Schedule

IVRC2022 will be held in the format of on-site review and hybrid presentation. There are two stages as follows:

The SEED STAGE will feature about 23 works selected through document screening. The on-site review sessions will be held in several separate locations in Japan, and will be attended by the creators of the works, judges, and corporate partners. The hybrid presentation will be held as part of the annual conference of VRSJ (Virtual Reality Society of Japan).

The LEAP STAGE will feature 11 works selected from the SEED STAGE and 1 work invited from Laval Virtual 2022. The on-site review session (demo at Science Agora) will be held in Tokyo and will be attended by the creators of the works, judges, and corporate partners. This session will be open to the public.

YouTube playlist

List of works

Wall Walking Experience ~Become a Gecko!~

GeckooooOgaimori

<Keio University
Graduate School of Media Design>

Everything on this earth is beholden to gravity. It is impossible for us to climb walls or crawl on the ceiling by ourselves. However, there are many non-human organisms that can do so. We created this work with the desire to climb up the walls, crawl on the ceiling, and generally look at our surroundings in new and unexpected ways.
Because of the physical proximity of the gecko’s four legs and the ease of imagining its hands as suction cups, we considered a system that would allow the user to become part of the extraordinary experience of climbing walls and crawling on ceilings.

The Ultimate Hourglass Experience 

It’s a Sand World

<Keio University
Graduate School of Media Design>

Have you ever had the experience of being buried in something? In the ultimate hourglass experience, visitors enter an hourglass and recreate the sensation of having their feet buried in sand. In addition, the surrounding scenery changes with the passage of time, and in addition to sand, you can also be buried in hot springs, waves, etc. The sensation of burial is expressed through the use of boundary line stimulation to the feet, pressure on the instep, and temperature presentation, in addition to visual images. In addition to relying on visuals, the work also attempts to stimulate the imagination through sound, allowing the viewer to experience the sensation of being buried. The unique feature of this work is that the hourglass, an object now used for decoration and appreciation, was incorporated into a kind of experience, designed to provide a narrative and entertainment experience in which the scene changes with the passage of time.

Mountain Accident at Home!

SSD Brigade

<University of Aizu
A-PxL>

Did you know that the number of people getting lost in the mountains has been on the rise for the past 20 years? One of the causes is that older climbers are unaware of their declining physical fitness. Another cause is inadequate mountaineering planning, clothing, and equipment due to indifference to the proximity and low elevation of the mountains. This experience uses backpack tanks, cooling devices, and HMDs to help subjects understand the cold, darkness, falling rocks, and other natural phenomena that can occur in the mountains at night and cause distress, as well as the feeling of fatigue. It also aims to increase the number of participants by providing them with a positive experience of the game.

Growing Stilts -The Tale of the Bamboo’s Growth-

 Bamboo Emperor

<Keio University
Graduate School of Media Design>

By focusing on the growth rate of bamboo, we are proposing an unrealistic and innovative experience of stepping on a gradually growing stilts. The main idea was inspired from The Tale of the Bamboo-Cutter (Taketori Monogatari), and we took Kaguyahime’s return to the moon on stilts as a reference to further develop our design. We want the users to pay attention to the changes of haptic experience which makes the unreal experience not only stay in the game world, but also makes this illusion appear as if it were happening in the real world. We are trying to use the asymmetric vibration stimulus to imitate the stretchiness of the bamboo’s growth and transmit the growth sensation to the users.

SAKE Brewing Simulator (Legal!!) 

Virtual Sake Brewery “YAGAMI”

<Keio University
Faculty of Science and Technology>

We propose content allowing players to legally experience the sake brewing process in VR, which would be against the Liquor Tax Law if done at home. The system consists of an audio-visual display using an HMD, an olfactory display using aroma oil, and a haptic display using the gyro effect, so it multimodally reproduces the sensation of stirring a large barrel filled with sake.

“Te”mpura

TENAGE!

<Tohoku University
Research Institute of Electrical Communication>

This project provides the player with the experience of deep-frying TEMPURA. However, it is not the ingredients that are fried, but your hand. This project provides an unrealistic experience of making ‘”Te”mpura’, a dish made by putting one’s own hands in oil and deep-frying them. Through the HMD, the player is presented with an image of his or her own hand gradually changing to the color of a fox as it fries, accompanied by the sound of light oil frying. A unique haptic device is used to present tactile stimuli to simulate the sensation of the hand being fried in oil. By making full use of these multiple sensory stimuli, the player will have a completely new experience of frying your own hand in hot oil, which is difficult to experience in reality.

Vivid Ground Generator - Haptics to enjoy VR space with feet -

vivid mech haptics

<Chuo University
Faculty of Science and Engineering>

We have developed the “Vivid Ground Generator”, a wearable lower limb force feedback device that improves the user experience by adding reaction force for falling and walking on the ground in VR space. The device consists of exoskeletons and shoes. The exoskeleton part provides resistance force when walking in water. The shoes also allows the user to walk around in the VR space and present the sensation of falling and walking on the ground. This work provides VR side-scrolling action entertainment using the device.

Mechanical Brain Hacking: The Conversion Experiences of One’s Own Brain and Body System Using Robotic Avatar

ElecTRICK⚡BRAIN

<The University of Tokyo
Graduate School of Interdisciplinary Information Studies / Graduate School of Science and Technology>

The biological brain is almost inviolable, its activity difficult to observe, and therefore mysterious. Then what if it is a machine’s brain? In this project, the participants will become a broken robot whose limbs are almost completely immobilized, and will open their own brains to repair the circuits in their brains, providing the experience of repairing and modifying their body systems in real time. By reconnecting the circuits extending from the “consciousness module” in the robot’s brain to its limbs, the robot acquires control of its limbs. When the circuits are misconnected, the limbs will operate in a way that differs from that of reality. The sensation of brain invasion is presented through tactile stimulation, and the sensation of gaining control of the body is presented through electrical stimulation. Through the modification of their own brain and body systems, participants will encounter a new set of values as a living of a mechanical body.

MEcholocation

Team Melon

<Gifu University
Faculty of Engineering>

The ” MEcholocation” is a system for experiencing echolocation. Echolocation is a biological sonar used by several animal species such as dolphins and bats. They use echoes of ultrasonic waves to locate and identify the objects. Some blind people can also use echolocation by clicking their tongues. In MEcholocation, the echoes of the tongue click are visualized in virtual reality so that anyone can simulate echolocation. We scanned the room in 3D beforehand using LiDAR sensors to enable the player to walk around in the actual space.

in time become snowman

Bean sprouts revengers

<Konan University>

We propose a system to create a snowman by rolling a snowball in VR.
Participants wear audio, video, and temperature sensory presentation devices to experience the weight, size, coldness, and other sensations they might feel when rolling a snowball in a snowfield.
Finally, participants can complete the snowman by placing a “head snowball” on top of the snowball created by rolling it.

Laval Virtual Invited Work

Rustle

Rustle team

<Cnam-Enjmin>

Rustle is an ambient, seated VR game. On a camping night with our friend Diane, we’re celebrating the end of high school by roasting marshmallows, playing the guitar, and discussing our past and future. But the anxiety our incoming adult life produces materializes in the nocturnal woods. Strange sounds disturb our conversation, and we’ll have to identify them before we can calm down and have a peaceful night.
Click here for details

SEED STAGE Repechage Winner

Creating typhoon

Team storm

<Salesian Polytechnic>

In recent years, abnormal weather often comes up as a topic of conversation. We focused on typhoons and decided to create a device that allows visitors to “become” a typhoon itself in order to experience how it works. Specifically, the device allows visitors to freely manipulate a typhoon in a determinate area on a planet and experience how the typhoon changes depending on sea water temperature and atmospheric pressure.