Microsoft Declares PC Best for VR & AR

FrgMstr

FrgMstr

Just Plain Mean
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We welcome Microsoft to the PC Master Race. Console plebs need not apply. I am sure Sony will have something to say about this. But if you were holding out hoping to get some VR action on the upcoming next-gen Xbox, you will likely be waiting a long time. Maybe 1180 will be out by then.


"We don't have any plans specific to Xbox consoles in virtual reality or mixed reality," Nichols said. "Our perspective on it has been and continues to be that the PC is probably the best platform for more immersive VR and MR. As an open platform, it just allows faster, more rapid iteration. There are plenty of companies investing in it in the hardware side and the content side, or some combination therein.
 
Sweeeeet...
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It's a call that makes a lot of sense from Microsoft's overall VR/AR position but is a black eye for the Xbox. Windows when coupled with the appropriate hardware is easily the most powerful VR consumer platform currently with a healthy software and hardware ecosystem. And then there's HoloLens that they are investing in heavily. Xbox VR by comparison is slumming it for probably not a lot of gain.
 
No ones been able to make VRR break critical mass/adoption in the market yet. VR/AR is gonna be a long ways off.
 
Well if the goal is to spread adoption of an expensive technology, consoles are definitely the way to go. They're cost effective, and they have perfectly consistent performance.

The problem is the Xbone is underpowered and, if the recent PS5/Xbox rumors are to be believed, the next Xbox will be too. Too underpowered for VR. But Microsoft would never admit that.
 
VR is still half baked, aside from the Vive Pro with the wireless adapter but that's crazy expensive. I am hoping that the Rift 2 will finally be the device that spurs mass VR adoption. But who knows when it will come out.
 
The absolute best gaming PCs fight for every frame with VR, consoles are out of the question.
 
In other words, we will let other people invest, and if it is somehow a success than we will claim partial credit! VR is dead on PS4 I'm pretty sure, and it's been dead on PC. Let's see if someone starts crying "it's not dead" because they made the investment on a bunch of VR gear.
 
atom said:
In other words, we will let other people invest, and if it is somehow a success than we will claim partial credit! VR is dead on PS4 I'm pretty sure, and it's been dead on PC. Let's see if someone starts crying "it's not dead" because they made the investment on a bunch of VR gear.
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Don't let Klye see this post!
 
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atom said:
In other words, we will let other people invest, and if it is somehow a success than we will claim partial credit! VR is dead on PS4 I'm pretty sure, and it's been dead on PC. Let's see if someone starts crying "it's not dead" because they made the investment on a bunch of VR gear.
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Still waiting for the right VR device, so I'm not invested, but I guess I'm confused what dead looks like:

active-virtual-reality-users-worldwide.png



virtual-reality-software-revenue-worldwide.png
 
This VR push is WAY to early... and its going to kill VR in the crib.

Oculus and their early look phone screen hardware push was 10 years too early.

We have already seen most of the initial excitement from the game development companies evaporate.

If anyone could drop 400-500 bucks on a VR headset and be golden that would be different. Realistically however average consumer PCs are just not going to be VR capable as a rule for another 5-10 years from now, never mind 6-7 years back when the push started when it was 15 years at least away.

I can understand perhaps why guys like Carmack got excited... and perhaps if GPUs kept multiplying performance factors every year things would have been different.

At this point VR is DOA as a consumer device until the average mid range laptop sells with enough Horsepower to run a decent head set. With out a base of millions of potential consumers there is ZERO reason for a gaming company to invest more then pennies on VR only games. There is a decent number of PS4 sets in the wild as Sony has sold north of half a million units, last year and likely sold more since. (this Xmas should tell us if Sonys VR is here to stay or is going the way of motion controls) Oculus and HTC hadn't even combined for half a million units last year.

To put those sales number in perspective... lets assume that by the end of this year there are 750,000 PC VR headsets in consumers hands. If you are a AAA game developer... lets say you believe you can sell your game for $80 retail. Lets then assume that you are going to profit around $50 after you pay for the cost of distribution via in house servers or store fees. Now lets also assume you are going to be cheap and only spend $10 million on promotion. (which would be very low for a AAA title.. EA spent 673 Million on Marketing last year).....
So with all that in mind. If EVERY Single person that has a headset bought this game. That is 37.5 Million - 10 million in marketing = 27.5 million. (again that is a 100% sell rate.) Realistically a smash hit is going to have a 30% sell through at best. Which means they would make 11.25 million - the 10 million in marketing making them 1.25 million. (that isn't counting ANY development costs... so its would be a massive loss)

Bottom line its clear to see.. VR is not a market any major game developer would spend 70-100 million developing a AAA exclusive title for until the install base is like 20-30 million units at least.

Xbox VR may have helped VR get to that sort of install base before the bottom falls out completely. As it is Sony can't create that market alone at the rate they are selling units... and the PC sales numbers are even more dismal. PC VR built with phone screens needed to launch in 2025-30 not 2016.
 
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tetris42 said:
Well, with revenue for software growing year upon year, I'd imagine the quality ones will come at some point once the numbers get high enough. Again, I'm confused how growing adoption + software revenue = dead.
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Let me guess those numbers are adding up all the Google Android sales right ? Are they also counting VR porn ? lol

The google daydream stuff is cool and all but its hardly what people around here are talking about when they talk about VR and VR software.
 
ChadD said:
This VR push is WAY to early... and its going to kill VR in the crib.

Oculus and their early look phone screen hardware push was 10 years too early.

We have already seen most of the initial excitement from the game development companies evaporate.

If anyone could drop 400-500 bucks on a VR headset and be golden that would be different. Realistically however average consumer PCs are just not going to be VR capable as a rule for another 5-10 years from now, never mind 6-7 years back when the push started when it was 15 years at least away.

I can understand perhaps why guys like Carmack got excited... and perhaps if GPUs kept multiplying performance factors every year things would have been different.

At this point VR is DOA as a consumer device until the average mid range laptop sells with enough Horsepower to run a decent head set. With out a base of millions of potential consumers there is ZERO reason for a gaming company to invest more then pennies on VR only games. There is a decent number of PS4 sets in the wild as Sony has sold north of half a million units, last year and likely sold more since. (this Xmas should tell us if Sonys VR is here to stay or is going the way of motion controls) Oculus and HTC hadn't even combined for half a million units last year.

To put those sales number in perspective... lets assume that by the end of this year there are 750,000 PC VR headsets in consumers hands. If you are a AAA game developer... lets say you believe you can sell your game for $80 retail. Lets then assume that you are going to profit around $50 after you pay for the cost of distribution via in house servers or store fees. Now lets also assume you are going to be cheap and only spend $10 million on promotion. (which would be very low for a AAA title.. EA spent 673 Million on Marketing last year).....
So with all that in mind. If EVERY Single person that has a headset bought this game. That is 37.5 Million - 10 million in marketing = 27.5 million. (again that is a 100% sell rate.) Realistically a smash hit is going to have a 30% sell through at best. Which means they would make 11.25 million - the 10 million in marketing making them 1.25 million. (that isn't counting ANY development costs... so its would be a massive loss)

Bottom line its clear to see.. VR is not a market any major game developer would spend 70-100 million developing a AAA exclusive title for until the install base is like 20-30 million units at least.

Xbox VR may have helped VR get to that sort of install base before the bottom falls out completely. As it is Sony can't create that market alone at the rate they are selling units... and the PC sales numbers are even more dismal. PC VR built with phone screens needed to launch in 2025-30 not 2016.
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It takes the same kind of horsepower to drive 4k gaming, is that dead? PC gaming has always been about dropping money on hardware and overall it's bigger than ever. Even Linux gaming is bigger than ever and according to Steam there's as many VR gamers as Linux gamers. VR may never be mainstream but I don't see it just vanishing for what, 200" OLED displays?

And there's quite a bit of VR content these days, more than anyone will ever play.
 
Well. I'd say Oculus Go is the most appealing VR headset for the widest demographic. It's so incredibly casual. It's just $200 for the whole kit. It has tons of cheap, fun games. I own about 110-120 of them. It is the king of VR media consumption. Even 2D video is good, since the soft headband lets you lie in bed, under the covers with your head resting on the pillow watching Netflix. The PQ is better than Rift and Vive. It doesn't offer 6DOF... but there are tons of experiences that don't need 6DOF. IMO, at $400 and $200, you should own both. But that $200 Oculus Go is going to turn a lot more people on to VR than a $400 rift / $500 vive that requires you to rearrange furniture, own a computer with a powerful graphics card, and have the time to play not-so-casual games.

It's hard to overstate how good of a value the Go is. It's like Oculus made a $200 laptop with a i5 / 8gb / gtx 1050 and 1080p screen that only plays games and apps from the Steam store. Sure, it's limited. But there's so much content for it and it's such a good value, you'd be crazy to pass it up.
 
ChadD said:
Let me guess those numbers are adding up all the Google Android sales right ? Are they also counting VR porn ? lol

The google daydream stuff is cool and all but its hardly what people around here are talking about when they talk about VR and VR software.
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I think you're guessing wrong, since Android sales would be 30x times that. Anyway, here's one without mobile factored in (or if it is, it's still in the minority):

https://www.statista.com/statistics/671403/global-virtual-reality-device-shipments-by-vendor/

They say VR "software", in the other one, so I would assume that would exclude videos.
 
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brucethemoose said:
But also the most expensive, by far.
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Of course. Windows is the most powerful and expensive gaming platform and has been for decades now. And PC gaming is bigger than ever. We have $1k smartphones on the market that sell like hot cakes. There is a market for expensive consumer tech. This site would have failed long ago if that weren't true.
 
Part of the problem is that vr is so radically different than regular games is that you are basically learning how to make video games all over again, modern conventions don't necessarily translate well across platforms and a whole slew of new issues arise. Noone is going to buy vr en mass without quality games, and there isn't much incentive to make quality games without an install base. So the hardware vendors need to subsidize developer/hardware costs to make it take off. Htc is unable/unwilling to do this and oculus and Sony are too conservative in their approach right now. I own a Vive with a dual 1080ti rig and I still hardly use it cause the only AAA experience on the platform is elite dangerous. Everything else is half assed ports or low budget arcade games.
 
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Yes, the PC is awesome, the OS, not so much unless you are running 7 or 8/10 with all the fixes and crap.
 
Chaos Machine said:
Part of the problem is that vr is so radically different than regular games is that you are basically learning how to make video games all over again, modern conventions don't necessarily translate well across platforms and a whole slew of new issues arise. Noone is going to buy vr en mass without quality games, and there isn't much incentive to make quality games without an install base. So the hardware vendors need to subsidize developer/hardware costs to make it take off. Htc is unable/unwilling to do this and oculus and Sony are too conservative in their approach right now.
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Yes, quality games and the hardware needs to catch up if it is to be heading up. 4K I hope is next, but with no hardware it just won't work.
 
heatlesssun said:
It takes the same kind of horsepower to drive 4k gaming, is that dead? PC gaming has always been about dropping money on hardware and overall it's bigger than ever. Even Linux gaming is bigger than ever and according to Steam there's as many VR gamers as Linux gamers. VR may never be mainstream but I don't see it just vanishing for what, 200" OLED displays?

And there's quite a bit of VR content these days, more than anyone will ever play.
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One game can be displayed at 20 different resolutions. And yes the day a game is 4k min... is 10+ years away. just like the day that a multi million dollar game production aimed at VR as a requirement is likewise 10+ years away. Which is the issue... PC VR is great if you wanna play converted non VR titles that will likely make you sick or force you to stand in place, or if your ok with spending top dollar to play up converted daydream titles.

PS keep your Linux bashing to threads where its even relevant. I'm done biting. lol
 
Hagrid said:
Yes, quality games and the hardware needs to catch up if it is to be heading up. 4K I hope is next, but with no hardware it just won't work.
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4k is going to be a game changer for vr but NVIDIA needs a push from AMD before mainstream video cards can handle that. I absolutely believe they are holding back multiple generations of gpus at this point due to lack of competition.
 
This is a non issue. My bone is in the living room. I play MP with my kids... When I want to hide I go to my office with a pc. Good call.
 
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Chaos Machine said:
4k is going to be a game changer for vr but NVIDIA needs a push from AMD before mainstream video cards can handle that. I absolutely believe they are holding back multiple generations of gpus at this point due to lack of competition.
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I agree. Considering the not huge gap between the 980 and 1080 and that's been out for two years now. They just have to sitting on tech not releasing it because they can sell this slower stuff without competition. Anyways... back on topic I suppose.
 
tetris42 said:
I think you're guessing wrong, since Android sales would be 30x times that. Anyway, here's one without mobile factored in (or if it is, it's still in the minority):

https://www.statista.com/statistics/671403/global-virtual-reality-device-shipments-by-vendor/

They say VR "software", in the other one, so I would assume that would exclude videos.
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That looks a lot more realistic then the other stuff you posted... Unless I read it completely wrong which is possible. :)

According to this the PC has 1.6 million units sold the last year and a half... which is close to all the units as they where not selling much before that. Its well under 2 million units. To put that in perspective if your a game developer... the Switch sold 18 million units in one year. If the switch has a hard time attracting real development dollars, VR is in a 100x worse situation. (still its better then I thought they had shipped So I will concede my numbers where off a bit on total units out there... still at under 2 million developers are targeting small budgets for any VR titles for a few years yet)

That Sony has shifted 2 million PS4 VR units is impressive though considering. Makes the news that MS is not going to support VR anytime soon pretty big for the future of VR. Even if MS could have shipped half as many units next year... if by the end of 2019 the developers where looking at 4-5 million console units it would have been perhaps enough for a few hail Mary games. With just Sony in the game though... conversions are the best anyone is getting.
 
ChadD said:
One game can be displayed at 20 different resolutions.
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Sure, 1024x768 is still an option. No one would touch that if they the ability for more.

ChadD said:
And yes the day a game is 4k min... is 10+ years away. just like the day that a multi million dollar game production aimed at VR as a requirement is likewise 10+ years away. Which is the issue... PC VR is great if you wanna play converted non VR titles that will likely make you sick or force you to stand in place, or if your ok with spending top dollar to play up converted daydream titles.
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And how many games have you played with a good PC VR setup?

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ChadD said:
PS keep your Linux bashing to threads where its even relevant. I'm done biting. lol
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You feel free to bash something you don't even use. Hell I've at least tried running PC VR under Linux.
 
ChadD said:
One game can be displayed at 20 different resolutions. And yes the day a game is 4k min... is 10+ years away. just like the day that a multi million dollar game production aimed at VR as a requirement is likewise 10+ years away. Which is the issue... PC VR is great if you wanna play converted non VR titles that will likely make you sick or force you to stand in place, or if your ok with spending top dollar to play up converted daydream titles.

PS keep your Linux bashing to threads where its even relevant. I'm done biting. lol
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Converted non VR titles? There are quite a few games that were built for VR. I love my Rift. Could it look better? Yes but 2 4K resolutions would not work unless you can run each eye on a GPU.
 
heatlesssun said:
Sure, 1024x768 is still an option. No one would touch that if they the ability for more.

And how many games have you played with a good PC VR setup?
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You feel free to bash something you don't even use. Hell I've at least tried running PC VR under Linux.
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You get the point about resolution though right. 4K is easy to develop for.. VR is not. 4k is nothing more then the same engine same game design same everything just with more pixels... and for the next 10 years at least playing games at 1080p will be an option (and really the target resolution as developers like to sell software).

Developing a VR first game makes all those other customers a non option. You and I can buy the same PC game and you can play it at 4k I can play it at 1080p... and some other customer may play it at 1440p... but the development costs don't change.

We have been through my VR experience before. No I don't own one cause why would I buy a product that makes me puke. Sure I have seen it... I experienced it on 1080 class hardware so it wasn't cause I was trying to experience it on an Intel GPU or something. lol Its another major issue which I won't even touch. The industry claims to be doing lots of things to make that better... hopefully by the time the masses have hardware capable of VR in bug numbers it will be much better.

For the record I'm not bashing VR. I would love to see all the technology of us 80s kids, childhoods become reality. Including VR. My issue is they pushed it when it really was in no way ready. The way the gaming industry develops games with massive budgets and place bets on AVERAGE hardware specs 4-5 years away... VR is in trouble imo. Game publishers are not looking for the next crysis... they don't want to develop multi million dollar games that 0.72% of the market can even buy never mind want to buy.
 
So is there a reason that VR can't use sli/cfx? I am not a coder and I know it has been on it's way out since 1 card is fine for 1080/1440.
 
Owning a PSPro / PSVR and i7 1070 / WMR I'd say so far the PSVR offers better bang for the buck for me. Inb4 "But Oculus Rift and HTC", at the price point they are, they're out of my desire to spend. Mass market appeal is what any technology needs to succeed, and that's consistent product at a cheaper price, consoles have that in spades.

"The best VR experience" is entirely subjective, for me a $4k gaming rig and a $2k HTC setup isn't the best, but being able to drop $600 on a PS4 and a PSVR setup is "the best experience" for me at 1/10th the price.

As for Windows being the best experience, that's market driven (target the most people, see above mass market comment), not necessarily the product itself.
 
tetris42 said:
I think you're guessing wrong, since Android sales would be 30x times that. Anyway, here's one without mobile factored in (or if it is, it's still in the minority):

https://www.statista.com/statistics/671403/global-virtual-reality-device-shipments-by-vendor/

They say VR "software", in the other one, so I would assume that would exclude videos.
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So at this time we have reached 5 million VR devices sold? The Wii U sold about 14 million and that was abandoned. It had better games too. I'm just trying to give some perspective here. I think VR is neat. I don't think you guys are dumb for buying it, if it brought you joy. I think it has to fully collapse before it is reborn into something better.

Also, please look at these dates:
https://www.hardocp.com/reviews/vr/
 
heatlesssun said:
PC VR has been on the market two years. And these are folks that spend a lot of money on games.
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Its still not a market yet. Even if we are being nice and say 2 million headed to 2.5 million by the end of the xmas season this year. That is still not enough to justify any major AAA titles being produced.

AAA titles don't get produced for ANY console or gaming device with less then 20 million units. Just do the math and you can easily understand why. This is the issue Nintendo has had for years... is 30-40 million Nintendo units to target enough for EA or Ubi or the other AAA developers to justify spending 40-50 million on developing a Nintendo only game. No. So why would they spend even 1/10th that amount developing for a platform with that small a base.

MS bringing Xbox into the possible market would have been good for VR development... if nothing else just increasing the chance that a developer might gamble some dev money on the hopes that one of the platforms takes off.
 
ChadD said:
We have been through my VR experience before. No I don't own one cause why would I buy a product that makes me puke. Sure I have seen it... I experienced it on 1080 class hardware so it wasn't cause I was trying to experience it on an Intel GPU or something.
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That's just not much experience from the perspective of someone like me. If you don't like VR or have issues, fair enough. But there's simply no reason based on your experience with it to take much from what you say beyond simple trial.
 
ChadD said:
Its still not a market yet.
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Odd that a market isn't a market where I've been able to buy three different devices on the market.

ChadD said:
MS bringing Xbox into the possible market would have been good for VR development... if nothing else just increasing the chance that a developer might gamble some dev money on the hopes that one of the platforms takes off.
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I agree with this but then Microsoft does have how much VR support for Windows? Windows is extremely well supported by Microsoft and 3rd parties.
 
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