Reading comics books on your phone is great. Reading comic books in VR is better. At least that’s what Austin Osueke, publisher of eigoManga and developer of Comx VR wants fans to experience.
Osueke has a humble set up at San Diego Comic Con 2017. His booth is located at 4531 at Artist Alley if you're really interested in seeing what Comx VR is all about. It’s a virtual reality comic book reading app and distribution platform for Android and iOS. Osueke is currently building the app and believes it will take the comic viewing experience to the next level.
“We’re trying to see what happens. There aren’t many players in VR for comics right now so, why not? We feel that VR is the next frontier for comics because people once thought comics on a phone would be crazy,” Osueke told Player One. “That was back in 2009. Look at where we are- it’s part of the business now.”
Virtual reality technology serves a lot of purposes. Developers are looking into how to utilize the technology for games, movies and scientific research, so taking the leap into casual entertainment like comic book readings isn’t a stretch. Osueke explained to Player One the technology is there in your smart phone and it's up to developers to take advantage of the power it yields to create new experiences for everyday consumers.
“We’ve built the system with Google VR,” Osueke said. “Every new phone since 2010 has an accelerometer, which allows you to pretty much track where your phone is physically. Whether it’s upside down or upwards. What Google VR does it tracks your accelerometer and tracks the coordinates to your camera on your phone.”
“With many VR technologies, like the Oculus or HTC, they use powerful computers but [the technology] is already on your phone,” Osueke added. “If you have an iPhone or a Samsung Galaxy, you have the power to run VR. Not everyone wants to spend $800 on a VR headset. We don’t feel that the mainstream audience, the ‘normal’ consumers, the don’t want to invest in VR right now because it’s still at its infancy. But everyone has a phone. You can get a headset as cheap as $5 and get into Comx VR with our system.”
It’s all about accessibility. Osueke wants to bring comic book readers into his VR world no matter what kind of phone they own. He doesn’t want his app to require an external peripheral or controller; if you have a $5 cardboard headset and a love for comics and manga, you’ll be transported into his world.
“I would say we’re about 80 percent completion [with the app],” Osueke said regarding the status of of his app. “We started in October and we’ve been developing and developing it. We’ve been going through a lot of user testing in the San Jose area...amongst VR developers, gamers, kids, adults, young and old. All kinds of demographics. But we rarely get to test in front of comic book readers, people who read them and use digital comics on their phones. San Diego Comic Con is the perfect venue for us to showcase it and get good feedback from the people who would engage in our system.”
And he’s received a lot of feedback. Comic book readers want more title and some intuitive features Osueke added to Comx VR. They also want to be transported into familiar comic book environments in VR settings.
“[Comic fans] would like to read Spider-Man or Batman in the system,” Osueke said. “They’d also like to read in another environment. Let’s say if they’re reading a Batman comic, someone thought it would be cool to read it in Gotham City. This is feedback that we love that we want to put into Comix VR. Ever since we’ve been doing these user tests in other parts of California we’ve been getting great suggestions. Some wanted pagination. People wanted features like zoom and we just add it in there.”
Osueke is preparing for a soft launch in October. He told Player On he’d like to get the “main functionality” of the Comx VR app up to 85 percent after Comic Con. If you’re not at San Diego Comic Con check out eigoManga on Twitter here for more updates.
ComX VR Trailer from eigoMANGA on Vimeo.
