WHAT VR?
T
his is literally the fourth Editor’s note I’m writing
for this issue. Just as I think it’s been nailed down,
something changes and I have to redo the entire
piece as it no longer makes sense. As you can imagine,
it has everything to do with trying to write something
speculative based on rumours - then suddenly there’s a
little more concrete information and the entire thing is
instantly junk.
A classic example is how the AM4 platform has changed
since March when it was introduced up until now in June.
It’s literally a different beast, so had I given an opinion
about what was presented in back then vs what is available
now, I’d be completely contradicting myself.
That aside, these are exciting times with plenty of
platforms, lots of new graphics processors, and generally
an interesting time in this industry which has been in dire
need of some excitement and a reason for people to care.
I’ll not be tackling that, however, but instead I want to opine
about VR a little.
The VR experience hasn’t exactly set customers’ digital
experiences on fire. There is a great and profound reason
for this, but superficially it also has everything to do with
the entities that are driving the VR experience. They’ve
not presented a worthwhile case for this and the entire
VR experience can only be appreciated once you’ve had
it. Prior to that it’s nothing more than a buzzword and
someone trying to get you to buy something you’ve never
even thought you needed and perhaps don’t even care
about. The presence of a killer application/game which
would make it all worth the investment just isn’t there for
the masses. This is in particular when it comes to games. A
game with a compelling narrative, mechanics, and so forth.
That game however would have numerous challenges as
well to overcome. Given the budgets of triple A titles these
days, any one title needs to sell millions of copies - and
rather quickly I might add - to be deemed worthwhile by the
publishers. However, for a game to take real advantage of
VR, it may need to be built in a way which makes it unusable
for those who do not have a unit. That means the potential
for it to sell is significantly diminished.
As such, no publishers will put a triple A budget into a
VR game when, even if you sell to every user out there with
a RIFT or VIVE headset, you’re breaking even at best and
most likely making a loss. This therefore feeds back into
the lack of true triple A titles for the technology.
It’s a difficult situation that VR finds itself in, but not a
helpless one. If and when prices get better, for example,
then access to the VR experience becomes a lot more
feasible and the idea of investing into the desired
controllers, sensors and all sorts of things becomes more
palatable. Right now it simply isn’t worth the investment as
it’s cost prohibitive for what it is you’re getting.
I would wager that there’s a good number of people
who - when presented with a choice of spending $500 on
an Oculus Rift or buying a new graphics card or monitor
– would go for the latter... Let alone when dealing with
the HTC VIVE which is even costlier. As a whole, the entire
ecosystem isn’t appealing. While some things are okay
to use for a while then forget about them, a $500 item for
novelty’s sake isn’t going to cut it.
As the technology gets better and the entire VR
experience can be had for $400 (controllers, headset and
whatever additional sensors) then things will improve by
some margin. There’s no doubt that it is the future along
with AR, but that future wont’ likely be ushered in by HTC or
Oculus.
The challenges for VR are far greater than this initial
hurdle though. For instance, the way that PC DIY vendors
have taken to VR isn’t realistic at all. In fact, at some level
it shows a lack of understanding not only the end user,
but how the propagation of technology into everyday life
works as a whole. There’s not a single keyboard, mouse,
motherboard, graphics card or any such thing that can help
one’s VR experience outside of the unit itself which is cost
prohibitive as we have established.
As we come to another Computex, we will inevitably we
inundated with VR experiences all over and each of them
will be meaningless outside of it being a novelty item or
gimmick. Again, mixed reality headsets and displays are
the future without question, but I somehow don’t think that
future will be delivered via Oculus or HTC, regardless of
their lone efforts.
I’ll end this Ed’s not here though as it may go into a more
fundamental question regarding the PC DIY industry. We
will leave that for another time, but suffice to say we will
just have to wait and see where VR takes us. Right now
there’s nothing that’s incentivising me and perhaps a few
others into forking out the money for either headset. Give
me a high pixel density, high scan rate, quality display
any day, if only because I can share such a display and
experience with other people. Not true for VR and perhaps
part of the reason why 3D Vision and such didn’t take off as
well. Let’s see what the next few years bring, and here’s to
me being wrong and VR blowing up as the next