Virtual reality is the new hotness. It’s going to be the thing we remember when we look back on 2016 from the cockpit of our hover car while we listen to President Trump ramble on about walls, and like any platform its success will be determined by the strength of its library of games. It’s far too early to tell which of the many promising titles will find a place on that pantheon of platform-defining titles, or if they’ll all be video games.
I suspect they won’t be, and the gorgeous Chernobyl VR Project is the reason for that.
Developed by The Farm 51 — the makers of Necrovision — this incredibly ambitious VR project aims to recreate the infamous ghost town of Pripyat so it can be explored freely without having to worry if you brought enough ammo to take out any wandering Radscorpions. The area was deserted in 1986 following a disaster at a nuclear reactor in Chernobyl that claimed 31 lives directly, and thousands more due to radiation sickness. A portion of the game’s sales will be donated to some of the foundations that have been set up to lend aid to victims of the disaster.
In pairing a virtual recreation of the area with educational and movie narrative software, the team behind the Chernobyl VR Project gives us the opportunity to better understand the tragic event, as well as bring attention to the people who continue to be affected by it.
It’s being built for most of the major VR headsets, including Oculus Rift, PlayStation VR and HTC Vive, with a release planned next month.
