Can Cybershoes remedy my movement illness on Oculus Quest 2? [Review]

I’ve been a huge virtual reality fan for a long time and have played more VR games than ever in the past year thanks to Lockdown and the arrival of Oculus Quest 2.

The best thing about this VR headset is that it is wireless, so you have the freedom of movement that you don’t get with other devices. There is also a good selection of games that you can buy and install on the headset. Personal favorites are Climb 2, Pistol Whip, Superhot VR, and Arizona Sunshine. You can also play games such as Half Life: Alyx installed on your PC using a compatible USB-C cable or the recently updated Virtual Desktop app.

As great as VR is, I have a problem with some games due to motion sickness. With titles like The Walking Dead: Saints & Sinners – where it was a tremendous struggle to pass the tutorial without throwing up – I had to limit myself to very small outbursts. Although this game has a setting to reduce nausea, it doesn’t work for me.

The reason for motion sickness in some VR titles is because the brain receives conflicting signals. The world moves around you, but you are essentially standing still and your head is not moving up and down or side to side like it does when you are really walking. This upsets the balance of the brain and makes you feel nauseous.

Solutions to the problem are marching in place to fool your brain into walking from one place to another, just like in the real world, even though it is not perfect.

For the past few months I’ve tried cybershoes which, as you can see from the name, are shoes that you can use to “walk” in VR games. They are designed to go over your own shoes and have a solid wheel at the bottom that will register your movement. The peripheral device works with all major VR platforms such as SteamVR, HTC Vive and Oculus Rift and now also supports Oculus Quest 2 wirelessly.

I received the Cybershoes Gaming Station for review and it came in an impressively large box as you not only get the Cybershoes, but also a red and black rotating bar stool (Cyberchair!) And a round rug (Cybercarpet!) To take away under the Chair.

The reason for the chair is, as you may be wondering, that you are sitting on it when you are using the shoes. You can use other chairs, but for safety reasons you cannot walk standing with your shoes on as there is a real risk of slipping. You have to assemble the chair yourself, but this only requires plugging the base into the seat and takes seconds. The bar stool is solid and well made, with Cybershoes logo on the back and a gas lift that allows you to adjust the height.

The round mat is important if you have a hard floor as it provides the right roughness to make sure the wheels of the shoes spin properly as they don’t have a rubberized handle.

You also get a CyQuest receiver for the Quest 2 that allows you to connect the shoes to the headset via Bluetooth, cables for charging the shoes and a cable reel that you can connect to a tripod to manage cables on wired headsets.

Hooking up the shoes is easy enough, although I had some connection issues at first. All you have to do is connect the receiver to the headset using the Velcro fastener provided and connect the USB-C cable to the Quest. The receiver is designed at 36 g (1.2 oz), which doesn’t add much weight to the headset.

Turn on the shoes so they are ready to pair, then go to in the Quest menu Settings, experimental functions, bluetooth pairing and connect with them there.

A game takes a while to find your way around and you have to sit in the chair and take exaggerated steps.

You can move back and forth, and the faster you move your legs, the faster you travel. It will certainly give you a good leg workout. There is a speed dial on the front of the receiver that allows you to get the perfect setting and make the movement natural, although the default setting will probably be fine for most users.

Games

Cybershoes aren’t yet compatible with many Quest 2 games (so I’ll have to wait a while to try them out in The Walking Dead: Saints and Sinners), but they work with a growing number of PC games. Half-Life: Alyx is the newest PC title to be added. The full list of supported games and their status can be found in a table here.

The zombie shooter Arizona Sunshine has native support for Quest 2, so it’s a great game to start with. Select “Cybershoes” as the movement option in Settings (leave the forward direction as “Head”), then align your head and shoes and you’re good to go.

What I’m going to say about Arizona Sunshine now is that the game doesn’t have a seated mode. If you configure it to your size and play while seated, you will appear shorter than you might want. However, you can cheat the configuration a little which will help.

With the height issue and the fact that you sit down and swing your feet, at first it feels like you’re shooting through the zombie apocalypse in an office chair. Fun but weird.

Persist, however, and it will soon feel a lot more natural. After about 20 minutes, I forgot that I was sitting while moving.

Does it help with motion sickness?

I was hoping cybershoes would prove to be an instant cure for my motion sickness, but they weren’t. However, the more I’ve used them and the better I can move around with them, the less motion sickness has become an issue in certain games. If, like me, you’re suffering from the problem, this could be a great solution even though the Gaming Station isn’t cheap.

The Quest 2 version has just been successfully funded on Kickstarter and Indiegogo, and backers were able to pick up the Gaming Station for $ 279.

If you missed the opportunity, you can buy it here, even though we don’t have any dates or prices yet.

The Windows 10 version is already available here for 369 US dollars.

Is it worth the price? I think so. It certainly adds a new and fun dimension to VR games and can definitely help with motion sickness.

Roll on native support for The Walking Dead: Saints and Sinners on Quest 2!

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