Are snow storms threatening your existence, your livelihood, your sanity? Well, we can’t help with that in the slightest, but we do know of some good VR beaches you can visit as the storm rages outside.
If you’re in the North of the US’s East Coast right now, it probably looks something like this outside:
Remember to maintain good posture when you shovel the driveway. Lift with the knees, not with the back. Or is it ‘lift with the back and not with the knees’? You better do your own research on this one, because we’re too busy living the life of digital snowbirds in some of our favorite beach-themed VR experiences!
vTime – Paradise Resort (Gear VR)
There are plenty of environments to visit in vTime, but by far the most relaxing is the social platform’s tropical beach front, which features deckchairs, champagne, and a few scuttling crabs that pop up now and then. Even a curious stork waddles by to say hello as you dig your toes into the virtual white sand.
vTime is free for Gear VR, and works on all versions (including Note 4). The devs say to “stay tuned for imminent news on vTime for Google Cardboard.”
Perfect Beach (Gear VR & Cardboard/Android)
Perfect Beach by nDreams is a tranquil place for guided meditation and relaxing music—a place with no objective other than to unwind and watch the waves roll in on your personal beachfront. Even at $2.99 for the Gear VR app, or $0.99 for the Google Cardboard version, it certainly beats shoveling snow.
You can also import your personal music libraries, podcasts and meditation sessions for extended replay.
SUNSETS FOR SALE (Gear VR, Rift DK2, Cardboard/Android)
Although not an extended beach experience like the others, the group behind the video, PAVR Media, focuses on creating “bite-sized experiences that people everywhere can enjoy and share.”
Sunsets for Sale is a fake 360-degree infomercial that does just that, hosted by writer/director/actor Nick Corirossi. As a former staff writer/director at Funny or Die, Nick plays Jared, a desperate salesman trying to sell exclusive ‘sunset spots’ while trying to maintain an on-again off-again relationship with his girlfriend.
You can download a 60fps 4k version for playback both on Gear VR and Oculus Rift DK2, or you can view the video directly on your Google Cardboard headset.
AltspaceVR – Desert Island (Rift DK2)
Oculus Rift DK2 owners have a plethora of beach-themed demos at their fingertips, but many of them run on old runtimes—requiring you to mess with drivers and whatnot. So one of the easiest ways to get into a beach with some friends is to pop into the spacious Desert Island map in AltspaceVR, which is always on the latest Oculus runtime.
Sign-up with an email address and instantly meet other digital snowbirds like yourself and talk about all things VR to distract you from the mounting snowstorm outside.
