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I've Been Waiting For The Oculus Rift, But Now It's Sitting In My Closet

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Re: I've Been Waiting For The Oculus Rift, But Now It's Sitting In My Closet

#81

Post by newhouseb »

To me, the most exciting thing about VR (particularly on the Vive) is not anything gaming related but the possibilities around creation and collaboration that are opened up by being able to program in "the real world." If you've played with Tiltbrush at all you can see a glimpse of this. Your brain's implicit understanding of your presence in 3D space is incredibly vital to understanding the shapes and structure that you see with your eyes. You can imagine many design fields: fashion, furniture, architecture, etc can all have a dramatically reduced leap between conceptualization and realization.

A lot of people are quick to dismiss VR and present AR as the future, but I think a more constructive way to think about it is that VR is AR without the walls punched out (yet). Realistically, we all spend the majority of our lives in a couple rooms (an office and a bedroom), so by moving to AR the largest benefit is going to be comfort. So many potential new interactions are ripe for exploring today, even in VR (not to mention the Vive has a front-facing camera anyway, although the latency can be a bit nauseating).

Re: I've Been Waiting For The Oculus Rift, But Now It's Sitting In My Closet

#82

Post by vectorpush »

I think the problem isn't so much that the tech isn't ready, it's simply that the software is immature. Everyone has been rushing hard to get this tech out the door, but software developers haven't really had time to produce much beyond "app-store" quality content which tends to lack lasting replay value. We all know it takes a lot of time to produce high quality software and there is still a lot of experimentation that needs to happen before developers lock onto the techniques that provide the optimal experience.

People aren't going to keep putting on their headset just to look at tech demos, they're going to keep coming back to experience the well designed, super fun, highly addictive title that they've been playing obsessively, just like on every other platform.

Re: I've Been Waiting For The Oculus Rift, But Now It's Sitting In My Closet

#83

Post by SystemOut »

I have to agree with most, if not all, of what this article is saying. Some friends of mine brought over their gaming rig and the Vive over. My kids loved it, it was pretty cool and all but there is no way I'm spending 2K to buy a gaming PC and the Vive. On top of that, you need a 3m by 4m room to play the better games so anytime I want to play I have to clear out a room in the house or dedicate it basically. For a game system? No.

For this to go big, and eventually I think it will, you need the headset to be wireless, the goggles have to be lighter, and the video card necessary to power the thing needs to be an appliance. I'm guessing once the consoles can handle it we might see more traction.

I also would like to see the hand controllers something more along the lines of a set of light weight gloves or something that allows finger and gesture tracking. Basically, Minority Report. When I was playing hollow point and budget cuts on the vive I really wanted something like that.

Re: I've Been Waiting For The Oculus Rift, But Now It's Sitting In My Closet

#84

Post by kranner »

visarga wrote: post #62
kranner wrote: post #20

It's especially a problem if you live in a hot and humid climate like I do. No matter what I did I could not prevent the lenses from fogging over and I tried everything from antifog sprays for ski masks to stuffing paper towels into the sides of the headset. The steamy, foggy, bad-smelling experience contributes as much to the nausea, or at least it exacerbates it in my experience.

Perhaps it needs active ventilation.

Forgot to mention that I tried that as well with a USB fan.

Something like this one: http://n4.sdlcdn.com/imgs/b/u/4/198x232/Persona-Portable-Min...

But yes, an in-built fan (if it weren't too noisy) should help a lot.

Re: I've Been Waiting For The Oculus Rift, But Now It's Sitting In My Closet

#85

Post by [deleted] »

startling wrote: post #79
reustle wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I agree, moving your head around all the time to look at things does get really tiring after a while Is this really the day and age we live in where needing to mov e your head around is considered a con? You move your head around all the time while walking around, driving, etc and nobody complains about that

generally you move your whole body, at least a little bit, when you move your head, though.

[deleted]

Re: I've Been Waiting For The Oculus Rift, But Now It's Sitting In My Closet

#86

Post by EdHominem »

argonaut wrote: post #54
sillysaurus3 wrote: post #5

Apparently I can't read this article due to using adblock. Neither visiting the article nor the "web" workaround work. http://i.imgur.com/8LN6ec0r.png Fascinating. I wonder what the web will look like in a decade. On-topic: I was one of the original backers of Oculus, but missed the opportunity to get a free Rift. I guess it didn't matter much. It seems like what happened to the Oculus is what happened to many platfo…

I thought this Sam Altman tweet is relevant: "not enough of us are willing to pay for news, so we get the click-bait ad-driven news we deserve." ( https://twitter.com/sama/status/736579483923156992 ). It comes off (in tone) as a bit entitled when I see people complaining about how they aren't able to view free (free!) ad-supported content for free because they are using an adblocker. I use ad block. I recognize that…

Ad-filled and ad-funded, news isn't news. It's corporate pandering with some external content.

As long as we're at this local maxima, with crap crowding out quality, news can never improve and will never be worth paying for.

Re: I've Been Waiting For The Oculus Rift, But Now It's Sitting In My Closet

#87

Post by bencoder »

Viper007Bond wrote: post #39

Honestly the only reason I'm excited to get one is for racing simulators. Rather than trying to sit close to a big TV or having multiple displays, you can just use one of these for the immersion. Plus you can look around like you would in a real car. Great example (with a bit of augmented reality via green screen mixed in): https://youtu.be/LlFKjWGxZqk

Yeah, I use my DK2 pretty much solely for a flight simulator (FSX with Flyinside).

I'm learning to fly in real life and it turns FSX into a realistic way of training for GA flying, rather than only instrument procedures - being able to look around out the windows makes all the difference.

Re: I've Been Waiting For The Oculus Rift, But Now It's Sitting In My Closet

#88

Post by creed »

I think the fact that we don't know how to use any of this at the moment just shows how new and game changing this all is.

You can't just copy/paste any of the old stuff onto this new medium, it just doesn't work that way and you certainly cannot compare this to 3D tv/cinema...

..and I think the people that got hyped the most also completely underastimated the tectonic shift needed in order to make any of this really entertaining.

I think of the "visual" component of the VR problem as solved and am now looking forward to seeing how the "interactive" component of the problem will be solved. Because you need to perceive the world, check, but now you need to be able to interact with it: not solved yet.

But people got waaaay to excited seeing only the visual aspect solved...

Re: I've Been Waiting For The Oculus Rift, But Now It's Sitting In My Closet

#89

Post by onewaystreet »

bunkydoo wrote: post #51

VR is going to be somewhat like the advent of the 3D television in 2010-ish. Every manufacturer will make one, few people will buy one, and the people who do will likely only use it on novelty occasions. VR is really only a stepping stone to augmented reality, and mixed reality mobile operating systems. On a side note Oculus and WhatsApp seem to be some of the dumbest expenditures Facebook could have ever made. 13 bi…

> On a side note Oculus and WhatsApp seem to be some of the dumbest expenditures Facebook could have ever made. 13 billion dollars for a messaging app.

Since being acquired by Facebook WhatsApp has doubled its active user base to over a billion users. If it was in the hands of Google right now it would be considered a very real threat to Facebook. I'd call preventing that one of the smartest expenditures Facebook has made.

Re: I've Been Waiting For The Oculus Rift, But Now It's Sitting In My Closet

#90

Post by jobigoud »

visarga wrote: post #59
darkrabbi wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In a similar boat but at the same time I haven't pulled my VIVE out in almost a week now - when I think about why it's because 1) the hassle of getting the headset on comfortably 2) lack of new and interesting software/games to try. Will come with time, comfortable lightweight HMD + good telepresence apps will be the breaking point for this tech imo

Is there an app to walk on street view? That would be a compelling use case.

Street view images are fixed viewpoint and low resolution.
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