Why You are Wrong that VR is Going to Fail

The needle has already been moved. We are at the point now where content is what is going to continue pushing that needle forward. There is already plenty of compelling content, and not just gaming.

I never thought it would be the PC enthusiast community that would be the most vocal against it, that is what has shocked me the most as this new medium has come forward. I expected it would be places like this which would have had the most amount of excitement for it.

I do agree with you... if VR is ever going to be a mainstream thing chances are it will be the mobile version. The PC version... as much as I want to believe it could take off, I just can't bring myself to believe it isn't doomed. And yes to be honest I also believe PC gaming is on a slow boat to oblivion. I believe that for one simple truth I can't deny... I have 3 boys in their 20s (in the next few years I'm going to have to say 30s... ahhh), not one of them has a gaming PC even after growing up with me around them when not everyone had such things. I have a 13 year old daughter as well... and she will sit with me and play a game here or there, but she just does it to spend time with me. It never lasts more then 30 min before she has to go chase her buzzing phone in the other room. It seems to me the average age of us hardcore gamers keeps getting older. (which has been good for the industry as we know have more $ to spend).

Long term... I just don't see it continuing if all our kids are fine with consoles and phones, couple that with mobile hardware that is starting to actually get pretty damn good for AAA style games and VR. So ya I think your completely right the future of VR is Android Daydream/Samsung VR and the future of gaming in general isn't much different imo.
 
So far, the main thing that has me wanting a VR set is that Star Trek Bridge Simulator game. Looks really fun, and has me wanting to buy the game now just so I have it when I get a headset.
 

This is cool... still not an option for people with crazy prescriptions. Also based on my prescription as an example this adds another $200 Canadian to the price of VR in my case. I have tried both the PC solutions and GearVR I had to use a backup pair of glasses I have that are a bit smaller then the ones I normally wear (right now anyway). Its not unusable... still I can't say if I would really find it comfy for long sessions. I don't think its a deal breaker for VR, but still ya its a turn off to a lot of people that do wear googles all day. :)
 
Does it matter anymore? There is parity now, I can do all the same shit on my Rift you can do on Vive. Both systems are excellent.

But if your point is, does he have the Rift without Touch controllers and room scale, I do see what you are getting at..

His point is that that guy got a cheap ass phone holder, failed to set it up and compares that to pc vr which is a completely different beast, no matter which of the two popular hmds you own right now.
 
You've got to ease yourself into it man. Start with the more comfortable stuff, then go up from there. I couldn't stomach a lot of that stuff at first either, but after awhile I gained my VR legs.

Complete BS. First month in VR i was slight motion sick, i played Lucky's Tale. 2nd month i was sick for a whole day after VR. 3rd month i was sick for 3 days after VR. I sold that piece of oculus crap and im not looking back. VR is dead to me.

I could play less and less in VR each time and got worse headaches and nausia. Is this what you call VR legs? Getting more sick with more you use it?
 
Complete BS. First month in VR i was slight motion sick, i played Lucky's Tale. 2nd month i was sick for a whole day after VR. 3rd month i was sick for 3 days after VR. I sold that piece of oculus crap and im not looking back. VR is dead to me.

I could play less and less in VR each time and got worse headaches and nausia. Is this what you call VR legs? Getting more sick with more you use it?

I had a different experience. First time I played, got sick after like 30 mins. Second time, like an hour. Third time, like 2 hours. Fourth time, like 5 hours. This was essentially every day. Then I stopped playing it for like 1 1/2 months, waiting for a DLC to come out. Got back into it, had to start all over again. Got sick after like 15 mins.

You build up a tolerance, but step away from VR for a little while, your tolerance drops back to nil. Obviously, this is going to be different for different users. Like...I can't use noise cancelling headphones at all. I will vomit if I use the noise cancelling for an hour. Which has happened, when I accidentally turned noise cancelling on, while sleeping on a flight.
 
I'm optimistic about VR, but the motion sickness is very real and a huge barrier for me. I'm totally fine if I'm looking around or am physically moving myself, but if the camera moves or turns (sometimes forward in one direction is okay), that's it, almost immediate motion sickness. I don't build up a tolerance, it's awful every time.

The ONLY thing I've found to work is VorpX. With that you can create a custom 3D screen to use inside a virtual living room to use where you determine how large it is. If I scale the content down enough, then I don't get sick. This DOES cut back on the immersion, but the 3D image is still pretty great and more importantly, I don't vomit.

I don't think VR is going to fail, but if it's going to get larger, they have GOT to come to up a solution for the motion sickness.
 
From what I'm reading here sounds like Oculus may need to add a bottle of anti nausea pills to their $1300 bundle. Perhaps with all the $ big pharma has for marketing they could even reduce the cost to zero if your Doc writes a scrip for a year supply. :)

Sorry couldn't resist.
 
Complete BS. First month in VR i was slight motion sick, i played Lucky's Tale. 2nd month i was sick for a whole day after VR. 3rd month i was sick for 3 days after VR. I sold that piece of oculus crap and im not looking back. VR is dead to me.

I could play less and less in VR each time and got worse headaches and nausia. Is this what you call VR legs? Getting more sick with more you use it?
Just like White Russian, one sip and vomit issues forth - worst is Vodka and milk - hiddiance stuff. Yet many do enjoy what I can't stand. So what do I do, I don't buy it nor do I try to over time get use to it. So I understand exactly where you are coming from.

What I don't understand is folks forcing views or experiences and then judging others for choices they make (please don't get me wrong, I don't think you are doing that, you expressed your experience is all). If 10% of the population enjoys and supports VR that really would be a huge success and it would advance rapidly. I am sure less than 1% of the population ever care about White Russian, the instant vomit mix for me but it is relatively popular and I am glad as well some enjoy it. I wouldn't waste time on White Russian forums either. Still your experience is valid but just like me with Vodka you may never really get into what is called VR and that does not mean anything different then the vomit mix of mixes for me. VR is not for everyone and probably never be for everyone even if as good as the holodeck on Star Trek in real life. I am sure as time goes on it will advance and more people will be able to enjoy it more but that is about it.
 
Just like White Russian, one sip and vomit issues forth - worst is Vodka and milk - hiddiance stuff. Yet many do enjoy what I can't stand. So what do I do, I don't buy it nor do I try to over time get use to it. So I understand exactly where you are coming from.

What I don't understand is folks forcing views or experiences and then judging others for choices they make (please don't get me wrong, I don't think you are doing that, you expressed your experience is all). If 10% of the population enjoys and supports VR that really would be a huge success and it would advance rapidly. I am sure less than 1% of the population ever care about White Russian, the instant vomit mix for me but it is relatively popular and I am glad as well some enjoy it. I wouldn't waste time on White Russian forums either. Still your experience is valid but just like me with Vodka you may never really get into what is called VR and that does not mean anything different then the vomit mix of mixes for me. VR is not for everyone and probably never be for everyone even if as good as the holodeck on Star Trek in real life. I am sure as time goes on it will advance and more people will be able to enjoy it more but that is about it.
The thing is, the motion sickness is a real problem for people who WANT to get into VR. It ABSOLUTELY needs to be judged based on that, otherwise it's going to stay very niche.

You say "VR is not for everyone", that's true. It's for people with money to burn AND have a high end system AND are cool strapping things to their face AND have software / games compelling enough they want to run for it AND won't get motion sick. That's an awfully high exclusionary list. In time, the price will come down and PC specs will rise, but if you have to exclude every person who gets motion sick, I just don't see how it's going to get a big foothold. VR needs a motion sickness solution to gain a wider audience.
 
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The thing is, the motion sickness is a real problem for people who WANT to get into VR. It ABSOLUTELY needs to be judged based on that, otherwise it's going to stay very niche.

You say "VR is not for everyone", that's true. It's for people with money to burn AND have a high end system AND are cool strapping things to their face AND have software / games compelling enough they want to run for it AND won't get motion sick. That's an awfully high exclusionary list. In time, the price will come down and PC specs will rise, but if you have to exclude every person who gets motion sick, I just don't see how it's going to get a big foothold. VR needs a motion sickness solution to gain a wider audience.
I have a friend who gets sick playing any FPS on a computer screen, he forces himself because he likes them but ends up playing minecraft mostly. Does that mean FPS won't make it? Of course not. There is rarely anything that everybody can use, does not make it less viable. Not everyone can drive a car either so all cars must be judge by that? I don't think so. Plus some folks do get motion sickness in a car (my friend actually if he keeps his eyes off the road it comes pretty quick for him) - cars must be judge by that?

Of course you do everything possible to limit motion sickness, that is just good business sense as well but you don't just quit because a percentage of the population it does not work for - virtually everything out there has limits to usability depending upon the person.

As for money to burn, would it be burning money for a $4000-$6000 HDR UltraHD TV? With very little content? Take a short cruise with family and burn up 2-3 grand? Go to Disney World, family wise, easily spend $500-$700 to mostly wait in lines? It is up to the person to decide what is worth it or not, not us. For a lot of us the price of VR is well worth the cost of admission and is extremely a great experience/$ investment.
 
I have a friend who gets sick playing any FPS on a computer screen, he forces himself because he likes them but ends up playing minecraft mostly. Does that mean FPS won't make it? Of course not. There is rarely anything that everybody can use, does not make it less viable. Not everyone can drive a car either so all cars must be judge by that? I don't think so. Plus some folks do get motion sickness in a car (my friend actually if he keeps his eyes off the road it comes pretty quick for him) - cars must be judge by that?

Of course you do everything possible to limit motion sickness, that is just good business sense as well but you don't just quit because a percentage of the population it does not work for - virtually everything out there has limits to usability depending upon the person.

As for money to burn, would it be burning money for a $4000-$6000 HDR UltraHD TV? With very little content? Take a short cruise with family and burn up 2-3 grand? Go to Disney World, family wise, easily spend $500-$700 to mostly wait in lines? It is up to the person to decide what is worth it or not, not us. For a lot of us the price of VR is well worth the cost of admission and is extremely a great experience/$ investment.
I was this close to adding "as someone who never gets sick playing FPSs."

I guess the thing is your argument does have valid points, in the absence of any numbers. What's the percentage of gamers who get sick from FPS? Maybe 2%? Now what's the percentage of people who get motion sick from VR once the camera starts turning and moving around? Maybe 60%? I don't know the numbers, but I'm certain it's a hell of a lot higher percentage than from people who play FPSs. If it wasn't such a significant problem, why would so many games only have teleporting as an option for moving around?

No, you don't quit, but you don't act like everything is sunshine and flowers for growth and reaching a larger market without solving major problems first.

EDIT:
In case there's any confusion, I'm convinced VR is here to stay for niche use. It's too unique an experience and has a lot of potential for it to just die off. What I'm NOT convinced about is how you rope in a larger marketshare without solving the motion sickness issue and / or severely limiting what content is shown due to motion sickness.
 
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As for money to burn, would it be burning money for a $4000-$6000 HDR UltraHD TV? With very little content? Take a short cruise with family and burn up 2-3 grand? Go to Disney World, family wise, easily spend $500-$700 to mostly wait in lines? It is up to the person to decide what is worth it or not, not us. For a lot of us the price of VR is well worth the cost of admission and is extremely a great experience/$ investment.

Well to play devils advocate on your points. If your buying a 4k TV right now, sure perhaps there won't be much content... still you won't have to worry about having the wrong format in a year. (although of course in a year a better TV will cost less). If you go on a family cruse and the food makes you sick for the entire time, the cruise company with likely get sued, and best case for them you may go back if they give you a redo for free.

Of course your right VR prices are reasonable enough likely for the average high end PC gamer. However having something really take off requires mass market appeal, even in our own gaming circles according to steam people that even buy a GPU are in the minority... never mind the gamers who are willing to buy the latest greatest. According to steams numbers the latest generation of GPUs doesn't often ever have more then 2-3% of the gamer market. So at least for right now not many people are ready to jump in with out complete new systems. Even with gamers if VR is ever to become as main stream as a high end GPU its going to take the hardware required to drift into the sweet spot in the mid range. (which it will... but when a year ? 2 years ?) Then of course the issue for early adopters is content. How many game companies are going to sink millions into development on a product that hasn't even sold 1 million units total (PC VR). Its coming I just don't believe main stream PC VR is in the cards till 2019-2020 at the earliest. imo anyway
 
Us older folks who don't have a bike/live in a loft, and have zero intention of exercising (because working and paying bills is plenty) will patiently wait for "Inside AR" (Augmented Reality) and "AI vs VI: Don't Reaper Me, Bro".
 
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Vr often gets tagged in along with 3D TV as to how it is going to fail. This here is the big difference I see between the two. After watching a 3D TV I have never heard any one say "I'll never watch a regular TV again". However Flat games are now dead to me. After trying my vive, my son-in-law just sits and stares at his ps4, cant get into the game anymore. He is the kinda guy who bought a season pass for every AAA game. I feel kinda bad. He has gotten really good at serious sam though.
 
The biggest problem most VR HMD's have is image quality. Rift and Vive has horrible image quality compared to the Pimax 4k for instance.
 
I do agree with you... if VR is ever going to be a mainstream thing chances are it will be the mobile version. The PC version... as much as I want to believe it could take off, I just can't bring myself to believe it isn't doomed. And yes to be honest I also believe PC gaming is on a slow boat to oblivion. I believe that for one simple truth I can't deny... I have 3 boys in their 20s (in the next few years I'm going to have to say 30s... ahhh), not one of them has a gaming PC even after growing up with me around them when not everyone had such things. I have a 13 year old daughter as well... and she will sit with me and play a game here or there, but she just does it to spend time with me. It never lasts more then 30 min before she has to go chase her buzzing phone in the other room. It seems to me the average age of us hardcore gamers keeps getting older. (which has been good for the industry as we know have more $ to spend).

Long term... I just don't see it continuing if all our kids are fine with consoles and phones, couple that with mobile hardware that is starting to actually get pretty damn good for AAA style games and VR. So ya I think your completely right the future of VR is Android Daydream/Samsung VR and the future of gaming in general isn't much different imo.

PC gaming on the slow boat to oblivion just because your kids aren't interested in it? What? Consoles have always been the mainstream massive market they are, and both are restricted to certain limitations that prevent it from achieving the versatility of a computer.
 
I do agree with you... if VR is ever going to be a mainstream thing chances are it will be the mobile version. The PC version... as much as I want to believe it could take off, I just can't bring myself to believe it isn't doomed. And yes to be honest I also believe PC gaming is on a slow boat to oblivion.

You are basing this assertion on a very small sample size.

Of my three brothers, none of them are PC gamers.

I didn't become a PC gamer until I was in my early 20s.
 
Its gonna be pricing and experiences that make or break the current trend of VR. Can pricing of VR headsets go low enough to make mass market adoption suitable? Will we ever get the breakout hit/new tech that will pave the way? Both of these I think are reachable by 2020.
 
I play games to relax and use them as a stress reliever, so I would rather sit not jump around and sweat - I go to the gym for that. I have a desktop and a laptop and a tablet, but I still prefer to watch movies on my TV. Historically, for a platform to succeed, it will need to find its own niche. Radio is still around. There might be a killer app for VR, but I am not aware of it. If someone is aware, please share (and pls don't say porn).
 
I play games to relax and use them as a stress reliever, so I would rather sit not jump around and sweat - I go to the gym for that. I have a desktop and a laptop and a tablet, but I still prefer to watch movies on my TV. Historically, for a platform to succeed, it will need to find its own niche. Radio is still around. There might be a killer app for VR, but I am not aware of it. If someone is aware, please share (and pls don't say porn).

Social, connected, video sharing and watching perhaps? Not with a person next to you but with people all over the world. A screen that has the immersion factor of an actual high-quality theater screen combined with the social aspect of the theater experience. In my mind I'm seeing it like a virtual movie theater. Everyone has an avatar of themselves sitting in a theater seat and you can hear their reaction to a movie as it plays. Crowd cheering, laughter, screams, etc. For some people that sounds like a horrible experience, but I think that could be a killer app for the younger generation, especially if it was an app that was able to team up with movie studios and get movies that are still in theaters. They could even take the theater approach and only show certain movies at specific times.
 
You are basing this assertion on a very small sample size.

Of my three brothers, none of them are PC gamers.

I didn't become a PC gamer until I was in my early 20s.

It takes some time and money beyond casual stuff. Kids my have the time but not the money.
 
Social, connected, video sharing and watching perhaps? Not with a person next to you but with people all over the world. A screen that has the immersion factor of an actual high-quality theater screen combined with the social aspect of the theater experience. In my mind I'm seeing it like a virtual movie theater. Everyone has an avatar of themselves sitting in a theater seat and you can hear their reaction to a movie as it plays. Crowd cheering, laughter, screams, etc. For some people that sounds like a horrible experience, but I think that could be a killer app for the younger generation, especially if it was an app that was able to team up with movie studios and get movies that are still in theaters. They could even take the theater approach and only show certain movies at specific times.
Social is probably it. Feels right. You want to experience what someone else is experiencing, or you want to share your experience. But for that to happen, creating content should be easy. I can see myself using Google Earth for VR, to see where I am going before I get there.
 
So far, the main thing that has me wanting a VR set is that Star Trek Bridge Simulator game. Looks really fun, and has me wanting to buy the game now just so I have it when I get a headset.
I was interested in this game also...until I saw actual gameplay footage. It's nothing more than Artemis Starship Bridge Simulator using the Star Trek license and VR.
 
Does it matter anymore? There is parity now, I can do all the same shit on my Rift you can do on Vive. Both systems are excellent.

But if your point is, does he have the Rift without Touch controllers and room scale, I do see what you are getting at..
Truly what I was fishing for there was whether or not he had a true VR setup or a "phone" VR system. The two are very different things.
 
VR will fail! If enthusiasts like me get sick from playing games in VR than I don't see this vomit fest to succeed. Unless they figure out way how to decouple brain movement detection with visual clues. Maybe holo chambers (room scale VR). But i want to play space and flight simulators so VR wont cut it.

That's like saying boats will fail because people get seasick.
 
The tech is exciting and fantastic... but the hardware is still first gen, and the software format is still in flux.

You keep mentioning the "software format is in flux." Not really sure what you've meant by that. VR is just an extension on current game development methodologies. You use the same game engines and APIs as you would for conventional 3D games. The major new elements are motion and controller tracking and input and feedback, the Vive controllers have haptic feedback and of course the VR renderer.
 
I thought the main cause of sickness was latency and I thought I had read that if you get the latency below a certain point (pretty low) and have good fps, then motion sickness is almost a non issue.
 
Pretty weak argument about wearing something on your face, comparing it to headphones. The difference is an HMD covers half of your entire head, and you have to wear headphones to get the best experience with VR. I don't play VR that often or for too long because I hate having to wear the thing on my head. Having to deal with condensation buildup exacerbates the issue.
Flight sims are one of the first thing I'd DEFINITELY want to try VR for.
EVE Valkyrie is absolutely amazing. I was giggling the entire time I played it the first time. Unfortunately Ace Combat 7 is going to have the typical PSVR exclusive "bite sized" experience instead of being all inclusive.
 
I thought the main cause of sickness was latency and I thought I had read that if you get the latency below a certain point (pretty low) and have good fps, then motion sickness is almost a non issue.

Also auto locomotion can cause sickness and I've felt that myself initially when experiencing for the first time. I adapted to it, I think many do.
 
I think a lot of people get caught up in not happy with current things, but isntead want things that dont exist yet and use that as justification. Yes I would love a holodeck, but since I started gaming on a 386, VR is pretty damn amazing! I have a friend that says that often when talking about vr, that it isnt vr until hes plugged into the matrix, but honestly, once we are there people will still say it isn't enough.


The cell phone based ones, i got one for free and it was neat but yea not even in the same ballpark.
 
Also auto locomotion can cause sickness and I've felt that myself initially when experiencing for the first time. I adapted to it, I think many do.
Can confirm that auto locomotion was what did me in at first, which can affect everyone regardless of whether or not you get motion sickness easily. I actually almost fell over after finishing my first VR session and taking the HMD off. But no matter how good the framerate or latency is there will still be a percentage of the population that is going to get motion sickness while playing VR games.
 
I'm open minded to VR being a success but it will not be a success on the level of the TV which the article pits it against as far as room for it. TV's were added to already established "living rooms" and still brought the family together as a whole. The worst part of VR right now (other than the piss poor games, on rails, and floaty hands) is the room part still. He did not do a great job of justifying a dedicated room for VR. It just doesn't make any sense for the average family to have and this is why it will never be a hit. VR just doesn't appeal to the mass and it can appeal to the lonely single guy that has room for it. Once the technology gets better and less wires are involved I could see this as a hit but we're just still not there yet. No Kyle I do not own a system but I have tried several from SONY, Oculus, and Vive. Cool stuff but being a successful hit? Far from it right now... I just don't think the demand is ever going to be high enough for the current systems.
 
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