Rez's Mizuguchi: Create virtual unreality

- Rez Infinite creator Tetsuya Mizuguchi on the promise of VR

If there's any developer who seems perfectly poised to take advantage of the promise of virtual reality, it's visionary Tetsuya Mizuguchi, whose early 2000s classic Rez is being reimagined for PlayStation VR as Rez Infinite.

Gamasutra caught up with Mizuguchi at the PlayStation VR event held today in San Francisco, alongside GDC, and asked his thoughts on the new medium. 

Has it met his expectations?

"First of all, yes. It's met the VR that I was envisioning. But beyond that I think there are so many other possibilities now, it's like today's VR has given us a blank canvas, so to speak. It's more than just, obviously, games. It's all other kinds of content. 

"The funny thing is that when you look at the term 'virtual reality,' there's reality in our real-world reality, but it's really about how much of the 'unreal reality' you can bring into the virtual reality world. In that sense, the creativity and creative content that can be created in that unreality space, whether we go to fantasy or just non-reality that seems endless in terms of possibilities and potential."

In other words, Mizuguchi hopes to unlock new experiences with VR -- and the beginning of that will be the all-new Area X, a sixth and totally original level for Rez Infinite that was not included in either the original Dreamcast and PlayStation 2 or Xbox 360 HD remake versions of the game. Mizuguchi told Gamasutra that he hopes to use this area to push into new avenues of VR game design.

Expect more from this interview on Gamasutra in the coming days.