Abstract
In the realm of extended reality (XR) applications, a significant challenge lies in the resource-intensive rendering of 3D models, which often demand high computational power, creating a need for optimization. However, not all elements within a 3D environment are equally important for the user experience (UX). Recognizing and effectively addressing this could greatly enhance the performance of XR applications. How can manipulating the level of detail (LOD) increase the overall quality of user interactions? It was hypothesised that there would be no significant effect on participants’ perception of the reduction of LOD for non-interactive objects, thereby forming the null hypothesis for \(H_1\). Additionally, a second hypothesis was proposed: The reduction of LOD of non-interactive objects would not significantly affect the game enjoyment, forming the null hypothesis for \(H_2\). A virtual reality (VR) survival game was developed in Unreal Engine to test these hypotheses. The virtual environment contained two types of objects: interactive objects (e.g., barrels and weapons) and non-interactive objects (e.g., pallets and shelves). Using interactive objects, players must defend themselves against multiple enemies. Users had to play through different conditions with a decreasing LOD of non-interactive objects and answer a post-session questionnaire. Only 5 out of 53 participants noticed a difference in quality. Furthermore, the majority of participants reported equal game satisfaction for every condition. These findings indicate that a decrease in the LOD of non-interactive objects is not significantly perceptible and does not significantly affect the UX.
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Acknowledgements
This work would not have been possible without the effort of Annalena Wittig, Denys Babenko, Ella Danay, Lin Son Cheung, Milos Denck, Shao-Chieh Lee, Colin Schreiber, and You-Jin Kim, who contributed to the design and development of the shown solution. This work was partly funded by the Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) and the state of Berlin under the Excellence Strategy of the Federal Government and the Länder.
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Vergari, M. et al. (2024). The Influence of the Level of Detail and Interactivity of 3D Elements on UX in XR Applications. In: Chen, J.Y.C., Fragomeni, G. (eds) Virtual, Augmented and Mixed Reality. HCII 2024. Lecture Notes in Computer Science, vol 14706. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-61041-7_19
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