So VR is only a niche uh?
- Thread starter VR SenseiMatty
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I agree, some of the best gaming experiences I’ve had have been in the last two years since getting a Rift and, more recently, Rift S.
Elite Dangerous, SkyrimVR, Lone Echo, Subnautica, Doom3 mod, Alien Isolation mod. There are also a whole host of “experiences” or shorter games that have left a massive impression, like Aircar, Vader Immortal, the free ISS interactive tour, even Google Earth etc.
I think the “enthusiast” level VR stuff (by which I mean headsets that plug into a PC) will remain niche due to cost and hardware requirements, but I can see stand-alone units like the Quest being the breakout vector. Family and friends who’ve tried my set up have been massively impressed, but that was it. Those who’ve tried my friend’s Quest, playing Vader Immortal and Beat Saber, have said they’re now saving up to buy one!
Are high end GPUs niche? How about 4K monitors? HOTAS controllers?
People used to swear blind that VR would tank. It didn’t, you were all wrong, get over it.
People used to swear blind that VR would tank. It didn’t, you were all wrong, get over it.
Absolutely, i'm at the latter (very) end of my 40's and have been 'gaming' all my life, Imo - VR is without a shadow of a doubt the biggest leap forward since the 3DFX graphics card.
Being in there, surrounded by the environment of the game is stunning. Even a simple puzzle platformer, my least favourite game genre, like Moss had me enthralled.
Sure, VR is not going to be for everyone, there are times when it's not for me, the hot evenings we have been having lately, no chance am I putting that on my face! But when i've got the time to game, when I want to be IN my ship, then there is no comparison.
My only concern is that developers, and in this case FD specifically, realise how important ED in VR is for many people. I really hope the big 2020 update incorporates VR in the same way as it does now, if not improves on it, and it doesn't get borked because, well, VR is all a bit niche really innit!?
It’s certainly a niche within gaming at the moment and I suspect for some time yet. Once costs, financial and graphical power, come down plus portability and manoeuvrability improve I can only see the number of users begin to go up substantially - admittedly assuming that alongside those improvements we receive the expected improvements in resolution and field of view but these are aspects already showing incremental progress as new headsets are released.
My biggest hopes for VR gaming actually come from the hugely impressive work that VR is allowing various other industries to accomplish. With the likes of architects and designers benefitting hugely from VR I don’t see it as something that will dissolve away, with the hugely impressive work surgeons are able to perform thanks to VR (amongst other technologies such as 3D printing, also derided for a while early on) I believe it’s future is all but guaranteed. Whether that translates to gaming will come down to accessibility and that means price and ease of use for the majority of people in my opinion.
If you haven’t heard about the story of conjoined twins Safa and Marwa and the use of VR it’s well worth a Google. Just one amongst many fascinating stories.
My biggest hopes for VR gaming actually come from the hugely impressive work that VR is allowing various other industries to accomplish. With the likes of architects and designers benefitting hugely from VR I don’t see it as something that will dissolve away, with the hugely impressive work surgeons are able to perform thanks to VR (amongst other technologies such as 3D printing, also derided for a while early on) I believe it’s future is all but guaranteed. Whether that translates to gaming will come down to accessibility and that means price and ease of use for the majority of people in my opinion.
If you haven’t heard about the story of conjoined twins Safa and Marwa and the use of VR it’s well worth a Google. Just one amongst many fascinating stories.
Same, I’m just into the last third of my 40’s and stepping into VR was one of my gaming paradigm shift moments - I really wasn’t prepared for my brain being fooled so readily into thinking I was in a place. In Skyrim and Elite I still sometimes have to take a moment to stop and stare; I’m really glad I’ve never lost the “wow” factor.
As for the 2020 update, I’m hoping VR at least works, but à la previous updates I’m fully expecting it to (at least initially) work in one eye only
Are high end graphics cards a niche product?
I’m not sure what your point is.
Do you mean that most gamers, even fairly casual, have high end graphics cards? Or that high end graphics cards were once considered niche but are now commonplace? I’m not sure anything I wrote contradicts either of those which leaves me scrabbling for the meaning of your comment.
Either way I’m not sure possession of a high end graphics card is enough to persuade everyone to get into VR.
It’s late here so perhaps I’m missing the obvious but to be clear, if my post wasn’t, I’m a VR convert - I love it and am blown away by the applications it can be used for.
What's the big deal? Both VR and high end GFX cards are niche. So are HOTAS, head trackers, and just about anything to do with gaming computers, including the computer. It doesn't mean it's a bad thing. You can make a lot of money selling into niche markets. I've worked for a company selling a niche product for 30 years. We've probably shipped less than 250,000 units. And that's a lot compared to something like indoor golf simulators. But I believe that given time, VR, in whatever form, is destined to be as common as cellphones today. But for now, selling in the millions, rather than hundreds of millions, is still nothing to stick up your nose at.
And earlier adopters are about as diametrically opposed to lemming behavior as you can get. People buying new cellphones every year is behaving like lemmings.
Anyway, I'm more interested in No Man's Sky being released in VR. If that happens, I'll probably finally give it a shot, while waiting for the big ED upgrade.
And earlier adopters are about as diametrically opposed to lemming behavior as you can get. People buying new cellphones every year is behaving like lemmings.
Anyway, I'm more interested in No Man's Sky being released in VR. If that happens, I'll probably finally give it a shot, while waiting for the big ED upgrade.
It’s a very simple question with two possible answers.
Yes. And no.
And once again, people just can't admit that VR is here to stay. It's even driving GPU development as well as other hardware. I just don't understand why some of you people want to write off VR. In VR you actually sit in a ship, unlike your rather silly monitor setups that are like wittle pixie windows into a miniature world.
There's a saying in the VR sim racing world, 'don't race with triple cripples, they can't judge speed and distance'
That 4k monitor you bought, that feeling you have about VR, it's just buyer's remorse. You bought a donkey.
Have you tried pointing a small desk fan at your face?
This is what we ultimately need -
IMHO VR is a niche only for a matter of costs.
People that don't use it because they don't like it are just liars. I can understand instead people that got issues (motion sickness).
I completely disagree with David Braben when he said that it's anti-social, because when you play it you are isolated from other people in the same room. I mean... even when I'm not playing in VR I stay isolated and my wife for sure don't like spending her free time watching me playing!
This is absolutely ridiculous! 
People that don't use it because they don't like it are just liars. I can understand instead people that got issues (motion sickness).
I completely disagree with David Braben when he said that it's anti-social, because when you play it you are isolated from other people in the same room. I mean... even when I'm not playing in VR I stay isolated and my wife for sure don't like spending her free time watching me playing!
This is absolutely ridiculous! No, we need Sleeping VR, so we can play in VR while sleeping.. Quite sure all kids around the world would not complain to go to bed anymore!
And since in dreams time runs slower than in reality because our mind is much faster, I could play Elite Dangerous for days every night!
I tend to stumble into every next niche
(could have thought that this is a closed society, as that's symptomatic for all 'niches')
i would have doubleliked this comment if the last sentence were in the now customary small font.
that's still primitive. why go through actual biological eyes and other unreliable and bandwidth limiting pathways? lots of incompatibilities there! just jack directly into the visual cortex.
what niche of the niche? (joke)
the current strongest bet in vr are autonomous devices. cost there is already way down but not yet quite enough as in, e.g., e-books. there are still unsolved challenges for massive adoption other than cost. and i'm a fan of high-end vr gaming. but for every day use for all sorts of menial tasks? there's still a long way to go before talking about costs. if you ask me, from an interface and usability point of view mixed reality devices should get there first.
that's my just made up opinion!
