What kind of longevity do you think VR has?

Do you think VR has much longevity?

  • Yes, it will from now on be a thing that becomes very popular for a long time to come.

    Votes: 59 43.7%

  • Not really, it may last a few years but eventually go the way of the Kinect/PS Move.

    Votes: 76 56.3%
  • Total voters
    135
It's a passing fad like motion controls or 3D TVs. No one will be talking about it in a year or two. Strapping big, expensive, dorky scuba goggle looking things to your face is not the future of gaming, and lol at anyone who thinks it is. This shit is going to die an even quicker death than Wii style waggle controls.

AltTabbins said:
Just personal opinion. Ive been around for every gimmick in the gaming industry. Things really haven't changed with the core of video gaming since, well... ever. Video games now are essentially the same as they were in the 70s.
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QFT
 
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As usual in these threads, many of the comments are pretty asinine. VR is not a genie that can be put back in the bottle. The experiences, with the Vive at least, are incredible. Even if current price points persist, it's not going away. No one expects VR to replace gaming as we know it. It will always be a peripheral used for some games like a flight stick or racing wheel. VR can also be used for more than just games. We're only scratching the surface of possible applications-- medical imaging, education / training, architecture, realty, engineering, film, adult film, etc.

VR is great overall for all gamers that want high performance GPUs. The demands of VR will keep Nvidia and even AMD from getting complacent.
 
I think people who purchase VR will get plenty of use out of it. I bet there are many existing games not made specifically for VR, where the headset would create a whole new experience. However, I think the games made for VR will be lacking in quality due to the push from consoles and phones advertising themselves as these amazing VR experiences, and it could slow the market to the point that it doesn't become mainstream. We'll have to wait and see what the next generation of headsets can do to keep the market growth.
 
Microsoft just announced their VR gear. Maybe it will stick around a little longer.
 
there is already one with 230*View and another with much better tracking + object tracking, being developed, soon we'll get 8k per eye and VR will get very interesting
 
Its a natural progression of life as we know it. This particular implementation may ebb but it will be replaced by the next evolution. It's always evolving. Every technology is like that. For us old fuckers who owned crap like the VCR gun thing and the Archos Jukebox you can always see where this stuff is heading. When they had the crappy Nvidia steroescoptic 3D(shut up it was awesome) at the same time highend manufacturers were trying to Market 3D headsets to presentation companies and Dentists offices. It was just too costly and impractical at the time. Go read the history of micromanufacturing, technology always follows that path.
 
We've come a long way from the Forte VFX1/Virtual i-O i-glasses! VPC/Victor CyberMaxx days of '90s VR and 263x230 per eye already, and it's only going to get better from here on out. The Rift CV1 and Vive are finally "good enough" to make a good first impression despite their shortcomings in respects like resolution and overall comfort.

Let me put it this way: I can't go back to my monitor and TrackIR anymore. It's the difference between looking through a window at a flat facsimile of a cockpit and being in that cramped cockpit, where gauges have depth and you really gotta crane your neck to check your six. It's also the difference between putting up with juddery TrackIR rotation while trying to click on things in said cockpits and being able to just point and click with my very gaze, which is quite necessary for most DCS World modules. Vehicular simulations take on an unbelievable level of immersion, and the head-tracking is also quite useful for getting a quick R-73 or AIM-9X helmet-mounted sight lock. (Thought those EVE: Valkyrie head-tracked missiles were just science fiction? Think again!)

The Rift CV1 is also comfortable enough for long-term gaming. Yes, it could still be much better, particularly if they just had a better facial interface and my face didn't heat up in it, but it's a start. I'm thinking that some softer, more breathable foam and a wider nose gap would help.

More importantly, though, this isn't just a technology for games. Look at Tilt Brush, Oculus Medium or Quill. This marks a point where people can create 3D content using a proper 3D interface instead of 2D interfaces viewing 3D content as a flat 2D image. The creative possibilities are quite impressive, from painting to modeling, and we're just getting started with what we can do with a HMD and a pair of hand controllers. Like, imagine CAD in VR, being able to see everything in 1:1 scale as you make it and tuning the design accordingly.

I want VR to actually stick around this time, mature, and take off, having waited decades from the day I first played Quake with a VFX1 as a '90s kid. The price will come down, the specs will get better, and developers actually understand what makes a VR app a good VR experience now, unlike the '90s.
 
NamelessPFG said:
I want VR to actually stick around this time, mature, and take off, having waited decades from the day I first played Quake with a VFX1 as a '90s kid. The price will come down, the specs will get better, and developers actually understand what makes a VR app a good VR experience now, unlike the '90s.
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What was your impression of the VFX1 in the 90s? I knew there were VR headsets out there but I never got to try them myself. Closest I ever got back then was shutter glasses (ELSA Revilators) on a 17" CRT.
 
I used a VFX3D in Half-life. The view angle was 35°, so the screen seemed a little farther away from your face and the VGA colors were a little washed out, but it was functional without issues.
 
Stereoscopic 3D / 3D TV's were / are definitely a fad.

VR is an entirely different thing.
It's a technology, not a gimmick.
It's only going to get better and be more appealing to the average consumer.
 
No that it is capable to be in the living room it is here to stay but will be slow until prices come down. Battery and wireless HDMI need to get better also.
 
TheSmJ said:
What was your impression of the VFX1 in the 90s? I knew there were VR headsets out there but I never got to try them myself. Closest I ever got back then was shutter glasses (ELSA Revilators) on a 17" CRT.
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I mainly remember that it was the coolest thing to see that the game was responding to the motions of my head and the VFX1's CyberPuck controller, especially as I had thought that such control was only possible with crappy mercury-based tilt sensors at the time. It responded quite well for both devices, actually.

The limited resolution didn't stand out to me back then (it's easy to be impressed as a kid), but if my i-glasses! VPC are anything to go by, the 263x230 resolution would be painfully limited today, since most games at the time rendered at either 320x200 or 320x240. Even with the much lower FOV, you can make out the individual subpixels, too, like sitting real close to an old-fashioned CRT SDTV and picking out the individual RGB phosphor strips.

I actually do have some ELSA Revelator/X3D shutterglasses, but the lenses themselves don't go fully opaque and cover a limited FOV. Even with a monitor capable of refreshing fast enough for comfortable use (any 21" FD Trinitron like a Dell P1110 or Sun GDM-5410 will do the trick at up to 160 Hz), they have an annoying ghosting/crosstalk effect between eyes that kills the immersion - something that the 3DS parallax barrier screen suffers significantly less from in most lighting conditions, and which VR HMDs with individual screens per eye don't suffer from at all.

You also have to deal with the trouble of trying to get them to work properly in various games, setting up the stereo separation and everything just right, turning off certain rendering effects that look completely incorrect in stereo 3D, installing the NVIDIA 3D Stereo driver on top of the actual ForceWare driver (I don't think other GPU vendors supported it) and so forth, whereas any properly-developed VR game will have all that configured properly out of the gate - just put on the headset and play. It's easier to get all that stuff right when you know you're working with a display that's viewed the same regardless of the user, because factors like viewing distance, perceived screen size and the resulting FOV are now solved variables.
 
NamelessPFG said:
You also have to deal with the trouble of trying to get them to work properly in various games, setting up the stereo separation and everything just right, turning off certain rendering effects that look completely incorrect in stereo 3D, installing the NVIDIA 3D Stereo driver on top of the actual ForceWare driver (I don't think other GPU vendors supported it) and so forth, whereas any properly-developed VR game will have all that configured properly out of the gate - just put on the headset and play. It's easier to get all that stuff right when you know you're working with a display that's viewed the same regardless of the user, because factors like viewing distance, perceived screen size and the resulting FOV are now solved variables.
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I remember ELSA's Revilator drivers (which only worked on ELSA's cards) were top-notch compared to anything NVIDIA ever came up with. It was so easy to adjust each game perfectly by accessing the driver's UI while in game and setting distance levels, cursor depth, etc. Over a decade later and I haven't seen anything come close.

Were you able to get your glasses working on modern hardware? I still have mine and as I've been unable to let myself toss them yet. I looked into it years ago and it seems like you're still locked to CRTs connected to ancient video cards. I remember looking into building a driver circuit that you could use to run the glasses on virtually any hardware, but it was beyond my ability to get it to sync with the video card's output.
 
What kind of longevity do you think VR has?
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Oh! Has it risen from the grave again?

Thanks for the notice. I'll be on the lookout for the same thing all over again in 10-15 years.
 
TheSmJ said:
I remember ELSA's Revilator drivers (which only worked on ELSA's cards) were top-notch compared to anything NVIDIA ever came up with. It was so easy to adjust each game perfectly by accessing the driver's UI while in game and setting distance levels, cursor depth, etc. Over a decade later and I haven't seen anything come close.

Were you able to get your glasses working on modern hardware? I still have mine and as I've been unable to let myself toss them yet. I looked into it years ago and it seems like you're still locked to CRTs connected to ancient video cards. I remember looking into building a driver circuit that you could use to run the glasses on virtually any hardware, but it was beyond my ability to get it to sync with the video card's output.
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I actually *could* run it on my more modern desktop using Win7 (probably Win10 too, I just haven't tested it recently out of lack of interest) using this eDimensional utility that puts the screen into interlaced/interleaved mode for each eye, and then using a 3D driver like Vireio Perception or TriDef to work off that for games (or, if watching YouTube, just setting it to interleaved 3D). Of course, that's because I still use VGA output to a CRT monitor, even today in late 2016. (Pascal and later are gonna put a damper on that, though.)

Ideally, I'd just use NVIDIA's own 3D Surround drivers, but the process is strictly limited to NVIDIA's own shutterglasses unless you like red/blue anaglyph 3D. It's quite annoying in that respect when I'm aiming to use these old Revelator/X3D shutterglasses.

There's actually a big overview of 3D drivers that you might want to read up on, though it's targeted more specifically toward VR HMD use and is a few years old. It highlights some interesting things about the performance (in)efficiency of stereo 3D rendering between the available products.
http://www.mellottsvrpage.com/index.php/stereo-3d-drivers/
 
l upgraded my rig to run an ultrawide monitor setup, didn't even bother if it's VR-Ready. Being able to watch movies on a huge screen inside a VR headset certainly got my interest if it can be made portable, but I do not like the idea of being strapped with cables and swinging my arms in the air and turning and making body movements to play a game. The image quality of VR games are certainly in its infancy to even bother trying, not to mention the hefty price one have to pay.
 
Chas said:
Oh! Has it risen from the grave again?

Thanks for the notice. I'll be on the lookout for the same thing all over again in 10-15 years.
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We've all seen it before.

Maybe by then they will figure out the whole moving around thing. What we have right now is too restrictive and cumbersome for games, just like the wii was. The current vr library looks identical to the wii, it's even got carnival games. It's novelty is going to wear off fast, i think well be lucky if we get second gen devices.
 
Holo lens idea and Google Glass concepts will likely progress in one way or another. As for gaming, I'm no so optimistic.
 
I think part of the drawback at the moment, with things like Gear VR for Samsung, is having to take the phone in and out of the device pretty often (for loading different apps, etc.) If the user experience gets a lot smoother, I don't think there's any reason VR can't succeed for certain game types. At the moment it can be a bit cumbersome.
 
stenhammer said:
I think part of the drawback at the moment, with things like Gear VR for Samsung, is having to take the phone in and out of the device pretty often (for loading different apps, etc.) If the user experience gets a lot smoother, I don't think there's any reason VR can't succeed for certain game types. At the moment it can be a bit cumbersome.
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Do you own a GearVR? You don't have to remove the phone to switch apps. You launch apps from Oculus Home while in VR just like the Rift.
 
I think a long time, but I have ZERO interest in it today. I've demo'd Rift 1/2, PSVR and Vive. I have had issues with all of them, varying from screen door effect to general problems with the technology just not working as advertised. I have expendable income, but not for this stuff.

I'll wait 5 years, hell maybe 10 years for it to mature. I simply refuse to fund this early gen stuff, purely on principle. Someone else can, and I have no shame in that. If its not there in 10 years all because I refused to fund it.. so let it be. It was never meant to be if a handful of consumers chose not to support infant technology.

So long as companies like Facebook are behind it, there is a chance.. otherwise this will just die on the vine until someone else gets it right in the future. Also, this will succeed much better in the non gaming world IMO as well.
 
Parja said:
GPUs need to be at least 10x more powerful than they are now for this to be remotely feasible for VR.
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we can already do 4k so really 8k is just the next step in the evolution, we'll be there within 10yrs
 
buhbuhfet said:
we can already do 4k...
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No, 4k is not yet feasible. Maintaining 60Hz with reasonable quality in newer games isn't there yet.

And for VR, you really need closer to 90Hz.

8K is 4x the pixels of 4k. Dual 8k is 8x the pixels of 4k. So my 10x estimate is actually kind of low.
 
Parja said:
No, 4k is not yet feasible. Maintaining 60Hz with reasonable quality in newer games isn't there yet.

And for VR, you really need closer to 90Hz.

8K is 4x the pixels of 4k. Dual 8k is 8x the pixels of 4k. So my 10x estimate is actually kind of low.
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okey well, get back to me in 10yrs and we'll see how things are :)
 
cageymaru said:
I could see virtual porn becoming room scale. Have a generic doll where your headset maps your favorite actress face, tattoos, etc onto it. Then you do whatever.
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Can't we have something like that but headsets mapping our favorite celebrities on our girflriends? XD
 
VR in its current form with a black brick attached to your face will never succeed. It's not social, it's not flexible for movement because you are constraIned by the space and obstacles in your game room. There should at least be a camera on the front of the brick so you can see where you are see the natural environment when you pause the game or have to interact with the real world for a second.

It's a failed concept in current form. The very definition of a gimmick.

A hud for gaming like google glass makes much more sense.
 
Just curious how many of the naysayers have tried the Rift CV1 or Vive? People are raising very legitimate concerns (form factor, tethering, cost, lack of AAA experiences) which I agree with, but, I just don't understand how people don't see the amazing potential IF they have tried one of these products. The immersion is crazy. Once some really compelling games/experiences come out and we hit gen 2/3 hardware this stuff will take off in a very similar form factor.
 
Yeah, honestly so far my only complaint is the lack of quality/length content. There are still some wave shooters that I will go back to (and H3VR) and play for maybe an hour or so, but ultimately it is a short burst each time, and not many games have drawn me in for a long period.

Call of the Starseed was very good but relatively short as well. I do still need to finish Vanishing Realms...
 
VR experiences (virtual tours) may sell it but I don't think gaming will be a big hit.
 
i'm still waiting to see who survives...

don't want to buy either rift or vive just to see one fail.
 
HTC and Valve are dumping a ton of money into VR so I feel pretty safe with my Vive purchase.
 
TheSmJ said:
On the other hand Facebook+Oculus aren't going anywhere anytime soon.
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true, but then facebook is rather evil company that I would preffer not to get involved with.

Either way, i'm not buying either, until one gets declared the industry standard.
 
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