We just pushed an update, here's what's new!
- The Rec Center got a major upgrade! New layout, fresh paint, some nice big windows, etc. Check it out and let us know what you think!
- You can now buy donuts to share with your friends! Since the donuts are virtual, they are also gluten (and calorie) free =]
This update represents a big revision to how Rec Room handles rooms. Long story short, everything is now a room with a ^roomname. Paintball, Quest, The Rec Center, even your Dorm Room - they're all Rec Room rooms! This change unlocks a lot of new stuff in the near future (including customizable Dorm Rooms!), but here's what it means for this update:
- Lots of watch UI changes for you to yell at us about =]
- Greatly improved room search! Go to Watch > Play > Search and search by room name, creator, or tags. Speaking of which...
- Rooms now support tags! There's a bunch of pre-defined tags, plus you can add your own to rooms you create!
- All our rooms (Rec Royale, Paintball, Laser Tag, etc.) are tagged with #rro (for "Rec Room Original"). All community-created rooms are tagged with #community (for hopefully obvious reasons!)
- There are quick buttons for filtering by tag when you go to Watch > Play > Hot. Tap the Rec Room icon to see only Rec Room Originals. Tap the #community button to see only community-created rooms. And so on...
- Rooms now support "subrooms". You can now create multi-room experiences that exist under a single ^roomname. A visit or cheer to any subroom will go to the parent ^roomname.
- Doors in the Rec Center are now "multi-doors". They essentially perform a tag search when you use them. For this update, several of the doors are limited to Rec Room Original rooms, this may change in the future.
This update also introduces some big changes to what we call "player type":
- Starting with this update, you can play Rec Room in Screen Mode (i.e., without a VR headset) on PC and PS4. Both mouse and keyboard and controller are supported.
- VR players can now choose between Walk and Teleport mode. This choice is offered during the new user tutorial, and you can change it (unless you're in the middle of a game) in Watch > Settings > Gameplay.
- Walk VR can no longer teleport. They jump and clamber, and use doors/ladders by grabbing them.
- Default matchmaking in all rooms is now "pickup" style. This means that all player types (Walk VR, Teleport VR, Screen) play together as one big happy family (hopefully!).
- Rooms can optionally limit access by player type. For example, we've created a room called ^paintball for pickup paintball (all player types allowed), and a second room called ^paintballVR which is identical except that access is limited to Teleport VR players only. Same for ^RecRoyale (pickup) and ^RecRoyaleVR (Walk VR players only)
- We expect to iterate on this system based on feedback, so let us know what you think.
But wait there's more:
- Roles UI cleaned up and now aware of player types. Hopefully this should be easier to use and understand now.
- You can now hide player names using the roles system.
- Fix bugs which could prevent drawing surfaces (e.g., whiteboards) syncing correctly in some circumstances.
Thanks for playing Rec Room! As always, don't hesitate to give us your feedback