Picture this: You turn down the in-game music volume for Elite Dangerous, and enable the free "V" browser inside your cockpit. A floating window appears, allowing you to log into and run Netflix. The window can be moved and sized anywhere in your cockpit, allowing you to have a floating, flat screen TV above/below/beside your HUDs. You start an episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation and fly your ship while the opening credits roll! A surreal experience. Particularly when you hear the hiss of a hatch opening on the Enterprise and it sounds like the hatch behind you opening in the cockpit! I have looked around more than once.
The controls are a bit quirky, but "V" for VR works very well for Elite Dangerous and Oculus Rift. In addition to embedding a moveable / resizable web browser inside E.D., the software supports a number of streaming apps, including Netflix, Hulu, and Spotify.
This guide is for using V inside Oculus Rift with an Xbox One controller. So far I have only evaluated these controls for Netflix.
The software download and additional information can be found here:
Hello V
I am a user of this software, do not work for V, and have no ownership in the company. I found the control scheme confusing at first and not well-presented on their own web site, so wanted to publish this guide. And the list of supported apps is larger than indicated on the site.
After installing, run the V software before running E.D.
It initially runs minimized to the system tray, so right-click and select Show GUI, then start E.D.
If it works you should see an extra icon in your E.D. session - look up, down, and around for a little white circle with a clock a few inches below it. Mine was always located down. If you don't see it, then try tapping twice (firmly) on the side of your Oculus headset and see if that shows the white circle.
If you still do not see it, take off your headset and look at the GUI window for V. A few times I received the following error:
"injection failed"
From the dropdown menu I then selected "Elite Dangerous (64)", and once I did that it injected correctly into Oculus.
Change sound playback to Oculus
You must change your playback device in Windows if you want to hear the V audio inside your Oculus headset. This assumes that Oculus Rift is not set as your default "speaker" device.
- Right-click the system tray speaker icon and select "Playback devices"
- On the Playback tab right-click on your Rift audio and select "Set as default device" if it is not already selected
- You will have to change this back to your default speakers to hear sounds through your PC speakers after you finish using V
Start the App Inside E.D.
Once you see the white circle, point your head at it until you see the circle start to fill. Once it fills the small interface will open. You should see the V Library with a grid showing the available apps.
At this point your are controlling the little V screen and not Elite Dangerous. The biggest adjustment is learning to trade off between controlling V and controlling E.D.
Controlling V
Y key: Re-locates the V screen(s) to where you are looking. I prefer to put the screen to the right of my upper-right HUD and just above the big right-hand HUD. So I LEAN FORWARD to that position and hit "Y" to locate the screen there. Just keep hitting "Y" as you move your head around and you will see how the grid gets re-oriented immediately. (See section below for re-mapping the Elite "Y" key functions - they conflict with each other)
D-Pad: Selects different apps on the grid. The highlighted app hovers above the grid.
A key: Runs the selected app and serves as left-click. Select Netflix. The app window will appear above the main V grid. Inside an app the A-key also serves as the left-click of the mouse to select buttons on the screen.
At this point your cursor is available for navigating around the Netflix browser window with the left thumbstick - you need to log in with your credentials. I found this very confusing with the controls. I did not take notes and had to fumble through using the keyboard versus moving the cursor around to log in. It took several attempts to get logged in.
Left Thumbstick: Moves red web cursor around the screen. Once your credentials are saved, you will not have to fumble through the log in process on Netflix. So when Netflix starts, just use the thumbstick to select what you want to play and use the A-key to click on play.
Trigger + Left-Thumbstick: (either left or right trigger) Re-position: Moves the screen in an orbit (up/down/left/right) from its current location (which you initially determined with the Y key)
Trigger + Right-Thumbstick: Resizes the screen.
Left or Right (Shoulder) Bumper: Pins the screen and HANDS CONTROL BACK TO ELITE DANGEROUS. Hitting the bumper is the key to locking in the V screen and putting it "in the background" in terms of control. At this point you are back to controlling your ship inside the E.D. game and can watch videos or listen to music while you pilot.
Double Tap: Enables V interface. If you need to switch back to the V interface, double tap your oculus headset (firmly!) to bring up the white circle / clock beneath your video window. Point your head at the white circle to activate it. At this point you can then use the A-key to select Netflix and get the red cursor back on the Netflix screen to navigate. Then just hit the bumper key to lock it in and return to E.D.
Re-Map E.D. FSD Y-key
My Xbox controller scheme uses the Y-key for supercruise and jump functions, but when I would do that in-game to start the FSD, it would also re-position the V screen to wherever I was looking when I hit "Y". Not good! I went into my E.D. controls and re-mapped the Y-key FSD functions to B-up-arrow and B-down-arrow, since I did not use the targeting functions that were previously mapped there.
Performance: I am running a Nvidia GeForce GTX 980 and have not had any major performance issues running Netflix inside the game. At some points I have noticed a brief video stutter in both Netflix and E.D., but it usually only lasts for a second or two. Overall the V experience has been great.
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