Bigscreen might have begun life as a way to bring your desktop into virtual reality (VR), but it has since grown to be much more than that, leading the way with regards to social VR. Bigscreen are taking this even further with the launch of the new Big Rooms Update.
Bigscreen has become a popular way for users to screen-share or stream to friends and family in VR. Small groups can gather to watch a stream together, and Bigscreen have even started to experiment with larger-scale official VR screenings, like its partnership with Paramount to screen Top Gun.
Following on from that success, Bigscreen are introducing ‘Big Rooms’. Whereas normal Bigscreen rooms only allowed up to four people in a room, with the new update a special kind of room is available labelled simply as ‘Big Rooms’ that allow up to 12 people to share a virtual space. A Big Room only allows the host/admin to stream from their desktop in a Big Room, and that person will need a good, stable internet connection – Bigscreen are recommending 10Mbps or better.
To tie-in to the new Big Rooms, some new large environments have been added. The Big Balcony and Big Campfire, which is similar to the existing campfire environment, but on a much larger scale, with amphitheatre-style seating and a valley between mountains. The developers have also said some Easter eggs are lurking in these new environments.
The development team have also been busy rebuilding the environments to improve efficiency and reduce the work needed for a user’s GPU and CPU. In addition, netcode has been optimised for multiplayer use. Whereas previously each new person added to a multiplayer room would add to the CPU overhead, with the new update this is no longer the case, so hosts no longer need worry about maxing out their CPU usage.
Bigscreen have promised further news about its upcoming mobile VR launch in the next few weeks. VRFocus will, of course, bring you the latest news once it is available.
via Mint VR