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Read more: 鈥�Dreams on demand: Virtual reality finally delivers鈥�

I鈥橫 WALKING through a villa in sunny Tuscany 鈥� or so it seems. Donning the Oculus Rift headset (see 鈥�Virtual reality: Get your head in the game鈥�), I am immersed in my environment. But it鈥檚 not just the wraparound visuals that are fooling me. Thanks to a few clever perceptual tricks, I feel like I鈥檓 walking naturally, even though my feet are only moving back and forth on a static platform.

The buzz around the Oculus Rift headset is giving virtual reality a new lease of life. But however immersive the visuals, you are usually stationary when using it, moving your avatar via a control pad or keyboard. Now hardware is adding the sensation of movement to virtual adventures, without leaving you feeling nauseous.

Unlike joysticks, devices such as the 鈥� which lets users glide in any direction 鈥� can integrate real motion with moving visuals. This makes it easier to exploit an illusion known as vection to make people feel as if they are moving faster than they actually are.

鈥淪ome game characters run at an equivalent of 40 miles per hour, so it鈥檚 just as well you don鈥檛 have to emulate that,鈥� says Julian Williams, WizDish鈥檚 creator.

With the WizDish, a person experiences the sensation of walking simply by sliding their feet back and forth on a slippery disc. This provides feedback to the brain about where a person鈥檚 limbs are and how much they are exerting them, in the same way actual steps do. 鈥淎 key feature is that your centre of mass remains equidistant between your feet, as it does when you walk for real,鈥� Williams says.

Another system in development is the made by Virtuix, a Kickstarter project that has raised more than $810,000 in just two weeks, after asking for $150,000. Users climb into a harness on a circular treadmill that has a padded band around the waist. The treadmill鈥檚 floor is almost frictionless and moves as the user runs in any direction.

Exploiting illusions can really enhance the feeling of immersion. from the University of W眉rzburg in Germany tricked users into thinking they were walking in a straight line by rotating the view seen on one side of their virtual reality glasses. Without realising, users compensated by walking a circular arc in the opposite direction. His team is also looking at how optical illusions can be exploited in virtual worlds to match real-world perceptions. By adding certain visual tricks to a moving scene, the wearer can be fooled into thinking they have walked further than they really have ().

鈥淓xploiting illusions can really enhance the feeling of immersion in a virtual world鈥�

But apart from replicating the real world, illusions have the potential to create out-of-this-world experiences. Realism is useful, says at the University of Tampere in Finland, but only to a point. 鈥淭hen it needs to be bigger, at least for entertainment purposes. We鈥檙e after the wow factor, not realism.鈥�

This article appeared in print under the headline 鈥淥ptical illusions help you explore a virtual world on foot鈥�