The Oculus Rift Still Isn't Selling, In a Worrying Sign For VR (technologyreview.com)

An anonymous reader quotes a report from MIT Technology Review: Despite Mark Zuckerberg's early enthusiasm for virtual reality, the technology has stubbornly remained a hard sell for Facebook. Now, in yet another sign that VR is failing to capture the imagination of the public, the company has just cut the price of its Oculus Rift hardware for the second time this year. For the next six weeks, the Oculus Rift headset and its matching controllers will cost just $399. That's $400 less than when it first hit the market, and $200 less than when its price was first slashed in March. It means that the Rift now costs less than the package offered by its cheapest rival, Sony, whose PlayStation VR currently totals $460 including headset and controllers. Even so, it's not clear that it will be enough to lure people into buying a Rift. Jason Rubin, vice president for content at Oculus, tells Reuters that the reduction isn't a sign of weak product sales, but rather a decision to give the headset more mass market appeal now that more games are available.

Comments

Why is this surprising?

[gfxguy]

It's like 3D TV... an expensive and largely useless toy that really only irrationally exuberant developers and people with more money than common sense will buy.

Re:Why is this surprising?

[yuriklastalov]

People still don't want to pay $400 for a gimmicky motion sickness simulator? But how else are they going to consume all these rehashed "VR Experiences" we been churning out?

Just hearing the word "experience" in an entertainment context makes me gag. The boundless expanse of marketing drivel packed into that one god damn word is appalling.
  On the other hand, once you hear anyone talking about the "$PRODUCT Experience" you know they're full of shit.

Re:Why is this surprising?

[MightyYar]

On the other hand, Universal Studios has nearly perfected the art of combining a moving car with large, 3D halls to create very fun rides. It's very interesting to ride the various attractions of varying ages - it basically lets you see the progress over the last 20 or so years.

And several other companies have figured out how to give a pretty-good "4D" ride in a smaller, cheaper venue. Those theaters with the interactive seats and 3D screens have gotten much better over the last few years, and computers have gotten good enough to make them individually interactive. I just played a game at Niagara Falls (Canadian side) where my family and a perhaps 30 other people all stuffed into a theater to shoot zombies. The theater kept track of all our scores, took pictures of us while playing, and then reported the winner and all the other scores complete with pictures. The next step would be for the individual zombies to interact directly with the people shooting at them, but it was pretty fun as is. Anyway, based on all of the brand new 3D rides I've been seeing, I don't think it is going anywhere. It can give people a cheap thrill with much less investment and upkeep than a crappy fairground thrill ride that would require more space.

Re:Why is this surprising?

[Frobnicator]

It's like 3D TV... an expensive and largely useless toy that...

It is like many things, not just that. You are right that it is a luxury device, and a toy. But the same can be said of your PlayStation and XBox, your television, and your smart phone.

The luxury device is part of the reason they're lowering the price. You still need a high-end computer, something around $1500 and far beyond what most people have. They lowered the price from about $800 at launch to $400, but by the time you get a few games and the computer you are still paying two grand. If you already own the high end computer that meets the hardware requirements --- a luxury -- then the extra $400 won't be a painful addition.

Stereoscopic displays are a product that has been tried with many options over the years. None have taken off yet, but eventually it is one will. It may not be this generation of 3D devices, or next generation, or the generation after that. Or it may be this set, as the latest round are quite impressive.

For another thing, it is a technology that has a chicken-and-egg problem. There needs to be enough good products (in this field it is generally games and porn) to encourage hardware sales. And there needs to be enough hardware out there to ensure products get built. Without good products the hardware doesn't sell, and without enough devices the software cannot generate a profit.

Eventually stereoscopic tech will take off, there is little doubt of that. I've used many of the devices, including Oculus, Vive, PSVR, all the way down to Cardboard. I've tried 3D games all the way back to the VirtualBoy, and enjoyed trying Vectrex 3D with a game collector friend who could probably start a museum. I played a few shutter glasses games and stereoscopic arcade games back in the 80's. With all of that, I know that sooner or later the tech will take off eventually. Most failed because of the chicken-and-egg problem of needing both hardware and software. 3D TV never had any must-have products. 3DS has a good set of games and is still viable for steroscopic 3D. Both Oculus and Vive have some amazing position tracking hardware and have an ever-expanding library of software. They're gaining must-have products as AAA games are starting to include options for 3D play; Bethesda and EA have talked about several, such as Fallout and The Sims. Even existing games like Minecraft, GTA V, Half Life 2, Doom 3, people are creating 3D mods for Vive and Oculus.

I think this is the generation of hardware that will bring stereoscopic 3D to the masses, but if it isn't, we are extremely close to that critical tipping point.

Re:Why is this surprising?

[AuMatar]

No, one doesn't need to eventually take off. It could just be that people actually don't want it. There's lots of ideas that have been rehashed repeatedly and fail in the market each time.

Even as a gamer, I have 0 interest in VR. I don't want to wear something on my face, I'm far from convinced having a screen that close to my eyes is good for them, and generally I want to be able to look around my apartment when gaming- hell I usually have the TV in on the background and glance at it on occassion, or tab over to a brower (or have one on monitor 2). You can build the perfect VR machine and I just don't want it. And I think the market is showing the majority are with me.

A double-sided problem...

[__aaclcg7560]

If the VR gear is expensive and a high-end computer system is needed to run the VR gear, it's a niche market. Mass market VR gear is where everyone can afford it to run with their existing computer system. Not quite there yet.

Free as in beer

[Jamlad]

They could offer it to me for free and I still wouldn't take it because of the FB affiliation.

I'm waiting out for my hardware to catch up and the Vive II.

Everyone who wants it has it

[PhrostyMcByte]

I love my Rift but I'll be the first to admit it's still a compromised experience. It's too blurry and causes eye strain. And it needs a stupidly powerful PC to have a great experience. Everyone I know with a high-end gaming PC capable of running VR either already has a headset or has decided to wait for next-gen headsets -- exciting things like eye tracking, improved depth of field, and simply higher res are all on the horizon *if* VR can survive long enough to give us the 2nd gen it needs.

Not so niche, honestly...

[cirby]

"Expensive" gear?

Back when I bought my Apple IIe in 1983, it cost $2400 with a floppy drive and a color monitor.

That's about $5900 in today's dollars. You can buy a Vive with a reasonably overbuilt desktop to run it for about half that (I did).

A "cheap" Commodore 64 with a floppy drive in 1984 was about $1000.

That's $2300 today - about the cost of a decent Vive headset and a basic VR computer.

How niche was my Apple IIe? Or the Commodore 64?

I guess the whole "computer revolution" never happened then, right?

I know a lot of people who spent a couple of thousand dollars, just a few years ago, for a big-screen TV. Niche? Yet they still make large, expensive sets - and that ubiquitous iPhone is basically a thousand bucks, replaced every couple of years...

HTC Vive

[ProzacPatient]

Is it possible it's just being out competed by the Vive? I hardly hear anyone mentioning Oculus anymore ever since Facebook bought Oculus and the Vive hit the market.

Rift is fantastic.

[Toasterboy]

There aren't a lot of apps yet, but Oculus Rift really is fantastic. It runs OK on relatively old gaming hardware... I have both the DK2 and the consumer release version with touch controllers. It certainly runs better on a NVidia 1070 (or better), but it ran just fine on my previous card, a GTX480, which is below minimum requirements technically. It also runs pretty well on a gx980(which is a mobile gpu for laptops). Everyone whom I have demonstrated my rigs to wants one (and my gaming rig is a 4 year old i7 box, outside of having a 1070 recently upgraded). Given that the Rift is mostly cell phone screen, plus a few electronics, and some cameras, $400 is what the price point should have been at launch. You need a beefy system, but it definitely doesn't have to be a crazy rig.

Having tried the HTC Vive, and owning some older VR equipment (Vuzix stuff), it's pretty clear to me that the Rift is the best VR equipment I've used. It's more responsive, and looks better (higher res screens). Other stuff I've tried tends to be kind of laggy with respect to head tracking and motion controllers, but not the Rift.

Elite Dangerous in VR is a fantastic experience, as is In Medium (3d sculpting). I've also run a fair number of older titles through VireioX with good success; Skyrim is pretty cool in VR. Even my 80 year old parents like many of the experiences. Viewing 360 degree photos of sites in Egypt in VR is amazing.

VR games are _different_ from existing games though.. the VR experience is more intense, and more immersive, and some things that worked on 2D screens don't work well in VR... for example, the speed you run at in most FPS games can be 50-70 MPH, which in VR makes you want to hurl, because running that fast through corridors is kind of disorienting. I also tend to be sated with VR after a much shorter gaming period...the experience is just more intense. I believe VR is here to stay, but it will take a while for developers to discover what works well in game experiences.

Re:Simple answer.

[jon3k]

Never required a $2500 PC (more like $500-$1000, you know, like any decent gaming PC). Tons of available games. I love watching all the old slashdot luddites shit on VR, most of whom have never experienced it.