VR Market Predicted to Grow 50% Every Year

AlphaAtlas

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Digitimes Research predicts that the global AR/VR headset shipments will grow at a compound annual growth rate of 52.7% over a 5 year period, reaching 40 million units in 2023. However, they seem to think most of that growth will come from standalone headsets. The researchers claim "Screen-less VR devices" offer a sub par experience, while the constraints of tethered devices like the Vive and Oculus Rift will severely hinder mass adoption.

However, shipments of wired VR headsets will not come as many as consumer electronics products because these VR headsets are being regarded as household appliances on consideration that the use of VR headsets is confined in fixed space with user's view rather limited. On the other hand, AR headsets are defined as consumer products as smartphones, and therefore, a growing popularity of AR devices is likely to result in an explosive shipment growth of the entire AR/VR industry during the forecast period from 2018-2023.
 
VR belongs in experience parks only. The hardware needed is too much for mass adoption anytime in the next 10 years.

Maybe if you could get 2080ti SLI performance into a pair of raybans with no coords and a few hours of battery life for $299 it would be adopted universally
 
No it just needs to be user friendly and not be ultra expensive, the only wired unit close to that is the PSVR. It needs to be wireless no one likes be tethered. Oculus has the right idea independent wireless like the Oculus go and the Santa Cruz....
 
The technology and latency of not being tethered just isn't there yet.
 
VR belongs in experience parks only. The hardware needed is too much for mass adoption anytime in the next 10 years.

Maybe if you could get 2080ti SLI performance into a pair of raybans with no coords and a few hours of battery life for $299 it would be adopted universally

By the time your unrealistic requirements happen, the rest of the gaming industry would have also moved farther as well, and you would be equally as disappointed in it comparing to 2d gaming.

15 years ago people wanted what vr is now, but back then.

It is a weird polarizing thing, people hate on it or think it is stupid. I just see it as a peripheral similarly to how some get elaborate driving or flight setups, still not the real thing but if you can make yourself feel more immersed in the games you enjoy, go for it.

That said, i really love the vive and still get a few hours a week in on it and have since last xmas.
 
I own four VRs, PSVR, HP Windows Mixed Reality, Oculus Rift and the Oculus Go. Of all four the Oculus Go is used most. Average person, not a computer person doesn't want ultimate performance at the ultimate price. That is critical to VR mainstream acceptance....
 
They've been harping about this since '91 and the tech still hasn't hit the right price/perf ratio yet. I think part of it is the majority of people are simply used to gaming at couch distance; getting up close isn't a big draw.
 
I hope so. I'm seriously tired of spending money on games, no matter how fun they are to play. I've got so much more to do in life than just sit around and play stuff. Move us to VR so I can stop gaming.
 
I hope so. I'm seriously tired of spending money on games, no matter how fun they are to play. I've got so much more to do in life than just sit around and play stuff. Move us to VR so I can stop gaming.

People come to the Oasis for all the things they can do, but they stay for all the things they can be.
 
Not interested until the headsets are comparable to a pair of sunglasses. I'd be okay with an external battery (cell phone size) that clipped to my belt.
 
Grow 50% in price or user base.
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I'm pretty social for a geek. Almost all my friends are not geeks.

I've got an oldish i5, OCed pretty good, and a 1080ti OCed. It drives my VIVE perfectly well.

I let people try it out. Some play the blu, some try saber beat or the lab. A few played golf.

Very few said they don't like it. Mostly teenagers. Older people love it.

Then they hear the price. To expensive. That's from people that could afford it without much noticing.

I had the computer and 1080ti already. So I just had to fork over for the vive. Lots of people dont have a gaming pc, and would have to buy a fairly pricey graphics card onto of the vive.

Where do most people game? Phone. How long do they play? A couple minutes at a time.

Vive will never be mainstream. As much as I enjoy it, and other people like it, it's to expensive and involved.

Small stand alone headsets that deliver 1/4 the experiance but are inexpensive and easy to use will be the big sellers.

I hope someone keeps making the VIVE level hardware in the future for those of us who want a more in experiance.
 
Interesting. Was expecting a slew of articles touting the death knell of VR after the Oculus story.
 
They are wrong. Its going to increase 20,000x per year.

Sadly 20,000 x zero is zero.

Really 50% per year still likely leaves VR with next to no base even 10 years out. I can't see major investment dollars sticking around that long.
 
Just a quick search was 3million ish psvr headsets sold. So you guys realize the number isn't near zero right?

Hell, how many of us here have a vr headset?
 
https://www.roadtovr.com/ccp-games-ceo-expected-vr-two-three-times-big/

CCP Games CEO: “We expected VR to be two to three times as big”



CCP Games, the Icelandic studio known for their long-running MMO Eve: Online (2003), shuttered their VR production studios in a surprise move last year, selling off their Newcastle-based branch behind their multiplayer space dogfighter EVE: Valkyrie (2016), and completely shutting down their Atlanta studio behind sports game Sparc (2017). Now, CEO Hilmar Veigar Pétursson speaks out in an interview with Destructoid about the studio’s reconsolidation back to traditional desktop gaming, and his thoughts about the VR landscape. In short, he thought VR would be bigger by now, and more capable of supporting a healthy multiplayer userbase.

So carry on, all 4 of you. Next year there will be 6
 
VR belongs in experience parks only. The hardware needed is too much for mass adoption anytime in the next 10 years.

Maybe if you could get 2080ti SLI performance into a pair of raybans with no coords and a few hours of battery life for $299 it would be adopted universally
Hardware is too much? It does not take that much cpu or gpu wise really.
 
VR belongs in experience parks only. The hardware needed is too much for mass adoption anytime in the next 10 years.

Maybe if you could get 2080ti SLI performance into a pair of raybans with no coords and a few hours of battery life for $299 it would be adopted universally
That really depends on what you are trying to do with the VR, you can do a lot in VR in the education market for $200, for simple games cellphones are more than powerful enough and the simple games for them run well enough on GearVR for $80. You don't need $3000 in hardware to run minecraft.
 
A good VR capable PC is definitely not cheap. But if you already are into some serious PC hardware to support your gaming habit/PC hobby, well, then the leap to PC VR is a relatively painless one, similar to the cost of a decent monitor these days. What, $350-$400? (Compare that to the $800+ that VR demanded just a couple of years ago...) The racing SIM crowd has wholeheartedly embraced VR. Once the SIM crowd tasted VR and experienced what it delivers, they were hooked. Take a look at any hardcore SIM enthusiast out there these days - they simply aren't going to switch back to 2D monitors.

The PC and console VR markets are now pretty well established as to having a foothold. Steam has over 2300 PC VR titles. Sure, the vast majority of those are crap/shovel-ware, but there are a substantial number of really good games in that mix as well - and they keep coming. Is the PC VR market huge? No, but then again it did just start up a little over a couple of years ago and it *is* still growing. I fully expect that it will continue to grow. And every time newer PC VR hardware hits, it will keep boosting that growth. Especially as the VR tech/hardware keeps maturing. I fully expect that PC VR will remain a niche market for quite a while still due to its cost of entry. I'm ok with that as long as it hangs around and continues to grow - which I fully expect it will.

The mobile and console segments of VR are what is going to carry the bulk of VR market growth for the next couple of years (especially with products like the upcoming Quest)... but once VR tech reaches a certain point, especially as to FOV/resolution/performance, I see it really picking up steam again on the PC front. But that's still a good 2-3 years out. VR still needs faster/cheaper GPUs/CPUs and better displays... and all of those are certainly always advancing/arriving as tech marches ever forward.
 
Just a quick search was 3million ish psvr headsets sold. So you guys realize the number isn't near zero right?

Hell, how many of us here have a vr headset?

3 million sold lifetime so far.... even if we grant that the last year was 2 million sold.

They are saying a year later 3 million will be sold... a year after that 4.5.... a year after that 6.75... a year after that 10.125.... a year after that 15 million.

First I don't buy that for a second. There is no way 2023 sees 15 million VR units sold.

Second... even if that turns out to be true. It is still less then the switch sold in a year. It is still % wise a single digit drop in the bucket of the larger market.

Which means the software is unlikely to follow. AAA VR games with 50 million+ budgets are simply impossible unless some miracle hardware pops up that solves all of VRs mass market woes and pushes 20 million units a year out of the gate. AAA non-VR conversions are cool and all but for VR to really take off it needs a handful at least of AAA killer games of its own.

The mobile tech VR push came way way too early imo. Yes its great that the cost of screens was pushed low enough to make VR headsets affordable. The issue is none of the other hardware did. High end PC hardware is just now getting to a point where its feasable to push VR that doesn't make a rather sizable minority of people physically ill. Mid range hardware... nope still not there, and it isn't likely to be for a few more years. For VR to really get the mass market push it would need for the software industry to throw development money at it... 2080 performance needs to hit low middle range machines. As long as the cost of entry of VR includes an actual GPU card... it will fail. I know around here that sounds crazy... I mean no [H] member has willingly gamed on an integrated solution ever. Still the sad truth is... the vast majority of users that make up the millions of sales required to fund 100 million dollar AAA game title development are gaming on integrated or the rather low end OEM cards that shipped with their systems.

There is a very good reason why crysis even today can make hardware cry... and a very good reason why no one developes games like crysis anymore. No developer wants to sink millions and potentially bet their studios future on a game that MAY look spectacular and ground breaking... but also MAY also only run on 1% of the populations machines. For a AAA VR title to launch in say 4 years from now when it sounds like they should be moving 10 million units a year.... it needs to start development RIGHT now. So what hardware do they target... 2080 ? and hope and pray Nvidia isn't still selling 2080tis in 4 years for $500+ a pop. Not really the point they would be betting of course that 2080 type performance will be main stream in 4 years. However that may not happen... it is entirely possible that AMD doesn't push them, that Intels entry is more aimed at AI and blows terribly for gaming... and that Nvidia just bumps their high and mid range cards 10% every 18 months for the next 3 or 4 years. In which case.... that multi million dollar investment is going to have a very small pool of potential sales.

Think about what a AAA game costs to develop... if there are say 20 million VR sets in the wild and 20 million potential customers. Even if a developer sells a copy to every single one of them and makes 10 dollars profit off each after marketing and distribution costs... that is only 200 million. If you just spent 4 years and 100 million on development that sucks.... now no game has 100% sell through accept a handful of Nintendo titles... so if a developer is expecting a very very good sell through of 40% they are looking at 80 million... and a 20 million loss if they spent 100m on development.
 
There's no killer application for VR.. YET. I haven't seen anything that tells me "YOU MUST HAVE VR, NOW!"

Most of it is gimmicky stuff which loses it's flavor quickly like cheap bubble gum. I want a steak. (as it were) Show me something that entices me and gives me the urge to spend the money to make it happen.

it doesn't even have to be a video game. If someone has a way to make this into productivity software, i'm all for it. Designing. Advanced chemistry modeling. Simulations of all kinds. Make it stand out and worth my time.
 
they seem to think most of that growth will come from standalone headsets


and that is something i can easily see.

Most people are simply not wanting to spend the kind of money my wireless vive pro has costed. That portion alone is around $2k. I cant really count the cost of my threadripper system as i would have gotten that anyways to replace my old dual quad core xeon machine as my everyday machine, but it hasnt been cheap either.

i am still.. waiting.. for my lawnmower man VR setups though

LOL
 
There's no killer application for VR.. YET. I haven't seen anything that tells me "YOU MUST HAVE VR, NOW!"

Most of it is gimmicky stuff which loses it's flavor quickly like cheap bubble gum. I want a steak. (as it were) Show me something that entices me and gives me the urge to spend the money to make it happen.

it doesn't even have to be a video game. If someone has a way to make this into productivity software, i'm all for it. Designing. Advanced chemistry modeling. Simulations of all kinds. Make it stand out and worth my time.
There are learning applications, but you could always make your own?
Gimmicky? Your opinion. I don't just use mine to game, but for exercise and in a fun way. If you have used a Rift or Vive you would know that there is nothing to entice you, it is already there. The immersive
qualities are far superior to regular 2D games.(Putting it mildly)
 
Just a quick search was 3million ish psvr headsets sold. So you guys realize the number isn't near zero right?

Hell, how many of us here have a vr headset?

Well yeah, there have been millions of sales of high-end headsets, but not tens of millions. There is no mass-market demand for high-end VR.

This isn't even Kinect level of peripheral success (24 million units in three years) , and even that didn't have long legs. How long before people get sick VR headsets, and sales fall?

Most people are not looking for high-quality immersive simulations, and that's about all high-end VR is good at.

But low-end all-in-one devices can play VR movies and casual games just fine, and that's where the market is headed. That's why HTC bet the farm on the Vive Focus. But those also come with lower margins.

High-end devices will still garner enough sales to pay for themselves, but finding the high-end software makers to service these tiny markets is a bit of a challenge.

IT WILL NEVER BE MAINSTREAM TO PUT ON A HELMET, so VR sales will never have that runaway sales success story.
 
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There's no killer application for VR.. YET. I haven't seen anything that tells me "YOU MUST HAVE VR, NOW!"
Was there a killer app for Windows 3.1? I can't remember, but I don't recall that being important for the platform to succeed. Of course everyone wants a killer app, but I think what might be more important is an overall improvement of life based on a collection of applications and workflows. Early days of windows/mac provided that, VR does not clearly have that yet... maybe non-gamers will adopt it sooner

As for price 400 for Quest seems like a pretty good sweet spot. People don't mind a bit of a sacrifice of graphics and reports show some games (like Superhot) it's hard to tell the difference between it and PC VR anyways.
 
Was there a killer app for Windows 3.1?.

Sure there were.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_Word#Word_for_Windows
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Netscape_Navigator
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Encarta

There is nothing like WYSIWYG text editors.

Hypertext was a renascence in online services. It was enabled by cheap GUI multitasking computers.

And interactive encyclopedias were excellent uses for multitasking GUIS while you were writing a research paper in said WYSIWYG text editor (these still live-on as Wikipedia).

Windows for Workgroups was it's own killer apps for businesses, as you could suddenly share things on the network painlessly. But WYSIWYG text editors were a close second :D

Have I made my point, or do you still need more examples?
 
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you actually made my point, it being more of a collection of good life-improving/utilitarian apps than one single killer app...

I do remember Doom 2 for windows (increased resolution baby!) being my personal killer app for upgrading my hardware and Win95, but of course windows was basically established before then
 
you actually made my point, it being more of a collection of good life-improving/utilitarian apps than one single killer app...

I do remember Doom 2 for windows (increased resolution baby!) being my personal killer app for upgrading my hardware and Win95, but of course windows was basically established before then

No, you keep making our point for us.

As you've so blatantly stated, VR need multiple killer apps to be a runaway success like Windows 3.1. And it doesn't have even one yet.

Kinect (8 million a year) is the kind of sales blitz you can expect form *ONE* killer app: Kinect Adventures. Until that happens, each VR headset will sell only a million or two a year.
 
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I didn't say VR needed multiple killer apps, lol... I do remember when Word came out and it was a nice improvement over Word Perfect or whatever, but it wasn't like "OMG WORD IS KILLER! I MUST HAVE WINDOWS NOW!!" but at a certain point there was a general feeling that moving to windows made sense for a multitude of reasons. Luckily we could still go back to DOS mode to play Monkey Island. The transition seemed more gradual...

This was just my experience and opinion on the matter... I'm not trying to say you're wrong...
 
What percentage of Kinect sales were due to it being bundled as opposed to people actually being interested in it?
 
What percentage of Kinect sales were due to it being bundled as opposed to people actually being interested in it?

It wasn't bundled with the Xbox 360. I quoted sales up to 2013, before the One bundled it into the console.

24 million sales of Kinect, and thus, 24 million sales of Kinect Adventures, (the title bundled with it).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kinect_Adventures!

VR is nowhere near the success story Kinect was, and it still killed itself after people got tired of it.
 
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Kinect was cheap enough for people to risk trying it despite there not being a great collection of apps, which I think we can agree is a big reason it had no legs. I've also not met one person who enjoyed Kinect besides using it for some interesting tech demos (like real-time 3d scanning of environments, which have been adopted by AR/VR) but if you wanna just look at sales numbers and use that to define "success", that's fine I guess...

Good inexpensive VR, not including the 3dof stuff, hasn't really had that chance yet and devs know this which is part of the reason there's more reserve in it's marketing. Maybe with Quest being out for a year we'll get a better idea of that, I don't care for trying to predict this stuff. Personally I'm fine with it being a niche product like steering wheel controllers. It can still be successful and have legs even if it's not so widely adopted, right?
 
You want market penetration into VR you need a good price, and content to the market that will be buying it. The kids growing up today more often than not don't really have a PS9 or a Xbone 1 XS4111!1ONE1.

They have their phones. Maybe a laptop or cheaper desktop to play fortnight on. They MAY have a PS4 if their parents were gamers. And what the younger generation doesn't have is disposable income for Consoles or high end gaming PC's. What's selling light hotcakes? Cheap portable solutions that work on TV or at home... phone and tablet games. Lower fidelity games that focus on community or gameplay over graphics.

Having to buy a piece of hardware that removes gamers from the world and pushes on the coffee shoppe Apple CEO wannabe's pony tails isn't going to sell headsets. I've tried VR in the PS4 headset, and at VMworld where Dell was showing off some gaming in it.

My personal thoughts are it looks and feels low res. If I wanted to play a 3d based racquetball there have been programs to do that on my computer monitor longer than there have been 3d rendering graphics cards.

What they need is compelling fun to play good looking content that can pull a person in for 40+ hours of gameplay on ONE game that isn't just having your friends ride a virtual roller coaster so you can mess with them.

Give me a good sit in my chair put on my headset and play Fallout VR solution, or Metro, or a good FP RPG that I can play without having to run and jump (IRL). Make it so I can hear the real world easily enough as well as the virtual so when my wife calls or for the kids Mom or Dad calls you can hear them and respond. Stop trying to make me wear a headset the size of a football helmet. Learn that people want to be able to play the game even when out and about. Collapsible headsets that work off of a modern laptop that don't require me to run and jump to play a game. THEN you will have something.

Until then your just pissing money into the wind and the only people getting wet are yourselves.
 
It wasn't bundled with the Xbox 360. I quoted sales up to 2013, before the One bundled it into the console.

24 million sales of Kinect, and thus, 24 million sales of Kinect Adventures, (the title bundled with it).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kinect_Adventures!

VR is nowhere near the success story Kinect was, and it still killed itself after people got tired of it.

Well, Kinect was just all Microsoft, had a 4 year run, and we all know how well they promote/keep/develop their HW products... Zune *cough*...

Now, let's subjectively compare the full blown HTC Vive / Rift VR gaming experience to that of the MS Kinect gaming experience:


compare.png


And let's check back in a couple more years... I can see why folks got tired of Kinect. I'm not tired of VR yet... just hungry for next gen VR hardware.
 
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