Top 10 Best Seated VR Games

Alien Isolation is a hit game from 2014 known for it’s intense atmosphere and frightening visuals. Three years later modder Nibre created a tiny dll that allows gamers to fully experience the horror of Alien Isolation, by actually walking around inside the space station that the game is based in!

We are including this game in our Top 10 Seated VR games as this mod is intended for seated play only, however to fully capture the intensity of this VR experience, there is a quick fix that allows gamers to actually walk around the space station for the full effect. See our detailed review for full details on playing the original Alien Isolation in VR.

  

Keep Talking and Nobody Explodes is an asymmetrical VR game, ie a game where one player dons the VR Head Mounted Display and the other player use the PC driving the VR unit. In this game both players can be seated; one player uses a bomb defuse manual (you can view it here) to describe how to disable the virtually reality bomb that the other player handles – all against the clock.

This is a very clever game that families and friends will enjoy playing together, although of all the asymmetrical VR games this is probably the one that will test relationships to the max as the timer counts down to the explosion. This is a very polished game, great fun, and thanks to some very challenging routines will keep even the most intelligent and crafty of players on their toes.

   

If you have ever finished a game and been left thinking “I really hope they make more of these“, then you know you’ve just had a great gaming experience. This is how I felt after playing Nanite Fulcrum from the Oculus store (on the Vive).

This is a new type of experience where the gameplay is based around a comic book where the player can dive in and play out some of the scenes. In between there is some gorgeous comic book artwork to enjoy.  This will go down as one of my favourite VR experiences and I’m not even a comic book fan! This virtual comic could be the next logical step for comic books, and would open up the industry to a new audience. Polished, fun, innovative and enjoyable. Nanite Fulcrum deserves it place in any Top Seated VR games list.

  

Like Alien Isolation, Dirt Rally is another legacy game that is transformed into virtual reality with the addition of a simple DLL file. We describe how to play Dirt Rally in VR in our full piece here. Originally release in December 2015 , Dirt Rally was very well recieved and a favourite PC racer. As the game is two years old, any PC capable of running VR will play Dirt Rally great, so we get the fantastic gameplay, without any slowdown. This is one reason why we selected Dirt Rally over more recent racers like Project Cars 2 – its runs great, looks great and has fantastic playability.

You can ever hold the Vive wands like you would an invisible steering wheel to control the car. It’s no walk in the park and will be challenging to stay on the track, but persevere and you will be rewarded with a thoroughly immersive driving experience – so immersive in fact that this is one of very few games that actually made us feel a little disorientated at times. If you already have Dirt Rally in your game collection, you owe it to yourself to put yourself in the driving seat and play it as if you were there!

   

Isn’t  “I Expect You To Die” a fantastic name for a game; it’s so intriguing. This is a polished albeit quite short secret agent game that can be played seated. The main menu of the game is in fact an office where you sit at your desk selecting the next mission. One of the first missions has you sitting in a car, repeatedly trying a sequence of events to enable your escape. This is in fact how most of the missions play out – figuring out how to escape a situation in order to get one step closer to stopping your arch enemy.

The puzzles are clever without being mind benders, there is some clever use of VR controllers, and the spoof spy story works very well. If you are looking for a fun, polished sitting VR game and are not too bothered with a slightly high price point versus content, then this is your bag. Go get it.

   

VTOL (Vertical Takeoff and Landing) is a combat flight simulator developed specifically for virtually reality. VTOL is a good example of the benefits behind a game built from the ground up specifically for VR – the cockpit controls in particular are a good example of VR implemantation that takes it’s design cues from VR limitations. And don’t worry if you do not have HOTAS controllers, because VTOL uses a very clever vive wand system to control your flight.

Because the controls are carefully designed for VR, you can enjoy the experience of actually feeling like a pilot, rather than grappling with a game trying to fly an aircraft. Not just one of the best VR flight sims, but one of the best all round VR games and one you should definitely have in your library.

  

This is one for all you mech warriors out there! Strap yourself in for the ride of your life in a AAA seated cockpit blast-a-thon. For some this is the best seated VR game available however a couple of minor points relegate Archangel to the bottom half of our Top 10 seated games – firstly this is an on the rails game which some gamers feel limits a VR experience, and secondly it is quite graphically demanding and will require a GTX1080 to enjoy the sumptious graphics without stuttering.

Quality user interface, professional voice acting and soundtrack, and cracking mech graphics make this a fun game and a triple A title. A decent story keeps the player engaged and multiple difficulty levels cater for all would-be mech abilities. Go big, go mech.

   

Publisher Ubisoft have pulled off quite a feat with Star Trek Bridge Crew. Already a big hit since release, Ubisoft have continued to support this game including the option for non-VR players to join in on the multiplayer fun.

As the title suggest, this game puts the player on the ship bridge as Captain, Helm, Tactical or Engineer. Using the vive controller to manage control panels, the player directs the crew and ship in order to complete a series of missions. While initially the game appears to be simplistic menu management with a lack of depth, the real fun comes in multiplayer where players co-ordinate their efforts to complete missions, often with hilarious results.

Although this is a must have game for trekkies and co-op multiplayer fans the AAA production values will impress most players.

   

It kills me to put this amazing VR game at the bottom of this top ten, but it’s here for a good reason; most people play Subnautica standing, but it can be played seated. As this is one of the very best, most immersive VR games available, it would therefore be a crime not to include it in this top ten of best seated games.

A stunningly beautiful survival game that takes place under water – who wouldn’t want in?! Story driven with some great, memorable moments (which I will not spoil), Subnautica is a game that at one moment will stun you with its beauty, and the next shock you with a terror moment. Wrap this up in a terrific soundtrack and Subnautica is indeed the full package. Miss it at your peril.