Opinion: The Future of VR - Stand-alone headsets (?)

I have recently been interested in getting into VR but it seems there are still not quite good enough devices out there to make it worth it. Valve’s Index seems the most promising technologically, with really nice displays and high refresh rates. Still, there seem to be some major problems. One being the insane price tag, and another one being teathered to your pc.
I don’t think this is an issue when playing games that have you sit down and use other peripherals on you pc/console, like racing or simulation, but when playing actual VR games that are roomscale and have you stand up and move around, actually using the VR controllers and tracking not just your head movement but your whole body, it becomes a problem for me.

So in the end the only VR headset I would consider for actual VR gaming is the Oculus Quest. Major problems with that begin with it being facebook, and not really powerful enough to run most games at high quality settings.
As a concept however, it’s just what I think we need VR to be. Basically a wearable console with it’s own ecosystem, no need for anything else.

I think we need manufacturers to start treating VR as a new gaming platform and not just another peripheral for your pc or console, and start developing the technology to make it better and more powerful to open up even more potential. Would be great to see AMD/Intel/Nvidia develop specific hardware for use in a VR headset too.

Looking up other stand-alone headsets it looks like they are primarily being developed for the enterprise and are even more expensive than the index.
I do believe there will be more consumer level gear in the future as well, since I think facebook/oculus has pretty much dropped the teathered headsets now.
I really hope other vendors will start making stand-alone headsets for consumers as well. Especially Valve should make one, utilizing their own steam VR and store etc. where most gamers are already using that ecosystem.

What do you think, what would it take for you to adopt VR? Are you already on VR? What’s your experience?

See that’s the issue. What you are describing is massive misuse of the VR system.
Allow me to elaborate: VR is a peripheral. It should be used as a peripheral. The entire “stand up, walk around, kick a table you didn’t see because you had 3kg of technology covering your vision but yet ask you to stand and walk around, barely stable location system, that makes the picture shake constantly”… No. The correct way to use VR IS supposed to be while you are sitting, holding a controller really or clutching a racing wheel or flight stick… But no, let’s make a bunch of horror games that ask you to stand up, walk around, dedicate an entire room to it, etc…
That’s what I think. That’s also the main reason VR is nowhere at the moment. And HalfLife will not help it. You still need an entire bloody room and standing up with all the cords around your neck and the controllers on your hands and you wave and there goes the chandelier…

Ignoring the price, because it basically always gonna be fairly high, it would take a super cool game on VR… What made me buy PSP? Patapon 2. My favorite game ever. Super fun…
What made me want to buy a WiiU? The Wonderful 101 and Bayonetta 2…
VR needs a killer game, but you can’t have a killer game, when you ask people for a separate room, powerful PC, physical ability, because like it or not, when I come home from work I want to sit on my chair and play a game, not jump around with 5kg of technology on my body…

VR is massively misused and I am very sad about it.

Is it sad this is still any sort of criteria? The humanity should just stop caring about that. There are so many examples of low fidelity great games and super high fidelity garbage games… Yet people still ask for higher fidelity…

I agree with you in that VR still has it’s place as a peripheral, and always will, because driving in VR for example is just really amazing.
I also think that VR offers a completely new way of playing games and it is not being misused in roomscale experiences. I can’t even imagine playing something like superhot VR sitting down with regular controllers, yet it doesn’t really require any athletisism to play standing up and have a lot of fun, either.
The biggest problem with it now would be the stupid cables hanging out or too low fps and/or resolution image on the quest to be comfortable.

But anyway there is definitely two different use cases that both need to be filled, imo. Also VR will never replace the traditional games for me. It’s just a completely different way of playing, or in the right use case, a major enhancement to the experience.

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Oh no, not at all… It’s prohibitive, that is the main issue with it.
The fact, that you need time and effort to set it up, you need extra space dedicated pretty much to that alone - that is it’s main issue. People spend thousands of dollars on GPUs, they won’t mind spending some on a headset. But it’s heavy, bulky and massively restrictive.
Maybe you enjoy that aspect of it, but that is the thing that holds it back - the space and time requirement.

Yes, and the truth is, one already is - you can play Elite Dangerous or a driving game or something perfectly fine… OMG I would love to play Euro Truck with one of those. Yet people keep making and boasting about standing up flailing games instead of focusing on making a killer game and helping VR booming.
IDK, I am massively against that whole room scale style of gameplay… Inconvenient and messy…

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