Crafting New Worlds: Lessons from the Frontiers of VR
Text: Maxim Zhestkov
Concept art: Cosmos Interactive
Games and interactive environments have always held a captivating allure for me, promising endless opportunities for exploration, immersion, and fresh perspectives. They transcend the boundaries of linear storytelling, offering entirely new ways to experience and relive events through ambient storytelling of the environment.
This enduring fascination served as the spark for Modules, a VR project that ultimately led to the creation of Cosmos Interactive and our dedication to pushing the boundaries of interactive storytelling.
Medium-Content problem
Interactive worlds, with their boundless possibilities, give a chance to involve the audience in the creative process, empowering them to make choices and navigate the environment. I never wanted to simply present to the audience a story with pre-defined boundaries and interpretations, but to give viewers the opportunity to explore the world and understand the story in their own way through pieces of the story left for them.
Another important aspect of interactive storytelling, for me, is capturing the spirit of the times through technology and using the medium as a conduit for that spirit.
Drawing parallels to the philosophical "Mind-Body problem," which explores the primacy of thought and intention, I introduced the concept of a "Medium-Content problem" in the technological realm.
It involves exploring how new technologies can be used to create content specifically tailored to the new tools, avoiding the repetition of old principles. While acknowledging the role of skeuomorphism and inheritance, I feel the importance of embracing the tool and using it to create something special and new.
Creating art with immersive technologies
My fascination with VR began as soon as I heard about it, around 2010. It was boring for me to work with well-known mediums, because they already have an established framework of action and thinking. In contrast, VR presented a blank canvas, a realm of boundless possibilities and unexplored frontiers. Working in an environment without defined rules and conventions felt like discovering new continents.
I was very lucky to have a guide to the world of interactive technologies - Viktor, a man who joined our company 5 years ago. Together, we made dozens of small experimental internal projects, before moving on to creating something complex and comprehensive.
Modules started as simple experiments with space, and early tests with my wonderful team yielded unexpected results. Daniil, the architect on the project, developed and proposed innovative approaches that I hadn't anticipated, transforming the environment from simple cubes into carefully crafted compositions.
This realization sparked a desire to create a complex experience that combined movement, sculpture, sound, architecture and boundless imagination. In Modules, all of these aspects amalgamated into one whole sensory experience.
We didn't just make a VR project, we also made an app that users can play/perceive in the first person on a computer. It was a very important detail for me — to give the opportunity to step over just a VR experience and to give the game into the hands of even those who do not have VR. This was also an idea that was born during my conversations with the team, and this is the beauty of the process — you come up with an idea, even the craziest one, and in communication with the technical director, you understand the limitations and possibilities.
Challenges along the way
The shift to VR demanded a new way of thinking about project development. Creating documentation and adopting a systematic approach became essential, fundamentally changing my understanding of my own interests. Immersing myself in literature and studying software development and its associated challenges became necessary. This marked my first experience with such a complex undertaking, which proved to be a valuable but challenging learning experience.
One of the key skills I developed during the Modules project was systematic thinking and the ability to envision and describe the final product after the experimental phase of the preproduction.
I recognized the damaging potential of "feature creep," a cognitive trap where new ideas constantly emerge, making it difficult to stop adding features and burdening the project. Structured thinking and planning help to avoid this by understanding your expectations and requirements clearly.
From the technical point of view, one of the most challenging aspects of the project was the goal of making it compatible with the Quest 2 VR headset. This required significant optimization, as maintaining a stable frame rate in VR is crucial to avoid lag and nausea, so we worked to find the perfect balance between graphic quality, textures, animations and performance.
Becoming Cosmos
Modules had a profound impact on my creative vision and approach to art creation, as it was a benchmark for the level of immersion and complexity that I would like to tackle in my future projects.
It became clear that my future work should involve intricate team interactions and meticulous planning and documentation. I found comfort in these complexities, recognizing that they were essential for creating something truly ambitious. This approach allows for continuous learning, the identification of numerous problems, and the development of better, smarter, and more confident solutions.
The experience of creating Modules has shaped my plans for future projects. As we work on our first game The Great Filter with a team of around 20 people, and I am confident that this project would not have been possible without the experience gained from Modules and the lessons on the teamwork and structure learned there.
