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Why is Apple asleep at the wheel with VR?

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Re: Why is Apple asleep at the wheel with VR?

#2
Personally I don't care much for VR in general. It's more like the new opium for the masses once it's affordable. While VR promotes escaping in virtual realities (hence, the name), Apple is looking for ways to improve your actual world with it's products (no marketing intended). This is where AR will matter, not VR. Google kinda pioneered here with Glass, Apple gave it a shot with it's wearable devive (watch), and I'm super excited what will come next!

Alone glasses that don't suck visually (people shouldn't notice the difference from a distance) and an all-day-battery-life would be features I'd spend $1000 upwards on, just because.

Re: Why is Apple asleep at the wheel with VR?

#3
Apple doesn't innovate. It combines proven technologies into polished products.

When VR has proven itself, with R&D investments of other companies, Apple will release a near-perfect refinement of all things VR and everyone will hail them as the savior who brought VR to the world.

Re: Why is Apple asleep at the wheel with VR?

#5
"I’m willing to bet there is a high stress team in the basement of Apple working on an End to End VR solution but it could be years before it sees the light of day."

Sure, that sucks for developers and us on the bleeding edge, but it doesn't hurt Apple one bit. At the most optimistic, it'll take 2-3 years for VR to become mainstream, and as long as Apple comes out with a polished Apple-like solution by then, they won't miss out on the market. If their offering is compelling then content will be ported to it.

If they wait much longer than 2-3 years competing solutions may achieve critical mass.

At this point, releasing any solution before nVidia's Pascal and/or AMD's Arctic Islands is available would be just silly. Maybe we'll see something in September.

Re: Why is Apple asleep at the wheel with VR?

#6
VR is not yet 'here' and is not currently delivering, but it is promising a lot.

The form factor alone has challenges which the public will not be willing to sacrifice for the experience, which could turn out to be mostly a gimmick. Some things people don't think about;

-) looking at your keyboard/input device whilst wearing a VR headset

-) being the same room as other people for prolonged periods of time with a headset

-) sharing experiences with other people close to you

-) what are you going to experience on VR, that needs VR so bad? Who is going to pay/develop and what is this content going to be... can it actually deliver, making good immersive software is incredibly hard.

-) and then cost...

Re: Why is Apple asleep at the wheel with VR?

#7
post #6

VR is not yet 'here' and is not currently delivering, but it is promising a lot. The form factor alone has challenges which the public will not be willing to sacrifice for the experience, which could turn out to be mostly a gimmick. Some things people don't think about; -) looking at your keyboard/input device whilst wearing a VR headset -) being the same room as other people for prolonged periods of time with a head…

What are you going to experience on VR, that needs VR so bad?

Elite: Dangerous. DiRT Rally. Minecraft. Movies, and interestingly, documentaries. These are all currently available.

Further down the line, VR will replace multi-screen setups. As a developer I'm very excited to code in a VR IDE.

Re: Why is Apple asleep at the wheel with VR?

#9
post #6

VR is not yet 'here' and is not currently delivering, but it is promising a lot. The form factor alone has challenges which the public will not be willing to sacrifice for the experience, which could turn out to be mostly a gimmick. Some things people don't think about; -) looking at your keyboard/input device whilst wearing a VR headset -) being the same room as other people for prolonged periods of time with a head…

what VR dev kits have you tried?

the HTC Vive and Oculus don't come out until next month.

Re: Why is Apple asleep at the wheel with VR?

#10
post #6

VR is not yet 'here' and is not currently delivering, but it is promising a lot. The form factor alone has challenges which the public will not be willing to sacrifice for the experience, which could turn out to be mostly a gimmick. Some things people don't think about; -) looking at your keyboard/input device whilst wearing a VR headset -) being the same room as other people for prolonged periods of time with a head…

I don't want to feel like there is a brick strapped to my head.
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