I’ve been using your new product, the Plex VR software, on my Samsung Galaxy S9+. This isn’t really a question so much as a suggestion; I’m hoping you guys don’t mind a little constructive criticism.
First let me say I’m so happy you have developed an app for use in Gear VR. I’m a huge fan of Plex and my nephews are getting into VR and of course are movie fans as well. I can’t wait to try the shared viewing option with them! But I do have a couple of thoughts regarding the software. I’m aware that everyone has their own opinions so some may think it’s close to perfect already, but I’ve been using it and running into a few things I would like to see done differently.
The first is with regard to the various “skins” or environments. At least one of them, the drive-in, has objects in the scene that interfere with or block the controller beam. It makes the skin feel claustrophobic; I’m always waving the beam around, trying to find the right angle that lets me select a menu item or whatnot. To me, it would be much friendlier to have the beam cut thru objects, or perhaps have an easily triggered option that makes all the blocking scenery disappear for easy access, say by having scenery in the path of menu items disappear if you aim the beam at it for more than a second or two.
But not all blocking scenery is bad, one of the general issues with movies in Gear VR is that the controller beam is “always on”, so you have to aim it carefully away from the viewing area to avoid leaving full screen or activating menu pop-ups while watching. Maybe there could be a couple scenery sections that don’t sit in front of any menus that absorbed the beam without activating anything?
Another item is the screen re-sizing. In general I love this feature. The ability to make the screen bigger or smaller and move it around is fantastic, but right now it’s a little too easily triggered. Maybe I’m just fat fingering it, but I’m always accidentally moving the screen side-to-side when I mean to make it bigger or smaller because I accidentally put a little side motion into the swipe, or just brushed the pad accidentally while holding it and didn’t mean to adjust the screen at all. I was thinking that one way to make it more deliberate is to put the screen on “tracks” with handles for moving it front to back and side to side. Then you could isolate movement along one axis and make adjusting more of a deliberate action by requiring that you point and trigger a specific area to adjust.
In a similar vein, I would like the option to make the screen bigger than it can be made currently. When I first use an environment I make the screen smaller because I’m enjoying the novelty of the area, turning around to look at things, etc. But once I settle in for real movie watching, I tend to want the screen to encompass most of my viewing window, IMAX style.
I would also like higher resolution backgrounds for things like the night sky, but I realize there may be performance concerns there. I’ve just always had a fantasy about watching movies in a beautifully rendered outer space/night sky scene.
Something that I love is the way I can put a movie up on the screen and have movie summaries and extras up on the sides; please don’t lose that feature! I also love seeing related movie as I finish a film that’s part of a series, so that if I’m bingeing I can go right to the next movie.
And that’s it. Like I said, I’m a big fan of your software. I purpose-built a media server after trying Plex a few years ago and have since spent a small fortune expanding my movie collection (now at 750 Blu-Rays and counting!) because you guys made owning movies fun again. So I hope you understand that my suggestions come from the perspective of a real fan. Thank you!
