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Oculus Rift Review: Virtual Reality is Almost Here
In what can be seen as a major milestone in the nascent, but fast-evolving virtual reality technology space, Facebook-owned Oculus on Monday began shipping the commercial version of the Rift. Several technology publications have posted their reviews of the Oculus Rift. The Verge, for instance, says: The high cost of buying and running high-end VR headsets makes them inaccessible to many people, and the Rift in particular is relentlessly focused on gaming. Within these limitations, though, the Rift makes a good case for seated VR, and it lays a solid foundation for what's to come. The headset you can buy today is not Oculus' most ambitious vision for virtual reality -- but it's a vision that Oculus has successfully delivered on. The publication has given the Rift a score of 8 out of 10, noting that the retail price of the Rift, and the accompanying gaming PC, is a tad too expensive. It also found the lack of motion controls a weakness. Cnet writes: You simply must try the Oculus Rift. It's breathtaking. I just wouldn't buy one right now -- and there's no reason you should feel the need to, either (especially with its arch-rival, the HTC Vive, also just days away). The longer you wait to buy, the better it will get. This is just day one for Oculus -- and for the future of virtual reality.
I just got into the drone craze. My daughter gets one mid-April. I want this craze to kick in around end-summer at least. Allow for out of house play first, the winter over in door play.
...the better the chance this hype will have fizzled and that you will not have to buy anything! VR is about as "ready" as 3D television, which is completely over because it does not really work at this time. The same is true for VR.
Most ACs are not even worth the keystrokes to insult them. Be generically insulted by this and ignored otherwise.
Virtual reality has always been almost here.
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
i had the chance to use v1 and v2 devkits at various CCP events where they showcased EVE: Valkyrie.
The tech is simply put, amazing. Absolutely immersive, comfortable and responsive. It's the VR experience you have always dreamed about. For gaming, it will be a big change.. And I'm sure better things will come.
Yeah, so is the second coming. Reality has been pretty "virtual" for over 45 years...
“He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
The CNET review linked above isn't too bad, actually.
We're looking at the "Nintendo era" for VR, remember the light gun and the power-glove? I'd KILL for the power-glove type of integration with this. Earlier attempts at VR are like the Atari and ColecoVision systems. We just weren't there yet.
Listen, until you've TRIED it and thought about the potential, don't knock it. This isn't a fad anymore. People scoffed at the first mouse, too.
I really wish the Gear smartwatch was integrated as a controlling device, just for hand-waving grab/slide/push/pull type of gestures. Instead of tabs in a browser, moving them around to create panels while I read, do research, etc would be amazing.
Right now it's just a toy. But I'd write code while looking at references, etc. All with this on, if it only had the interface to do so.
What's the market penetration on 3D again?
Wake me up when I can jack in for my info, and simstim for my entertainment.
Until then, stop bothering us when you haven't got anything as good as Movies, Music, TV and print *yawn*
I didn't think it was actually possible to flunk Marketing 101. Until now.
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
Okay what the hell has happened to the internet? Both of the linked articles were unreadable, unsearchable, and psychedelic garbage that looks like it was coded on LSD.
I do appreciate the summary though. 8 out of 10, verdict: not recommended.
Never mind gaming, I'm interested in VR for data visualisation. Like graphs with tens of thousands of nodes, or heat maps in three dimensions.
I've been trying to figure out which to buy: The Oculus or the Vive. Note: I have no personal experience of either so this is all about info just gleaned from reviews ete. I really hope to try both before I place an order but I have a feeling it wontt be easy.
The Vive is about $100 more expensive but it seems well worth it for the difference, since it can also support standing up and moving around, and also comes with VR controllers. Yes I'm presuming the seated experience is as good as the Oculus, which is pretty important since I'm guessing that will actually be the most commonly used scenario, but having the option to stand up and move around would be nice.
The BIG decision factor for me is that Oculus is primarily targetting Windows only, with Linux support at best being an afterthought (they announced several months ago that they have put their Linux dev effort on hold)
Linux support remains a core goal to the Vive team.
That alone would be enough for me to STRONGLY favour the Vive over the Oculus.
My fear/expectation is that most windows game developers will stupidly only support oculus not vive, because they consider it the "de facto" VR headset, even if it it is more limited/not as good as the vive.
How to find an estate sale.
All your database are belong to U.S.
I will wait to try VR until a company who is not Facebook makes a good unit.
the hardware technology employed for VR isn't cutting edge, it is existing things glued together in a new way, I suspect we will see a price war over the next year, and version 2 of everything 1/2 the cost. Maybe even subsidized hardware, to get them market share. Chinese clones, Madcatz and Razor "3rd party" VR.
The birth of VR.
It is finally here.
The canonical form of any tech gadget review must be submitted in the form:
No wireless. Less space than a Nomad. Lame. [*]
These words have been handed down from our forefathers since time immemorial you damn dirty Kohm.
the preceding comment is my own and in no way reflects the opinion of the Joint Chiefs of Staff
PLATO had a 3d plotting program that let you cross your eyes to see things in stereoscopic perspective, but you had to focus your eyes at an unnatural distance -- so it wasn't the kind of thing you would necessarily want to subject users to for long game playing sessions.
That's one reason, second to cutting the 512 pixel X-dimension down by a factor of 2, I didn't torture my Spasim gamers with it back in 1974.
Seastead this.
Not quite Damming with faint praise. More like announcing the Osboure 2 they are about to design will smoke this beta product. That's a death curse for companies with negative cash flow. My feeling is the hype machine is strong in this one and it will be like the iPod. Cost not a problem for the early adopter.
The booger in that analogy pudding is ipod had suck for rivals both in terms of ease of use, music price ecosystem and coolness. Will the VR gear be the rio player to the occulus iPod. If the gear VR doesn't suck then the analogy may be Windows 95 versus Imac or vhs versus beta.
Maybe this attempt to virtual Osboure themselves is a kamikaze attack on the Samsung.
Some drink at the fountain of knowledge. Others just gargle.
No I'm not kidding. 3 days from now Samsung is going to announce they will release Duke Nukem VR FREE with every headset. Just wait.
Some drink at the fountain of knowledge. Others just gargle.
Virtual reality won't "be here" for the average consumer until they can lower the price of the entire package.
As it stands now, you need to dish out $1000+ for a PC, PLUS the price of the VR device, which is another $500+.
To put things into perspective, for that kind of money, you can get a decent smartphone for the whole family, or you can buy this current generation of consoles (all of them), and still have spare change for games.
Unless they intend to target a niche market, they need to lower the costs a lot. I have a lot of disposable income, and these costs for a technology that is totally untested in the wild make even ME extremely nervous.
Once this technology has matured a bit, and immersive gaming is the norm, I imagine it will be very popular.
I also imagine it will be very popular with younger people.
It makes me wonder how immersive gaming with an oculus or similar on for hours at a time will affect players health.
How will it affect eyesight and vision and other things?
We play the game with the bravery of being out of range
For all you old timers still on Slashdot....
Where's the interview with Jaron Lanier?
If telephones are outlawed, then only outlaws will have telephones.
I'm waiting for the "I was wearing the VR goggles while playing Mortal Combat when I punched him. But I got arrested for domestic violence anyway".
Also a tally should be kept of the lamps, pictures and other assorted stuff that will get destroyed due to the blind flailing of appendages.
I'm curious, am I supposed to adopt VR before or after the Internet of Things? I don't want to get them out of order, you know? I'm pretty sure self-driving cars come after those two, and the gig economy comes first, but I keep mixing up the two in the middle.
You are welcome on my lawn.
well, if you dismiss any technology just because it could be transient, you're gonna miss out on lots of stuff....
I personally see the Rift and the Vive as the perfect modes of gaming to incorporate a controller close to the original Nintendo Powerglove and would work so much better than the ill-envisioned concept they released.
The system as is is already too expensive for all but the niche buyers and too limited for some of them to bother. If they were to release two gloves for motion feedback, doubly so if they can incorporate some sort of resistance into the finger grips and such, it would take the home VR experience to a level beyond just what the Vive and Rift could offer.
And more field of view. I'm interested in being able to see what's going on behind me without breaking my neck. Of course, more field of view needs more pixels, too.
Unless you are a poor peasants. The rest of us can buy and enjoy the shiny new toys, which will be more entertaining that listening to haters and their soap boxes.
...need Oculus Rift for ?
Give me some real world applications and not just games and porn.
VR apps worth mainstream attention and justifying the purchase price are still 10+ years away.
Occulus has no chance at a 300+ price point. People won't try it out and developers won't care if millions of people don't own it. The technilogy exists, but not at a practical price point AND VR isn't all that anyway. VR is only good for some games and not even most games.
Monitors aren't being replaced by VR like flip phones were replaced by smartphones because smartphones offered a lot more. VR offers only small advantages, comes with a big price tag, has limited app support, requires you wear some bulky crap (which I think is a deal breaker at almost any price point for mainstream acceptance).
The fact of the matter is, no VR product has been successful other than perhaps google glass/samsung gear and that's because they went low end and even then those product are likely not making much money and will not get huge investments. Even stuff like that is too practical and not transparent enough for the user experience.
VR is for rich kids and certain gamers. That's about it and that's not going to change for 10-20 years. People aren't going to walk around wearing 2 pounds of display on their head for very long before they get tired of it. Gaming isn't about looking around the world anyway. It's about being present a challenge or problem and beating it.
If you want to improve gaming then the prime focus should first be input devices. This way your building toward a new more immersive gaming experience and later down the road you might get VR displays to sell, but the REAL money is in VR input devices.
Even Kinect really has a lot more potential than any of these silly VR goggles out there. A 360 display is overrated for most gaming and cost + weight means it's not going mainstream or anywhere close. Even with games designed for it, it's still not that great of an idea.
I understand that the current tech is really great for what it does, and i'm sure a ton of FPS/3PS and cockpit racing/combat fans will jump right in.
However i'm a fan of strategy and RPG games, particularly 2D ones. The only 3D game i've played a great deal of in the last several years has been Minecraft. (And given some of the jump scares i've experienced in that i'm not sure i'd _want_ to be more immersed in it.)
I also tend to multitask a lot. Currently i'm playing Stardew Valley and i'm constantly tabbing back and forth between the game and various guides and forums and spreadsheets. I'll also frequently be paying-half attention to whatever show my SO is currently watching at the time, or put on some show of my own in the background if she's not watching something. I'm unsure of how any of that would work well with VR. AR maybe, but not VR.
So is there something i'm totally missing about the appeal? Or am i just not the target audience?
This Space Intentionally Left Blank
well, if you dismiss any technology just because it could be transient, you're gonna miss out on lots of stuff....
Only if it actually turns out to be transient. Otherwise, you just aren't the first to adopt it, which isn't really that big of a deal. I don't really regret missing out on the Virtual Boy or Apple Pippin, but I sure wish I had given the first generation DVD-ROM drives a pass (still have one around here somewhere...).
;-)
I don't want to play games on one.
I do want to use one that presents a huge space of windows. I just look at a window and it expands into my central vision and the keyboard and mouse are right there. No need for an array of monitors. No overlapping windows.
I should use this sig to advertise my book ISBN-13 : 978-1501515132.
The wave of media banging on about VR, Oculus and the rest is as a appealing as a turd in my bed, and then you try it and is, expectedly so, awful. Sorry, I meant, AWEFUL.
... when they see me wearing one of these!
With the expense of a high end gaming PC and the VR unit, you might as well pay the extra few hundred and get the richer experience with the HTC Vive. From all the reviews I've read being able to move in VR is way cooler than the sitdown experience.
Except actually usable this time... Nah, that doesn't matter!
it was usable then too, its the exact same fucking tech as last time, but in HD