A data miner discovered Oculus's upcoming safety feature 'Space Sense'. This is set to replace the current spatial safety feature found in Oculus headsets 'Guardian' which has been part of the Oculus platform since 2019. Guardian allows users to highlight their play space to keep them clear of static objects. Things such as tables and chairs would be noted on the Oculus and would alert users when these objects would enter their immediate vicinity. Oculus recommends 6.5 feet by 6.5 feet to play VR games, however, users can go down to one meter by one meter should they so require. Users then get a warning should they get too close to their set boundaries or step outside of the area. The boundaries appear as a grid.
Other VR safety features include the chaperone system with the HTC Vive, whereby it similarly detects surrounding walls and foreign objects however it similarly cannot detect moving objects leading to similar safety issues as with the Guardian system. The lack of moving object sensors shows a potential safety issue with virtual reality as a whole. Videos continue to go viral around the web when users accidentally interact with people in their vicinity, often while swinging their arms wildly. Users may even risk tripping over pets, resulting in injuries to themselves or even their four-legged friends. With that in mind, a new feature that can track moving objects and warn a VR user before contact is made is obviously a good thing.
It's important to note that, at the moment, little is known about the upcoming Space Sense feature. A video found by German data miner Basti564 shows a video found in the Oculus Quest 2 headset's software about the upcoming feature. The video shows the user playing a high physicality game as the system tracks objects around him. Next, he is alerted with a hologram of a person on their phone unknowingly walking by. Because of the alert, the user stops and gives way to the other person. It also shows a woman waving to a small child after looking at their dog in VR. The inclusion of the user being able to recognize the child and gesture back to them implies that the Space Sense feature will include highly visible warnings of moving people and animals.
Protecting The Metaverse From Yourself
To access this video for yourself, open the Oculus Quest 2 debug menu and enter in the following code: adb shell am start -a android.intent.action.VIEW -d systemux://settings/intrusion_detection com.oculus.vrshell/.MainActivity. Then you will have the ability to view the video under the new setting option 'Space Sense'. There is no official update as to when this feature will be rolled out, however as the clip was included with the Oculus v32 update, one could assume that this new feature will be included with the anticipated Oculus v33 update.
The safety applications of this feature are monumental. With this addition, users will no longer have to worry about the potential physical trauma they can put on their loved ones while enjoying VR. One can hope that HTC and other large VR companies implement similar functionality with their headsets for no extra cost.
Source: Basti564/Twitter