5 ms·

Oculus and Vive Usage Appears to Be Flat or Declining

23 points by Kroeler 8y ago

paulmendoza 8y ago
Buying a vive was the biggest waste of money. Just sits in a box in my closet now. It was never enjoyable enough to want to play after the first week or so.
- mrguyorama 8y ago
  What games do you play? Both in and out of VR? It was a good purchase for me because I already own most simulation games that are VR compatible and love simulation in general.
- bfuller 8y ago
  send it to me I am poor and would love one
Paraesthetic 8y ago
I have yet to find a decent enough reason to use or even upgrade one. I have a feeling that this will be like 3D Tv's they will come back every couple of years or so with some company saying 'hey do you want this now? no? ok" and then disappearing again for a few years. I think the biggest problem is that the FOV is tiny on these things, its good for a while, but I'd much rather use a giant screen than use googles where my head gets sweaty and takes a while to set up.
- kruczek 8y ago
  Personally I find current VR already at the mind-blowing level, although I agree there are some things which definitely need improvement. However for me FOV never has been an issue, I barely notice lack of peripheral vision. The main issue I see is relatively low resolution - with normal monitors you have at least 1920x1080 covering small percentage of your view; with VR there's half of that covering whole view. Increasing FOV without providing better resolution will only make it worse. This can be especially noticeable in games with large distances (like ETS2) and games with small text size. For those I'd definitely like to see a headset with at least 4k resolution.
- Sir_Substance 8y ago
  The biggest problem for me is that in order to use it, I have to buy into their respective ecosystems. I actually don't want an ecosystem or an oculus account or a vr storefront, I just want a monitor for my face. If I can't have that without the nonsense, I guess I'll just wait until they go bankrupt and sell all the patent IP.
  - Macha 8y ago
    You don't have to use viveport for the Vive.
  - mrguyorama 8y ago
    The Vive is an open ecosystem. The hardware is all semi-open and off the shelf, and the software is all on github. The only hangup is that I am not sure whether you can actually BUILD the software on your own or not, as I've never tried.
    - Sir_Substance 8y ago
      I tend not to compile my own monitor drivers from source. If I have to do that to use the vive without steam, then I'm not sold on your assertion that I don't have to buy into their ecosystem to use their face-monitor.
      - mrguyorama 8y ago
        Ah, right, I'm not sure if you can run the Valve provided binaries without Steam. Although a quick google search offers up https://community.viveport.com/t5/Technical-Support/Vive-without-Steam/td-p/14146 https://community.viveport.com/t5/Technical-Support/Vive-wit...
        Sir_Substance 8y ago
        Yeah. I did some googling and it seems that all non-steam options are in the "technically you can, here run this cmake file and then hand-calibrate the coordinate mappings in this json file" stage. It might be that we get to a point where it's more open, but I hoped the same for a bunch of other products (lytro comes to mind) that never made it. It's not like I don't have steam installed on every computer I own, but it's more of an on principal thing. I don't buy razer mice because I don't want to spend $50-100 on hardware that doesn't work properly if the vendors download servers go down, and razer mice have very strange profile defaults if they can't talk to the razer desktop program. If razer goes under it won't really be possible to move razer mice to new computers after a while. Similarly, I'm really not keen to buy $800 worth of kit that could become a paperweight if I get VAC-banned. I'm a big fan of separation of concerns on this front. I might part with $100 with a dependency on steam because that's throw-away money, but not $400 and certainly not $800.
koiz 8y ago
Its what valve always feared when Oculus went their own way... why would an oculus user use steam? I tend to stay away from buying stuff for my rift on steam simply because the experience is better within the oculus ecosystem.
kruczek 8y ago
Hm, as far as I understand these statistics count people who have had their headset connected at the time of measurement. I wonder how much this skewed the numbers, since for example I connect the headset only when using it. So despite using it daily, I still likely wouldn't appear in these stats.
- mrguyorama 8y ago
  Interesting, meanwhile my headset is connected 24/7 while I have decreased usage over the past several months (though this is in general for all video gaming, not just VR)
LUmBULtERA 8y ago
I like my Rift, but I can't actually run content very well on it with my current hardware. I was hoping to upgrade my hardware this year, but GPU and RAM prices have been atrocious. Maybe next year...
- mrguyorama 8y ago
  The previous generation's flagship, or one level below flagship, level hardware runs VR pretty damn well.
bni 8y ago
Anything based on Steam survey is suspect at best, since it does not reflect the whole ecosystem. That said, I think there are problems with VR mainstream adoption. Number one being the convenience problem. I takes effort to setup and start a VR gaming session, as opposed to flat-screen couch gaming. It has to be insanely good and addicting for it to be worth it, and its a few hardware and software generations from being there. Flatscreen games also get better and have ever higher production values (Try RDR2 and you see what I mean). This is the competitive environment for VR. VR might remain niche, and the problem with that its not commercially viable on its own like that. Hence the situation we have now with Facebook basically being the Patron of VR.
snlnspc 8y ago
personally I won't be buying in until (at least) another generation of improvements to the technology, and I'm sure there are many others that feel the same. there will surely be a tipping point in price/quality of the device/software that will make it worth it for a lot of people.
intellix 8y ago
Love my Vive. Got a beast of a machine to run it on and just bought the Deluxe Audio Strap and the Wireless adapter. The wireless adapter is a game changer for me. The wire was driving me nuts and breaking immersion entirely. Got addicted to Beat Saber for a while but it's not very comfortable to play for long as you have this huge headset strapped to your face and you're streaming with sweat before long. Took it to the office for a week about a year ago and then again about a month ago. All of my colleagues were asking me what new experiences I had and you be honest I could only really suggest Beat Saber. Seems to me like the content stream has dried up a bit but then again I entered the scene late and downloaded years of content at once. Astrobot looks awesome and I'm a bit miffed it's exclusive for the PSVR
beerlord 8y ago
If Steam are not going to subsidise hardware, then they are a parasite on VR gaming instead of an asset - charging 30% commissions for any VR games sold whilst developers take all the risks. The future of VR is with a PS5 console that can have an official VR backpack and headset, maybe even a battery pack, and thus be inherently portable with good enough power to run a 1440p display. VR games need to be so optimised (1440p or 4k @ 90fps) that I don't think the experience will be good enough on anything except console device, that developers can target and build for precisely. On a side note I think PC gaming could be seriously threatened if console makers ever get their act together with keyboard and mouse support - even going so far as to allow developers to sell games that require KBM to play. There are too many greedy actors like Nvidia and Valve that are ripping off PC gamers, and the physical dimensions of a PC case are just too big - the platform hasn't been modernised to make everything smaller and more compact.

23 points by Kroeler 8y ago

Buying a vive was the biggest waste of money. Just sits in a box in my closet now. It was never enjoyable enough to want to play after the first week or so.

mrguyorama 8y ago
What games do you play? Both in and out of VR? It was a good purchase for me because I already own most simulation games that are VR compatible and love simulation in general.
bfuller 8y ago
send it to me I am poor and would love one

Paraesthetic 8y ago

I have yet to find a decent enough reason to use or even upgrade one. I have a feeling that this will be like 3D Tv's they will come back every couple of years or so with some company saying 'hey do you want this now? no? ok" and then disappearing again for a few years. I think the biggest problem is that the FOV is tiny on these things, its good for a while, but I'd much rather use a giant screen than use googles where my head gets sweaty and takes a while to set up.

kruczek 8y ago
Personally I find current VR already at the mind-blowing level, although I agree there are some things which definitely need improvement. However for me FOV never has been an issue, I barely notice lack of peripheral vision. The main issue I see is relatively low resolution - with normal monitors you have at least 1920x1080 covering small percentage of your view; with VR there's half of that covering whole view. Increasing FOV without providing better resolution will only make it worse. This can be especially noticeable in games with large distances (like ETS2) and games with small text size. For those I'd definitely like to see a headset with at least 4k resolution.
Sir_Substance 8y ago
The biggest problem for me is that in order to use it, I have to buy into their respective ecosystems. I actually don't want an ecosystem or an oculus account or a vr storefront, I just want a monitor for my face. If I can't have that without the nonsense, I guess I'll just wait until they go bankrupt and sell all the patent IP.
- Macha 8y ago
  You don't have to use viveport for the Vive.
- mrguyorama 8y ago
  The Vive is an open ecosystem. The hardware is all semi-open and off the shelf, and the software is all on github. The only hangup is that I am not sure whether you can actually BUILD the software on your own or not, as I've never tried.
  - Sir_Substance 8y ago
    I tend not to compile my own monitor drivers from source. If I have to do that to use the vive without steam, then I'm not sold on your assertion that I don't have to buy into their ecosystem to use their face-monitor.
    - mrguyorama 8y ago
      Ah, right, I'm not sure if you can run the Valve provided binaries without Steam. Although a quick google search offers up https://community.viveport.com/t5/Technical-Support/Vive-without-Steam/td-p/14146 https://community.viveport.com/t5/Technical-Support/Vive-wit...
      - Sir_Substance 8y ago
        Yeah. I did some googling and it seems that all non-steam options are in the "technically you can, here run this cmake file and then hand-calibrate the coordinate mappings in this json file" stage. It might be that we get to a point where it's more open, but I hoped the same for a bunch of other products (lytro comes to mind) that never made it. It's not like I don't have steam installed on every computer I own, but it's more of an on principal thing. I don't buy razer mice because I don't want to spend $50-100 on hardware that doesn't work properly if the vendors download servers go down, and razer mice have very strange profile defaults if they can't talk to the razer desktop program. If razer goes under it won't really be possible to move razer mice to new computers after a while. Similarly, I'm really not keen to buy $800 worth of kit that could become a paperweight if I get VAC-banned. I'm a big fan of separation of concerns on this front. I might part with $100 with a dependency on steam because that's throw-away money, but not $400 and certainly not $800.

koiz 8y ago

Its what valve always feared when Oculus went their own way... why would an oculus user use steam? I tend to stay away from buying stuff for my rift on steam simply because the experience is better within the oculus ecosystem.

kruczek 8y ago

Hm, as far as I understand these statistics count people who have had their headset connected at the time of measurement. I wonder how much this skewed the numbers, since for example I connect the headset only when using it. So despite using it daily, I still likely wouldn't appear in these stats.

mrguyorama 8y ago
Interesting, meanwhile my headset is connected 24/7 while I have decreased usage over the past several months (though this is in general for all video gaming, not just VR)

LUmBULtERA 8y ago

I like my Rift, but I can't actually run content very well on it with my current hardware. I was hoping to upgrade my hardware this year, but GPU and RAM prices have been atrocious. Maybe next year...

mrguyorama 8y ago
The previous generation's flagship, or one level below flagship, level hardware runs VR pretty damn well.

bni 8y ago

Anything based on Steam survey is suspect at best, since it does not reflect the whole ecosystem. That said, I think there are problems with VR mainstream adoption. Number one being the convenience problem. I takes effort to setup and start a VR gaming session, as opposed to flat-screen couch gaming. It has to be insanely good and addicting for it to be worth it, and its a few hardware and software generations from being there. Flatscreen games also get better and have ever higher production values (Try RDR2 and you see what I mean). This is the competitive environment for VR. VR might remain niche, and the problem with that its not commercially viable on its own like that. Hence the situation we have now with Facebook basically being the Patron of VR.

snlnspc 8y ago

personally I won't be buying in until (at least) another generation of improvements to the technology, and I'm sure there are many others that feel the same. there will surely be a tipping point in price/quality of the device/software that will make it worth it for a lot of people.

intellix 8y ago

Love my Vive. Got a beast of a machine to run it on and just bought the Deluxe Audio Strap and the Wireless adapter. The wireless adapter is a game changer for me. The wire was driving me nuts and breaking immersion entirely. Got addicted to Beat Saber for a while but it's not very comfortable to play for long as you have this huge headset strapped to your face and you're streaming with sweat before long. Took it to the office for a week about a year ago and then again about a month ago. All of my colleagues were asking me what new experiences I had and you be honest I could only really suggest Beat Saber. Seems to me like the content stream has dried up a bit but then again I entered the scene late and downloaded years of content at once. Astrobot looks awesome and I'm a bit miffed it's exclusive for the PSVR

beerlord 8y ago

If Steam are not going to subsidise hardware, then they are a parasite on VR gaming instead of an asset - charging 30% commissions for any VR games sold whilst developers take all the risks. The future of VR is with a PS5 console that can have an official VR backpack and headset, maybe even a battery pack, and thus be inherently portable with good enough power to run a 1440p display. VR games need to be so optimised (1440p or 4k @ 90fps) that I don't think the experience will be good enough on anything except console device, that developers can target and build for precisely. On a side note I think PC gaming could be seriously threatened if console makers ever get their act together with keyboard and mouse support - even going so far as to allow developers to sell games that require KBM to play. There are too many greedy actors like Nvidia and Valve that are ripping off PC gamers, and the physical dimensions of a PC case are just too big - the platform hasn't been modernised to make everything smaller and more compact.