With any luck Oculus Rift will beat the HTC Vive to market, because right now it looks like their only real competition at this point. Question is - Has Oculus made enough progress on their hardware to retain their perceived lead on the VR hardware market? If HTC releases the device before Oculus or worse has about 2-3 months or more of uncontested access to the market, it will make their situation much trickier.
The worst case scenario? HTC / Valve release a product that has flaws which Oculus already knows about, but hasn't fully ironed out yet. This could lead to the entire VR scene getting scuttled before it has properly taken off. This is precisely why the Oculus team says they haven't released a product yet.
The HTC Vive has a couple of advantages at this point. They have gone old-school for the screen panel and skipped the issues the Oculus is facing sourcing OLED panels with the appropriate quality / refresh rates. The device also seems better geared for a 'stand up and move about' experience. The 3 metre x 4 metre space needed could be a barrier for a lot of people though... The other place where the HTC Vive seems to have a significant lead is the presence of a controller which has already got positive reviews even though it is still a prototype. Palmer has made it clear recently that the Oculus controller is still a while away.
In short, if the Vive hits the market early and has a controller that is intuitive in a 3D space, they just might run away with the VR prize. And if a Half Life sequel is bundled with an inevitable tie up into Steam...?? Oh boy!
Oculus has enormous goodwill in the VR scene for sticking to the idea of a polished VR experience right from CV1. That goodwill was dented somewhat by the sale to Facebook. But the presence of an actual rival in the market before the Rift comes out will sway a lot of people & that goodwill will erode pretty fast. Either way, Christmas season of 2015 will be interesting for the VR marketplace. I can't wait! :)
The worst case scenario? HTC / Valve release a product that has flaws which Oculus already knows about, but hasn't fully ironed out yet. This could lead to the entire VR scene getting scuttled before it has properly taken off. This is precisely why the Oculus team says they haven't released a product yet.
 |
| The HTC Vive. Wannabe Oculus Rift, or the other way around? |
The HTC Vive has a couple of advantages at this point. They have gone old-school for the screen panel and skipped the issues the Oculus is facing sourcing OLED panels with the appropriate quality / refresh rates. The device also seems better geared for a 'stand up and move about' experience. The 3 metre x 4 metre space needed could be a barrier for a lot of people though... The other place where the HTC Vive seems to have a significant lead is the presence of a controller which has already got positive reviews even though it is still a prototype. Palmer has made it clear recently that the Oculus controller is still a while away.
In short, if the Vive hits the market early and has a controller that is intuitive in a 3D space, they just might run away with the VR prize. And if a Half Life sequel is bundled with an inevitable tie up into Steam...?? Oh boy!
Oculus has enormous goodwill in the VR scene for sticking to the idea of a polished VR experience right from CV1. That goodwill was dented somewhat by the sale to Facebook. But the presence of an actual rival in the market before the Rift comes out will sway a lot of people & that goodwill will erode pretty fast. Either way, Christmas season of 2015 will be interesting for the VR marketplace. I can't wait! :)
No comments:
Post a Comment