VR Adoption Among Steam Users Has Crashed To A Halt

This kind of sucks to hear—I did finally get a VR headset yesterday and have to say that the experience lives up to the hype. I imagine that a lot of people are interested but are waiting for the second generation of devices before they jump in.

The number of new HTC Vive owners on Steam grew only 0.3 percent in July and was flat in August, according to a survey (via Reddit) of customers that use Valve’s distribution network. The Oculus Rift headset from the Facebook subsidiary saw similar stagnation of 0.3 percent in July and 0.1 percent in August. At this point, only 0.18 percent of Steam users own the Vive and only 0.10 percent own the Rift. And with lethargic sales, both of these high-end head-mounted displays are going to need a lot of help to catch on with audiences.

Hardly surprising, another 6-12 months and all VR adoption will crash to a halt. The only ones really interested in it have already adopted it. I've said it more times than I can count. VR is really cool, but it is going to be really niche as far as gaming is concerned. Its the same category of people that setup full racing chairs, steering wheels and pedals for their racing games. Most certainly it is a superior experience for that kind of game, but the majority of the market just wants "good enough" without all the extra crap and expense.

VR was a passing fad, and it was a fad with a tiny niche of people. I'd compare it to motion controls, but unlike motion controls it never saw and will probably never see wide adoption. Strapping heavy, clunky scuba google looking things to your face is not the future of gaming.

Is this a surprise. Its 800 dollars for a headset... I could afford it and even I wouldn't do it yet.

Package VR with Xbox and PlayStation at reasonable prices and it will catch on. On the PC it has zero chance of success as its a very expensive accessory with only a handful of games.

If the cost of entry was lower I could see it taking off a lot quicker. But $800 for the HMD setup of choice (Zuckerberg & Carmack can both suck it IMO) is pretty damned steep. If they started hawking Vives for the price of a decent gaming monitor I'd be all over it like a fatkid on a cupcake.

I think more people are interested in it and do NOT think it's jut some passing fad. But two things still need to happen.


Cost. The entry price with controls is 800 dollars for the VR system with the vive. You cannot sustain volume sales with only the 1080/titan buying crowd, you HAVE to be able to dip into lower price tiers, or you will exaust the number of people that are both interested and have the easy spare cash to drop nearly a thousand dollars on a first generation VR setup.


Technology. The other two areas it is being constrained is performance and screen tech. I have not tried the vive, but I Have tried the oculus rift. The screen on the latter is supposed to be better than the vive and it does look good, but still not good enough to warrant a premium price for some. The second generation versions of these products needs to have better screens, and ideally, an improvement in the field of view. As for performance, so far VR only seems to perform OK with UE4 games (seemingly the only engine devs latch onto for these titles en masse) and it runs like shit on AMD cards. Who's fault is it? The amd haters will say amd, the amd defenders will say the crappily optimized UE4 on amd based cards and the lack of dev focus on optimization, but either way, releasing games that have to be reprojected on cards that are clearly more powerful than lower tier nvidia cards where that is not the case is not tolerable.

VR is an area where you need to squeeze out the most performance possible, and if you are not up to the task of coding for those scenarios in demanding VR games, step aside or pay someone who is and put them to work. If you need to learn how to properly code in dx12 for both nvidia and liquid vr, then do so. Or don't, let the games you release run like ass on a smaller but still decently sized segment of the gpu population, and have sales suffer.

I'm going to hold off calling VR a passing fad until after the PSVR is released and how it fares. Personally, I believe if PSVR does take off, we'll start seeing more developer support and more consumer demand for premium VR devices.

So more people bought VR headsets than Steam Boxes?

They have been repeating the same mistake ever since the Nintendo virtualboy. No one wants to wear some clunky obnoxious device on their fucking head...

Get the tech to the point where all you need is the equivalent of a regular pair of glasses - so you don't look like a retard while wearing them - and the tech might have a chance.

Yeah ^^^ 100% agree. Sadly we just are not there yet. People want it to be like that now and its not possible yet.

Sounds about right, anyone who wants and can afford one has one already by now. Very few games and applications, none that are capable of driving sales on their own.

GotNoRice said:

They have been repeating the same mistake ever since the age of the virtual gameboy. No one wants to wear some clunky obnoxious device on their fucking head...

Get the tech to the point where all you need is the equivalent of a regular pair of glasses - so you don't look like a retard while wearing them - and the tech might have a chance.

Click to expand...

That's looking to be possible soon enough with AR. Not sure why you're worried about how you look in the comfort of your own home, though.

I've always said that I would wait until the 2nd or 3rd generation of VR comes out. I am not that interested in VR and what I've seen doesn't impress me to the point of needing it right now.

This gen is still not good enough for my need of modern flight sim ( DCS ) , so i will wait for 2nd gen , i just hope they wont really wait 2 years from gen 1.

aeliusg said:

Not sure why you're worried about how you look in the comfort of your own home, though.

Click to expand...

Most people don't live by themselves, and playing video games with friends is the most fun kind of gaming. Also, even if you don't actually care about looking like a retard, it's still a clunky obnoxious device attached to your head.

If the general public actually wanted this kind of experience, then a lot of things would be different, even things not directly related to VR. Instead of buying big-screen HDTVs people could just use a headset and watch the equivalent of a theater-sized virtual screen. No one does that because it's stupid - so why would anyone think that people would embrace that same experience for VR?

I haven't bought one for the simple fact that I'd have to buy two. One for me and one for my wife. While I can afford that, I'd rather continent scale my PC to play at 4k. My 4k monitor was cheaper than either headset by a good margin...

yeah 4k monitor is a good choice if you have video cards to push it, but monitor will not give you the experience you get with vr

I bought one a week ago.. pretty convinced I'll keep it but I have a few days to decide if I'll return it..

My girlfriend went mental and said it was a waste of money and I should take it back straight away. Then I bought 'theBlu' for her to try, somewhere between jumping out of her skin when a whale appeared over her shoulder, freaking out and refusing to turn off the torch in 'the deep' or whilst pushing jellyfish around and gazing up at the surface to see the schools of fish.. she said "your not taking this back".

I'm going to give it a try on Elite Dangerous tonight, if all goes well I'll get the Thrustmaster HOTAS x tomorrow.. I remember playing the original on the schools BBC Micro in 1984.

I'd definitely keep it if they would confirm Vive 2 (not just a lighter version) will just be a swap of the headset..

GotNoRice said:

They have been repeating the same mistake ever since the Nintendo virtualboy. No one wants to wear some clunky obnoxious device on their fucking head...

Get the tech to the point where all you need is the equivalent of a regular pair of glasses - so you don't look like a retard while wearing them - and the tech might have a chance.

Click to expand...

Even that may be too much if 3d is any indicator. Love VR and am an adopter, but I understand it will likely remain a niche, similar to 3d glasses, full HOTAS with rudder pedals, and racing wheel/shifter/pedals setups. Awesome, but still niche.

I

The problem is still the cost. I was able to get a 4k 43" tv for 300$, and used a display port to hdmi adapter for 20$ and I get 4k gaming for half the price of a vr head set. It's just too expensive. You can't even play whatever you want on it, like a fake 3d tv setup. I don't need true vr in all my games, but some basic support to use the headset as a monitor would work wonders for adaptation.

n31l said:

I bought one a week ago.. pretty convinced I'll keep it but I have a few days to decide if I'll return it..

My girlfriend went mental and said it was a waste of money and I should take it back straight away. Then I bought 'theBlu' for her to try, somewhere between jumping out of her skin when a whale appeared over her shoulder, freaking out and refusing to turn off the torch in 'the deep' or whilst pushing jellyfish around and gazing up at the surface to see the schools of fish.. she said "your not taking this back".

I'm going to give it a try on Elite Dangerous tonight, if all goes well I'll get the Thrustmaster HOTAS x tomorrow.. I remember playing the original on the schools BBC Micro in 1984.

I'd definitely keep it if they would confirm Vive 2 (not just a lighter version) will just be a swap of the headset..

Click to expand...

I have the thustmaster hotas X and I really like it (although I don't use it much). Its a lot better than trying to play with a gamepad (and steamVR doesn't support KB/Mouse, which is too hard to do in VR anyway)

The joystick has 5 seperate analog inputs (X/Y and twist on the right stick, plus throttle and left/right paddle on left stick) and plenty of buttons .

I bought it for House of the Dying Sun and it was very easy to control everything from just the joystick. That being said, it was far easier to fly and aim accurately using the KB/Mouse in non-vr mode (but that could just be me)

GotNoRice said:

They have been repeating the same mistake ever since the Nintendo virtualboy. No one wants to wear some clunky obnoxious device on their fucking head...

Get the tech to the point where all you need is the equivalent of a regular pair of glasses - so you don't look like a retard while wearing them - and the tech might have a chance.

Click to expand...

While I am an early adopter (and more than willing to wear a clunky headset), I completely agree with this. The first time I took my Vive out of the box my wife just stared at me. "Really?", she said. Her skepticism only increased as I plugged everything in and made the motion trackers a permanent installation in our living room. While I continue to enjoy it (including her on a number of occasions) this tech is not quite ready for the mainstream for a number of reasons, mostly limited by available/affordable technology:

1. As you mentioned, the headset is big, clunky, and not exactly attractive to most. Shrinking the tech and making it a little sexier might help to convince the general public.

2. Wires. Oh God, the wires. A few solutions have been posited - most recently Kyle's post about the guy using a retractable clostheline device to keep the wires up and out of the way.

This is, in my opinion, is tied (see below) for the biggest problem with VR right now. No matter your skills with cable wrangling (benefits of having a wife...) you are nearly always aware of them when playing any games that use the motion tracking functionality of the Vive. The situation is better when seated, playing games like Project Cars and Elite Dangerous, but only marginally so. The breakthrough here will be wireless VR which, of course, will come with its own laundry list of caveats, such as battery life, signal lag, signal processing lag, etc.

3. The Resolution. You get used to it after a while, but it's always there - right in front of you. The screen-door effect is real and won't be solved until manufacturers can increase pixel density sufficiently. For me, this is just as big a problem with VR as cable management.

Fixing this also comes with a whole host of problems. As Kyle's excellent runthroughs of VR Performance vs. Graphics Cards have shown, even the GTX 1080 starts to struggle to perform at non-rearprojected 90fps for certain games. Increasing pixel density will only compound this problem and I doubt that a mainstream/non-Titan, non-SLI Graphics Card solution will present itself in the next year that will run a 4K+/eye VR headset at 90fps in demanding games with high settings.

4. Field of View. This is a bigger problem with some games games than others and will likely get better as manufacturers find a sweet spot between screen size and lens size. One easy fix right now is to buy different pads for your headset that position your face closer to the lens. Users with larger glasses will likely have problems with this though.

5. Cost. At $800 for the headset and at least $600-$800 for a rig to run it, the cost barrier is too high for most people. We at [H] are a different breed though (just look at the guy who DIY'd himself a 4-way SLI Titan XP rig), so it is sometimes hard for us to envision a person unwilling to pay X amount of dollars for a piece of hardware. Significant market penetration will only come when the cost comes down.

Despite these problems, I love my Vive and look forward to the tech only getting better with time.

sir-gold said:

I have the thustmaster hotas X and I really like it (although I don't use it much). Its a lot better than trying to play with a gamepad (and steamVR doesn't support KB/Mouse, which is too hard to do in VR anyway)

The joystick has 5 seperate analog inputs (X/Y and twist on the right stick, plus throttle and left/right paddle on left stick) and plenty of buttons .

I bought it for House of the Dying Sun and it was very easy to control everything from just the joystick. That being said, it was far easier to fly and aim accurately using the KB/Mouse in non-vr mode (but that could just be me)

Click to expand...

Just put House of the Dying Sun on my Steam wishlist to remind me, thought of playing it in VR and it made me think of "The Last Starfighter" movie.

Seems my 14 days to return ran out yesterday, looks like I'm keeping the Vive then..

Cost is definitely it's biggest hurdle. I love my Vive, I really do think it's the future of gaming. Unfortunately it is very expensive, $800 is steep but that still doesn't cover it, you need a min of a $400 graphics card and a relatively high end PC. Then there are the incidentals like space requirements and various mounting item workarounds for base stations in some situations like apartments, the current necessity for wires, etc... There is still a lot of work to do before more mainstream adoption can take place. PSVR I don't think will do it and I am worried that PSVR might hurt it due to the console's lack of power and odd external processor. I think it'll be at least 5 years before VR is viable for the mainstream public.

I have about as much interest in VR as I did with 3D TV which is close to zero.

The price is not mainstream level, no surprise. Perhaps the cheaper console versions will help drive prices to commodity levels, we'll see.

Maybe it's a fad, but maybe not. I think it's way too soon to know. I can afford the tech, but I'm not interested in 1G tech. Once the price comes down and there are more apps, it'll take off. And maybe the first killer app is something other than gaming. Maybe you go to some exotic place and you use a 360 camera to take video. You come back and friends can experience it with a VR headset. Better still, imagine a BBC documentary like Planet Earth filmed for VR. I think that's pretty exciting and once I've gotten it for that, then why not game with it too?

As for the size of headsets, not sure how big they are now, but they will get lighter and more comfortable as time goes by, just like Big TVs. When i sold A/V, nobody was carrying a 32" set by themselves. Now just about anyone could carry a TV one.

5150Joker said:

Package VR with Xbox and PlayStation at reasonable prices and it will catch on. On the PC it has zero chance of success as its a very expensive accessory with only a handful of games.

Click to expand...

I think that when it gets cheap enough to be packaged together is when it will not need to be packaged together because the masses will then be able to afford it w/o dropping anything on a console. Otherwise, adding 800 onto a console that isn't capable of running VR... yet another refresh with new silicon? Yea, I'm just not seeing the possibilities there yet.

3DO.

I am also more than willing to early adopt if the device is going to be mainstream. But...

My main beef with full VR and not some advanced form of AR is simply that (for gaming) you can't SEE the real world at ALL while wearing the headset. You can't adjust your seat... drink your beverage... find your phone... SEE YOUR KEYBOARD...

So really it's going to be limited in games in the mainstream to things you can play with a one or two handed console-style ergonomic controller. This really eliminates a lot of the more complex games a lot of us crave. I've got to agree with an above post that the first killer apps for full VR may not be straight PC games. It may be something else. And I think it's going to NEED to be something else to get a few brands of headsets to sell enough to get a permanent foothold.

I truly see the future as being AR headsets/glasses that will immerse you in full VR when desired but still manage some kind of needed on-demand view of your real surroundings. Like if you glance down the VR fades a bit and you can see your hands/desk/keyboard. It has to be more seamless than putting cameras on a clunky headset too. It will need to be glasses lightness and with no offset to your vision.

I could care less about needing a connecting cord if those pie-in-the-sky specs could be met.

It seems likely to me that something along the lines of Microsoft's AR or similar may produce the first killer apps that makes everyone want to own one... THEN those systems will mature and be able to deliver everything from AR to VR seamlessly.

{NG}Fidel said:

Is this a surprise. Its 800 dollars for a headset... I could afford it and even I wouldn't do it yet.

Click to expand...

Yeah, I have disposable income but I only light money on fire for things that are at least worth the cost. $800 is just too much for tech demos.

Krixon said:

The breakthrough here will be wireless VR which, of course, will come with its own laundry list of caveats, such as battery life, signal lag, signal processing lag, etc.

Click to expand...

Mobile AIO, aka cellphone VR. I bought a Galaxy S6 just to use with the GearVR, and honestly the implementation was brilliant. That is exactly the kind of platform we need. A fully enclosed all in one unit so you are wire free, lag free, and able to stand/walk around as you please. The S6 cant detect forward motion effectively for something like VR, but the premise is there. I was bringing this thing everywhere with me showing it off to as many people as I could. The portability of it is just astounding.

I think in a few years mobile graphics will catch up to a point where android video games will offer enough fidelity to be considered quality for VR games. Include some ability to walk around in space and you're set.

SeymourGore said:

I'm going to hold off calling VR a passing fad until after the PSVR is released and how it fares. Personally, I believe if PSVR does take off, we'll start seeing more developer support and more consumer demand for premium VR devices.

Click to expand...

We'll see. I don't expect to see substantial improvements people are hoping for in upcoming/2nd Gen devices.

My suspicion is that strapping something to your face just isn't going to take off. I'd rather have a nice 4k TV or eyefinity setup.

I've had a GearVR for quite a while. It was really amazing when I first got it but I seemed to lose interest and then it was just a PITA to use. Like someone else said, kinda like using 3DTV. I have an Epson 5030UB projector too, but rarely get out the 3D glasses. I've got a 55" curved Samsung 4k TV for my gaming monitor now and prefer it.

I've used the Vive and the Rift. Totally amazing experiences - if you haven't tried it, go do it. The Microsoft Store has a Vive set up.
My problems with the tech:
1. Cost. $800 ish is way too high for most people (me included). Not jsut the $800, but you also need a PC capable of running it. I'm sure this will exclude a lot of people. So really, you need to have a PC that is about $600 or higher (I have read a few budget articles - Maximum PC published one for $500). Given time, the industry has shown us that prices will come down and quality will increase.
2. Not much software yet. After the tech demos, what's left? I hope the user base is big enough to support a few killer titles. This might attract more people to the platform.
3. The wires suck. When I used the Vive, I was in an open area standing. I wrapped the wires around my legs more than once.

Not sure what they can do about looks. Yes you look like a dork using them, but honestly not worried about that. If they shrink them, restyle them, you'll still need to wear goggles of some sort.
I have two kids. They are using hand-me-down computers from me. If they see daddy playing the Vive, they would always be bugging me so they could use them. Their computers aren't up to snuff to run VR. Not even close. So, now I have a resource issue - my computer. Even the Sony PS4 VR is going to be a problem. We have one PS4 in the house and VR is solitary. If I get it, it's a fight waiting to happen at my house. I don't want to buy 2 PS4's either.

Of interest to me are the VR headsets that are basically computers. I think AMD is working with a startup. If you could do this, I presume I'd be untethered (although not sure about battery life and the weight).

Wrapping it up: I'm not going to be an early adopter for once in my life. I'd like to stay married and not have kids fighting more than they normally do anyway.

I don't think it is a fad, but it certainly is a niche.

So the top 1% er gamers in the world have bought there VR set now they need to make it affordable for the other 99% of poor gamers

It's very expensive (to most people, I know everyone on this forum is loaded so don't bother commenting about it), inconvenient and it's basically impossible to convince people it makes sense unless they try it first. That's why VR faces a serious uphill battle. I'm interested in VR, but I'm not buying a headset until they settle in on one software standard, the last thing I want to do is spend $600 on something that will work in only a very small number of games.

Cmdrmonkey said:

VR was a passing fad, and it was a fad with a tiny niche of people. I'd compare it to motion controls, but unlike motion controls it never saw and will probably never see wide adoption. Strapping heavy, clunky scuba google looking things to your face is not the future of gaming.

Click to expand...

*facepalm*

You realize that as technology progresses, the devices become lighter and sleeker, right? You remind me of the guys in the history books you hear arguing about how idiotic airplanes are, as no one would want something that is so clunky with such a short range and it couldn't possible have any military application.

The hurdles right now are:
1) Its expensive
2) The LCDs need to be higher resolution (preferably 4K per eye)
3) The device needs to be lighter and smaller
4) The GPUs need to be stronger to drive them at high framerates

All of these hurdles will organically be resolved one way or another, as 4K LCDs for cars, phones, and tablets are coming one way or another, electronics are getting more powerful and lighter everyday anyway, GPUs are always increasing in power at a steady pace, and prices for electronics are always falling.

When VR headsets are like putting on a thick pair of sunglasses with no screen door, there's simply too much greater immersion with such a device in witnessing a concert or big fight or watching a movie or playing a video game to go back to static 2D screens. The living room is already dying as a communal place to watch television, as personal media consumption is taking precedence.

VR and enhanced reality are inevitable, but pushing the limits of current technology.

Ducman69 said:

*facepalm*

You realize that as technology progresses, the devices become lighter and sleeker, right? You remind me of the guys in the history books you hear arguing about how idiotic airplanes are, as no one would want something that is so clunky with such a short range and it couldn't possible have any military application.

The hurdles right now are:
1) Its expensive
2) The LCDs need to be higher resolution (preferably 4K per eye)
3) The device needs to be lighter and smaller
4) The GPUs need to be stronger to drive them at high framerates

All of these hurdles will organically be resolved one way or another, as 4K LCDs for cars, phones, and tablets are coming one way or another, electronics are getting more powerful and lighter everyday anyway, GPUs are always increasing in power at a steady pace, and prices for electronics are always falling.

When VR headsets are like putting on a thick pair of sunglasses with no screen door, there's simply too much greater immersion with such a device in witnessing a concert or big fight or watching a movie or playing a video game to go back to static 2D screens. The living room is already dying as a communal place to watch television, as personal media consumption is taking precedence.

VR and enhanced reality are inevitable, but pushing the limits of current technology.

Click to expand...

You continue to ignore the biggest hurdle. People as a whole don't actually want to be that isolated from their environment for long periods of time. The average gamer is in their 30's, which means they likely have kids. Which means they are exactly like me where they play with one eye on the game and one eye on what their kids are doing, and or play with their kids. VR doesn't and cannot do this and that is a very serious handicap in an overwhelming majority of use cases.

The numbers don't lie, VR is going to be a niche product and none of the things you mentioned are going to change that.