Chapter 10

In the world

This chapter is about what a visitor sees, hears and does in a world with a Dream in it.

Arriving#

If the maker set intro cards, the Dream begins in the dark and the cards show one after another, each an image held for a moment. If the maker allows it, a click or the trigger moves the intro on one card. Unless you joined the Dream by walking into its zone, it moves on for everyone in the room.

While the Dream's performers load, a card floats in front of you with a progress bar. It holds still until you look well away from it, then eases back in front of you. The controls stay away while it is up.

Then the world, and the controls.

What a Dream can do to you#

A Dream acts on each viewer, and most of it is yours alone. Two people in the same room can see different things.

Text and image cards appear in front of you, inside a comfortable part of your view, and move aside for each other and for the controls. In VR they can appear on your hand instead.
A prompt asks you a question with up to four answers and a countdown. Your answer can change the rest of the show for you.
Your sight can fade to black and back.
The sky can change, for everyone or for you alone.
You can be teleported to a spot and placed in a line or a curve with the others.
A camera shot seals you in the dark with one window on the world. You keep your head, so you can look around inside the shell, but you cannot walk. In a shot that turns, the world moves, not you. If you turn away from the window, an arrow brings you back. The controls travel to a spot below the window for the length of the shot. A teleport that falls inside a shot does not happen at all. It is skipped, not saved for later.
Your movement can be held or changed: no walking, no jumping, or a different speed.
How you sound to others, and what you hear, can change: quieter, louder, farther, muffled, or echoing.
An arrow can point you at something, or a dotted path on the floor can lead you somewhere. It is a hint. It never moves you.
A performer can turn its eyes, head or whole body toward you. Everyone sees the performer looking at them.
A VRChat group page can open for you.

What you can do#

Press play, pause, skip and scrub, if Who May Control allows you.
Set your own volume. Resync.
Fold the controls away, and move them.
Step through slides, if you are allowed to.
Type a pin and open a gated Dream for everyone.
Answer a prompt.
Move the intro on, if allowed.
Look at a Look Here target for a moment and the arrow goes. Look away again and it comes back after a moment. Walk into a Go Here spot and the path goes; step out and it returns.
In VR, take hold of a performer and pose it, while the maker allows it.
Walk into a Dream's zone to join it, and out to leave it.

The player controls#

A glass bar with the transport:

Skip back ten seconds.
Play and pause.
Skip forward ten seconds.
The time bar. Drag it to scrub. In a slideshow it spans the slide you are in.
The current time and the length.
A volume slider. It is yours alone and scales every sound the Dream makes for you.
Resync, which snaps you back in step with the room. It shows only when the Dream has something to resync to.

A small message bubble on the bar tells you what is happening: "Opening this Dream", "Loading...", "Enter the pin to open this Dream", "That pin is not right", "This Dream is private", "Host controls playback", "Dream complete".

When you are not allowed to control playback, play, skip and scrub go away. The time bar slides to the middle and stays, smaller, as a readout. Volume and resync are still yours, and the bubble says who controls playback.

Where the controls live#

The Dream's Player settings choose one of three:

Stationary. The controls stay where the world's maker put them.
HUD. The controls float in front of you and follow you. After about fifteen seconds of no use they blink away, and only the small plus sign is left, still following you. Click anywhere to bring them back. In VR you can also grab the bar and hold it somewhere. It drifts back when you let go.
Hand. In VR the controls sit on your wrist. Raise that hand and glance at it, like checking a watch, and they appear. Lower it or look away and they go. On desktop this works like HUD.

The collapse button, a small plus or minus beside the bar, folds the controls away and brings them back. If you fold them on purpose, they stay folded until you press the button again.

The slide panel#

In a slideshow, a smaller glass panel sits under the controls: previous, a slide counter, next, and the slide's name. On the wrist it sits with the controls. Someone arriving mid-show lands on the slide everyone else is watching. A viewer Who May Control does not allow gets no slide panel.

The pin box#

A Dream gated by pin shows a box for a six-character pin and an Enter button. A Dream gated by name has no box; it opens by itself for the people on the list. The right pin opens the Dream and it plays for everyone in the room. A wrong pin shakes the box, turns the message red for a moment, and leaves what you typed so you can fix it. In VR, the right pin gives one buzz in the right hand, and a wrong one gives two.

Posing a performer#

What you pose is yours alone. Nobody else sees it, and the performer keeps performing for everyone else.

When a Mechanics node with "Watchers can pose this performer" is playing, bring your hand near the performer's head, a hand, a foot, a knee or the hips, and a small bubble shows inside the part. Squeeze the grip to take it. The part is yours while you hold it. The rest of the performer keeps performing. Let go, and the part eases back into the recording after about a second, unless the maker set poses to stay. Posing needs VR hands. Desktop cannot pose and sees no bubbles. Two hands on the same part: the first hand keeps it.

Shared and Local#

In a Shared Dream everyone watches the same moment. Pausing or seeking changes it for everyone who may control it.

In a Local Dream everyone has their own playhead. Walking in starts your show. Walking out pauses it where you stood. Walking back in picks it up. Watching to the end lets it start from the top next time.

Several Dreams in one world#

A world can hold several Dreams, each with its own zone. You watch one at a time: the one whose zone you are standing in. Walk into another zone and that Dream becomes yours.

VR, desktop and Quest#

Desktop has everything except posing and hand surfaces. Hand controls behave like HUD.
Quest plays every recording. At most three performers perform at once. Any others are still on stage, left as the scene had them, until one of the three leaves.
In VR the pin box uses the VRChat keyboard.