Minecraft? More like Motion Sickness Craft

September 12, 2015 7:44 AM

Sometimes when playing first/third-person games, I start feeling nauseous and motion-sick. How can I prevent this so I can enjoy Minecraft and other games again?

I had to stop playing Minecraft a couple years ago because it got to the point where I could play between 5-60 minutes before getting sweaty, nauseous and otherwise motion-sick. I tried it again recently and got motion-sick shortly after starting.

This has happened for other first-and-third-person viewpoint games as well, like Ratchet & Clank (mainly specific sequences in specific titles; most of the games are fine most of the time). I don't think Skyrim ever did it, though, so it's not all first/third person types.

It seems to happen when I'm playing on monitors or TVs. My husband has offered me dramamine, but that seems excessive just to play a video game. I took naproxen before playing once and it helped but just delayed the onset.

I'd really like to be able to play and enjoy without worrying when/if I'll have to quit suddenly. I've been chasing down medical problems with doctors a bunch recently (hypothyroid, for example) so I welcome any questions/tests to ask about.

Any recommendations on game setting or physical setup tweaks I can try?

posted by bookdragoness to Sports, Hobbies, & Recreation (6 answers total)

Best answer: Try to ensure that the monitor/TV refresh rates are as high as they can go, if those can be adjusted on your devices.

More advice here.
posted by Cool Papa Bell at 8:04 AM on September 12, 2015

I found I could only play Minecraft comfortably in a small window, on account of the field of view setting. Seriously, full screen (on a 15" laptop or 24" desktop display) = instant queasiness. Default windowed mode size? Fine. I have not had this experience in other FPS games so I think it's specific to the Minecraft defaults. I could have adjusted in the preferences, I think, but I generally had other reading material up, so that worked out okay.
posted by Alterscape at 8:16 AM on September 12, 2015 [2 favorites]

I get this with about 30% of the games I play. I find focusing on the display on the controller for my WiiU helps when the tv makes me dizzy. I also changed my glasses prescription which helped. I'm going to pick up a set of sea bands. I didn't used to have these issues so I hope they'll go away. Certainly the linked article suggests that you can be trained out of them. I'm going to try that, too.
posted by palindromeisnotapalindrome at 9:15 AM on September 12, 2015

Best answer: Try playing with and without "View Bobbing" enabled in Minecraft. That's the thing that simulates your head bobbing around as you walk. I find games without view bobbing are more likely to make me motion sick.
posted by Nelson at 9:41 AM on September 12, 2015 [4 favorites]

Response by poster: Turning off "View Bobbing" seems to have solved my problem (pending, ahem, extensive testing, yay!). Very interesting article from Cool Papa Bell on how the different loci of motion contribute to motion sickness.
posted by bookdragoness at 6:32 PM on September 12, 2015 [1 favorite]

Best answer: As someone that threw up playing hall life, after 15 mins, I would suggest also checking for field of view(FOV) many games have it, from memory I think Minecraft does, make it as wide as possible, also increasing mouse sensitivity helps me sometimes too.
posted by wwax at 7:20 AM on September 19, 2015