Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Valve drops VR support for macOS

techcrunch.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

221–230 of 287 posts

Re: Valve drops VR support for macOS

#221

Post by baby »

ashtonkem wrote: post #19

I remain skeptical of the long term viability of VR; I’m old enough to remember when 3D TVs and monitors were going to change the face of both TV and video games, and yet here we are. I priced out VR recently and I was unimpressed with the price per value available, with most systems adding $500-$1,000 to my gaming system’s cost, and some requiring that I modify my room to work properly. And that’s not even accountin…

The Oculus Quest is 400$, an amazing technology, and constantly out of stock. I'm pretty optimistic for VR.

Re: Valve drops VR support for macOS

#222

Post by baby »

wpietri wrote: post #134
soneca wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I never heard anyone really passionately speak about the 3D experience. It was always marketing speech with movie-goers sometimes buying into the expectation. But after experiencing it, no one ever was really passionate about it. At most they would slightly prefer, and even so I think it was because the confounding factor that 3D sessions are also played in the largest screens and the best sound system. But for VR? I…

Unfortunately, I don't think it can be a niche forever, assuming it's a gaming platform. As we see from game developers in this thread, a platform with a too-small audience is uneconomical. That's true even when the platforms are as similar as Windows and Mac. It'll be way more true given that VR is a very different experience. Apparently Quest sales figures aren't public, but I see estimates that they sold a million…

Dude, Half Life just came out on VR. It's not a niche anymore.

Re: Valve drops VR support for macOS

#223

Post by ashtonkem »

speedgoose wrote: post #149
ashtonkem wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’m not floating that much money to try a game, and I’m unaware of anyone in my social circles who owns any level of headset. “Go spend a few hundred to prove the value” is a hard sell.

So you haven't tried VR?

I tried it years ago, and I thought it was a cute tech demo with zero replay value.

Re: Valve drops VR support for macOS

#224

Post by baby »

Fiezah7e wrote: post #198
ashtonkem wrote: post #19

I remain skeptical of the long term viability of VR; I’m old enough to remember when 3D TVs and monitors were going to change the face of both TV and video games, and yet here we are. I priced out VR recently and I was unimpressed with the price per value available, with most systems adding $500-$1,000 to my gaming system’s cost, and some requiring that I modify my room to work properly. And that’s not even accountin…

I've been owning a VR headset (a htc vive) for more than a year, now, and I concur with other comments : it's something else, and I think the only reason it's not taking over is the high price tag for a setup. That being said, I use my VR headset probably even less than my 3d printer. As mindblowing as it is when I put the headset on (and truly, it never gets old), I realized it's just not for me. I usually play game…

I think VR is for everyone, like any medium, it's just that you haven't found a game/app that makes you come back.

For me it's the multiplayer games that I like, more of my friends are getting VR headsets right now and I suspect that as more of them get into it the more we'll end up playing VR together.

Re: Valve drops VR support for macOS

#225

Post by baby »

tonygrue wrote: post #4
baby wrote: post #2

I don't understand why a Mac is such a bad platform for gaming, what is the technical challenge here? Can someone enlighten me?

As the article alludes, lack of a build your own, flexible yet affordable desktop option seems to be a pretty deadly aspect. Pretty much Mac owners are on laptops. Even in the PC world few laptops can power VR. Those that do tend to be bulky for cooling and have nVidia GPUs; both things which MacBooks seem unwilling to have. Having a extensible desktop at 1k that supports nVidia would probably go a long way.

That doesn't convince me, I use to run windows with bootcamp on a macbook pro and play there. It worked.

Re: Valve drops VR support for macOS

#226

Post by ashtonkem »

chaostheory wrote: post #127
ashtonkem wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Obviously I have not tried beat saber. If it’s that amazing, I wouldn’t be posting cynical takes on VR. I think one of the problems of VR is one of cost and credibility. Even if I knew you personally and trusted you, there is no way in hell I’m going to float thousands of dollars getting a new gaming PC, VR headset, and customizing my room for the full setup just because someone said it’s amazing. The risk/reward rat…

It's funny that you're making a really strong assumption about something that you've never even tried. You can get $2xx.xx Microsoft backed WMR VR headsets new. Facebook's all inclusive Oculus Quest is $400 new. ymmv but I've been able to buy used VR systems like the Vive Pro for $375 on ebay. Just to use them for either driving or flying simulators, VR is already worth it. That said, there's still plenty to complain…

You’ve got it backwards. One must make a strong argument for spending hundreds on something with uncertain value, not make an argument against spending the money. Basic prudence says that items of uncertain value should be weighted less strongly, and receive fewer resources.

Re: Valve drops VR support for macOS

#227

Post by baby »

Taek wrote: post #197
013a wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I will proselytize Beat Saber until the day I die. I have played hundreds of hours of video games in 2020, which reflects the time spent since I was 8 playing Donkey Kong on the Super Nintendo. After writing this, I'm probably going to jump into some FF7R. In the morning, I'm going to log into Animal Crossing and do some chores around the island. Beat Saber is the most fun game I have ever played. No qualifiers. No s…

Games that do a good job of keeping the arcade format are a lot more immersive. Fact is, VR today can only put you in a single room. So the entire game needs to be build around that constraint to maintain immersion. Space Pirate Trainer is another game that did a really good job of this. Before Beat Saber, that was easily my favorite, though wow Beat Saber is _so good_. Blarp is another game that did a great job of i…

> So the entire game needs to be build around that constraint to maintain immersion

I haven't tried the new Half Life, so I'm wondering if you're right.

Re: Valve drops VR support for macOS

#228

Post by ashtonkem »

erikbye wrote: post #195
wpietri wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have tried Beat Saber. I rented an Oculus Quest for a couple of weeks over Christmas. Several things, Beat Saber included, were really impressive at first, but the thrill quickly wore off. The kids quickly went back to playing their PS4 and Switch games, and never even mentioned the Quest after it was gone. My basic take is that the technology is really impressive; I agree with proponents that the Quest finally nai…

> but the thrill quickly wore off. The kids quickly went back to playing their PS4 and Switch games, and never even mentioned the Quest after it was gone. Same experience (Vive Pro) with niece, nephew and their friends. They tried Beat Saber and all other age-appropriate VR games. After those few times, not once did they ask to try again. They would much rather play Fortnite and The Sims, with a mouse and keyboard.

That’s fascinating. I would totally be willing to accept that I’m on the other side of a generational divide over VR, and that I’m now too old to “get” new stuff like that. But with kids these days (heh) finding low replay value in VR, my thesis might be closer to the money than I thought.

Re: Valve drops VR support for macOS

#229

Post by ascom »

mekanicalsyncop wrote: post #182
ComputerGuru wrote: post #161

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don’t think you understand what raw input means. It doesn’t mean telling the OS you don’t want it to mess with your input, it means bypassing the userland OS input framework entirely and grabbing the input at a lower level preventing the default OS stack from even processing those input events. A well-designed game would do that, anyway. I wouldn’t be surprised if the counter strike port for macOS doesn’t qualify a…

I understand what it means. There's an option in CS and it doesn't seem to actually do anything on Mac OS. Its one of the most popular games ever created and unlike many AAA devs Valve is still actually really good at what they do. If they can't get it right on a Mac it doesn't inspire much confidence that its an acceptable gaming platform. Can you name an online FPS with a decent sized community with proper raw inpu…

GeForce NOW seemed to handle raw input correctly when I tested it on macOS. Though that's more of a game streaming thing.

Regarding Apple's mice, the Magic Mouse has a rather unusual polling rate of 90 Hz (likely to save energy), which probably explains why it feels awful to use.

Re: Valve drops VR support for macOS

#230

Post by wpietri »

baby wrote: post #222
wpietri wrote: post #134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unfortunately, I don't think it can be a niche forever, assuming it's a gaming platform. As we see from game developers in this thread, a platform with a too-small audience is uneconomical. That's true even when the platforms are as similar as Windows and Mac. It'll be way more true given that VR is a very different experience. Apparently Quest sales figures aren't public, but I see estimates that they sold a million…

Dude, Half Life just came out on VR. It's not a niche anymore.

That doesn't prove it's not a niche, dude.

Valve, like a lot of other companies, hopes that VR will become a thing, so they're making a headset. Because they'd like to sell headsets, they took a major property and made a VR version. If they lose money on their VR version of Half Life, they're fine with that.

Some game makers will surely try VR versions as well. This could be a big wave, and they want to be ready, so it's ok to lose money. But if unit sales aren't there, they're not going to keep doing it. In which case, things could well end up just like every other attempt at VR going back to Nintendo's 1995 effort. Or like the various waves of 3D movies and TV, where everybody's really excited for a hot minute and then people stop caring.

Post reply on HN