Why Virtual Reality is NOT niche

[ears]

A statement I see a lot from PC gamers....

"only a few people own a VR device, or can afford one, so they shouldn't be supported or developed"

Imagine a world where the people at the forefront of developing technologies listened to such narrow minded selfish claptrap?

How would you travel? There would probably be no cars, buses, planes.

You actually wouldn't be able to post that opinion anyway because there'd be no computers.

And even if there were computers there'd be no internet because there'd be no telephone lines or telephones to connect everyone up.

That would be quite boring. So maybe you'd spend more time watching TV. Except, of course, that there would be no TV.

VR is groundbreaking. It has huge potential. Already it enhances the sim racing genre of games to levels I never thought I'd experience. Yet people - people who have never experienced it - are so narrow minded as to not only dismiss it as something they're not interested in, but publicly express a desire for development of it, and for it, to stop.

Despite their best efforts, VR will continue to develop. Comparing headsets available five years down the line to the current Rift CV1 and Vive would be like comparing a 1970s TV set to an OLED 4k tv. And some game genres, more than others stand to benefit from this.

None more so than sim racing.

There's so much scope for immersion. The connection between the driver putting on a helmet and the player putting on a headset. Placing that headset takes you into the racing world. Into the car, onto the track. The co-ordination of the physical wheel in the real world to the virtual one, beautifully modelled and accurate to the virtual car being driven.

While other genres will not lend themselves to VR due to the relatively limited hand tracking technology, sim racing rises above it as it knows already what you're doing with your hands and feet due to input from wheels, shifters, pedals. And its recreating of this in the virtual world is startlingly accurate.

Popular genres such as first person shooters will only really flourish when advanced treadmills, capable of tracking the player's walking, running movements are ready. A sim racer doesn't need to worry about that. A racing driver sits in their seat, puts on a helmet, then stays in that seat until their race or session is complete and they remove the helmet.

Several game studios have worked to incorporate and develop VR integration after the release of a title. Whilst I'm sure some of this is out of support for existing owners of the title, at least one eye will be on the growing VR owning, non sim racing community. These people, who own VR, want the best experiences in VR and racing sims / games are right up there. Studios will be looking to this group and thinking they can sell copies of their minority appeal game to a wider community.

And the 'niche' tag may be a little wide of the mark - even now. It doesn't take much research to discover that the two main manufacturers of PC VR devices can't keep up with demand. They can't make them fast enough. I ordered one in January and still have not received it.

The cost to the existing gamer is not as high as some might suggest. You could say that by the time you do your next PC upgrade, it will be ready for VR. AMD and nVidia have invested in VR technology and the new range of nVidia cards were developed to support it. You probably already have a CPU capable of running VR, if you're playing rFactor2, Assetto Corsa, Project CARS.

Your average sim racer only stands to gain from the development of VR. OK maybe you're not ready to invest now, but play the long game. The price of the technology is going to come down. The cost of putting a PC together that can handle it will come down. The games / sims will establish and improve VR support over time.

Those who are not ready for VR yet can only gain by sitting back, letting the technology and software develop further, then diving in when they are ready. But compaining, de-prioritising and declaring its insignificance isn't helping, and is also inaccurate.

Would they be willing to stand by those claims one, two, five years down the line? Do we still hear people tallking of the expense, inaffordability and minority appeal of cars, TVs, personal computers now?

 

[ears]

I read the review - but it seems the StarVR isn't quite there yet.

My CV1 arrived recently and the increase in quality is obvious. It's like I was viewing the sim racing world through a fishing net in the DK2, and suddenly, with the CV1, that net was taken away.

 

[eSEA One]

I had VR as well, but for me it's anyway not the right thing. Got motion sick within 2 laps.

From what I gather if you do not have a system that can reach over 90fps you get motion sickness!
On another fact I have spent many years at sea on yachts and have never had motion sickness and I have had plenty of people onboard who have been sick from conditions from relatively flat seas to raging storms. It affects diffrent people differently. So I would say VR might not be for those people who suffer from motion sickens no matter what rate the FPS is.
I am not a VR fanboy and do not own one. I am interested but at the moment pricing is making it out of reach as I would have to upgrade my system to reach that +90fps on top of the VR itself.
3D TV failed due to the glasses, the social thing of watching TV, the cost of providing and delivering content and a host of other issues. Whereas a lot of gaming tends to be a single person activity unless connected on line with others (yes there is multi person games too and VR has a long way to address that.) TV is not a hobby, people spend money on hobby's
Yes this is my opinion! I believe VR is here to stay and if it doesn't go main stream it will certainly hold a hardcore gaming market ( look who uses high spec PC's and GPU's - gammers and graphic artists ) and speciality experience entertainment.

 

[Peter Klawitter]

it's for sure in the market and here to stay, certainly not everyone's budget $$$ at least for now, many who I know used it but can't stand wearing it for many hours for sim racing as an example, for me after using it, just don't like the current generations resolution and quaility, I think it will be really great in 2nd or 3rd GEN VR, imho, but it is of course already a fantastic technology and that it has made it into the consumer market so smoothly. let's not forget one requires also pretty good hardware to support the VR gear, which again $$$$ is costly, and not every normal gamer had that kind of budget. regardsless of any aspect, be it positive or negative, VR is here to stay. if it stays in gaming industry or not, is the question since there are not many games yet. (just google some of the financial sector articles on VR development, research and product releases and how the industry sees it dispite their huge investments)

 

[Jeremy Ford]

I'm now an owner of an HTC Vive and once you've plugged one of these on your head you'll agree that VR isn't niche. It the beginning of something epic.

My first go with Project Cars wasn't a great success, even on a GTX 1080, I was getting moments of low FPS, which caused odd momentary dizziness going around corners. I was also having a problem with the resolution settings (stuck at low resolution below the headset default). The disclaimer here is I believe my in-game settings are not quite right, so this isn't me flaming Project Cars in VR. I'll report back on this experience once I've spent some time with the settings.

On a wider note on other VR games which also applies to sim racing, the presence you get in VR is quite amazing because you're seeing real world scale through your eyes. I'm having loads of fun with the roomscale games. Moments of the HMD and controllers have no perceivable lag, which gives everything convincing substance in VR to all objects you interact with. The controllers are modeled 1-to-1 in VR, even rotating and touching them together in real life, it's identical in VR.

Everything feels natural in VR. A great example of this is Space Pirate Trainer. It's a simple arcade shooter, your controllers are guns or shields, and your fighting waves of laser firing robot drones. The experience is you're in that world. A robot will fire a laser at you and you block or dodge the incoming laser, the depth perception is the same as reality. Dodge to the side and you watch the laser go inches past your face. You fire back down the sights of your virtual guns and it's no different from aiming with real guns.

With other titles with objects, you pick things up and navigate around obstacles as in real life. Even though you can walk through things in roomscale VR, things have perceivable substance which you naturally respect.

There are a bunch of indie titles which are so much fun, these aren't extensive games, and if played on standard monitor they'd mostly be considered quite average. Jump into VR and experience is elevated a thousand fold.

VR currently lacks its killer app, so we're waiting for properly funded VR game beyond the current crop of indie titles. Should that stop you getting onboard with VR now? Personally I'd say not at all, there's still plenty of incredible content to experience and I'm loving it!

 

[Insert Coin]

I'm now an owner of an HTC Vive and once you've plugged one of these on your head you'll agree that VR isn't niche. It the beginning of something epic.

My first go with Project Cars wasn't a great success, even on a GTX 1080, I was getting moments of low FPS, which caused odd momentary dizziness going around corners. I was also having a problem with the resolution settings (stuck at low resolution below the headset default). The disclaimer here is I believe my in-game settings are not quite right, so this isn't me flaming Project Cars in VR. I'll report back on this experience once I've spent some time with the settings.

On a wider note on other VR games which also applies to sim racing, the presence you get in VR is quite amazing because you're seeing real world scale through your eyes. I'm having loads of fun with the roomscale games. Moments of the HMD and controllers have no perceivable lag, which gives everything convincing substance in VR to all objects you interact with. The controllers are modeled 1-to-1 in VR, even rotating and touching them together in real life, it's identical in VR.

Everything feels natural in VR. A great example of this is Space Pirate Trainer. It's a simple arcade shooter, your controllers are guns or shields, and your fighting waves of laser firing robot drones. The experience is you're in that world. A robot will fire a laser at you and you block or dodge the incoming laser, the depth perception is the same as reality. Dodge to the side and you watch the laser go inches past your face. You fire back down the sights of your virtual guns and it's no different from aiming with real guns.

With other titles with objects, you pick things up and navigate around obstacles as in real life. Even though you can walk through things in roomscale VR, things have perceivable substance which you naturally respect.

There are a bunch of indie titles which are so much fun, these aren't extensive games, and if played on standard monitor they'd mostly be considered quite average. Jump into VR and experience is elevated a thousand fold.

VR currently lacks its killer app, so we're waiting for properly funded VR game beyond the current crop of indie titles. Should that stop you getting onboard with VR now? Personally I'd say not at all, there's still plenty of incredible content to experience and I'm loving it!

You should really try Assetto Corsa with pixel density set to 1.5 or higher in the oculus.ini file. It's very smooth on my GTX 970 (CPU 2600k @ 4.4 GHz).

 

[Pär Öqvist]

The killer apps is in the simulations and will probably be for a while. To spend multi millions of dollars on roomscale experiences that only works for VR don´t make to much business sense. Also it takes time you don´t deliver triple A games over night. Luckily you really don´t need all that much in fancy graphics if you can just get the gameplay right. Had so much fun hitting simple robots with knifes in the budget cuts demo. Point and click adventures and horror games will get new air for sure. Amnesia for example I only played in theater mode but with head tracking it has the potential to kill gamers by heart attack surely...

I have not had much fun in the zillion of platform shooters. Yes the controls works great but it´s monotonous but everybodys taste is different. Pinball is something that translated really well to VR as well looking forward to FX 2 VR though FX 2 by itself feels great in theater mode. If you don´t have a 150" projector setup at home don´t forget the home theater mode. I was surprised how good it was. I would not watch movies though the SDE issue is to big for that for me. Pool Nation VR... Essentially simulations which is in a way easier and cheaper to produce then more abstract adventure games.

If we stick to racing PCars and LFS work so well I will never use a regular monitor or triple monitor setup for those titles if I can help it. I have obligations to my team and all but honestly I would really just want to focus on racing in sims with such good VR support. I love endurance racing though that would be the only reason to continue running rFactor 2 if it don´t get VR support.

In P Cars my initial impression was that it´s just to low res and to much of SDE but with some fine tuning of the graphics and my X 1080 I have hardly ever been so confident with lapping nordschleife despite a lot of SDE. It´s always there and always visible some reviews suggest it disappears but it´s not. Resolution is on the lower scale of doable but it does reach a minimum point for me at least. I don´t have perfect vision -1.0 without glasses so if you have better vision you will see clearer

3D is helping a lot easier to judge distances and my car placement is just better. Harder to find small reference points yes but with track knowledge you will find ways but you are not so desperate finding them in 3D when you have more to go by to judge when to brake. Whenever I get on a new track I just crash all the time braking to late as I have trouble judging the distance to next corner plus the fact I have no fear for the consequences if I crash. I don´t do that to anywhere the near same extent in VR.

There is problems seeing small objects. I do have trouble seeing what´s in my mirrors if there is a gt or a Prototype I can see there is something sometimes but spotter plugins is helpful and for sure if there is big pile ups ahead I will see it later but no doubt it´s already good enough to replace monitors and get a much superior experience.

I am lucky as I am not prone to motion sickness whatsoever. The headtracking and latency is so low I don´t get any more dizzyness compared to running gokart IRL. When going down the laguna seca corkscrew omg yes you feel it in the gut like in a roller coaster but I like the sense of death. It´s absolutely horrifying at times but you do get battle hardened. My first rounds I was crying by fear trying to push never ever happened I got the sensation what I was doing was real before.

Don´t have to be dramatic like the corkscrew can be more modest like the sweeping right hander at watkin glens short you just want to get back there. Turns that in 2D is just another flat turn.

Can go on and on and on about how awesome it´s tbh. And this is despite the Vive software/hardware has giving me absolute hell. Currently I can´t get the SteamVR theater mode working can just run games with native support and I can´t for my god figure out why and how to solve it.

But even if I could just use it for games designed for it the experience it gives can not be had with a triple monitor setup or the like.

Hope I get my Rift soon so I can try some Assetto Corsa. Looks like Occulus killed the Revive support so have to wait for Kunos to offer official support. I am also praying every night that Automobilista will get support and not to say rFactor 2. What I worry there is how the tracks will be as we run addon tracks will they have correct elevation changes etc? I am afraid they will fall apart because you can really scrutinize the tracks better in VR. See so much more detail and get a feel of how they are actually build. Running a track in 2D and in the Vive in 3D is like running an entirely different track.

 

[Insert Coin]

Highly recommended: the Real Head Motion plugin for Assetto Corsa. In short: when driving over bumps it bounces the car, instead of the world around you which, to my opinion, makes it more realistic. And the best part: it reduces VR motion sickness a lot (I'm quite prone to that unfortunately). The latest version of the plugin is only available on the forum of AC.

 

[xnorb]

Just because a technology is future-proof doesn't mean that it can't be niche.
We need to talk about expectations first:
When talking about gaming i talk about 60 FPS minimum @ 1080p with settings to High/Max, i'm not talking about < 30 FPS running low settings and downscaled to 720p.
So for VR i'm talking about High settings and 90 FPS solid in let's say Assetto Corsa.

2 main problematic areas:

a) The PC gaming market is dominated by non-VR genres.
Mobas, RTS, FPS, CTG, RPG all can't really benefit from VR and would need to be redesigned. (I know FPS appears to be THE genre for VR but there's a huge problem with mixing VR and K+M players and the old problem of disconnecting your head from your body) Don't get me wrong, i think every genre could potentially gain a lot from VR, but the way the gaming industry works i can't see developers/publishers being willed creating 2 completely different gameplay mechanics (for VR and monitor) for the same game.
Heck, they don't even adjust for the PC version...

VR for party games is something different, that's like mobile games which attract all kind of players and just like mom and your 8 yo sister loved playing Wii games, they will also love playing VR games, but for hardcore gamers the use is limited (happily we're simracers and can enjoy VR to it's fullest extend)

b) Costs
Most people struggle keeping 60 FPS solid in modern games on a single 1080p screen.
To achieve the recommended 90 FPS in VR we're talking about 120 FPS on a single 1080p screen, now how many people do you know running a rig being able to never drop below 120 FPS?
We're looking at a rig that costs about 2000$ + 500$ for the headset.
Which absolutely is not the majority of what's currently being used...


VR is here to stay and i'm very excited seeing what the headset developers and game developers will be able to pull off in future, but at the moment VR is not an option for me or any of my friends.

 

[eSEA One]

Just because a technology is future-proof doesn't mean that it can't be niche.
We need to talk about expectations first:
When talking about gaming i talk about 60 FPS minimum @ 1080p with settings to High/Max, i'm not talking about < 30 FPS running low settings and downscaled to 720p.
So for VR i'm talking about High settings and 90 FPS solid in let's say Assetto Corsa.

2 main problematic areas:

a) The PC gaming market is dominated by non-VR genres.
Mobas, RTS, FPS, CTG, RPG all can't really benefit from VR and would need to be redesigned. (I know FPS appears to be THE genre for VR but there's a huge problem with mixing VR and K+M players and the old problem of disconnecting your head from your body) Don't get me wrong, i think every genre could potentially gain a lot from VR, but the way the gaming industry works i can't see developers/publishers being willed creating 2 completely different gameplay mechanics (for VR and monitor) for the same game.
Heck, they don't even adjust for the PC version...

VR for party games is something different, that's like mobile games which attract all kind of players and just like mom and your 8 yo sister loved playing Wii games, they will also love playing VR games, but for hardcore gamers the use is limited (happily we're simracers and can enjoy VR to it's fullest extend)

b) Costs
Most people struggle keeping 60 FPS solid in modern games on a single 1080p screen.
To achieve the recommended 90 FPS in VR we're talking about 120 FPS on a single 1080p screen, now how many people do you know running a rig being able to never drop below 120 FPS?
We're looking at a rig that costs about 2000$ + 500$ for the headset.
Which absolutely is not the majority of what's currently being used...


VR is here to stay and i'm very excited seeing what the headset developers and game developers will be able to pull off in future, but at the moment VR is not an option for me or any of my friends.

Well said mate, it will be a while before it becomes available on the price point for the masses. With the next gen graphics cards, incoming at a more reasonable price, more folks will be able to afford more powerful GPUs. This hopefully will help lower the price of the GPU (that can run VR).

 

[Pär Öqvist]

After actually experience fps in VR I don´t really understand where the big problem is? I tried Far Cry 4 and Fallout 4 and experience 0.0 % nausea. I tried both in cinema mode which is just like playing on a huge projector setup. So no wonder there is no nausea there. I also tried with vorpx which let you adjust the view with the headtracking. Again no nausea. head is linked to the gun in fps games though so a bit unorthodox control method but obviously it can be done just fine. This is a game that is not optimized for VR even!

This is of course not the full experience but still. Some games that bug out and give fps drops and all kind of weird issues using vorpx has caused nausea but that is just bugged games more then the control method causing it.

Most of these games you may just as well run in theater mode. Just the low resolution that might make you want to choose to run on a regular monitor instead I was surprised how well it works. Some games it´s plain obvious you should play in VR like Amnesia where others there is a question of eye candy making you go for the monitor when immersion is not important.

For me it´s only the resolution and SDE that would make me run rpgs, fps, 3rd person action games etc on a regular monitor for some games otherwise the projector setup would win. I was expecting to just want to run games with native VR support.

 

[My993C2]

Do you think a computer game requires the skills of a real driver?

Don't forget that driving a racing car, and playing a racing game are not the same thing.

Are these racing sims games? I guess that all depends on how the person uses their hardware and software, what software they use as well as it might depend on if they have any real world experience.

I am not a professional race car driver. But I used to track my Porsche 911 when I had local access to a race track and ever since we lost the track I started racing a Rotax DD2 Kart. I know the differences between the real world and the sim world are. The real world is far more expensive, far more time consuming, far more dangerous and yes far more fun. Now there are times when I fire up iRacing or Project Cars and I am only doing it to entertain myself. But there are other times when I use the sim for real world training. So yeah for some it is only a game. But for others it is a training tool. So is it a game or is it a tool depends on how people use the hardware and software. I stay away from real world and sim cars that I cannot drive at the limit because I am just wasting my time on cars that exceed my current skill level. A gamer doesn't care that they can't drive at their limit. I do care.

I have yet to experience this VR sim racing, but the people who have, said it is pretty immersion. Because of this, I have decided to piece together a new rig and it will be a VR rig. Obviously when I am whipping around Monaco in a Formula Renault car with my VR headset on driving at my limit, I will be in gaming mode as I will never get a chance to race at Monaco. But when I am driving around Nordschleife in a RUF, know this. I am using it as a training tool as driving the Green Hell in the real world is on my bucket list.

Oh and yes I know long message. But 14 years ago when I was an active private pilot (had to give up flying, it was too expensive), I landed at Glenwood Springs in Colorado (considered Colorado's 3rd trickiest airport to fly in and out of). When I flew into that boxed canyon on approach into that airport, I had the coolest Deja Vu sensation even though it was my first and only time I even flew that approach. What caused the Deja Vu feeling? I had it because I flew into Glenwood Springs many many many times on my Flight Simulator which I set up specifically as a training tool. Of course the Flight Simulator did not teach me how to fly. But it did teach me the terrain, and I made my mistakes in the flight simulator so that I would be prepared for the approach when I did it for real and when I flew into that airport what was going through my mind was "I've been here before" with the biggest smile on my face.

Yes these can be games. But they can also be used as training tools.

 

[ears]

@My993C2 you're far more experienced than me in real world driving and have much more authority to comment.

I think what i was trying to do was play down the realism claims.

Adding VR makes a game / sim more immersive and more fun for me. It also helps me improve and be faster and more consistent. It even tricks my brain into thinking that I'm in that virtual car. But I don't know if it makes the experience more realistic, closer to the real thing, because I have never experienced the real thing.

 

[My993C2]

@My993C2 you're far more experienced than me in real world driving and have much more authority to comment.

I think what i was trying to do was play down the realism claims.

Adding VR makes a game / sim more immersive and more fun for me. It also helps me improve and be faster and more consistent. It even tricks my brain into thinking that I'm in that virtual car. But I don't know if it makes the experience more realistic, closer to the real thing, because I have never experienced the real thing.

In a few weeks from now my new sim rig should be pieced together and when I am running the Vive VR headset I will get to experience this immersion people speak of. The physical sensations like g-forces can only be experienced in the real world but I hope the visuals + plus the ability to look to the apex are the best they have ever been in the sim world. However I am a little concerned when I read that objects in the distance of these current headsets can be a little blury and every good driving instructor will always be telling their students to look further down the road and yet when we do in VR the image will be blury? Hopefully this won't create too many bad habits. But I am sure in 5-10 years from now the 2nd or 3rd gen headsets will have this distance issue all ironed out.

We are in the early days of VR sim racing. But make no mistake, VR is the future and it will only get better with time.

 

[Insert Coin]

Be prepared for a low resolution experience. It is blurry. Looking into the distance is still a problem with the current VR headsets. But it sure is immersive!

 

[My993C2]

Be prepared for a low resolution experience. It is blurry. Looking into the distance is still a problem with the current VR headsets. But it sure is immersive!

I did the Vive demo at the Microsoft store yesterday. You know the demo where you doodle with the 3D art, the demo where you are under water in the ocean with the fish and the Blue Whale, and then I blasted some space aliens. So yeah I did see low resolution of the current headsets. But I am still looking forward to trying it out in the racing sim. Of course all my talk earlier this morning of using the sim as a training tool could just be that, talk if we can't look far enough up the road.

 

[Pär Öqvist]

No its not talk fear get involved you dont want to crash. If you feel fear you think its real and its not a game anymore. Vr would prepare me much better for real racing and let me push harder from the beginning. Because you are used to the feel which you never get with monitors.

 

[Jeremy Ford]

Further to my recent posting, I've now managed to dial in the settings to use my Vive on Projects Cars. My personal verdict is it's not quite there, at least in this title. Everything runs smooth, and actually being in car is amazing. The letdown are the graphics on the Vive screen, which isn't entirely down to the Vive itself.

I've picked up a bunch of VR specific titles and since they're custom made for the VR, the graphics have been tuned to work on HMD screens and they looks crisp and detailed. Project Cars on the other hand suffers from having VR as a bolt on rather than proper development. The native Project Cars textures pack too much detail, and the result is some blurriness to fine detail in the game, particularly distance objects and car liveries. It's not a game breaker, but it's hard not to focus on those elements.

By having having seen VR graphics done better elsewhere, the first gen HMD's are fine as long as the game developer invests the time on custom VR visuals. A good example is Hover Junkers which packs in loads of detailed visuals, but it's done right.

 

[ThugUK]

Just curious, how is it not the same thing in your opinion?
If I have a DD wheel, hydraulic pedals, a VR headset and a rig that simulates motion and vibration and accurately mimics the position in a real race car, what exactly are the big differences between driving a real race car and why are different skills needed?
Except for the psychological factor that you don't place as much money and potential loss of life/injury on the line when playing in a simulator.

Are you a driver in real life?

There are no exhaust fumes or oil smoke from a little drip filling the cabin. You don't smell the steam from an overheating engine. You don't have rain dripping in and fogging your visor. Brightness of VR goggles is nowhere near the level of looking into the sun when cresting a rise (and you don't want it to be!). There's no 500 degree heat from the exhaust passing under your feet and you're not wearing 3 layers of fire suit. There's no wind buffeting your head. Noise levels are an order of magnitude (or more) in a racecar. Motion rigs do not sustain the level of g-forces experienced in a racecar and unless you've experienced a 1hr-2hr stint, you have no idea how fatiguing that is. Vibration from an out-of-balance wheel is not as severe (could be damage, could be rubber pickup), even with a direct drive wheel. You don't hear the noises that make you wonder if something is breaking apart. Night racing is a whole 'nother world compared to sims. You don't have to go through the engine & brake warmup procedure or wait in pregrid for 15 minutes alone with your thoughts. The toilet is just down the hall in a sim and you don't have to undo your driver's suit to use it. Potential trackside distractions are far less (unless the Great Dane wants to be in your lap).

Good post.

There are so many other sensory stimuli too, including the feeling of what the brakes/clutch/accelerator pedals are doing and micro adjusting them as you go. The feeling of potholes, bumps, changes in tarmac, oil, water etc unsettling your steering/braking/acceleration. The feeling when debri flies up a you (or a bird strike) when doing 150mph. The 'feeling' of actually traveling fast. The wind effecting the way you drive, the smearing from dirt on your windscreen (visor).
There are SOOOO many other feelings you get when driving, especially at speed that to think its 'similar' to actually being there is crazy.

 

[Robes]

It's a simulation. For me it's about getting as close to the real thing as possible, because I'm never going to drive an f1 car, I'm never going to experience a full Grand Prix. A VR takes me one step closer to reality. Sure it's still virtual but I've packed away my triple screen setup and I haven't touched a sim that doesn't support VR since, for me it's a game changer and I never want to go back.

 

[Andrew Harper]

It's certainly new technology still and I may consider getting the HTC at some point. Simply because my arrangement means the TV/monitor has to be high up on the wall. With the space I have the VR setup makes my life much easier.

Now....as some have already mentioned. I think VR will probably have something like a 5-7 year life span. Why? Because it will need support from games designers to be a success. I love my 3D TV and I have lots of good films to enjoy on it but that is slowing dying now which is a shame. I listen to dvd-audio and SACD music which are awesome and sound amazing but as above the manufacturers couldn't be bothered with the extra expense. Blu-ray is my movie format of choice but sales are just about hanging on as people download copies elsewhere. Which are usually awful quality!

I was around for the first time for VR and that died probably because it was seen as a gimmick and the support just wasn't there. The way occulus have done their project means that the software kits have been around for ages and the support is there which is great.

I've read lots of articles about VR being used in education, theme rides, and so on and I'm hoping that it will be a success in the long term. As mentioned it needs a killer game to make people want it. Probably a first person shooter. If the next call of duty was made to be VR ready I'm sure that would help a lot!