How can you design VR UX for user retention?

I think it’s critical as UX practitioner to consider bringing aspects of the real world that could assist in creating something that users feel familiar with whether it’s particular mechanics or shapes. That can create a level of intuitiveness in the experience, looking at the world around you before designing VR experiences will contribute to creating familiarity and that will make users feel safe within an experience.

The first step is really getting to know your users. What do they like? What are their daily challenges? You can find this out through surveys, chats, or even creating personas - kind of like characters in a story, imagining their day-to-day life. It's also super important to think about where and when they'll be using your VR experience. Are they in a small room or a big open space? Are they looking to unwind after work or for something quick during a break? By understanding these bits, you can craft a VR experience that not only fits into their world but also hits the right emotional notes. It's all about making VR feel like it's made just for them.

I think it is of great importance to understand your users, how they behave, what drives them forward, their backgrounds, and what flows for them. The more you understand how your users approach things, the better you can cater to their needs in the virtual word, addressing more and and more to their needs, instead of them searching for solutions elsewhere. It’s a simple formula, if you present the most of what they need as a service or solution in the best means possible, the more time they are likely to spend in your experience. Ux works particularly the same across all platforms at the end of the day it is the “experience” of the user and no the platform or medium itself. Working around the needs of the user should be the top priority.

Before designing your VR experience, immerse yourself in the platform firsthand to truly understand your users' perspective. Engage with the community directly, participate in the experiences as a user, instead of only relying on the research conducted by others, and observe behaviors and interactions within the VR environment. This hands-on approach helps to compliment traditional user research methods like surveys and interviews. By experiencing the platform from a user's viewpoint, you gain invaluable insights into their needs, expectations, and the nuances of their interactions.

Having started in VR as a teen and developed into a UX practitioner, I can't stress enough the importance of immersing oneself in the platform. Participating in VR experiences first hand provides a unique perspective that traditional research methods can't capture. Also if you are part of forums and can engage directly with the community, it really helps with understanding wider pain points. I found that user behaviors and interactions within the VR environment are nuanced and require a hands-on understanding. Also drawing from my own VR exploration, I've noticed that aligning with familiar mechanics and shapes not only increases familiarity but also meets user expectations and needs, making sure the mapping is obvious for yr user.

To design VR UX for comfort and safety, we need to avoid sudden movements and flashing lights, provide breaks and rest periods, use adjustable settings, provide a safe play area, and educate users about VR safety. We should also use ergonomic design principles, consider individual needs, and test the VR experience thoroughly before releasing it to the public.

Design interactions that feel natural, intuitive, and accessible. This reduces the learning curve and helps prevent disorientation and discomfort. Instead of reinventing the wheel, improve upon existing practices that are proven to enable the best user experience. Providing users with clear, consistent immersive feedback on visual, auditory, or haptic cues will help to acclimate more naturally to an experience. By focusing on these aspects of comfort and safety, you create a VR experience that is not only enjoyable but also respects the well-being of the user. This approach is key to maintaining user retention, as it demonstrates a commitment to providing a safe and comfortable immersive experience.

When you're creating a VR experience, it's really important to make sure your users are comfy and safe. Nobody wants to feel sick or strained while they're trying to have fun, right? So, here's the trick: Keep things natural and easy to understand. Steer clear of anything too jarring or intense, and let users take control - they should be able to slow things down or take a break if they need to. And don't forget about safety basics: clear instructions, privacy, and a bit of space to move around. It's all about creating a cool VR experience that feels good and safe.

Make sure that your users can easily understand what they're supposed to be doing first, and then improve the quality of the experience. In Metapilot we designed an AI avatar that explains to the user what they need to be doing and it has been of great help, because we did get reviews before that saying they did not understand what the game is about, what they're supposed to be doing, and where all this is going. The trick is to make sure you're not overstimulating or boring the user, so make sure that entire explanatory experience is simple yet fully informative.

To create a sense of presence and immersion in VR, we need to focus on visual fidelity, audio immersion, interaction realism, scale and scope, and storytelling and narrative. We can do this by using high-quality hardware, designing for the senses, giving users control, eliminating distractions, and using storytelling.

Many beautiful, excellent VR games or experiences suffer from the menu problem - either because they are being adapted from a non-VR environment or because they copy them. You can be in the most breath-taking environment surrounded by action and lively sounds, but if you have to constantly go through menus, the immersion is broken and your tasks become a drag. Clean and smart solutions always make the user forget they are wearing VR equipment - all the items they need can be grabbed from a wristwatch or holsters on their bodies, and the way to navigate the world does not contain a ridiculous amount of buttons. The main menu becomes your headquarters where you prepare for the next mission. Everything flows and feels real.

High quality graphics are important in VR, bu we did need to use the PC's GPU for our Metapilot game. Other than that we created a cohesive and meaningful experience with our UI, AI avatar and through our messaging via influencers. The narrative and the logic need to be seamless as it is very easy to bore gamers and the expectations are high given strong competition.

Achieving true presence and immersion in VR is about more than just stunning graphics and sound. Sure, they're key, but remember, we're not just visual and auditory beings. Full immersion taps into all senses and understands the user's physical and emotional context. It's about crafting a world that feels real and engaging. To get closer to this, it's crucial to be aware of the limits of current VR - like not fully replicating touch or smell. We can either cleverly work around these gaps, making the experience feel complete in other ways, or ingeniously integrate real-world elements to enhance the virtual experience. And, of course, keeping users free from distractions and glitches is a must to maintain the magic!

The big one here is intuitive UI and UX. People are surprisingly willing to suspend their disbelief and feel immersed in experiences with simple, stylized graphics. But nothing will snap them out of their immersion like clunky, annoying-to-use UI elements. When building an experience try looking at the world around you to find 3D "UI" elements that we use in our every day lives. (A door knob is a great example of this). Then try to build your VR UI elements to be as simple and intuitive as those.

Consider how users can carry a piece of this virtual world back into their real lives. Maybe it's a skill they learned, a memorable interaction, or an achievement they're proud of. Blurring the line between virtual and real worlds makes the experience more impactful and memorable, encouraging users to return and further explore the VR environment. It's about creating a seamless continuum between the virtual and the real, where each enriches the other.

For us, we realized that we need to provide value and motivation for our game Metapilot as users were still not convinced by just the AI avatar. We are now usign prizes and perks in order to motivate players, and it works much better!

During the playtesting phase of your VR experience pay close attention to capacity, does having a full instance effect performance? Sometimes it's better to allow less people to make for a more performant experience. Ask questions, give multiple channels for feedback, and really lean on your community to help you test. Then fix what is broken! Take into consideration movement as well, teleport vs. glide and how movement/interaction is affected in each scenario. If you have a ton of forced movement in your experience, consider having a rating - or warning.

Both Google Play and Steam offer great options for beta testing your product, in terms of speed, usability and overall user satisfaction, which will also help you price your product. Make sure you get 50-100 real beta tester responses and written feedback and include those in your product roadmap based on important before launching it.

*This is huge. Nothing will improve your product faster /than a good testing routine. On top of all of the other great advice here: try to bring users down to your office and run tests with them live. Try to avoid asking them any specific questions about the system you're trying to test — instead let them naturally find areas of your platform that need improving. You'll gain so much insight into what to prioritize, and gain a better understanding of how to improve your experiences moving forward.

Measure, measure measure and then measure. Study what users do during the first 5 to 10 minutes and identify places where they drop. Do they discover the main feature you put there? Do they join a private room or go directly into public lobbies? Look at power users and see what are the activities they spend the most time on? Building something? Experiencing something etc Once you have find out try to stir the user flow in a way that those features are discovered and well communicated. The chance is some people might find them useful as well and stick around for a while longer ??

Enhance with Social Interactivity: Boost VR user retention by adding social and interactive features. Encourage user connections through multiplayer modes, cooperative tasks, and communication tools. Incorporate competitive elements like leaderboards to foster community engagement. These social layers can make users more likely to revisit for both the community and the content.

Keep it comfy by dodging motion sickness with smooth movements and adjustable settings. Make navigation a breeze with simple gestures and clear cues. Speed matters, so nix lag by optimizing performance. Entertain users with engaging content and social vibes, tailoring experiences to their tastes. Hold their hand through onboarding and tutorials, boosting confidence. Encourage exploration with hidden surprises and regular updates, throwing in fresh challenges and events. Most importantly, listen up! Gather feedback, tweak, and keep evolving. Let users own it – personalize avatars and settings. Be a champ for inclusivity, offering options for all abilities. Nail these points, and your VR UX will have users coming back for more!

To design VR UX for user retention, we need to focus on creating experiences that are simple and intuitive, engaging and immersive, rewarding and progressive, and social and collaborative. We can do this by making onboarding easy and enjoyable, giving users control over their experience, minimizing motion sickness, providing feedback, and using data to improve the user experience. In short, we need to design VR UX that is both easy to use and enjoyable, and that provides users with a sense of progression and achievement. We can also increase user retention by making VR experiences social and collaborative.

It's about creating experiences where the virtual elements don't just mimic reality, but rather, complement and expand it. For instance, consider a physical room designed to change its features in sync with the VR environment, like temperature adjustments or subtle scent releases that align with the virtual world. This multi-sensory approach deepens immersion. Also, think about using physical objects as part of the VR experience. Objects in the room could become interactive elements within the VR world, blurring the lines between the two realities.