I played with ‘The Lab’ a little in an open space with a Vive. It was an intensely magical technological experience. (So was Tilt Brush.) Exploring an environm

I played with ‘The Lab’ a little in an open space with a Vive. It was an intensely magical technological experience. (So was Tilt Brush.) Exploring an environment in VR can’t be compared to exploring one on a screen, because the objects have scale that makes sense, and you can freely move around them to see their shapes. Or, when you pick something up, you can freely move it around with your hand to see different sides and angles. The software includes detailed representations of the Vive controllers, so you can see them while you’re in VR — including accurate battery LEDs, the state of the buttons, and the position of the analog trigger. Even the little toys in The Lab’s “menu room” are fun and natural — there's a wooden bow on a table. You can reach out with a hand, touch the trigger on the controller to pick it up (the controller disappears so you seem to just be holding the bow), and then use your other hand to grab an arrow, pull it back (holding the trigger), and release (by releasing the trigger). The demo worlds are equally magical — when I played fetch with my little robot dog, I kneeled down to pick up a stick, stood up to throw it, and then kneeled back down to give the dog an approving scratch when it brought the stick back. I was mildly excited about VR and AR. Now I’m convinced that they’re going to change how we interact with computers, and with each other.