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Rec Room (video game)

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Rec Room
Developer(s)Rec Room Inc.
Publisher(s)Rec Room Inc.
Director(s)Cameron Brown
EngineUnity
Platform(s)
Genre(s)Game creation system, massively multiplayer online
Mode(s)Singleplayer, multiplayer

Rec Room is a 2016 virtual reality massively multiplayer online game with an integrated game creation system. It is released on Windows, Xbox One, Xbox Series X/S, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, PS VR, Meta Quest 2, Meta Quest 3, Meta Quest Pro, Oculus Rift, Pico 4, iOS, Android and Nintendo Switch.

Gameplay

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Rec Room centers around users accessing various in-game experiences (referred to as "rooms") created by Rec Room Inc. (referred to as "Rec Room Originals"), as well as custom rooms created by players. These rooms can be accessed using in-game menus, teleports found in other rooms, as well as through invitations sent by other users.

Virtual Reality

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Rec Room can optionally be played on a virtual reality headset, specifically using SteamVR, virtual reality headsets on Meta Quest, Pico 4, and PlayStation VR (PSVR2 not supported). In virtual reality mode, the game uses full 3D motion via the motion capture system of a virtual reality headset and two handheld motion controllers, which are required to pick up and handle objects in the game world, including balls, weapons, construction tools, and other objects. Players can explore the space around them within the confines of their physical floor space while roaming further by using the controller buttons to teleport a short distance, with minimal to no virtual reality sickness. A “walking” mode enables players to move continuously rather than teleporting, although this poses a higher risk of motion sickness.[1]

Social Interaction

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Throughout rooms, players can encounter and interact with other players in real time through voice and text chat, being represented by their avatar. Players can choose to friend, invite, mute, block, or report other players, as well as "cheer" them for various reasons (equivalent to a "like" on most social media platforms), or form a party with other players to travel between rooms together. As players engage with Rec Room, they gradually earn experience, and eventually obtain an additional level on their account, with an indicator displayed by their username showing how many levels they've earned so far, and by extension, an indication of the age of their account.

User Generated Content

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When creating rooms, players can use the in-game "Maker Pen", a tool resembling a hot glue gun, that can be used to draw shapes in 3D. Players can also code in Circuits V1 and Circuits V2, Rec Room's visual programming language. Rec Room announced a partnership with Unity for Rec Room Studio, which allows certain users to use Unity to create more advanced rooms.

Items and Currency

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Rec Room's in-game currency, Tokens, can be earned throughout gameplay, purchased using real money, or earned by subscribing to Rec Room Plus (stylized as Rec Room+), which grants several benefits, including the ability to make custom shirts, sell user-generated content (also known as inventions) for tokens. Tokens that are earned in this way can be exchanged for real money. [2][3]

Development

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Seattle-based development studio Rec Room Inc. (formerly Against Gravity Corp) was co-founded in April 2016 by Nicholas Fajt, Cameron Brown , Dan Kroymann, Bilal Orhan, Josh Wehrly, and John Bevis.[4] Prior to the company's founding, CEO Fajt worked as a program manager on the HoloLens team at Microsoft. Kroymann worked on the same team after working on the Xbox team. CCO Brown worked as the creative director of HoloLens.

In 2016 and early 2017, the company raised $5 million in funding for the development of Rec Room and its community. According to Fajt, the company will keep the game free to download.[5]

In June 2019, Rec Room Inc. announced that the company raised an additional $24 million over two rounds of funding.[6] In December 2020, Rec Room Inc. announced an additional $20 million in funding.[7]

In March 2021, Rec Room Inc. announced another funding round of $100 million with a valuation of $1.25 billion leading to its unicorn status.[8][9] In December 2021, Rec Room Inc. announced that they raised $145 million during another funding round, bringing the studio's value up to $3.5 billion.

Music

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Most of the music heard in Rec Room Originals were composed by creative director Cameron Brown,[10] whose in-game username is "gribbly".[11]

Reception

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Dan Ackerman, writing for CNET, described Rec Room as VR's "killer app".[12] In January 2017, Ars Technica reported that trolling and harassment were major issues for Rec Room.[13] In June 2017, MIT Technology Review contributor Rachel Metz described it as a great example of VR's potential for social interaction while criticizing its underdeveloped anti-abuse features.[14] Filmmaker Joyce Wong described Rec Room as her choice of "most interesting piece of art in 2017".[15]

References

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  1. ^ Groen, E.; Bos, J. (2008). "Simulator sickness depends on frequency of the simulator motion mismatch: An observation". Presence. 17 (6): 584–593. doi:10.1162/pres.17.6.584. S2CID 43585717.
  2. ^ "RecRoomPlus". Rec Room. Retrieved 2023-05-01.
  3. ^ "Rec Room+". rec.net. Retrieved 2023-12-12.
  4. ^ "Company Against Gravity". VBProfiles. Spoke intelligence. Retrieved December 30, 2017.
  5. ^ Hayden, Scott (February 2, 2017). "'Rec Room' Studio Raises $5M "to continue to build the future of Social VR"". RoadToVR. Retrieved December 30, 2017.
  6. ^ Matney, Lucas (June 12, 2019). "Against Gravity is building a VR World that won't stop growing". TechCrunch.com. Retrieved June 28, 2019.
  7. ^ Matney, Lucas (December 17, 2020). "Social gaming platform Rec Room scores $20 million Series C". TechCrunch.com. Retrieved December 18, 2020.
  8. ^ Matney, Lucas (March 24, 2021). "Rec Room raises at $1.25B valuation from Sequoia and Index as VCs push to find another Roblox". TechCrunch.com. Retrieved March 27, 2021.
  9. ^ Lyons, Kim (March 25, 2021). "Rec Room rides uptick in users during the pandemic to become a VR unicorn". TechCrunch.com. Retrieved March 27, 2021.
  10. ^ "Music". Rec Room. Retrieved 2022-09-30.
  11. ^ "RecCon keynote with Gribbly". rec.net. Retrieved 2023-05-01.
  12. ^ Ackerman, Dan (August 12, 2016). "VR finally has its killer app, and it's called Rec Room". CNET. Retrieved December 28, 2017.
  13. ^ Newitz, Annalee (January 24, 2017). "Welcome to the world of trolling in virtual reality". Ars Technica. Retrieved December 28, 2017.
  14. ^ Metz, Rachel (June 14, 2017). "Virtual Reality's Missing Element: Other People". MIT Technology Review. Retrieved December 30, 2017.
  15. ^ Wong, Joyce (December 27, 2017). "The art of VR: In 2017, filmmaker Joyce Wong found compelling new ways to socialize online". CBC Arts. Retrieved January 2, 2018.
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