Hello there, and thank you so much for checking in!
Summer is finally upon us, and we’re certainly bringing the heat with it. This time around, we’re introducing a brand new landing page for new players to get acquainted with the game, an easier way to jump right in to the game with a Steam account, public testing builds for the much anticipated Lua Scripting feature in addition to a new way to interact with objects, and finally our plans to address those pesky voice chat issues.
New Landing Page
We now have a brand new landing page for ChilloutVR that includes all of the basic information anyone would need to know about the game before jumping in, including features, versions, system requirements, frequently asked questions, and a full archive of all past and latest blog posts.
Outside resources can also be easily found and accessed from here, such as the Content Creation Kit, feedback site, roadmap, and documentation.
If a friend or loved one is interested in checking out ChilloutVR, this would be the best place to direct them to learn about what we have to offer.
You can access ChilloutVR’s landing page here: https://abinteractive.net
Lua Experimental Builds
As a quick reminder for those who don’t keep up with our community Discord announcements…
Last month, we released the first iterations of our brand new Lua Scripting feature with two public Experimental builds of our next release. Since then, we’ve received a lot of useful feedback from the community and are working on ironing out any remaining issues and implementing suggestions.
For those interested in working with Lua in ChilloutVR, documentation is available here. We have also opened a new Scripting channel in our community Discord to discuss and ask questions about Lua development.
We would greatly appreciate any and all feedback leading up to the stable release of 2024r176.
Proximity Grabbing
In addition to Lua Scripting, another feature that may have been a bit overlooked is a new way to pick up and interact with objects.
Previously, the only way for a player to pick up objects in VR was by aiming a laser from your hand to the object, and gripping with the controller, which could be done from close or far away. As many have noted, this isn’t a very immersive way to interact with props and items in the world, and can even lead to unintentional pickups. With that said, it is now possible to grab objects in a more direct manner with your hand in close proximity, or inside, of it.
For those who still prefer the old method, picking up objects with the laser will still be possible, so users may choose whichever they wish to use.
The Proximity Visualizer is shown for demonstrative purposes, and can be disabled.
Steam Sign-up
In our previous May Status Report, we discussed the inclusion of a new way to log in to ChilloutVR via a Steam account. It was also mentioned that signing up with a Steam account would also be possible later, making it significantly easier for new users to quickly try out the game without having to create an ABI account through our Hub website, and we are happy to say that this feature will be available in the next release!
For those on the bleeding edge of our Experimental builds, Steam sign up will first be available with version 2024r176 Experimental 3 very soon, but everyone else will have access to this feature with the stable release of this upcoming update, along with Lua Scripting and many other improvements, as soon as it is ready.
Now, you may be wondering, “how does a Steam account differ from an ABI account”? Well, if all you’re wanting is a basic gameplay and social experience, then you’re not missing out on much. All basic features will be available to Steam users with essentially no restrictions. However, creating an ABI account will be important for users interested in uploading any worlds, avatars, or props to ChilloutVR, and managing such content. Doing so does require an ABI account to access our full Hub website and log-in to the Content Creation Kit. But this can be easily accomplished by migrating your Steam account to an ABI account via the Hub website along with the stable release of 2024r176.
We’re looking forward to welcoming any new users who make use of this new feature to stop by and visit our platform and community!
Further Voice Chat Improvements
We are aware of issues that have been impacting our new voice chat system these past couple of months, which include occasional stutters and reconnections and while we have already made significant improvements to resolve all past issues, some new ones have come up. To address these, we have been working on some major improvements of our voice server software that aims to provide more stability to player communications.
We expect to begin testing within the next two weeks, and hope to push these server changes to live soon after.
Thank you for your patience during this ongoing process, and to all of those who have provided feedback related to these issues thus far.
Community Feedback
For those of you who regularly keep up with ChilloutVRs development, or even for the occasional or first-time readers, thank you for tuning in to our monthly Status Reports. We try to keep the community up to date on our plans and activity as much as possible, and these reports allow us to provide a steady and consistent stream of information related to our progress on a month-to-month basis.
While we do our best to keep things here relatively interesting, we're always looking for ways to improve. Whether it be the information provided, the content included, or anything else related to these reports, we want to hear what you think, be it positive or negative. If there's a way we can do better, don't hesitate to let us know! Ultimately, these status reports are for the community, so your input is very important to us when putting these together.
Feel free to provide any and all feedback in the comments below on Steam, or email us at [email protected] . Thank you!
Final Notes
As always, thank you for your continued interest and support of ChilloutVR's development.
Social Media
Find us on social media with the links below:
Discord
Twitter (Company)
Twitter (Status)
YouTube
Reddit
Support Alpha Blend Interactive
Like every company, we need financial support to be able to push updates and improve our product. We are grateful for every bit of support we get.
If you want to support us you can do so here: https://www.patreon.com/AlphaBlendInteractive
We are more than thankful for your support!
Not in our Discord server yet?
Use the link above to join our discord server and get in touch with our wonderful community, get help with creation-related topics and find people to play with.