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I very much think that folks on HN are jaded by the long wait and the unfulfilled promises of VR. I recently picked up a Quest 2 as my first VR headset and I am

I very much think that folks on HN are jaded by the long wait and the unfulfilled promises of VR. I recently picked up a Quest 2 as my first VR headset and I am blown away and convinced it is the future. The thing is, I also recognize that while it is already an incredible achievement, it's still probably 5-20 years from hitting its iPhone moment. By then, my initial excitement will have gone away and I'll have tired of waiting too. But for all you jaded folks out there, let me tell you that this is an absolutely unstoppable evolution of computing. All entertainment since sung epic poetry has aimed to briefly take us into another world. Plays, novels, movies, theme parks, and video games have always offered immersive fantasy. This is the ultimate fufilment of that very human impulse, to consciously enter another world. If we lose sight of that, then it will be up to the next generation of technologists to create it.

inventtheday 6y ago
ya it's a slow burn, but I think the September '20 - September '21 period will end up seeing roughly the unit sales mentioned in their bet. Quest 2 is making a large impact.
an_opabinia 6y ago
> The thing is, I also recognize that while it is already an incredible achievement, it's still probably 5-20 years from hitting its iPhone moment. Ironically, by getting acquired by a giant company, Quest development was set back by that many years. The real problem isn't technology or even adoption, it's that people who work at giant companies suck at making games.
- Impossible 6y ago
  Microsoft has a good track record with making games, but yes all of FAANG is terrible at this. I have a little more hope for Facebook now that they've started acquiring studios and letting them run independently, instead of the previous combination of publishing\funding and having few internal game teams (which generally doesn't work in big tech anyway). This could lead to a model that looks more like Microsoft Game Studios.
  - dougmwne 6y ago
    One of the best VR experiences out there was made by a single dev, Eleven Table Tennis. Most of what Facebook puts out there is mediocre tech demos and they don't seem to understand the strengths of their own platform enough to take advantage of them in their games.
  - an_opabinia 6y ago
    > I have a little more hope for Facebook now that they've started acquiring studios and letting them run independently The reality is, the acquisition of best VR game of any objective measure, Beat Saber, set back VR for all game developers because it will rob other VR platforms of a doorbuster title (i.e. Beat Saber 2). Also, it enables Beat Games to keep using unlicensed music by fiat of Facebook's legal might, a completely unassailable competitive advantage that is strictly better than actually licensing the music and making a game with it. It is illustrative of how the things giant companies are good at, which is using their huge cash piles to achieve totally anti-competitive advantages, changes nothing for the status quo of the consumer - they don't pay for the music no matter who the game's owner is - but just winds up harming other game developers. Consider also Facebook Horizon is seeking to replace VR Chat, I believe the #1 free VR title by installs. How is that benefitting game developers and gaming culture? Just compare a screenshot of VR Chat here (1) to Facebook Horizon here (2), it tells you everything you need to know about why the kind of people who work at giant companies are awful at making games. It's so fucking sterile dude, and it's sterile on purpose. People have said this for eons about Disney, but it's not comparable. By the way, Disney also totally blundered Disney Interactive, shutting down under the CEO Bob Iger who was known as the "tech" CEO of Disney. (1) https://miro.medium.com/max/3840/1*I5c-QMDHVPeyC35pM1V4Ng.png https://miro.medium.com/max/3840/1*I5c-QMDHVPeyC35pM1V4Ng.pn... (2) https://cnet1.cbsistatic.com/img/9kGJANvUNFtxp5mGEgMIDI95DnA=/1200x675/2019/09/27/4bce2f4b-8d1f-4335-859c-5bd0a649728a/friends.png https://cnet1.cbsistatic.com/img/9kGJANvUNFtxp5mGEgMIDI95DnA...
    - Impossible 6y ago
      I worked on the Horizon team, and there's only so much I'm comfortable saying, but I can say the team burnt me out and I quit. There isn't a 100% chance that Beat Saber 2 will be exclusive, but you're right that it's likely and if that happens it will be a shame. My hope is that Facebook moving away from PC VR as a focus means they won't see it as competition, and start releasing previously exclusive games on Steam in the same way Microsoft and Sony have started releasing previously console exclusive titles, but I won't hold my breath.
- dougmwne 6y ago
  I'm not even sure we are at the compelling apps stage yet. I think there are still very difficult hardware and software platform issues to solve first that are going to take tons of basic research. I expect the first 100 million unit headset to include extremely accurate eye-tracking that is used to drive foveated rendering, varifocal active lenses and neural network interpolated facial expressions for high fidelity social avatars. Facebook Research seems to be making good progress on all of that, but it will still take many years of additional research to perfect. Facebook wants to be the company to invent the first mainstream VR Metaverse, but that doesn't mean they won't invent the hardware and get beaten to market on the software. They are about to release Horizons which is clearly in this vein, but I expect they are still too early.
- _iyig 6y ago
  > The real problem isn't technology or even adoption, it's that people who work at giant companies suck at making games. Many companies besides Facebook have developed games for the Quest. I guess you could say Facebook sucks at working with game developers, but I’m not sure if that’s true either. Unreal and Unity have well-developed integrations with Oculus [0]. I think where Facebook really falls down is tying customers’ FB account to their Oculus Store purchases (and ability to use the Quest at all). They’re applying a social media platform’s aggressive algorithms to suspend or ban accounts which violate their expansive TOS, which is wrong in consumer product and digital marketplace space. For that reason, mixed with personal experience at the hands of Facebook's algorithms, I have no interest in developing for Oculus. [0] https://developer.oculus.com/get-started/ https://developer.oculus.com/get-started/
- deleted 6y ago
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- nomel 6y ago
  > it's that people who work at giant companies suck at making games. I don't understand this statement. The Oculus store is open to developers and is filled with third party games. All of the games I personally play are not Oculus/Facebook games.
  - fomine3 6y ago
    The store is available but its screening is a little strict (near to game console, rather than Play Store or Steam). Alternatively it seems that FB unofficially supports SideQuest.
    - nomel 6y ago
      > Alternatively it seems that FB unofficially supports SideQuest. They're actually opening support for off-store apps [1], but with some limitations: > Applications will have to meet the obligations of the Oculus Content Policy, but won’t be held to the same technical standards as official Oculus Store Apps. [1] https://www.roadtovr.com/oculus-quest-distribution-non-store-q1-2021/ https://www.roadtovr.com/oculus-quest-distribution-non-store...
- deleted 6y ago
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- thebigman433 6y ago
  > Ironically, by getting acquired by a giant company, Quest development was set back by that many years. What does this mean? We likely wouldnt even have a Quest (or really even a 3rd headset imo) from Oculus if not for Facebook. The Oculus founders were all almost completely about building high end enthusiast hardware, which wouldve almost surely made the market die off again.
- whywhywhywhy 6y ago
  FB mostly publishes games and what that have published include some excellent games. Lone Echo is probably the mostly complete example of a AAA quality VR title for years until HL:Alyx launched. Wouldn’t have been possible without a large enough company to bankroll it.
jnwatson 6y ago
Facebook's Quest 2 is an impressive piece of tech. One of the biggest reasons to be skeptical of VR taking off is that Facebook is one of the major players. Between the login shenanigans and their anti-competitive dealings with developers, they have an opportunity to single-handedly tank the industry.
- outworlder 6y ago
  It's the ONLY player on the "stand-alone" headset space. There's some competition on PC headsets, Rift headsets are not even the best, feature-wise. But just like the quest, they score very high on the cost-benefit analysis (I guess we pay with a combination of cash and data).
  - jonny_eh 6y ago
    PSVR is somewhere in the middle but Sony has all but abandoned it at this point.
    - outworlder 6y ago
      Pretty underwhelming hardware too.
- nitrogen 6y ago
  I think Facebook is in VR because they don't want the Metaverse to belong to anybody but them.
  - echelon 6y ago
    100%. Zuckerberg sees that it has the potential, and he wants to have an early angle of attack in case someone else innovates first. Zuckerberg views platforms as chess pieces. He doesn't care what they are - he just wants the most valuable and strategic ones. He's not like a Musk that just builds or a Cook that refines product into a cohesive vision. Zuckerberg is playing war and finding the reverse salients. He's destabilizing and weakening the platform and expanding his reach. He's more like Bezos or Ellison.
babyshake 6y ago
With everything happening with major movies going direct to streaming, I actually am expecting a big development somewhat related to VR in the next year or two. It's a device much smaller than a VR headset you wear on your face that gives you a theatrical quality audio-visual viewing experience, and only allows you to purchase/rent and not sideload anything. I'm thinking it could sell for around $500 and I'm pretty sure there's a company in Cupertino taking a close look at this.
- dougmwne 6y ago
  I have been watching movies on the Quest 2 with Big Screen. It's a great experience and very much reminds me of going to the theatre.
  - ozten 6y ago
    No new titles - For me, their 3D movie catalog is exactly what it was 7 months ago. Doesn't seem like a thriving business...
- aksss 6y ago
  Hasn't Hammacher-Schlemmer been selling something like this for years? Lastest variation: https://www.hammacher.com/product/wearable-virtual-cinema https://www.hammacher.com/product/wearable-virtual-cinema
qznc 6y ago
Flying simulators seem make a comeback and they sound great for VR. MS Flight Simulator was well received. A colleague of mine praised Star Wars Squadrons as a great VR game.
fossuser 6y ago
The headsets are pretty cool - I’ve played with all of them except for the Valve Index. Though there’s something unpleasant about them that keeps me from going back when the novelty wears off. I think it might be because I don’t want to be standing and moving around when playing a game and if you’re not doing that, the motion is kind of unpleasant. I’m not sure this is something it can really overcome. I think an AR overlay of our actual world is more likely to be the next real platform (assuming the hardware is possible to pull off something like this). Being in VR is just kind of an unpleasant/isolating experience for me and I’m a pretty early adopter of most things. In other people I’ve mostly seen a small number of games (mostly beat saber) keep people coming back, but I haven’t seen most people keep using it once the novelty wears off outside of that. I think there are probably some narrow applications where it’s clearly better than not having it, but I’m skeptical of VR as a platform. Maybe when the hardware is 10x better/lighter it’ll be a difference experience? We are pretty early on in the medium, movies and tv were pretty bad for the first fifty years. It might just take a while for people to figure out how to use VR well.
- noir_lord 6y ago
  > I think it might be because I don’t want to be standing and moving around when playing a game and if you’re not doing that, the motion is kind of unpleasant. Project Cars 2 and DCS make it worth the headset alone - throw in Elite Dangerous and No Man Sky and I have enough VR entertainment to keep me busy for the foreseeable.
  - StavrosK 6y ago
    For some reason, Elite Dangerous throws the graphics into low for me, no matter what settings I have. On the computer it looks great, whenever I put it on the Quest 2 it looks horribly pixelly. Even so, it's incredibly immersive, and if that problem gets fixed it's going to be amazing.
    - vrthrowaway2020 6y ago
      This review of E:D sold me on both the game and VR https://youtu.be/Fa0b2Kd2xhU https://youtu.be/Fa0b2Kd2xhU
ChildOfChaos 6y ago
i'm still on quest 1 and it's honestly amazing, it's a great workout for me, someone that is/was fairly unfit and hates exercise. Using FitXR and Beat saber (with some additional handles that add a bit of weight) really get my heart rate u p and feeling great and most of all I really enjoy it. It's amazing. I also enjoy watching movies in it as well, I don't watch a lot and was considering buying a TV but this has really delayed me doing so.
modzu 6y ago
yeah we can do one better with the holodeck. im not sure the problem is that much harder...
site-packages1 6y ago
I played with a really nicely Oculus set up the other day, it was totally amazing and immersive. In particular this was a racing sim, and when I was headed toward a wall I got the feeling like in a real car when you're about to hit something. It was very cool. Unfortunately, I lost my lunch after 5 minutes or so and had to lay in a dark room for a couple hours to get over a bout of nausea. Excited for the future though if they can solve that problem for people like me (I also get seasick easily).
- teach 6y ago
  I'm curious which Oculus headset you were using. All the ones that plug in to a PC are fairly underpowered even compared to the Oculus Quest 2. Nausea is heavily tied to framerate and latency -- a really beefy machine with a Valve Index should be a lot easier on your lunch.
- dougmwne 6y ago
  I'm not surprised you got nausea from a racing sim. It takes time to get your "VR legs" and anything with artificial locomotion is absolutely terrible for this. I started with about 2 weeks of games where the only movement was with my own two feet and the VR world always matched up to my real body movements. Then I was able to gradually handle more and more intense artificial movement. Jumping, heights, speed, and smooth turning are the worst of the bunch and still make me a bit uneasy if I overdo it. Jumping right into something with intense movement is going to program you brain to have a very negative association with VR and will take you backwards on VR acclimatization.
  - hnick 6y ago
    I wonder if there is any hangover of this acclimation when going back to the real world? If you get immune to that feeling of danger when driving towards obstacles, will it show up in a real car? I know that personally I once binged GTA V hard over a week or so, and had to catch myself before I started driving on the wrong (right-hand) side of the road one day out of habit.
    - 6y ago
rainonmoon 6y ago
Given that VR requires an interface, it seems a stretch to say it's the "ultimate fulfilment" of entering another world. Before even getting to the philosophical inquiry about what would truly constitute an Us and its actual, for real entering of another world, that it's mediated by a big headset seems to put it still many iterations prior to its ultimate realisation.
- brodie 6y ago
  The real world has plenty of interfaces too. Surely VR will eventually approach the same level of seemingly physical interfaces as the distinction between the real and the virtual starts to break down.
- dougmwne 6y ago
  That is actually the magic moment I've had, tech without an interface. Or to put it another way, it has moments of seamlessly using the interface I was born into, natural kinesthetic movement and realistic physics.
- Beaver117 6y ago
  I said it 10 years ago and I'll say it again, putting a screen and lenses on your face is not "virtual reality". It's just a gimmick (although fun in it's own way). The real VR revolution will not come until we have true BCIs that can hijack and isolate your vision and all attempted actions. Neuralink is on the right track but not even close to working. We'll need 50 more years maybe.
aksss 6y ago
Predicting the future of technology isn't too hard, it's predicting the timing accurately that people tend to fail at. I don't have a lot of experience with all the headset variations, mostly Oculus and PS, but it's clear to me that we're still in a hype stage and the hardware has a long, long way to go. I'm guessing 10-20 years before it starts approaching what we're after.
zn44 6y ago
“ All entertainment since sung epic poetry has aimed to briefly take us into another world. ” Maybe it is just me but I can achieve perfectly satisfactory immersion with a good book.
- dougmwne 6y ago
  Fair point and I can as well. It takes a great book, time, a good atmosphere, a nice state of mind and the page can disappear and I enter that other world. The last book that did this to me was The City and the Stars and it was just incredible. But with VR you are instantly, automatically and with zero effort just THERE. The immersive pull is probably thousands of times stronger if you could quantify it by number of seconds till you stop caring about the real world.
  - zn44 6y ago
    fair, maybe it's me getting old (and i'm only 32) but perspective of the slow immersion is more appealing. Taking the time to make your entire environment just perfect, with good music and some whisky is part of the enjoyment for a slow relaxing evening. But i guess it's just me there could be a market for instant immersion. I have second dev version of oculus at home, never used it much. I also went to a VR venue in London and it was great fun. From my perspective VR would work great in venues, as a night out alongside bowling, karake and similar options. I can't imagine using it reguralrly at home.
- bvcvbuiy 6y ago
  Also, the tech may enable wonders but the implementation may suck. If you have an amazing technology but the scenario of all the movies / games using this technology turn out to be the Nth version of the same story (like basically every movie on Netflix) then it is subpar compared to a book. I think a domain where it can exceptionally shine is the adult entertainment industry.
ska 6y ago
> If we lose sight of that, then it will be up to the next generation of technologists to create it. It's not clear this generation of technologists will be able to get there even keeping it in sight. Which isn't to say it's not worth plugging away at.
criddell 6y ago
I also was blown away by my first VR experience and convinced it was the future. It was when I played Dactyl Nightmare in 1992. Your second paragraph is compelling, except there are exceptions. Remember 3d tv? I think once the need for a headset is eliminated (like Star Trek's holodeck) it will take off. Until then, having to strap something over your face is asking too much. It's too isolating.
- anonymouse008 6y ago
  ^ This a thousand times over. Everyone forgets VR has been 5-10 years away since the 1960s![0] You can't obstruct people's eyes - glasses get a pass because they're a handicap, and folks with sunglasses communicate by wearing them. We will need to live many more rounds of evolution to give up the idea that covering your eyes to 'go somewhere else' won't be a survivally threatening move... and what's more, we're just starting to fully appreciate how smells and air (quality, pressure, etc) play a role in 'us being there' - don't even begin to think about the small gravitational pull between all of our bodies at a concert. Long story short, it will take a long time and a lot of generations to die off before we appreciate VR as much as a physical experience. [0]https://virtualspeech.com/blog/history-of-vr https://virtualspeech.com/blog/history-of-vr
ohhnoodont 6y ago
I also recently got a Quest 2 and it's changed everything for me. I'm usually that jaded person but today's VR tech really has me gushing. This is the first time I've been truly excited about video games since I was a teenager 15 years ago (despite playing a lot of games in that time). The feeling of vertigo and momentum in games like Jet Island that makes you weak in the knees, looking out your cockpit and being awestruck by planets and stations in Star Wars Squadrons or Elite Dangerous, dodging bullets in Pistol Whip and Superhot. The dream of the 90's is alive - the technology is here! It's so good and I can't wait until quarantine is over to share this with more people. Previously I'd used a friend's Oculus DK1 (not good) and then later a friend's HTC Vive (getting there). The Quest 2 is a major improvement and I look forward to the next generation of headsets.
ben174 6y ago
While I agree with you, and am a HUGE fan of VR, the undeniable truth is these headsets collect dust after a week or two. Always. I've convinced a ton of my friends to buy one and they always end up with the same fate :(
- swalsh 6y ago
  I mean, I guess it depends. I have an Hour or 2 a week to game. For the past 4 years I've spent that exclusively in VR. I recently picked up some new pancake games, but I keep going back. The VR experience is so much more enjoyable to me.
m463 6y ago
I think you're right -- new technology is overestimated (overhyped) in the short term, and underestimated in the long term. I think of speech recognition over the years where the promise never met reality and then it quietly started answering most corporate phones. I have tried VR many times over the years (I vividly recall there was an interesting arcade game back around 1990 that used it). I got a vive. I tried others. But after using it for a while, I returned to a monitor and keyboard as my preferred way of interacting. There's still something sort of self-limiting/tiring about VR. Is it just me?
- SulfurHexaFluri 6y ago
  For me the kinds of games I mostly play do not translate well to VR. Or at least yet. But for stuff that does translate like shooters, its unreal how much better they are in VR.
LiquidSky 6y ago
>I am blown away and convinced it is the future. The thing is, I also recognize that while it is already an incredible achievement, it's still probably 5-20 years from hitting its iPhone moment. Except for the iPhone part, I bet this exact comment was made in 1991.
SulfurHexaFluri 6y ago
There will never be an iphone moment because its not a product useful to literally every person. Gaming consoles and PCs have not had an "iphone moment" after decades because their market is and always will be limited. I don't see why people are so obsessed with instant and explosive growth. Almost no recreational product has seen this kind of growth and they have all continued to exist just fine. VR is ready today if its something you want. Its fun, cheap enough and has loads of games. If you hold out for something better you will always be waiting because there will always be something much better in 5 years.
- pbourke 6y ago
  Isn’t gaming a larger industry than the movies, driven largely by consoles? Seems like gaming had its iPhone moment a generation ago. Edit: gaming is larger than the movie and music industries combined
  - vtange 6y ago
    Yes it's true it's larger than books and movies, but games in the end just compete with other forms of media for customers' entertainment dollars. Unless we can come up with a use case for VR beyond gaming and fulfilling escapist fantasies. It will likely just be another contender for entertainment dollars. Smartphones on the other hand essentially made it possible to do anything a general desktop pc could do for people on the go without having to be tethered to a chair infront of a desk. Phones can be used for payment, notetaking, etc. There are people who use smartphones and don't play games at all.
    - jonas21 6y ago
      And the ultimate use case of VR is that you will be able to be "on the go" without ever leaving your chair -- in a form that's good enough that it doesn't feel inferior to being in person. It's sort of the inverse of the smartphone use case. Is it there yet? Of course not. But if/when it does get there... that's a much more compelling use case than a smartphone.
    - 6y ago
ekianjo 6y ago
I remember not too long ago when the Wii and the Kinect were supposed to be the future of gaming (they were hugely popular at some point) before everyone got sick of standing playing games and went back to their couches. Wondering if the same thing is not going to happen with VR as well.
ekianjo 6y ago
> let me tell you that this is an absolutely unstoppable evolution of computing. If that's the case, the sales are hardly convincing. If this was such a revolution you'd see more people buying them. Beyond head tracking and movement tracking, the fact that you cant feel anything (no feedback) in the world you are supposed to be in makes it illusion breaking.
- jobigoud 6y ago
  He is saying it's inevitable, not that it's there yet.
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tommilukkarinen 6y ago
It looks the consensus here is pretty much that anyone who tried the latest tech understands that we have went beyond a certain point here. Comparing to phones, I think this is the point where we have keypad-phones. Content is still limited, but using your imagination you can create good experiences. Personally, I switched to VR/Quest gaming from PC this autumn, and I feel good about it. I feel healthier than sitting in front of PC. I also feel less isolated with the family, as we have more 'playing together' now. As a developer, I'm exited to try out to create new kind of experiences, like I did 16 years ago with phone SDK's. If you think yourself as a creator, I think you feel a fool if you wait another ten years - seeing the times when a single person could do something meaningful, going past.
- dougmwne 6y ago
  I have watched a lot of products come and go. It's been quite a while since I saw a product and realized that it would not be silly to pivot my career to take advantage of the opportunity. VR is one of those things.
AntiImperialist 6y ago
I don't know about plays, novels or movies, but it's worth it just for the porn itself.
LockAndLol 6y ago
So many comments to yours are all sceptical and saying "never" a lot. Maybe in 20 years you'll be vindicated. I'm with you. It's surprising how much imagination people lack. It's like people who told me "humans will never fall I'm love with an artificial human". Lo and behold, that Chinese AI has 600M users. Now the discussion have moved to " they shouldn't " and then it will change to "I want one too". The same will happen with VR and AR.

inventtheday 6y ago

ya it's a slow burn, but I think the September '20 - September '21 period will end up seeing roughly the unit sales mentioned in their bet. Quest 2 is making a large impact.

an_opabinia 6y ago

> The thing is, I also recognize that while it is already an incredible achievement, it's still probably 5-20 years from hitting its iPhone moment. Ironically, by getting acquired by a giant company, Quest development was set back by that many years. The real problem isn't technology or even adoption, it's that people who work at giant companies suck at making games.

Impossible 6y ago
Microsoft has a good track record with making games, but yes all of FAANG is terrible at this. I have a little more hope for Facebook now that they've started acquiring studios and letting them run independently, instead of the previous combination of publishing\funding and having few internal game teams (which generally doesn't work in big tech anyway). This could lead to a model that looks more like Microsoft Game Studios.
- dougmwne 6y ago
  One of the best VR experiences out there was made by a single dev, Eleven Table Tennis. Most of what Facebook puts out there is mediocre tech demos and they don't seem to understand the strengths of their own platform enough to take advantage of them in their games.
- an_opabinia 6y ago
  > I have a little more hope for Facebook now that they've started acquiring studios and letting them run independently The reality is, the acquisition of best VR game of any objective measure, Beat Saber, set back VR for all game developers because it will rob other VR platforms of a doorbuster title (i.e. Beat Saber 2). Also, it enables Beat Games to keep using unlicensed music by fiat of Facebook's legal might, a completely unassailable competitive advantage that is strictly better than actually licensing the music and making a game with it. It is illustrative of how the things giant companies are good at, which is using their huge cash piles to achieve totally anti-competitive advantages, changes nothing for the status quo of the consumer - they don't pay for the music no matter who the game's owner is - but just winds up harming other game developers. Consider also Facebook Horizon is seeking to replace VR Chat, I believe the #1 free VR title by installs. How is that benefitting game developers and gaming culture? Just compare a screenshot of VR Chat here (1) to Facebook Horizon here (2), it tells you everything you need to know about why the kind of people who work at giant companies are awful at making games. It's so fucking sterile dude, and it's sterile on purpose. People have said this for eons about Disney, but it's not comparable. By the way, Disney also totally blundered Disney Interactive, shutting down under the CEO Bob Iger who was known as the "tech" CEO of Disney. (1) https://miro.medium.com/max/3840/1*I5c-QMDHVPeyC35pM1V4Ng.png https://miro.medium.com/max/3840/1*I5c-QMDHVPeyC35pM1V4Ng.pn... (2) https://cnet1.cbsistatic.com/img/9kGJANvUNFtxp5mGEgMIDI95DnA=/1200x675/2019/09/27/4bce2f4b-8d1f-4335-859c-5bd0a649728a/friends.png https://cnet1.cbsistatic.com/img/9kGJANvUNFtxp5mGEgMIDI95DnA...
  - Impossible 6y ago
    I worked on the Horizon team, and there's only so much I'm comfortable saying, but I can say the team burnt me out and I quit. There isn't a 100% chance that Beat Saber 2 will be exclusive, but you're right that it's likely and if that happens it will be a shame. My hope is that Facebook moving away from PC VR as a focus means they won't see it as competition, and start releasing previously exclusive games on Steam in the same way Microsoft and Sony have started releasing previously console exclusive titles, but I won't hold my breath.
dougmwne 6y ago
I'm not even sure we are at the compelling apps stage yet. I think there are still very difficult hardware and software platform issues to solve first that are going to take tons of basic research. I expect the first 100 million unit headset to include extremely accurate eye-tracking that is used to drive foveated rendering, varifocal active lenses and neural network interpolated facial expressions for high fidelity social avatars. Facebook Research seems to be making good progress on all of that, but it will still take many years of additional research to perfect. Facebook wants to be the company to invent the first mainstream VR Metaverse, but that doesn't mean they won't invent the hardware and get beaten to market on the software. They are about to release Horizons which is clearly in this vein, but I expect they are still too early.
_iyig 6y ago
> The real problem isn't technology or even adoption, it's that people who work at giant companies suck at making games. Many companies besides Facebook have developed games for the Quest. I guess you could say Facebook sucks at working with game developers, but I’m not sure if that’s true either. Unreal and Unity have well-developed integrations with Oculus [0]. I think where Facebook really falls down is tying customers’ FB account to their Oculus Store purchases (and ability to use the Quest at all). They’re applying a social media platform’s aggressive algorithms to suspend or ban accounts which violate their expansive TOS, which is wrong in consumer product and digital marketplace space. For that reason, mixed with personal experience at the hands of Facebook's algorithms, I have no interest in developing for Oculus. [0] https://developer.oculus.com/get-started/ https://developer.oculus.com/get-started/
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nomel 6y ago
> it's that people who work at giant companies suck at making games. I don't understand this statement. The Oculus store is open to developers and is filled with third party games. All of the games I personally play are not Oculus/Facebook games.
- fomine3 6y ago
  The store is available but its screening is a little strict (near to game console, rather than Play Store or Steam). Alternatively it seems that FB unofficially supports SideQuest.
  - nomel 6y ago
    > Alternatively it seems that FB unofficially supports SideQuest. They're actually opening support for off-store apps [1], but with some limitations: > Applications will have to meet the obligations of the Oculus Content Policy, but won’t be held to the same technical standards as official Oculus Store Apps. [1] https://www.roadtovr.com/oculus-quest-distribution-non-store-q1-2021/ https://www.roadtovr.com/oculus-quest-distribution-non-store...
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thebigman433 6y ago
> Ironically, by getting acquired by a giant company, Quest development was set back by that many years. What does this mean? We likely wouldnt even have a Quest (or really even a 3rd headset imo) from Oculus if not for Facebook. The Oculus founders were all almost completely about building high end enthusiast hardware, which wouldve almost surely made the market die off again.
whywhywhywhy 6y ago
FB mostly publishes games and what that have published include some excellent games. Lone Echo is probably the mostly complete example of a AAA quality VR title for years until HL:Alyx launched. Wouldn’t have been possible without a large enough company to bankroll it.

jnwatson 6y ago

Facebook's Quest 2 is an impressive piece of tech. One of the biggest reasons to be skeptical of VR taking off is that Facebook is one of the major players. Between the login shenanigans and their anti-competitive dealings with developers, they have an opportunity to single-handedly tank the industry.

outworlder 6y ago
It's the ONLY player on the "stand-alone" headset space. There's some competition on PC headsets, Rift headsets are not even the best, feature-wise. But just like the quest, they score very high on the cost-benefit analysis (I guess we pay with a combination of cash and data).
- jonny_eh 6y ago
  PSVR is somewhere in the middle but Sony has all but abandoned it at this point.
  - outworlder 6y ago
    Pretty underwhelming hardware too.
nitrogen 6y ago
I think Facebook is in VR because they don't want the Metaverse to belong to anybody but them.
- echelon 6y ago
  100%. Zuckerberg sees that it has the potential, and he wants to have an early angle of attack in case someone else innovates first. Zuckerberg views platforms as chess pieces. He doesn't care what they are - he just wants the most valuable and strategic ones. He's not like a Musk that just builds or a Cook that refines product into a cohesive vision. Zuckerberg is playing war and finding the reverse salients. He's destabilizing and weakening the platform and expanding his reach. He's more like Bezos or Ellison.

babyshake 6y ago

With everything happening with major movies going direct to streaming, I actually am expecting a big development somewhat related to VR in the next year or two. It's a device much smaller than a VR headset you wear on your face that gives you a theatrical quality audio-visual viewing experience, and only allows you to purchase/rent and not sideload anything. I'm thinking it could sell for around $500 and I'm pretty sure there's a company in Cupertino taking a close look at this.

dougmwne 6y ago
I have been watching movies on the Quest 2 with Big Screen. It's a great experience and very much reminds me of going to the theatre.
- ozten 6y ago
  No new titles - For me, their 3D movie catalog is exactly what it was 7 months ago. Doesn't seem like a thriving business...
aksss 6y ago
Hasn't Hammacher-Schlemmer been selling something like this for years? Lastest variation: https://www.hammacher.com/product/wearable-virtual-cinema https://www.hammacher.com/product/wearable-virtual-cinema

qznc 6y ago

Flying simulators seem make a comeback and they sound great for VR. MS Flight Simulator was well received. A colleague of mine praised Star Wars Squadrons as a great VR game.

fossuser 6y ago

The headsets are pretty cool - I’ve played with all of them except for the Valve Index. Though there’s something unpleasant about them that keeps me from going back when the novelty wears off. I think it might be because I don’t want to be standing and moving around when playing a game and if you’re not doing that, the motion is kind of unpleasant. I’m not sure this is something it can really overcome. I think an AR overlay of our actual world is more likely to be the next real platform (assuming the hardware is possible to pull off something like this). Being in VR is just kind of an unpleasant/isolating experience for me and I’m a pretty early adopter of most things. In other people I’ve mostly seen a small number of games (mostly beat saber) keep people coming back, but I haven’t seen most people keep using it once the novelty wears off outside of that. I think there are probably some narrow applications where it’s clearly better than not having it, but I’m skeptical of VR as a platform. Maybe when the hardware is 10x better/lighter it’ll be a difference experience? We are pretty early on in the medium, movies and tv were pretty bad for the first fifty years. It might just take a while for people to figure out how to use VR well.

noir_lord 6y ago
> I think it might be because I don’t want to be standing and moving around when playing a game and if you’re not doing that, the motion is kind of unpleasant. Project Cars 2 and DCS make it worth the headset alone - throw in Elite Dangerous and No Man Sky and I have enough VR entertainment to keep me busy for the foreseeable.
- StavrosK 6y ago
  For some reason, Elite Dangerous throws the graphics into low for me, no matter what settings I have. On the computer it looks great, whenever I put it on the Quest 2 it looks horribly pixelly. Even so, it's incredibly immersive, and if that problem gets fixed it's going to be amazing.
  - vrthrowaway2020 6y ago
    This review of E:D sold me on both the game and VR https://youtu.be/Fa0b2Kd2xhU https://youtu.be/Fa0b2Kd2xhU

ChildOfChaos 6y ago

i'm still on quest 1 and it's honestly amazing, it's a great workout for me, someone that is/was fairly unfit and hates exercise. Using FitXR and Beat saber (with some additional handles that add a bit of weight) really get my heart rate u p and feeling great and most of all I really enjoy it. It's amazing. I also enjoy watching movies in it as well, I don't watch a lot and was considering buying a TV but this has really delayed me doing so.

modzu 6y ago

yeah we can do one better with the holodeck. im not sure the problem is that much harder...

site-packages1 6y ago

I played with a really nicely Oculus set up the other day, it was totally amazing and immersive. In particular this was a racing sim, and when I was headed toward a wall I got the feeling like in a real car when you're about to hit something. It was very cool. Unfortunately, I lost my lunch after 5 minutes or so and had to lay in a dark room for a couple hours to get over a bout of nausea. Excited for the future though if they can solve that problem for people like me (I also get seasick easily).

teach 6y ago
I'm curious which Oculus headset you were using. All the ones that plug in to a PC are fairly underpowered even compared to the Oculus Quest 2. Nausea is heavily tied to framerate and latency -- a really beefy machine with a Valve Index should be a lot easier on your lunch.
dougmwne 6y ago
I'm not surprised you got nausea from a racing sim. It takes time to get your "VR legs" and anything with artificial locomotion is absolutely terrible for this. I started with about 2 weeks of games where the only movement was with my own two feet and the VR world always matched up to my real body movements. Then I was able to gradually handle more and more intense artificial movement. Jumping, heights, speed, and smooth turning are the worst of the bunch and still make me a bit uneasy if I overdo it. Jumping right into something with intense movement is going to program you brain to have a very negative association with VR and will take you backwards on VR acclimatization.
- hnick 6y ago
  I wonder if there is any hangover of this acclimation when going back to the real world? If you get immune to that feeling of danger when driving towards obstacles, will it show up in a real car? I know that personally I once binged GTA V hard over a week or so, and had to catch myself before I started driving on the wrong (right-hand) side of the road one day out of habit.
  - 6y ago

rainonmoon 6y ago

Given that VR requires an interface, it seems a stretch to say it's the "ultimate fulfilment" of entering another world. Before even getting to the philosophical inquiry about what would truly constitute an Us and its actual, for real entering of another world, that it's mediated by a big headset seems to put it still many iterations prior to its ultimate realisation.

brodie 6y ago
The real world has plenty of interfaces too. Surely VR will eventually approach the same level of seemingly physical interfaces as the distinction between the real and the virtual starts to break down.
dougmwne 6y ago
That is actually the magic moment I've had, tech without an interface. Or to put it another way, it has moments of seamlessly using the interface I was born into, natural kinesthetic movement and realistic physics.
Beaver117 6y ago
I said it 10 years ago and I'll say it again, putting a screen and lenses on your face is not "virtual reality". It's just a gimmick (although fun in it's own way). The real VR revolution will not come until we have true BCIs that can hijack and isolate your vision and all attempted actions. Neuralink is on the right track but not even close to working. We'll need 50 more years maybe.

aksss 6y ago

Predicting the future of technology isn't too hard, it's predicting the timing accurately that people tend to fail at. I don't have a lot of experience with all the headset variations, mostly Oculus and PS, but it's clear to me that we're still in a hype stage and the hardware has a long, long way to go. I'm guessing 10-20 years before it starts approaching what we're after.

zn44 6y ago

“ All entertainment since sung epic poetry has aimed to briefly take us into another world. ” Maybe it is just me but I can achieve perfectly satisfactory immersion with a good book.

dougmwne 6y ago
Fair point and I can as well. It takes a great book, time, a good atmosphere, a nice state of mind and the page can disappear and I enter that other world. The last book that did this to me was The City and the Stars and it was just incredible. But with VR you are instantly, automatically and with zero effort just THERE. The immersive pull is probably thousands of times stronger if you could quantify it by number of seconds till you stop caring about the real world.
- zn44 6y ago
  fair, maybe it's me getting old (and i'm only 32) but perspective of the slow immersion is more appealing. Taking the time to make your entire environment just perfect, with good music and some whisky is part of the enjoyment for a slow relaxing evening. But i guess it's just me there could be a market for instant immersion. I have second dev version of oculus at home, never used it much. I also went to a VR venue in London and it was great fun. From my perspective VR would work great in venues, as a night out alongside bowling, karake and similar options. I can't imagine using it reguralrly at home.
bvcvbuiy 6y ago
Also, the tech may enable wonders but the implementation may suck. If you have an amazing technology but the scenario of all the movies / games using this technology turn out to be the Nth version of the same story (like basically every movie on Netflix) then it is subpar compared to a book. I think a domain where it can exceptionally shine is the adult entertainment industry.

ska 6y ago

> If we lose sight of that, then it will be up to the next generation of technologists to create it. It's not clear this generation of technologists will be able to get there even keeping it in sight. Which isn't to say it's not worth plugging away at.

criddell 6y ago

I also was blown away by my first VR experience and convinced it was the future. It was when I played Dactyl Nightmare in 1992. Your second paragraph is compelling, except there are exceptions. Remember 3d tv? I think once the need for a headset is eliminated (like Star Trek's holodeck) it will take off. Until then, having to strap something over your face is asking too much. It's too isolating.

anonymouse008 6y ago
^ This a thousand times over. Everyone forgets VR has been 5-10 years away since the 1960s![0] You can't obstruct people's eyes - glasses get a pass because they're a handicap, and folks with sunglasses communicate by wearing them. We will need to live many more rounds of evolution to give up the idea that covering your eyes to 'go somewhere else' won't be a survivally threatening move... and what's more, we're just starting to fully appreciate how smells and air (quality, pressure, etc) play a role in 'us being there' - don't even begin to think about the small gravitational pull between all of our bodies at a concert. Long story short, it will take a long time and a lot of generations to die off before we appreciate VR as much as a physical experience. [0]https://virtualspeech.com/blog/history-of-vr https://virtualspeech.com/blog/history-of-vr

ohhnoodont 6y ago

I also recently got a Quest 2 and it's changed everything for me. I'm usually that jaded person but today's VR tech really has me gushing. This is the first time I've been truly excited about video games since I was a teenager 15 years ago (despite playing a lot of games in that time). The feeling of vertigo and momentum in games like Jet Island that makes you weak in the knees, looking out your cockpit and being awestruck by planets and stations in Star Wars Squadrons or Elite Dangerous, dodging bullets in Pistol Whip and Superhot. The dream of the 90's is alive - the technology is here! It's so good and I can't wait until quarantine is over to share this with more people. Previously I'd used a friend's Oculus DK1 (not good) and then later a friend's HTC Vive (getting there). The Quest 2 is a major improvement and I look forward to the next generation of headsets.

ben174 6y ago

While I agree with you, and am a HUGE fan of VR, the undeniable truth is these headsets collect dust after a week or two. Always. I've convinced a ton of my friends to buy one and they always end up with the same fate :(

swalsh 6y ago
I mean, I guess it depends. I have an Hour or 2 a week to game. For the past 4 years I've spent that exclusively in VR. I recently picked up some new pancake games, but I keep going back. The VR experience is so much more enjoyable to me.

m463 6y ago

I think you're right -- new technology is overestimated (overhyped) in the short term, and underestimated in the long term. I think of speech recognition over the years where the promise never met reality and then it quietly started answering most corporate phones. I have tried VR many times over the years (I vividly recall there was an interesting arcade game back around 1990 that used it). I got a vive. I tried others. But after using it for a while, I returned to a monitor and keyboard as my preferred way of interacting. There's still something sort of self-limiting/tiring about VR. Is it just me?

SulfurHexaFluri 6y ago
For me the kinds of games I mostly play do not translate well to VR. Or at least yet. But for stuff that does translate like shooters, its unreal how much better they are in VR.

LiquidSky 6y ago

>I am blown away and convinced it is the future. The thing is, I also recognize that while it is already an incredible achievement, it's still probably 5-20 years from hitting its iPhone moment. Except for the iPhone part, I bet this exact comment was made in 1991.

SulfurHexaFluri 6y ago

There will never be an iphone moment because its not a product useful to literally every person. Gaming consoles and PCs have not had an "iphone moment" after decades because their market is and always will be limited. I don't see why people are so obsessed with instant and explosive growth. Almost no recreational product has seen this kind of growth and they have all continued to exist just fine. VR is ready today if its something you want. Its fun, cheap enough and has loads of games. If you hold out for something better you will always be waiting because there will always be something much better in 5 years.

pbourke 6y ago
Isn’t gaming a larger industry than the movies, driven largely by consoles? Seems like gaming had its iPhone moment a generation ago. Edit: gaming is larger than the movie and music industries combined
- vtange 6y ago
  Yes it's true it's larger than books and movies, but games in the end just compete with other forms of media for customers' entertainment dollars. Unless we can come up with a use case for VR beyond gaming and fulfilling escapist fantasies. It will likely just be another contender for entertainment dollars. Smartphones on the other hand essentially made it possible to do anything a general desktop pc could do for people on the go without having to be tethered to a chair infront of a desk. Phones can be used for payment, notetaking, etc. There are people who use smartphones and don't play games at all.
  - jonas21 6y ago
    And the ultimate use case of VR is that you will be able to be "on the go" without ever leaving your chair -- in a form that's good enough that it doesn't feel inferior to being in person. It's sort of the inverse of the smartphone use case. Is it there yet? Of course not. But if/when it does get there... that's a much more compelling use case than a smartphone.
  - 6y ago

ekianjo 6y ago

I remember not too long ago when the Wii and the Kinect were supposed to be the future of gaming (they were hugely popular at some point) before everyone got sick of standing playing games and went back to their couches. Wondering if the same thing is not going to happen with VR as well.

ekianjo 6y ago

> let me tell you that this is an absolutely unstoppable evolution of computing. If that's the case, the sales are hardly convincing. If this was such a revolution you'd see more people buying them. Beyond head tracking and movement tracking, the fact that you cant feel anything (no feedback) in the world you are supposed to be in makes it illusion breaking.

jobigoud 6y ago
He is saying it's inevitable, not that it's there yet.

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tommilukkarinen 6y ago

It looks the consensus here is pretty much that anyone who tried the latest tech understands that we have went beyond a certain point here. Comparing to phones, I think this is the point where we have keypad-phones. Content is still limited, but using your imagination you can create good experiences. Personally, I switched to VR/Quest gaming from PC this autumn, and I feel good about it. I feel healthier than sitting in front of PC. I also feel less isolated with the family, as we have more 'playing together' now. As a developer, I'm exited to try out to create new kind of experiences, like I did 16 years ago with phone SDK's. If you think yourself as a creator, I think you feel a fool if you wait another ten years - seeing the times when a single person could do something meaningful, going past.

dougmwne 6y ago
I have watched a lot of products come and go. It's been quite a while since I saw a product and realized that it would not be silly to pivot my career to take advantage of the opportunity. VR is one of those things.

AntiImperialist 6y ago

I don't know about plays, novels or movies, but it's worth it just for the porn itself.

LockAndLol 6y ago

So many comments to yours are all sceptical and saying "never" a lot. Maybe in 20 years you'll be vindicated. I'm with you. It's surprising how much imagination people lack. It's like people who told me "humans will never fall I'm love with an artificial human". Lo and behold, that Chinese AI has 600M users. Now the discussion have moved to " they shouldn't " and then it will change to "I want one too". The same will happen with VR and AR.