Oculus Rift, HTV Vive And PSVR: Which VR Headset Should You Buy?

We stand at the very precipice of a new era of VR. The Oculus Rift launches on Monday, with the HTC Vive not too far behind and Playstation VR for PS4 waiting in the wings. It’s an exciting moment, but even if you’ve already decided you’re ready to make the plunge into a series of strange, infinite realities, you’ve still got a choice ahead of you. Which of the three major competitors do you want to go with? All three have their advantages, all three have their weaknesses. All three are, at the end of the day, more similar than not, but it’s still a big decision. Here are some pointers to help you along:

Oculus Rift: The first question you have to ask yourself about the Oculus Rift is: do I have a PC that meets these minimum requirements?  If the answer is no, be prepared to shell out a good deal of extra cash to buy a PC that can handle the thing, or to buy one of the Oculus Ready bundles out there that come with the headset and a PC — the cheapest available is ASUS’s $949 option. With that out of the way, the Oculus comes with several big advantages. It’s been the most talked about headset, it’s coming to market first, and it’s likely going to have a large install base than the more expensive HTC Vive. Combine that with flexibility and openness that comes with the Windows platform, and you’re bound to have the widest array of software and games of any of these three headsets. That’s a big deal, especially because nobody knows where the next great VR application is going to come from.

It’s missing a great control solution right now, however. Vive has its wands and PSVR has move, but the Oculus touch controllers don’t have a release date yet, and so you’ll more likely than not be playing the Xbox One gamepad. It limits the sort of immersion you can get, even if this is a problem that will be fixed eventually.

HTC Vive: Same question as the Oculus Rift, only different specs. The HTC Vive is the most expensive option of all three of these, because of the headset, the PC, and the fact that you’ll need a decent amount of space dedicated to it. The Vive is the only system to use full body tracking, which, combined with Valve’s excellent wand controllers, creates the most complete immersion of any of these three options. The Vive is the high end option of these three, with all of the attendant concerns that come along with that. If you want to pay the money, you can get the best feeling VR headset available.

Vive is bound to have a smaller install base than the Oculus Rift, which more likely than not will mean fewer, less varied games. That might not be a problem — you only need a couple great ones, after all — but the Rift is still probably going to win in terms of sheer variety. The Vive also has some of the best multiplayer experiences I’ve played in VR yet. So if money is no object and you want to set up the ultimate VR game room, the Vive is your best bet.

image credit: Sony

Playstation VR: You ask yourself a slightly different question here: do I have a PS4? Statistically speaking, your answer is more likely to be yes. And even if you don’t, you can pick one up for $350. PSVR is by far the most approachable of these three options, and it’s more than good enough to provide that “wow” moment when you first put on the headset. If you’re interested in VR but wary about diving into the sometimes strange and finicky world of PC gaming, the PSVR makes an excellent option. It may be cheaper, but it’s no slouch, either. I’ve had some of my best VR experiences in PSVR, which makes that lower price point all the more appealing.

PSVR is the only headset that’s not on Windows, and so the closed nature of PSN is going to mean you’ll have a harder time finding strange, esoteric experiences, if that sort of thing is your jam (also porn). But PSVR comes with all of Sony’s experience in the gaming business, not to mention a suite of impressive first party studios to boot. So there’s bound to be some good software out there. PSVR will also be last to market (no official release date), so if your eyeballs are itching to get inside a headset, you’ll want to go with one of the other options.

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Virtual Reality A Billion Dollar Niche - Click For Entire PDF

Virtual Reality's $182 Billion Future - Goldman Sachs Expects VR to Be Bigger Than TV by 2025

Two significant endorsements recently for the value of virtual reality -- from Goldman Sachs and Deloitte consultants -- are escalating the hype about VR, which was virtually ubiquitous at CES this month. In addition, Google, which has been on the VR fringes, this week confirmed that it has created a VR division, headed by a senior executive, Clay Bavor, who has run Google's apps units, according to published reports.

Goldman Sachs analyst Heather Bellini, in a58-page outlook on virtual reality and augmented reality, predicted that the technologies have "the potential to become the next big computing platform." Her most optimistic growth estimate expects that VR and AR could generate up to $182 billion in revenue, including hardware and software/content, by 2025 -- exceeding television revenue. 

Even at a slower pace, VR could generate $80 billion by then, she said. Bellini's forecast cites nine categories for VR and AR adoption. Videogames will represent about one-third of the revenue, with live events, video entertainment and retail collectively pulling in about another quarter of the money; healthcare, engineering, military and real estate applications will also use VR to varying degrees, according to the Goldman Sachs forecast.

Separately, consulting firm Deloitte Global, as part of its 2016 Telecommunications/Media/Telecom outlook, forecast that this year will be VR's first billion-dollar year. It expects that "full feature" VR -- based on consoles and wired devices -- will initially exceed the market for "mobile VR," which may rely on high-resolution smartphones for displays.

"VR’s capability is likely to improve further still over the years as processors improve, screen resolution increases yet further, and content creators learn how to create for the format," Deloitte's report observed. But it acknowledged that, "As can happen with emerging technologies, there is considerable hype about the impact of VR in the near term."

For cable operators, the VR/AR juggernaut poses countless questions, ranging from the capability of home gateway devices to signal latency for live events. There will also be challenges in dealing with the VR vanguard, which now includes Facebook's Oculus subsidiary, HTC/Vive and Sony in addition to Google.

CableLabs is working out "what cable operators need to do to prepare for a large market adoption of VR," said Steve Glennon, principal architect at CableLabs' Advanced Technology Group, who is focused on VR. CableLabs's recent consumer survey about the value of technology found "an overwhelmingly positive consumer response on the value, comfort and lack of nausea problems using the goggles," he said in an interview after CES.

"We’ve been trying to understand the bandwidth needs, and have found that a good consumer experience needs between 30 and 40 Mbps for 360-degree content with current technology," he said. "This is far above current video streaming bandwidth requirements for online video like Netflix and Hulu."

Glennon said that CableLabs is continuing "to look for tactical opportunities to speed the consumer adoption of the VR technology." 

At CES, "It was pleasing to see how mainstream this technology is becoming," Glennon added.

"I think this will quickly move from HD content for the VR sphere up to 4K," he observed, citing several immersive VR demos that were "not for the faint of heart."

Prior to CES, CableLabs CEO Phil McKinney characterized VR developments as "beyond the goggles," referring to the limited hardware demonstrations of previous years. "What we're going to see is content," McKinney told USA Today, emphasizing that sports and travel-related VR content are the most likely initial products.

Skeptics have noted that the new VR buzz resembles the 3DTV hype a few years ago, which fizzled away.  Bellini, in the Goldman Sachs report, waives off such cynicism, insisting that VR and AR are laying the groundwork for new kinds of devices "beyond PCs and phones" that include controls via head and hand motions.  

http://www.multichannel.com/blog/i-was-saying/virtual-realitys-182-billion-future/396573

Unreal Development Kit Free Download

THE FEBRUARY UDK UPDATE IS HERE!

1. In this new release of UDK, the free edition of Unreal Engine 3, developers will benefit from enhancements specific to mobile development, including iOS 7 and Xcode 5 support, shader upgrades, as well as the addition of distortion.
   Optimizations to the Unreal Editor, tools, post-process features and Mac packager also ship in this build.
   Click here download the latest release.
   We can’t wait to see what developers make next with Unreal Engine technology.
   Note: Build notes are available here.