These were, after all, what I'd signed up for when I installed The Climb, stay-at-home tourist that I am. It's a bit like a greatest hits of Cryengine games, really. The strange thing is that I don't spend much time gazing at the dramatic scenery: American canyons, Alpine peaks, Far Eastern bays. I believe I am climbing up a mountain, and parts of my body respond accordingly. I won't be so foolish as to pretend this is actually analogous to real-world free-climbing, because for one thing I'd be a jam puddle within 12 seconds if I tried that, but it's a surprising workout. It's the strangest thing: I barely move but I feel sweaty and achey after reaching a summit. I am trying to get to that grip myself, and I am clenching and stretching muscles to do it even though all I'm really doing is pressing buttons on a gamepad, the rest of my upper body seems to be working hard. If the grip is just that little bit out of reach, or around a corner, I strain over to it, my avatar's hands stretching upwards or to one side even though my own remain firmly clamped to the gamepad. Quite instinctively, I'm using my actual human head, encased as it is in a sweaty shoebox of plastic and polyester, to look at the grip I want to lunge to, it's taking my torso with it.
This creates both mental and physical tension - the reason The Climb becomes a true VR game as opposed to just first-person climbing on a dramatic scale is that is asks you to use your body, rather than a targeting reticule, to navigate around the rocks. If you're only hanging on by one hand and that hand runs out of stamina, it's goodnight, sweetheart. This expires rapidly if you're dangling from just one hand, but replenishes when hanging by both, so you need to both know in advance where the other hand is going to go and have a certain amount of accuracy in making that happen. The key challenge is not running out of stamina in either arm. You've got each hand bound to one of a gamepad's two triggers, and need to grab, lean and lunge your way up and around various mountains and cliffs looming out of beautifully Cryengine-rendered environments. It's a rock-climbing game, basically, but it's neither the forgiving auto-mantling of an Assassin's Creed or Uncharted or the torture-physics of GIRP.
Three fallacies I'm occasionally guilty of believing:ġ) The Oculus Rift does not involve any of the physicality of the HTC ViveĢ) VR gaming is riding a cart to minigame hellģ) There's a ceiling on how good VR games can lookĬrytek's beautiful and involving Oculus Rift game The Climb is a pretty good riposte to all of the above.
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