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Atari Jaguar-Related VR Units Show Off Virtuality

Posted by simoniker on from the very-max-headroom dept.

Thanks to an anonymous reader for pointing out videogame auction site Bidiots has a pair of Virtuality SU2000 Atari Jaguar-related VR pods for sale. These 1995-era 'virtual reality' arcade machines originally cost "$33,000 - $35,000 per seat", and the machines come bundled with compatible software titles, including Dactyl Nightmare 2, a multiplayer networked shooter in which, if you're not careful, the "awesome [eponymous] beast will pick you up in its claws, and fly hundreds of feet above the playing arena before dropping you to certain death!" A set of specifications for the SU2000 reveals more information, including exciting action shots of the device, and elsewhere, Atari Explorer has pictures of the unreleased Jaguar VR system, an "ambitious plan for a home VR headset at under $300" which used similar technology to this device.

12 of 35 comments (clear)

  1. Hey! by acxr+is+wasted · · Score: 5, Funny

    Now I can pay thousands of dollars to look like a jackass, and I won't even have to look at the people laughing at me!

    --
    "Come on, let's go drink till we can't feel feelings anymore."
  2. Hackers by krymsin01 · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Made famouse by the movie Hackers. (In which steven fisher uses one)

    --
    stuff
  3. Played it by SandSpider · · Score: 3, Interesting

    I played Dactyl Nightmare once when it was on tour and made it to my University. Usually people focused on the other player and did their best to avoid the Teradactyl. When I finally got my turn, I was unstoppable. The other opponent was easily dispatched time and again, but once the 'dactyl went for me. I said, "What the heck," and shot the thing out of the sky. It was reminiscent of that scene from the first Burton Batman film. Ah, good times.

    =Brian

    --
    There is nothing so good that someone, somewhere, will not hate it.
    1. Re:Played it by toyotaboy · · Score: 4, Insightful

      I was impressed when I played it way back then. Even though the graphics were crude, the immersion made you feel sort of like you were in another world. The steel cable attached to your back was clunky, and it fixated you so you couldn't turn 360. I do remember some corporate function that had some experimental software where it took you through a few worlds (a rat on a floor, hang gliding, etc.) I would love to see VR make a comeback. Looking at the type of graphics of today, if we had VR controls it would be so much fun.

    2. Re:Played it by KyolFrilander · · Score: 2

      I am kinda surprised that nobody has released an immersive HMD _yet_. I mean, I was always under the impression back inna day that the problem was pushing 2x the polygons, not the HMD. You can't tell me that modern video cards and computers can't push a reasonable frame rate at 800x600 times two. Or was that just that dude with dreadlocks' dream, and the HMD was equally distant? Or is it out there, hanging on to the fringe? (And I'm interested in tracking HMDs, not static or shuttered HMDs..)

      --
      Buddha says, "Shut your karma hole."
  4. Did anyone else play it? by quinkin · · Score: 2, Interesting
    I queued up and paid my $5 like all the other idiots...

    But the game was crap!

    I hope you can get the source and compiler, or at least get the specs. It really doesn't do the hardware justice.

    Q.

    --
    Insert Signature Here
  5. I remember that... by gabe · · Score: 5, Funny

    I played that Dactyl game a long time ago. From what I remember, you could see the other guy's entire body, but if you looked down, all you saw was your left hand with the "gun" in it. It wasn't really a gun so much as it was a mushroom launcher. Damn thing took 5 seconds to reload too.

    --
    Gabriel Ricard
  6. The Virtuality pods weren't based on the Jaguar. by samdu · · Score: 5, Informative

    They were Amiga 3000s. An arcade here on the Isle of Palms had one. They were interesting, not so much for what they were, but what they portended for the future. Unfortunately, that future has not come to pass. Still cool stuff, though.

  7. I had these by Jjeff1 · · Score: 3, Interesting

    I worked at a place that leased 4 of these things for like 5 years. They were pretty rough. They broke all the time. Eventually the company we leased them from went out of business. We were left trying to get custom made cables to get them working again.

    The company I worked for was in a mall, they went out of business, probably for spending thousands of dollars and stupid stuff like this.

    As I recall, the system was basically a 486 with 2 big video cards, they had something like 4 40mm fans on each card.

    Eventually we had 4 machines, with 2 sitting never used because we scavenged them for parts.

    Personally I could never use the thing. The way the headset fit on me I could never get the proper 3D view.

    1. Re:I had these by samdu · · Score: 3, Informative

      If I recall correctly, the PCs were simply for network communication. The real engines of these beasts were the Amigas. Primative? By today's standards, yeah, but oh the promise they showed for the future. Alas, VR is dead on the vine. I still dig the idea of throwing on an immersive headset and completely abandoning the real world for a bit to blast away at baddies in a full 360 degree artificial reality. :(

  8. Why is Virtual Reality such vaporware? by Sodade · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Ah the heady days of the early 90's. VR was coming, and fast. Jaron Lanier (VPL) was in every issue of Mondo2000 (the precursor to Wired mag). The Dactyl-nightmare VR game (that was just one of the games) was just a taste of what was to come - they had one on the UC Berkeley campus and there was a long line all the time - soon after, I convinced the owner of the campus-side computer store I managed to lease one (me and my buds became the midnight VR crew). The $300 home VR gaming system was on its way. I had four different business plans based on this stuff. This was going to be the beggining of the transhuman revolution. I was going to learn how to juggle in VR - Jaron Lanier said so. Somehow, the whole thing just disappeared. VPL was sold to some French company, the gaming console never came, Mondo2000 gave way to Wired and the whole thing went poof. WHY??? I dunno. Maybe because VR makes people naseous? I remember being pretty sick after some 3am dactyl sessions, but I thought that it was just because the displays were laggy. Today's 3d shooters make me want to puke and always give me a headache, but I figured that is because I am looking at a 2d display. Maybe the military didn't want their tech going into the layman's hands? Conspiracy theorys anyone? Anybody out there know the rest of the story? Any links to current projects? With the advances in computing/graphics power, the stuff they were doing with 100k SGIs should be doable on 1k AMD boxen. Why isn't this stuff reality?

  9. Bring back Virtual world and BattleTech! by cyrax777 · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Then Ill be happy BattleTech was one of the best "VR" games to bad it cost so damn much.