VTS-Heartrate 1.4.0 Release

Just in time for Halloween, vts-heartrate updates to version 1.4.0 with some delightful new features, well-suited for scary games.

Additions:

• VFX Support! Dynamically control any of the fabulous VTube Studio post-processing VFX with your heart rate! Experience distortion that pulses in time with your heart, or become increasingly desaturated and unstable as your heart rate climbs! The possibilities are endless.
• Built-in Stream Widget! Usable as a Browser Source in OBS, or as a Web Item in VTube Studio. It prints your heartrate in real time, and the backing image does a pulsing animation at the corresponding speed. Can be customized with Custom CSS in either case!
• Heartrate Offsets! Apply a flat +/- value to add or subtract from your real heartrate; perfect for folks who may feel sheepish about their naturally high or low BPM.
  • (NOTE: this feature was added at the behest of Henemimi who told me to say "can you put me in the patch note and say this is for henemimi who said her heart rate is cringe")

Updates:

• As of October 2023, Pulsoid and HypeRate now natively support Fitbit devices through their app! As such, it is highly recommended to use one of these input methods for this plugin, and connect your Fitbit device through that instead.

Tips and Tricks

The VFX feature lends itself to a lot of customizability. Maybe too much! It can be pretty overwhelming to look at, but the basic gist is that you can use Custom Tracking Paramrters to control effects. You can then apply an additional multipler to these values to increase or decrease the overall intensity of the effect.

Broadly speaking, I think setting the strength component of your desired effect to be driven by the vts_heartrate_linear Custom Tracking Parameter is a good starting point. You can then control the other components of the effect with vts_heartrate_pulse to create a visual reminsicent of being at "critical HP" in a video game.

Here's an effect I set up for myself and the configuration I used to achieve it.

Note how the effects strobe with my pulse, but also rise in intensity with my overall heartrate.

I hope this example helps! As always, if you have an idea for afeature, find a bug, or figure out a better way to convey this complicated information to the end-user, please feel free to reach out to me on any platform! My inbox is always open!