BroomBroom! Evaluation of Leaning and Controller-based Locomotion for Flying in Virtual Reality

Martin Hedlund, Florian Müller, Martin Schmitz, Cristian Bogdan, Remy Rey, Pooria Ghavamian, Deirdre Tobin, Andrii Matviienko

VRST 2025

Proceedings of the 2025 31st ACM Symposium on Virtual Reality Software and Technology

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TL;DR

What we did: We conducted a user study comparing headset-leaning and controller-based locomotion methods for flying in Virtual Reality, utilizing a broom metaphor for intuitive interaction.

What we found: We found that using headset-leaning for steering increases the sense of presence compared to controller-pointing; however, combining headset-leaning with controller-based velocity led to poorer performance across multiple metrics.

Takeaway: Our findings suggest that while leaning enhances presence, careful consideration of the combinations of locomotion methods is crucial for optimizing user experience in flying simulations.

Abstract

Virtual Reality (VR) locomotion methods are mainly ground-based, room-scale, or discrete, making them ill-suited for flying experiences. Although leaning- and controller-based techniques are promising for flying in VR, we lack empirical evidence of their advantages. We compared combinations of leaning- and controller-based methods for steering and velocity in a user study (N = 24) using a broom metaphor to integrate these methods into an understandable locomotion reference. The steering methods were: 1) controller-pointing (CP) and 2) headset-leaning (HL); and for velocity control: 1) controller linear displacement (CLD) and 2) headset linear displacement (HLD). Results indicate that HL increase presence compared to CP. However, combining HL with CLD worsens coin collection rate, completion time, mental load, control factor ratings, and enjoyment. In contrast, HLD worked well when paired with either steering method. CP-CLD led to the highest coin collection rate and lowest mental load. All methods had comparable feelings of flying.