I prefer to let other than me use the 1st generation of any new technology.
This way, I benefit from the improvment, and a lower price point.
This way, I benefit from the improvment, and a lower price point.
Expecting a VR headset with roomspace support to ever be cheaper than a high-end single LCD like a ROG[0], then you'll be waiting a long time. At least until high end LCDs are driven lower and that's not even a 4K gaming LCD- the prices on those won't be lower than a HMD.
There's amazing value in that $800 package and this is essentially 3rd gen in my book. Oculus Rift would be closer to 2nd gen and the 90s headsets were the 1st gen.
As well as the price never dropping to something like $199 or $399 (without an inferior experience like GearVR)- if you're old enough to have owned a 3dfx Voodoo card in 1996, you'll know there will never be anything quite like the "1st gen" experience ever again. The magic isn't the same down the road. Even for people who are having THEIR first experience later on- because everyone else around them has done it.
I'm sympathetic to the folks who don't want to or can't spend $800 on this, but I think this is one case where it's worth going in.
[0]http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16824236...
Oculus may be playing some catch-up with Vive's roomspace and other features, but I can't see Vive 2.0 adding a lot of features without bumping the price up even further. I'm guessing 2.0 will have incremental improvements on the existing stuff (resolution, cameras, controllers) which would be lucky to drop it in price. So it's as safe of a bet as anything can be for those willing to dive in.
Given the pace of this space and related technology (gaming, mobile, displays) for the past two years, I heartily disagree. If anything, new areas of technology have a steeper New-and-Shiny Tax than most other types of consumer goods.
This is 'it' for the forseeable future, roomspace VR. If you have knowledge of better ideas that are feasible for less than $1,000, other than incremental upgrades to what HTC has put together here, you could become a very wealthy person.
Displays are becoming smaller, higher resolution, and cheaper. Already, people who couldn't stomach the VR of 2014 are enjoying the VR of 2016.
Graphics cards are about to jump from 28nm to 16nm, later this year, leading to laptops that can run cards that outperform today's desktops at a fraction of the power consumption. One of the biggest issues of the current generation of VR is the necessity of being plugged in via a physical cord to a beast of a machine.
Carmack has stated that his primary focus right now is bringing positional tracking to mobile VR. We haven't even cracked the inside-out tracking barrier yet, so while my GearVR is fun, it doesn't fulfill its potential as a room (or field?) scale VR system.
I'm happy that fellow early adopters are buying the very clunky current generation, but it's ridiculous to suggest that the state of VR is 'it' for the forseeable future. That would be a depressing future of VR indeed.
I don't find an incremental build on the Vive to be depressing at all. But in 5 years the Vive 3.0 will have incrementally better resolution, tracking, and maybe a custom wireless method to transfer 8K video with positional information. Not worth passing on the Vive today just for incremental improvements. If it were the holodeck incoming, I'd agree.
Other than that one difference, both devices are very similar in their specs.
Oculus is betting that most gamers would still prefer to sit down while playing and that roomscale tracking will be a novelty (which with the current limitations of Vive it is).
This is pretty much the Wii vs Xbox360/PS3 type of control bet. The Wii did well but the best games for it were more or less the ones that used traditional controls, even the best first party games didn't really use the motion aspects of the Wii that much/at all.
The Kinect and what ever the PS Eye camera thing was called also ended up as being niche products that didn't really managed to build a sustainable ecosystem.
Oculus is betting that sitting / standing with limited movement will be the preferred gaming environment and I think they will be correct in that assumption.
Needless to say, I'm gonna be waiting as well.
The first few generations of "Gaming" LCD monitors were pathetic, shitty TN panels and more ghosting than a TV oriented LCD panel.
Spending 800$ (or 600$ for that matter) on a 1st gen that will most likely be obsolete before there is any substantial market for it isn't something most people are willing to do, especially when you currently have to make a bet on a horse that might be dead in 1 to 2 years.
E.g.: Would you rather go to space now, or wait until it's easy and comfy? For me, curiosity wins.
Even early adopters are "consumers". Just a different customer segment. One that places more value on the excitement of a new technology than comfort and cost.
As a consumer, I'd rather wait for the current gen to age a little, and buy it cheaper and with less bugs.
:-)