Applications of Video See-Through HMD only with General Smartphone and Cardboard to Game

Abstract

As Virtual Reality has the advantage that maximizes immersion and presence, it has been widely used for various contents such as video games, education, and therapy. In addition, the developments of see-closed HMDs such as GearVR, DayDream and Occulus Quest 2 accelerate these widespread. However, it still has the disadvantage that its users cannot see the physical world. Thus, the users can fall into dangerous situations that collide with one of the physical objects or fall. When the players use the see-through HMDs, they can avoid these dangers because the physical world is visible, and they can avoid the object. The see-through HMDs can use an optical-based and a video-based method. The optical-based HMD has advantages in that the physical objects can be directly seen but has a cost problem. The video-based HMD has advantages in the cost aspect and various virtual effects can be added to the raw images from the camera. For example, the virtual ball can be drawn in the real environment. To utilize these advantages for the game at a low cost, we developed the video see-through HMD only with the general smartphone and the affordable cardboard. We also developed a simple game to test the developed HMD. As a result of the affordable video see-through HMD, more users can play the MR-based games.