Factsheet

Release Date

Coming Soon

Development Start

January 2020

Developer

Dennys Kuhnert

Studio

Holonautic

Publisher

Holonautic

Website

holonautic.com/hand-physics-lab

Platforms

Oculus Quest
Oculus Quest 2

Price

-

Description

Hand Physics Lab is an experimental project created and developed by Dennys Kuhnert at the Holonautic Studio.

This game allows to experiment VR in a different way by having full control of your hands and fingers to interact physically with your environment and many different objects, puzzles and experiences.

Design

Hand Physics Lab embraces a minimalistic cartoon design to keep the user's attention on the essential. The performance limitation of VR mobile platforms also played a role to define the visual style.

Many classic games inspired the design of Hand Physics Lab which also share the minimalistic level design approach like Portal and Crazy Machines.

History

It all started in January 2020 as a weekend experimental prototype by VR developer Dennys Kuhnert. It happened very shortly after Oculus released the experimental hand tracking features on Oculus Quest. This was a big opportunity to jump on the hand tracking interaction system generalization for mobile VR headsets, experiment with it and get the precious feedback from the community.

The first video posted by Dennys on social media raised a lot more attention than expected and helped to realize the potential of this new way to interact in VR with just your hands and physical interactions.

After enough features and experiments were added, Hand Physics Lab was first released in Early Access for free on SideQuest on May 8. After just one month it reached the top 10 most downloaded apps on the platform. 6 months after the release it reached 100'000 downloads and was in the top 5 apps on SideQuest.

The feedback provided by the SideQuest community was very helpful to improve Hand Physics Lab in many ways and helped to make it the best possible experience given the limitations and compensate for the potential tracking issues.

Features

  • 85 Levels with a 3 star system based on completion time, precision, etc.
  • 7 Achievements
  • 15 Sandbox setups
  • Full hand tracking and touch controllers support
  • 1st person view and 3rd person view
  • Light & Dark modes
  • Playable in sit mode or stand mode

Videos

Images

Selection of screenshots

Logo & Icons

Logo

Download Logo Files

Articles

Press Articles

About the Developer

Dennys Kuhnert is a Swiss neuroengineer and VR developer. He co-founded the Holonautic Studio in 2018 with Roger Küng.

Always trying to stay in touch with the latest technology, Dennys graduated in neuroengineering and biotechnology with a specialization in regenerative medicine and neuroprosthetics.
In parallel to his studies, he had the chance to be part of successful and failed start-ups and used this experience to explore everything possible related to development, design and 3D immersive technologies.

Passionate about neurosciences, immersive technologies and the challenge to enhance human capabilities, Dennys learned to speak the language of engineers, developers, biologists, researchers, designers and artists. He uses a holistic approach to every project he starts and aims to use his knowledge to bridge the gaps between these different domains and make them work together for a unified and common goal with the help of spatial computing.

About the Studio

Holonautic was founded in October 2018 by Roger Küng and Dennys Kuhnert, both graduates from the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (EPFL) and passionate about the latest immersive technologies.

After experiencing state-of-the-art virtual reality for the first time, it became difficult to focus on anything other than the possibilities this new medium provided. Since childhood we have been passionate about video games, and discovered a unique opportunity to fulfill our lifelong dream of combining our creativity with cutting edge technology, to bring something beautiful into the world.

The Future of Virtual and Augmented Reality (VR & AR) presents many challenges yet to be solved. We are convinced that the best XR (cross-reality) experiences can only be crafted by perfectly combining hard sciences (cognitive neuroscience, biomechanics, computer sciences and engineering) with an imaginative and powerful artstyle to submerge the mind completely into an imaginary world.
We want to extend human perception and break physical barriers by creating interactive and immersive experiences, where the only limit is the mind itself.

Holonautic Press Kit

Other Links

SideQuest App Page

https://sidequestvr.com/app/750

Discord Community

https://discord.gg/rRsQEew

Credits

Dennys Kuhnert

Creator, Developer & Designer