Oculus Rift’s game within a game is a great idea

While some people's efforts to put games within games, seem to be more for the fun of the challenge and the novelty than anything else, when it comes to the Occulus Rift, it seems like it might be possible to go all Inception and go several layers deep, creating a far more visceral experience than playing a game within the Rift itself.

The game in question is Alone, and you play a character playing a very basic, fifth person horror title. You're just sat on your sofa, playing a game, in a darkened house. While this sounds mundane on the surface, it lets you experience the fear of playing a horror game, whilst having the environment around you be affected by the game you're playing. We've all played something scary and looked behind us or started at a strange noise. That now happens in the game world and within the game within the game.

If it sounds a bit difficult to understand, check out the following video(some NSFW language): [yframe url='http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jAdKUs-qvBw']

According to Mr Hodder there, the game required some very simple, forward facing attention, since he was staring at an in-game screen for most of the time. This meant that when it came to strange noises that he heard in the faux real world, instead of taking off his headset and checking someone wasn't sneaking up on him, he looked around the digital living room. If you're unable to watch the video, there's points where he here's noises ‘upstairs' sees a shadowy figure approaching him on a hidden camera and finally watches as the front door opens and an invisible figure walks towards him.

Spooky stuff, but this could be made far more visceral if he was able to move around the house. Perhaps windows could be left open that he needs to close in order to survive the night. Ironically, this type of game would be perfect for a representation of that pretty awful movie featuring Malcolm in the Middle, Stay Alive. Anyone remember that?

KitGuru Says: This is a great example of how the Oculus Rift is going to change gaming when it hits mainstream availability later this year. There will be a lot of new experiences made possible by not only the head tracking, but its immersive capability. I'm really excited to see what else comes of it.

[Thanks Eurogamer for the heads up]

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