Your thoughts about Virtual Reality

As someone who plays on pc a lot, I'm used to setting things up sometimes (both on software and hardware level)... And I still thing the current main VR solutions look like too much work currently. When you have an entire day free to dedicate yourself to a single game, that may not be a problem. But most people don't: there are entire weeks in which I am sitting at my computer doing work, have a few minutes free, then quickly open some game to play in short bursts, so I don't see myself setting up all this VR mess to play for 20-30 minutes everytime.

I don't think badly of VR, but I also don't believe it's "the future": it wil probably be a niche thing, as both the 3D and motion controls turned out. Right now, though, the entry price itself for the "main" solutions (Oculus/Vive) makes them really unattractive, even for a niche market. But we'll see how that turns out; maybe with technology advancements, they may become cheaper, lighter/less uncomfortable and need less wires.

stratogustav - As I understand, though, the experience given by Oculus/Vive is wildly different from the one present in Samsung VR, so they might not be really comparable (at least when talking about prices). Keep in mind I haven't tried either, so I don't know how either of them look/feel.

stratogustav - Although it's a one-time thing, the problem is the mess it might make on your space. If you use it for other stuff like working, as it's my case, that may be bothersome: I can't even imagine all that stuff over my desk. This Rock, Paper, Shotgun post sums it up. It's certainly worse with the Vive, as you have to distribute sensors over your room. Otherwise, I definitely want to try it: as much as I don't think it will be my thing in a near future, I'm still curious enough to see how it feels. Especially now that you mentioned VR porn.

Good call on the glasses-free 3d; that's actually the thing that always got me more interested than motion-controls/VR/AR, since it's completely non-intrusive: you don't have to move around, put on a helmet, mess with a lot of wires etc. If they can ever completely solve the problem of multiple people looking at the screen from multiple angles, then I think that could be a very common thing in the future (instead of a niche like VR or motion controls).

I don't know, man... I think AR might have more of a chance (thinking about those Microsoft glasses), while the isolationist aspect of VR itself seems enough to convince me that it will never be the standard. AR doesn't shut you so much from the world, so I see it being more accepted amongst people who have no interest in games or aren't so passionate about technology.

But hey, maybe VR porn will convince everyone and destroy our reality! I'm remembering that Futurama episode in which Fry downloads Lucy Liu.

AR is too far behind in development, but like I said before AR will be huge too once VR is set as the norm, at least the good AR, we'll see some lower end AR before that. VR, 3D, and motion controls are here to stay, and will become more mainstream for the reasons I mentioned before, like Super Bowl tickets, etc.

In terms of gaming I would say Nintendo has a better chance to make it mainstream, but the fact that Sony is pushing it first is because they believe this is the next 20 years of PlayStation, not that TV gaming will go away, it won't. But they marketed motion, 3D, and 4K before for a reason, to set the ground.

Facebook dropping a billion dollars on Oculus, HTC making Steam make Vive, Apple saying they are working on it, Samsung and Google coming up with cheap alternatives. This is no joke. You don't drop that kind of cash just cause, specially with that many people behind it.

This is an Illuminati type of thing, they don't want to mess this one up. This is the real "greatness awaits" we have been hearing for many years from Sony, which is why all their conferences in the last 3 years look like a VR headset.

I'm still on the fence on both AR and VR. These things have always been around in some form, and have yet to take off.

Why would anyone watch Oprah with this thing? The superbowl? Skype? First off, if you have one of these honkers on you can't multitask, which people do when they watch these things. What's better about having it directly in your face? If you're watching a talkshow you don't need an immersive experience anyway. When people watch the superbowl they jump around and cheer and go into the kitchen to grab burger, VR restricts that. It would also restrict the party aspect of the superbowl in general. You wouldn't be able to crowd around a TV with a bunch of friends, you'd all have to have your own headsets and when those things are on no conversation or interaction is going to happen. And skype, again I don't see what's better about have the screen a inch from your face instead of 2 feet away. It's not like VR would allow you to actually interact with the person you're talking to anyway.

Yep, this is, in a nutshell,  pretty much why I think VR won't be as common as people want it to be. For someone alone who wants to experience some immersive activity (an immersive game or movie) it's good; for casually watching tv / accessing the internet / playing party games? I doubt so. Since people who are dedicated enough to immerse themselves in those activities are already a niche, then I think VR will be mostly a niche too (I'm not even counting the price of admission).

I mean, even when I'm playing immersive games alone, I still can't (most of the times) be so cut from the outside world - I don't even use headphones, imagine having both my ears and eyes blocked. I'll certainly want to play a few VR games at some point, but I just can't see that as my main thing in the future.