<aside> 💡 Locomotion determines the method by which a player moves from point A to point B. A player can wear a 6DOF device, moving in the real world as is, and they also need auxiliary interactions to reach locations that are inaccessible due to the spatial limitations of the real world

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Current solutions

In virtual reality, the widely used locomotion solutions can be essentially simplified into two types:

Drifting: Players make a linear movement by pushing the joystick on the controller.
Teleportation: Players select a location on the ground with a laser pointer that resembles a fishing line, and then instantly move to that position.

Strictly speaking, both teleportation and translation are forms of indirect manipulation since they both rely on an intermediary medium to achieve movement (using a fishing line or moving joystick). Drifting is a common solution in traditional screen-space video games, but in VR, it can cause motion sickness in new players without conforming to body-eye coordination. The latter is a mode of movement that does not exist in the real world, and in terms of user experience, it breaks the immersion of virtual reality.

To maintain a consistent user experience with the rest of the direct manipulation components, Project Touch introduces a new type of interaction - Tugging

Tugging

Moving through a surface using tugging

The inertia of locomotion

Tugging with zero gravity

Using tugging, players move their avatars in virtual reality by grabbing an empty space and "pulling" themselves in that direction. This method of locomotion is similar to climbing in the real world. Imagine that the air in VR is filled with countless invisible handles for a player to climb. A player moves their avatar by grabbing these invisible handles.

The advantages of tugging include:

Utilizing the player's arm movements to compensate for body-eye coordination significantly reduces motion sickness.
Players can traverse a long distance with minimal effort by utilizing the inertia from rapid tugging.
It is a highly intuitive action with a strong real-world analogy, making it easier to comprehend than drifting or teleportation.
After all, players are already grabbing and dragging things in other parts of this world.

However, tugging also has its imperfections:

If a space is too large, players might need to tug multiple times just so they can move from point A to B. However this can be mitigated by designing relatively smaller spaces, as most of the larger spaces are meaningless. Additionally, allowing advanced players to adjust the strength of inertia, making the range of a single tug longer, can also address this issue.

Gravity

By allowing players to actively switch gravity on and off, we can further expand the potential of tugging. Zero-gravity locomotion can bring the following advantages:

It grants players a broader range of perspectives when viewing a large object.
Now that players can move along the vertical Z-axis, a scene designer can use the potential of the Z-axis to organize content within the space.
If a space is expanded vertically, players are less likely to encounter collisions with the edges of the play area.

有重力时，通过抓取的位移