Players can enjoy Valheim in VR thanks to a third-party solution. Setting this up is surprisingly easy, and it gives impressive results considering the game doesn’t officially support 3D. Those who want a more immersive experience can get up close and personal with Valheim in VR by following the instructions below.
How to play Valheim in VR
Valheim doesn’t officially support VR (yet), so players must use a third-party solution. VorpX (official site) is a 3D driver that can hook into games that use DirectX 9, 10, 11 (as well as some OpenGL) APIs and output video via a VR headset. While vorpX officially supports over 250 titles in stereoscopic 3D, players can tweak almost any title manually to give them a 3D effect. Unfortunately, vorpX isn’t free. So, those who want to play Valheim in VR will have to make a $39.99 purchase if they use this method.
Once vorpX is installed, players must ensure they do the following before activating it in Valheim:
- Start the game.
- Create a character.
- Load into the world.
- Exit the game using the ESC menu.
These steps ensure all the config files for the game are generated.
Once the above has been accomplished, players can either import a pre-existing Valheim profile by:
- Launching vorpX.
- Selecting “Cloud Profiles” in the left menu.
- Searching for “Valheim” in the “Game/App” text box.
This will bring up all the profiles the community has developed for the game. The user Paradise Decay has created a profile that works well using these settings:
- Start by selecting the “Unity 5 Base Profile” in “Local Profiles.”
- Click “Create a new profile based on this one.”
- Choose a profile name.
- Check “Keep special shader definitions if available,” and “Keep DirectVR scan settings if available,” and press “OK.”
- Select the new profile and click “Add File,” then select valheim.exe (the default location is: C:Program Files (x86)SteamSteamLibrarysteamappscommonValheim).
Once players have activated this profile, they can don their headset and enter the game. VorpX is compatible with practically every headset that can be used with a PC, but Valheim only works with mouse and keyboard or a controller as input.
The settings Paradise Decay used for Valheim are:
- Play Style: Immersive Screen Mode
- Screen Distance: 0.00
- 3D Reconstruction: Geometry
- 3D-Strength/Scale: 1.20
- Head Tracking Multiplier: 0.50
- Headset Sync: Device (Fast)
- Direct Mode FluidSync: Device (Off)
These settings don’t provide full 360 stereoscopic 3D. Instead, they bring the screen inward and use curvature to give the VR effect. The effect isn’t as impressive as full VR, but it gives a very immersive experience when combined with head-tracking, especially when paired with the first-person mod. The game also remains very playable, and this implementation of VR doesn’t handicap the player in any way.
If, for some reason, the above settings aren’t satisfactory, feel free to experiment. Users can make many adjustments with vorpX to make the experience of playing Valheim in VR more personalized.
