The New Era of Virtual Reality Locomotion: A Systematic Literature Review of Techniques and a Proposed Typology

TLDR

The latest technical and interaction advancements in VR have ushered in a new era, yet the field of VR locomotion remains largely uncharted. The study systematically reviews empirical VR locomotion research conducted between 2014 and 2017. The review analyzes VR locomotion techniques, their interaction characteristics, and the research topics addressed. The review identified 36 articles covering 73 instances of 11 locomotion techniques, found a technology‑focused research emphasis and a predominance of physical interaction, and proposed a four‑type typology of motion‑based, room‑scale, controller‑based, and teleportation locomotion.

Abstract

The latest technical and interaction advancements that took place in the Virtual Reality (VR) field have marked a new era, not only for VR, but also for VR locomotion. Although the latest advancements in VR locomotion have raised the interest of both researchers and users in analyzing and experiencing current VR locomotion techniques, the field of research on VR locomotion, in its new era, is still uncharted. In this work, VR locomotion is explored through a systematic literature review investigating empirical studies of VR locomotion techniques from 2014–2017. The review analyzes the VR locomotion techniques that have been studied, their interaction-related characteristics and the research topics that were addressed in these studies. Thirty-six articles were identified as relevant to the literature review, and the analysis of the articles resulted in 73 instances of 11 VR locomotion techniques, such as real-walking, walking-in-place, point and teleport, joystick-based locomotion, and more. Results showed that since the VR revival, the focus of VR locomotion research has been on VR technology and various technological aspects, overpowering the investigation of user experience. From an interaction perspective, the majority of the utilized and studied VR locomotion techniques were found to be based on physical interaction, exploiting physical motion cues for navigation in VR environments. A significant contribution of the literature review lies in the proposed typology for VR locomotion, introducing four distinct VR locomotion types: motion-based, room scale-based, controller-based and teleportation-based locomotion.