EMBEDDED TRAINING FOR FUTURE FORCE WARRIORS: AN ASSESSMENT OF WEARABLE VIRTUAL SIMULATORS

Embedded virtual simulation has the potential to provide more realistic and effective training for dismounted Soldiers, particularly in operations in urban areas, and in the operation and tactics, techniques and procedures for using Future Force systems. This paper describes an assessment of wearable virtual simulators (WSs) for Infantry Soldiers. The assessment focused on the capabilities and limitations of the WSs as they were used by Soldiers in a realistic training situation: the capability to support the performance of Soldier tasks, side effects, and human interface issues. Three vendors developed different WSs. Each was based on the Quantum 3D Thermite wearable computer, but the vendors used different software and interface hardware. Each permitted a Soldier to view a simulated virtual environment and to interact with other simulated and real entities within it. The SVS, an immersive but non-wearable 3D virtual simulator was used for comparison purposes and to provide enough simulators to fill out a full Infantry squad. OneSAF TestBed was used to provide a simulated enemy force and civilians. Six WS, four SVSs, the Dismounted Infantry Virtual After Action Review System (DIVAARS), and OneSAF were networked to provide a collective training situation in a shared environment. Squads of Soldiers each participated in a series of simulated tactical exercises using the simulators. They then completed questionnaires to report simulator sickness symptoms and to rate the ease with which they could perform 54 Soldier tasks in the simulator. The WSs were able to connect with each other and the SVSs. The major drawbacks to the use of WSs for training appear to be the current lack of graphic processing power of the Thermite computer. Reliability was also a problem. The activities that Soldiers reported they could perform well did not differ substantially from those reported previously with the SVS. The more highly rated tasks consisted of identification of types of people and tactically significant areas, imprecise movement, and communication. The lower rated tasks consisted of precise or rapid movement, distance estimation, and locating the source of enemy fire using either visual or auditory cues. Most of the problems identified should be correctible in the near term.