I stop they get me.
As for it being boring, I zone out and work on my projects in my head when running.
Not sure why you'd bother with a spread with a view if you don't enjoy it.
"VR is great. You don't have to spike your risk of skin cancer, you don't have to deal with allergies, you don't have to run along a road that constantly has drunken teenagers crashing into mailboxes...()"
And what about your eyes? How healthy is wearing VR? :)
Sure, if you have a CRT strapped to your face, there might be a little risk. But an LCD screen is just about the most harmless thing imaginable for your eyes.
Dry eyes happen without LCDs, and CVS isn't actually bad for your health or the health of your eyes. Not to mention that most people don't get it, even if they're staring at a screen for most hours of the day. As someone who stares at a VR LCD screen for almost all of my workday with eyes that've gotten less dry as I've started using screens more, I'm pretty much convinced CVS is a myth.
(And, of course, there's the fact that no one has ever been able to reproduce a study on CVS... also not giving it a very strong case.)
I only listed things that I actually do with the headset.
I do all of my daily programming with it on, there are a bunch of applications to watch movies with IMAX-size screens with it on in multiplayer-synced virtual theaters, there are a surprising amount of full-motion sports, plenty of applications built around socialization including a bunch of games, and it's incredibly easy to develop applications for: It's just an Android device as far as software goes, and as of last year it uses the industry-standard OpenXR, so you don't really need to know much specific to the headset at all.
The only thing you can't do completely standalone that's mentioned in that comment is use that particular Linux-in-RISC-V-emulator-in-pixel-shader-in-VRChat, but that's sort of an edge case, as you can probably imagine. For that sort of thing, the Quest 2 works really well for PCVR, as long as you're not using a very specific configuration of Linux (Linux/Nvidia), or a Mac.
I tend to agree—if you're at a point where you can do it. But for a lot of people VR will end up being better for the simple fact that it'll actually happen for them.
Personally, I do go on extended walks regularly, e.g. do a couple miles to the grocery store—but, I was trying to get back into an actual strength training routine after years of no formal workouts, just walking, and gaining skill in Beat Saber was actually the first stepping stone that eventually got me back into it. Just needed some kinda tiny success first, just some experience using my body in a relatively athletic mode again.
This sentiment is so predictable and boring. Also the article literally says the motivation was knee pain meant he couldn’t run more than a few minutes. Maybe people aren’t the cartoons you have in your head.
I suffered from knee pain from running, too. I was concerned I was going to cripple myself. I finally switched my technique from heel-strike to ball-strike. This dramatically reduced the impact load on my knees, and the pain faded away after a month or so and has not returned.
The reason this works is because your body is designed to ball-strike, the heel-strike is unnatural. The ball-strike enables the tendons in your feet to act as shock absorbers. Those tendons will hurt for a bit under the unaccustomed load, so it's best to back off the running a bit until they strengthen.
Be careful. I did the same and it worked fine until I started to run more than 15k at a time, when I started to develop issues with my metatarsals that still haven't gone away more than 6 months later. I saw a physio who specialises in running and he said that long-distance runners don't ball strike any more, it's more of a flat landing (so still not heel strike) and then you spring off from your ball. That stopped my feet really hurting after long runs, but as I say I'm still paying the price for pure ball striking.
I don't get either of you, at all. I greatly enjoy both.
I am not a serious runner, just ~20mi/week for health, but being outside, getting into that zone, the mental space for work/etc. as you mention (though math gets difficult with pace), or just listening to audiobooks as I watch the scenery change, it's great.
Weight training, on the other hand, is very technical. Mesocycles planned months out, tweaked as targets are crushed or missed, every set recorded with rates of perceived exertion, everything on timers, the constant strategizing over which variation of which accessory exercise might help with a particular sticking point and add a few lbs to a main lift in the long run. It's intoxicating.
I feel like people who find these things boring sat in a race car in a parking lot and decided race cars were boring.
I guess weight training is a means to an end that I want - health and fitness. It is not an end in itself, I don't enjoy it, and discovered that I cannot lift while thinking about something else.
I understand that if you love weight training for its own sake, the calculus is completely different.
Running can be a monotonous grind if you do it on a schedule. That’s assuming you live in a place with decent enough weather that lets you keep to that schedule year round.
It can be a monotonous grind, but it isn't for me. The difference is I "preload" my head with a problem I want to solve, and then solve it while running. It's very productive time.
I wear a 20 lbs weight vest, 3.5 lbs wrist weights and 5 lbs ankle weights at all times when using my Oculus Quest 2.
The point of always wearing them, even for low intensity use, is I never have to motivate myself to put on extra weight - and I strongly associate the weighted feeling, and the endorphins I get from them, with having fun.
This is how our bodies evolved to live ... or it should have been, lol.
Just be careful with vest, wrist, and ankle weights. They’re great for static exercises, think leg lifts or arm raises, but can wreck your ankles, wrists, and back while doing any sort of cardio, even walking:
274 comments
[ 0.17 ms ] story [ 392 ms ] threadI’d prefer not to buy anything from Facebook for privacy issues, though…
But I could see most of the above being improved in a few generations such that it’s a really great exercise option.
I own a BoboVR headband with an external battery, which helps balance the weight of the headset. I had the elite strap with external battery and the BoboVR is much more comfortable for me. It’s also leatherette instead of foam, so much easier to clean.
I also have a fan (BoboVR F2) attached to the face mask in order to prevent condensation and overall I get a great experience even when I drip of sweat after exercising.
I just had the foam for a while as well and it was disgusting.
https://topclassactions.com/lawsuit-settlements/consumer-pro...
https://www.oculus.com/quest-2/removable-facial-interface-al...
VR doesn't replace exercise for me; my regular routine involves weights, but it compliments it nicely on my off days. I think it's good to mix in, but wouldn't want to rely on it as the sole form of exercise. Maybe that's just me; I can't do the same thing every day, and since weight training requires a strict routine, cardio is where I mix things up for spice.
Being out of breath isn't actually great evidence of of a good exercise. A few things I particularly dislike:
* Headset gets sweaty
* Content that requires you to perform well can be harder to do when tired, so the exercise part gets less and less as you just fail. Yeah, you can tweak settings to not auto lose, but if the gamification of your exercise stops working then you might as well just do real exercise. This goes the other way too in that you may just get too good at the game and the gamification part is gone for all but the most extremely difficult pieces of content.
I'm not convinced that someone learning that they can cheat themself out of the exercise, and then doing it, is a proper criticism of Beat Saber.
It's not a criticism of the game to say that all of its design elements aren't conducive to a good workout. Novice players will move their arms much more than they have to. As you get better at the game you will probably learn to move your arms less.
This is my point. Playing better tends to result in exercising less. Saying you'll just play suboptimally to get more exercise is counterintuitive and will probably not work as it will force you to ignore all of the feedback that the game gives you, e.g. score and missing blocks.
The only issue I have with Thrill of the fight is that when I get into it, I hit hard, but find no resistance as I would hitting a punching bad or sparring with someone, so my elbow tends to overextend and I feel some pain for a couple days after playing for about 30 minutes. That’s something that will probably get better over time as I gain more control, but as of now, that’s something I need to be careful of.
Too bad I get obsessed with fast knockout punches and my shoulders hurt like hell after a couple of days.
I also learnt the hardway you cannot outrun a bad diet. I would routinely burn 600+ callories in Thrill of the Fight only to get extremely hungry after and eat double what I've burnt.
For me weight training is better than cardio because I don't get the same hunger afterwards, on the countrary, if I do it late in the evening I can't eat at all. I also can't sleep afterwards.
I also became obsessed with shooting/hunting simulators and haven't done any exercise in VR for a long time.
Pavlov Vr is free, I only used the firing range (which is much better than Contractors).
I also did play quite a bit of Contractors but right now I just play the Ninja mode, hunting bots with bow&arrow.
I also got Onwards, but given that it's very realistic (you die very fast if shot), it's too slow pace for my liking.
Space Pirates is also really nice, but it's not a simulator.
- SuperHot: while less cardio focused at the higher levels it really has you doing a lot of slow, deep squats and stretches as you dodge and move around. I recommend trying to do the "Whole game in 10 minutes" mode as that's an easy chunk of time to spend. It's been great to loosen up my back after being at the desk for too long or as a quick way to get over the sleepiness of a big lunch.
- Synthriders: a lot of people know BeatSaber already, but I prefer this as the music is more vaporwave and there's a more varied move set and better 360 mode.
- The Climb 1+2: more a pleasant mental break than anything else, but fun.
Most first-person VR games (including Half-life Alex) make me motion-sick. But for some reason that doesn't happen with Until you Fall. I really hope they make a sequel or similar game.
After a couple of days it was absolutely fine and I do 1 hour+ races in VR in iRacing without any issues - although the karussell at the Nordschleife still makes me a tiny bit dizzy for a split second.
RealFit, Hitmotion Reloaded, Les Mills Bodycombat, Thrill of the Fight, VRWorkout Bootcamp, FitXR, PowerBeatsVR, Supernatural ( if you are in the US), Holofit or VZFit (if you have a rower/bike), Happy Run, Hitstream, OhShape
and many more
Synth Riders forces you to have to move your body and do large sweeping motions, it feels like dancing, AND it has online multiplayer with voice chat which regularly has groups hanging out and playing for fun
That last part makes it so much more enjoyable for me
When I focus on form, I’m just a little sore from pushing myself past my comfort zone.
Most importantly, it gets me out of bed because I look forward to the 20min of zen and focus I get while listening to great music.
[1] https://sidequestvr.com/app/5820/space-punch
[2] https://discord.gg/MKsZqrZh
https://www.oculus.com/experiences/quest/2307085352735834/
In addition we also want to build out the social part and create a community of Space Punchers that work out together and motivate each other to stick to a regular schedule. I find it really fascinating how immersive VR can be and really make you think that you are in the same place with your friends. If we can translate this energy into forming a healthy habit of working out regularly with a community than we are on a good path.
Underappreciated aspect of long term exercising is "how to keep doing it long term" and "how to prevent it from becoming yet another annoying dot on my todo list".
If you want to join a hand tracking based full body group workout you can join our daily session in VRWorkout ( 7AM GMT+1/10 PM Pacific)
For audio chat send me a friend request (oculus) to: xrworkout.io because we are still ironing out some flaws of our audiochat in GodotEngine
[1] https://xrworkout.io [2] https://github.com/mgschwan/VRWorkout
There are many different kinds of people in this world. It pays to think of all the reasons there might be for even one single behavior.
What you do first isn't necessarily your highest priority.
I have to continue during the weekend (obviously as it is Sunday now) or I move out of the rhythm but that works fine too.
But, well, if it works for them - I suppose it correlates with likelihood of writing a blog?
Unfortunately, support for custom maps/mods for the standalone Quest version of the game is not great, so it’s best to play the PC version if the community maps are of interest (which can be done with a Quest via PC link).
I have:
1. A Quest 2
2. A PC with an RTX 20XX graphics card (usually running Linux, but can boot into Windows 10) and USB C port
3. Beat Saber (standalone version)
I guess I need:
4. A long USB C cable (or the official one)?
5. Beat Saber for PC (best to buy on Oculus or Steam?)
6. Some instructions for finding, installing and using these community mods.
Is there a particular place (e.g. Reddit community) that's the best place to find 'getting started' info?
I wouldn’t personally recommend the official link cable — it’s expensive, and in my case it was flaky. I’m currently using a cable made by Cable Matters[0] that works well.
Most people buy the Steam version, though either can work. I personally lean more towards Steam so if I change headsets to something non-Facebook (like Valve’s rumored upcoming quest competitor), I can still play Beat Saber without a second purchase or weird hacks.
For installing mods, ModAssistant[1] has worked well for me. It’s pretty foolproof; the “standard” mods are pre-selected for installation by default, so for a minimal setup just open ModAssistant, point it at your Beat Saber installation, and install the standard mod set. From there you can search and install custom maps in-game.
I don’t have too many other useful links for you, but r/beatsaber on Reddit is pretty active and good for asking questions that haven’t already been covered by that subreddit’s wiki.
[0]: https://www.cablematters.com/blog/Virtual-Reality/oculus-que...
[1]: https://github.com/Assistant/ModAssistant
I ordered this active USB-C to USB-C cable from Amazon, as it was OOS on the Cable Matters site: 201094-BLK-5m
- Quest dev mode instructions: https://uploadvr.com/sideloading-quest-how-to/
- BeatSaber custom modding instructions: https://bsaber.com/oculus-quest-custom-songs/
- Custom community BeatSaber songs: https://bsaber.com
- AI-generated maps from any uploaded MP3: https://beatsage.com/
BeatSage's results are hit and miss. I've uploaded a dozen of my favorite trance songs - some turned out completely unplayable, several actually worked out pretty well.
Airlink works surprisingly well and it's so much nicer to play wirelessly. You might need to connect a wireless (AC or better) access point to your computer if your existing wifi AP is in a different room, though.
My computer already has a wired connection to the wifi router (which is a recent AX model), so hopefully it will work well.
I'm now using an active booster one from Amazon that was about £20.
I don't find high difficulty levels to be great exercise. I can keep up fine, but I get lulled into using little wrist flicks instead of sweeping arcs.
The best tracks for me are ones which aren't technically challenging. Instead, I get my whole body into it - dancing the whole time, stepping to the side so I can take a wide swing, shakin' my butt to the groove... That all gets my heart pounding, and works a much wider range of muscles. I've also turned the HUD off so I don't focus on my score, instead loosening up and having a good time.
The Claws mod also helps me a lot. You only get about half the range of the normal sabers so you have to move your arms farther to reach the blocks. It also makes you use a wider range of muscles, which has stopped some of the RSI I was feeling from too many wrist flicks earlier.
It's not perfect exercise. I could feel my body improve a lot early on, but then it plateaued and I don't see an easy way to push it much farther. However, I'm happy with where it's gotten me, and I intend to keep with it for the foreseeable future. It's fun, and it's convenient so I have no problem doing it for 45 minutes every day, and those are valuable attributes.
Exactly. Once I could beat everything on expert I ended up losing interesting because expert+ felt like a different game: seemed much more wrist-oriented, which I have zero interest in. I'd like to find more maps that optimize around the criteria you've mentioned, but haven't put effort into it.
I tried working out in VR but realized that working out in RR is way more fun.
my model must be defective :(
https://clarkvision.com/articles/eye-resolution.html
You also get a semi permanent line down the middle of your head that lasts proportionally to how long you've worn the headset. Also the sinus pressure of having a 5 pound device drooping from your forehead and the red ring around your face and bloodshot eyes (because you didn't blink at all) means you can't go into public for another hour after you use the thing.
You could have special circumstances: sensitive skin, especially acidic sweat, or just different head pressure tolerances. Also, I could never use the VR system if I didn’t have around 3 sweat bands on. I had to move away from simple cloths ones when I upgraded to the quest 2 because they wouldn’t fit anymore, and the smaller elastic ones don’t hold sweat well, so I had to triple up on them. Otherwise my sessions would end after around 10 minutes as I simply couldn’t keep the sweat out of my eyes anymore.
https://vrhealth.institute/vr-ratings/
I actually ended up with a bit of repetitive strain from throwing hooks and had to switch to Supernatural. It's a monthly fee but it's more purpose-built for exercise.
1. https://www.tripp.com/
You get in an exercise bike (with a cadence tracker, which is a device thag measures pedal movement) and ride through 3D environments via google street view. It’s really, really cool.
Also, best saber is great for getting a little sweaty. So is holopoint.
I believe the versons with fans also don’t leak light.
There is, e.g, the BOBOVR F2 which will add a battery-powered fan to your Quest 2 to add some venting, but I haven't personally tried it.
I’ve sworn off FB and while VR for cardio has me intrigued, nothing is gonna get me to sign back in there.
EDIT: I hadn't actually seen much of the Vive Pro 2, it looks... comparable to the Index? Both price and feature-wise?
Further, you need a facebook account to log in (at least, for now) and it needs to be your real name (if you don't want to run afoul to Meta's terms and conditions).
so yeah, the will use and combine your data for any nefarious purpose see: https://support.oculus.com/146743104076817
"Yes. Facebook will use information related to your use of VR and other Facebook products to show you personalized content, including ads, across Facebook products. This could include recommendations for Oculus Events you might like, ads about Facebook apps and technologies, or ads from developers for their VR apps."
1. Isn’t the headset moving when doing fast moves?
2. Does the headset get dirty from sweating?
3. Does any sweat build up inside the device?
4. Did anyone break their device by moving too fast?
2. Yup.
3. Yup again, especially around the... face gasket?
4. Haven't broken it yet, but I definitely have windmilled my controllers into various things. Part of that is that I don't really have enough floor space for VR.
The Quest II actually feels a little more uncomfortable to be for exercise anyway. It seems like the lenses are closer to the face and the unit gets a little warmer.
So to you question, yes the face gasket and head strap can get quite sweaty, but not so much "inside" the device far as I can tell.
To the last point, I've punched the headset with the controllers a few times (usually going for a short inside uppercut), but they seem pretty sturdy. (Or maybe my punches just have no power :-)
2) The face gasket gets damp with a moderate workout, and sometimes I soak it if I push really hard. It air-dries between uses. It's made of antimicrobial something-or-other which seems to last a long time before it turns funky. When it does, new ones are 2 for $40, so you just throw it away and snap a new one on. The rest of the headset doesn't get wet.
3) I haven't had problems with it, but some people feel it gets too hot and humid. If so, you can get aftermarket fans which fit in the frunk to circulate air through it.
4) I haven't yet! The headset stays on fine. I have clapped the controllers together moderately hard a few times with no apparent damage. Everything seems well-made, and you can buy individual pieces if you do manage to break something.
My experiences are all with the Valve Index. YMMV with other setups.
2. It does. I wash the face mask foam regularly with just warm water + soap. The face cover is removable so it's not a big deal.
3. In my case, it's all absorbed by the washable foam.
4. The Quest 2 is pretty sturdy. I did bump the controllers pretty hard against each other a few times, and had a few glancing hits controller vs headset. Nothing broke so far. The controllers have a ring that tends to protect your hand and the buttons when you crash them into something.
2. Not really. The main thing that gets dirty is the face insert, which is detachable and can be washed by hand. I have a silicon layer above that so just wipe it off after each session. The oculus 2 is much better than the 1 in this regard, which had a fabric around the unit that could get really grimy.
3. I’m not sure. My first oculus died from reasons I can’t determine. I thought it might have been because of the sweat. The oculus 2 avoids fabric for the main unit and seems to be more resistant in this regard.
5. No. But I’ve had more than a few accidental controller strikes on either the other controller or on the unit itself at high speeds. Never hurt the hardware, but I’ve hurt my fingers a few times.
I guess that everyone is different. In my case I really enjoy participating in HIT workouts with people; the group competition drives me to push myself.
That's one of the reasons for having better results in a marathon than during training: group competitiveness
The second benefit is also obvious to me: socializing. Just the fact of doing sports together gives you a sense of bonding, of going through similar pain and succeeding.
One can argue you can achieve the same with VR meanwhile for me is just a poor replacement.
It wasn't my goal to alienate anybody. On the contrary I was trying to highlight the advantages of group sports.
VR is in and out in 30-40 mins and the sports venue is your living room or garage (no travelling required)
IME - VR can be more fun than the gym.
VR can be social and competitive. Many online e-sports are.
Horses for courses etc..
Inflexible, time intensive, lacks variety, intimidating to those with lower fitness, dealing with annoying people, competition limited to whoever you work out with rather than matching your level, affected by weather, injuries, expense ....
- DDR or games that require a mat: great! I used to have the britney spears one when I was younger (because I couldn’t find DDR) and what a fun workout it was!
- wii fit: really cool experience! Really intense. I think I have more fun with DDR but wii fit feels like a real session at the gym
- VR: best for immersion and feedback, you’re really somewhere else. I’ve only done beat saber, I feel like you tend to quickly understand how to do the less amount of movements to play, so it turns from a workout to a game after some hours. Curious about the other games tho
Correct me if I am wrong, but there is no way VR will bulk up your arms in a way that a simple dumbbell won't do better in 5-15 minutes per day, right?
> exercising parts of my body that running didn't touch
Similarly, running will exercise parts of your body that VR won't touch right?
Right, targeted exercise will bulk you up more
> running will exercise parts of your body that VR won't touch right?
What? No
Which muscles do you think you use while running that you don’t use jumping around in vr?
True, but you underestimate the most important thing when working out: consistency - doing it regularly over long periods of time. VR/AR trainings will take off in the future, as the "gamification" (read: instant gratification) will help motivate people to stick with a workout routine and achieve that consistency.
Using dumbbells is the main thing here: It doesn't matter if dumbbells do better if it simply isn't an activity you keep up long term. Daily VR is going to be more meaningful and develop more muscle over time than sporadic dumbbell use. And lets be honest, realistically this is what we are comparing. Fun activity with side effects to an exercise in boredom that has better side effects.
An oft repeated example of this fallacy is in the case of tanning. If you go out into the sun for 20 minutes and get a tan, what will happen if you continue to go out in the sun for 20 minutes each day? Will you get more tan? No. You've already adapted to the stress (ultraviolet light exposure for 20 minutes) and so the continued daily stress of 20 minutes of sunlight will not result in any new adaptations.
That is why if you are completely untrained, sure, VR constitutes a sufficient disruption to homeostasis that you'll get some muscular adaptations. But the stress is so minimal (and you cannot effectively increase it) that you will quickly adapt to it and subsequent exposure to the stress in the future will not result in any adaptations, it will only maintain what little adaptation you already have.
> Similarly, running will exercise parts of your body that VR won't touch right?
Perhaps but not nearly as many as VR hits that running doesn't touch. It certainly forces you to do squats.
I find the best antidote to boredom when lifting weights is to find the right weight and number of reps so that you're pushing through the burn for at least a third of the set. Hard to stay bored when your arms are on fire. Music is the other major component, you have to really amp yourself up and listening to music can put you in that mind set. Maybe even doing some circuit training would be better for you since you don't have to deal with long wait times between sets.
You're not wrong, just missing the point.
No you didn't, unless you were completely and utterly detrained (i.e., previously bedridden or something) and even then, the stimulus would've only resulted in adaptation for a short period.
VR exercise is far too submaximal (in regards to strength) to result in meaningful strength adaptations past a short initial adaptation period.
You don't need progressive overload to build muscles. High rep sets should not be underestimated.
Just because an exercise is hard or makes you sore doesn't mean it's effective.
Do you think this is the difference, the mindset we have in our training.
How do you know what makes you strong? That is, how do you measure it?
Complete nonsense.
I'm curious about the precise interpretation here. Are you saying increased strength be lost and I will return to baseline before I started exercising? Or are you saying I will get a certain amount of increase and I will maintain it, but it will plateau there?
Because I'm just fine with the 2nd scenario. The first would be weird and contradicts my experience (nearly 2 years in ...).
In a given set of muscles you have dozens to thousands of motor units. Each is activated by a motor neuron. When recruited the muscle fibers in a motor unit begin producing (or trying to produce) force. The interesting thing is that they arn't all recruited at the same time, when you use 'a muscle' your actually invoking a complex process of recruitment of sub units within that muscle. Moreover these units are not created equally. Some can produce force for a long period of time and are usually weaker, some can produce force very rapidly but tire quickly. This is why when you try to produce a small static force for a long period of time (e.g. hold your arms out straight) your muscles will eventually start shaking and eventually give out. As one set of motor units begin to fatigue the signal to the whole muscle increases, recruiting fast action motor units which are worse at slow holding, and eventually they and all the units are fatigued and you can't produce continued force.
If you'd like to play around with a simulation of the above process you can, it's older code but it may still check out:
https://github.com/iandanforth/pymuscle
And to specifically address the issue of 'building muscle', as I've noted there are lots of sub components with different roles. Each of those can grow over time for different reasons and fatigue is one of the main signals for growth. Not the only one, but the notion that the only way to build muscle is to 'tear up' your muscles with huge lifts is both outdated and wrong.
> Not the only one, but the notion that the only way to build muscle is to 'tear up' your muscles with huge lifts is both outdated and wrong.
I think you're misunderstanding my point. The bodyweight squat is ineffective because you cannot change the stimulus; the only training variable you can adjust is the number of squats you do. Because it's a relatively easy exercise, this quickly means that you cannot subject yourself to sufficient stress with it, both for myofibrillar and sarcoplasmic hypertrophy purposes. Nobody in the history of the universe has ever gotten big and strong on bodyweight squats. It has never happened and it never will happen.
Have your heavy barbell back squats made your legs and core strong enough to do explosive pistol pause squats?
The main driver of that was SynthRiders, where you get points for punching targets as hard as you can. To get to the top of the leader board you have to pretty much hit targets with all your strength for 3-4 mins. 30 mins of that a day over several months was enough to make a significant difference.
TIL. I’ve been doing this forever, but it’s kind of nice to have a zeitgeisty label to slap on the activity.
For example, I’ve been doing somewhere between 5 minutes and 60 minutes of yoga every day for about a year now. Some days it’s more, other days (or weeks) it’s less. But I’ve found that needing to do something with no minimum standard every day keeps it top of mind, but never stressful.
And it helps that even five minutes of stretching after sitting in front of a computer all day does help to keep me from feeling terrible.
Also, my wife and I have gotten really into doing Apple Fitness+ strength training videos together. It requires an Apple Watch because Apple, but no weird VR headset. I’m sure you could find any number of comparable videos on YouTube. I don’t think you need to buy a thing to start feeling healthier.
But more intense exercise without a novel mental aspect (i.e. a game) interferes with my ability to think hard and I find myself constantly frustrated and/or bored.
Now if I could go on physical exhausting, mentally entertaining, medieval quests in the real countryside that would be great. Maybe sunshine, Vitamin D and augmented reality are waiting in my future.
However, to each their own.
VR is great. You don't have to spike your risk of skin cancer, you don't have to deal with allergies, you don't have to run along a road that constantly has drunken teenagers crashing into mailboxes, there are no mosquitos that will make your life miserable, and you can play with friends, regardless of the fact that they're traveling, or live elsewhere. You don't have to deal with motion sickness as you're driving to a more interesting location, and you don't have to comply to the schedule of your immediate environment.
But none of that is quite as important as what really matters: The real world is boring. If the parts accessible to everyone were half as interesting as a world defined in silicon, people wouldn't strap an LCD screen onto their face and spend all day in it.
$300 for a device that you can do your work in, watch movies with friends in, play pretty intensive, full-motion e-sports in, meet new people every single night without having to pay a cover fee in, and program your own world around your preferences in is a hell of a deal.
These things are popular because the real world sucks in comparison for 80% of the population. Not everyone's a dotcom bubble millionaire, not everyone attends any university, let alone a good one, not everyone lives in the suburbs or in an urban environment.
It's more fun to see someone stand up on a virtual stage and give a presentation to eighty people on something that wouldn't be significant in real life, like a mainline Linux kernel running in a written-for-this-talk RISC-V emulator inside of a pixel shader inside of the video game you're currently standing in's virtual world[1] than it ever could be to watch birds.
I have one of the best views imaginable in real life, with as much land as a person could want to mess around with vehicles, run, or make impromptu sleds to see how fast you can go down a steep hill without toppling, and it doesn't hold a candle to VR. Most of my hours spent outside now are based in running with my pet or walking through the woods, because there's no point in going outside every day for its own sake. If it weren't for my pet, I probably wouldn't spend more than an hour outside every day.
[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G2u7NOpzcBQ&t=5054s
I run when the sun is lower in the sky because of skin cancer risk. For 6 months of the year, it's low enough that it isn't an issue any time of day. I also wear a hat and long sleeved shirt. I know this works because I don't have a tan. I've never been bitten by a mosquito when running, it's when I stop they get me.
As for it being boring, I zone out and work on my projects in my head when running.
Not sure why you'd bother with a spread with a view if you don't enjoy it.
And what about your eyes? How healthy is wearing VR? :)
https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/earth-talk-tv-eye...
Sure, if you have a CRT strapped to your face, there might be a little risk. But an LCD screen is just about the most harmless thing imaginable for your eyes.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Computer_vision_syndrome
(And, of course, there's the fact that no one has ever been able to reproduce a study on CVS... also not giving it a very strong case.)
I do all of my daily programming with it on, there are a bunch of applications to watch movies with IMAX-size screens with it on in multiplayer-synced virtual theaters, there are a surprising amount of full-motion sports, plenty of applications built around socialization including a bunch of games, and it's incredibly easy to develop applications for: It's just an Android device as far as software goes, and as of last year it uses the industry-standard OpenXR, so you don't really need to know much specific to the headset at all.
The only thing you can't do completely standalone that's mentioned in that comment is use that particular Linux-in-RISC-V-emulator-in-pixel-shader-in-VRChat, but that's sort of an edge case, as you can probably imagine. For that sort of thing, the Quest 2 works really well for PCVR, as long as you're not using a very specific configuration of Linux (Linux/Nvidia), or a Mac.
But yeah, the future is basically now.
Personally, I do go on extended walks regularly, e.g. do a couple miles to the grocery store—but, I was trying to get back into an actual strength training routine after years of no formal workouts, just walking, and gaining skill in Beat Saber was actually the first stepping stone that eventually got me back into it. Just needed some kinda tiny success first, just some experience using my body in a relatively athletic mode again.
The reason this works is because your body is designed to ball-strike, the heel-strike is unnatural. The ball-strike enables the tendons in your feet to act as shock absorbers. Those tendons will hurt for a bit under the unaccustomed load, so it's best to back off the running a bit until they strengthen.
(I'd rather have foot pain than knee pain.)
Running for me means I'm working in my head on my projects. It's the most productive part of my work day.
I am not a serious runner, just ~20mi/week for health, but being outside, getting into that zone, the mental space for work/etc. as you mention (though math gets difficult with pace), or just listening to audiobooks as I watch the scenery change, it's great.
Weight training, on the other hand, is very technical. Mesocycles planned months out, tweaked as targets are crushed or missed, every set recorded with rates of perceived exertion, everything on timers, the constant strategizing over which variation of which accessory exercise might help with a particular sticking point and add a few lbs to a main lift in the long run. It's intoxicating.
I feel like people who find these things boring sat in a race car in a parking lot and decided race cars were boring.
I understand that if you love weight training for its own sake, the calculus is completely different.
The point of always wearing them, even for low intensity use, is I never have to motivate myself to put on extra weight - and I strongly associate the weighted feeling, and the endorphins I get from them, with having fun.
This is how our bodies evolved to live ... or it should have been, lol.
https://www.health.harvard.edu/staying-healthy/wearable-weig...