2017's Weak VR/AR Demand May Burst VR Investment Bubble

[ShurikN]

Not to mention the amount of really well made and interesting games for VR is negligible. Its usually same old crap where you touch stuff in a room and accomplish absolutely nothing, with graphics on the level of Half Life 1. Also the fact that you have headset exclusives isn't doing it any good either.

 

[swirl09]

http://venturebeat.com/2016/09/02/vr-adoption-among-steam-users-has-crashed-to-a-halt/

Less than .3 of steam users. And that figure is flat for the last few months.

Its interesting that an article published in September talks about the last few months! Oh Im sure thats not what you meant, its ok, Im kidding. Great article. Thats too bad about the figures on "high res" displays, another fad I guess.

Some dipshit somewhere pulls a number out of their ass, which is exactly what the (Dr. Evil voice billion dollar headline is, and VR is considered a failure? So, zero chance the person who pulled that number out their ass might have simply been an idiot?

The range on the predictions for iPhone unit sales across a 1 year period varies to the magnitude of tens of millions, and thats on a product thats been selling for nearly a decade now, and yet some are giving credence to someone predicting on a completely unknown market! Its just analysts pulling numbers out their ass.

It wasnt so long ago you would have been laughed at for saying every home will have a PC, or the internet was going to take off, or that said internet was going to be accessible from tiny devices that even self professed technophobes would come to not want to part with for a day, or cars would become autonomous.

I never thought VR was going to explode onto the scene. Seemed like common sense, I mean, how many can afford it? Have the space for it? Have a PC that can run it? Would be happy to sit through the early adopters phase of little compelling content? It is a small market, for now. But every aspect that is wanting is being improved upon. You must be either closed minded or officially over-the-hill if the thought of a light weight visor that could completely replace your desktop monitor is either impossible or unlikely. The only question is, how long til it gets here. And if you think Ive watched 1 too many sci-fi movies, read the previous paragraph again (or for the first time if you are a tl;dr skimmer).

 

[eidairaman1]

i knew this was a gimmick

 

[INSTG8R]

Fully agree with you.

Elite: Dangerous I think is a good living example of VR done right in a lot of ways.

Fully agree with you. The only game in my massive games library that makes me want VR is ED.
I am a TrackIR user fo I'd say a decade now and ED is the best use of it ever so the VR aspect definitely has my eye(literally). My stance on VR is if it makes it too 2nd gen it will move up my list of gadgets.

 

[Melvis]

Who didnt see that coming like honestly, its just like the whole 3D crap, they tried it 20yrs ago and got no where.

 

[ShurikN]

Who didnt see that coming like honestly, its just like the whole 3D crap, they tried it 20yrs ago and got no where.

To be fair, they didn't have the technology 20 years ago. Now they do.

 

[PowerPC]

I think we established that from an app perspective, VR only makes sense in somewhat static environments like a car game (Dirt Rally) or a space ship game (Elite: Dangerous). Running around freely in game when you're actually sitting just doesn't work. It induces real nausea and that kills all the fun (I got it from just really simple demos without much movement). It doesn't matter how good the graphics will get or how cheap it gets, it will always be a niche for certain games and scientific applications like the ones mentioned here where you fly into things on a microscopic level maybe. No wonder it's a bubble! Because they put the emphasis of this technology on games when it clearly can't support that and never will be able for 99% of all games.

The only way VR will be successful is when the Devs change their mind about what the applications of this technology has to be. New apps have to be written that follow the real potential of this technology. In the areas of medicine, construction, design etc yes! In any way connected to games it will always be a very niche market it can fill and I think will not be worth it to buy, unless it becomes dirt cheap somehow over night (it will not).

 

[Vayra86]

Its interesting that an article published in September talks about the last few months! Oh Im sure thats not what you meant, its ok, Im kidding. Great article. Thats too bad about the figures on "high res" displays, another fad I guess.

Some dipshit somewhere pulls a number out of their ass, which is exactly what the (Dr. Evil voice billion dollar headline is, and VR is considered a failure? So, zero chance the person who pulled that number out their ass might have simply been an idiot?

The range on the predictions for iPhone unit sales across a 1 year period varies to the magnitude of tens of millions, and thats on a product thats been selling for nearly a decade now, and yet some are giving credence to someone predicting on a completely unknown market! Its just analysts pulling numbers out their ass.

It wasnt so long ago you would have been laughed at for saying every home will have a PC, or the internet was going to take off, or that said internet was going to be accessible from tiny devices that even self professed technophobes would come to not want to part with for a day, or cars would become autonomous.

I never thought VR was going to explode onto the scene. Seemed like common sense, I mean, how many can afford it? Have the space for it? Have a PC that can run it? Would be happy to sit through the early adopters phase of little compelling content? It is a small market, for now. But every aspect that is wanting is being improved upon. You must be either closed minded or officially over-the-hill if the thought of a light weight visor that could completely replace your desktop monitor is either impossible or unlikely. The only question is, how long til it gets here. And if you think Ive watched 1 too many sci-fi movies, read the previous paragraph again (or for the first time if you are a tl;dr skimmer).

You don't need to be of higher intelligence to see that VR's adoption rate was never going to work out well for consumer entertainment. The downsides to VR have not been solved at all and are not going to be solved anytime soon. VR has some fundamental issues as an 'entertainment system' and that is that it's a way too intense experience both mentally and physically. The same thing keeps happening with 3D TV and movies/content. Add to that the fact that there is no content 'to lay back with' and most of it is glorified tech demo material, and there is just no incentive to buy into VR really. A 15 minute one-time experience with VR is enough to get convinced of that, ironically, because the gimmick factor of it is so readily apparent.

High cost is not necessarily something that stops people from paying for a product. There are lots of high cost tech products that sell really well, with the Iphone as a prime example. With VR, the actual premium devices in the market have proven to sell really, really badly, which is the exact opposite movement. The fact is, people don't see the high cost justified in actual advantages or features.

I also strongly doubt VR will be able to take off with just the 'simulator' type of games like ED and racing stuff. We already have a 'simulator' niche in the PC market that has been super stagnant for decades.

We are also still missing the 'killer app' for VR. The overall view is that VR represents problems without real solutions only to achieve a better form of immersion. But immersion can also just come from 'getting into' a piece of content; if you really dig the content, you get immersed by nature.

 

[bug]

Smart watch is stupid from the beginning. Who would need to constantly recharge another gadget that you barely use? Curved screen TV/cellphone is just pure demonstration that OLED now works. VR/AR is fundamentally different from those failure. The entire reason that made VR/AR possible is the vast improvement of computing power as well as smaller footprint of semiconductors. With more powerful GPU and CPU VR/AR is bond to become mainstream. Will it be overnight? Hell no. It will probably be a good 5~10 years before this technology becomes main stream. This is the replacement of monitors, not an add-on to current computer interface.

Be open minded is all I am trying to say.

This is not about being open minded. It's about cost and content, simple as that.
Look at 4k TVs: totally useless at home, barely any content available (things are picking up albeit slowly), but since manufacturers managed to lower the cost enough, people still buy them. At this point VR/AR is little more than a curiosity.

 

[Melvis]

To be fair, they didn't have the technology 20 years ago. Now they do.

and it still flopped

 

[Octavean]

This is not about being open minded. It's about cost and content, simple as that.
Look at 4k TVs: totally useless at home, barely any content available (things are picking up albeit slowly), but since manufacturers managed to lower the cost enough, people still buy them. At this point VR/AR is little more than a curiosity.

I don't think that is a good analogy.

TV technology was developed in the early 1920's and has been in household since 1940's. 4K is simply a natural progression of the same phenomena which has a virtually (no pun intended) assured future (with the exception of some unforeseen disaster or fundamentally different technology that leapfrogs it).

VR doesn't have the same foundation or quasi assured future regardless of cost.

Of the many people that eventually buy a 4K TV how many of them actually care if it has 3D support (active or passive)? Probably very few. 3D support is likely dropping off in favor of other features like a better quality panel with hight contrast and HDR.

My point is VR could just as easy be that 3D feature that people care less and less about.

More people might buy a Vive, Rift or PSVR if the price were to collectively drop but that doesn't mean that interest in VR won't be short lived.

 

[Totally]

VR/AR [will] open up massive opportunities for artists, educators, programmers, marketing agencies, film students/students in general, transport and travel companies and on and on.

Chicken/Egg. Other than programmers, educators, and students. Opportunities for the other groups will not appear until there is widespread adoption of VR. It's the simple truth if there isn't a large enough user base there isn't an opportunity for them to make money. If they can't make money they aren't going to bother with it.

Much like Formula 1 drives automotive engineering, VR will drive AR engineering and AR it looks like will become very popular in time.

Incorrect, it is the other way around the need to go faster more efficiently is what drives automotive engineering and F1 is where new tech and advancements are 'beta' tested and when stuff eventually becomes reliable, safe enough it brought to the public via luxury brands. So that analogy does not fit at all.

I have zero idea why they thought or predicted PSVR would be the front runner for Virtual Reality. Consoles and console players are and will never be at the technology forefront in any way shape or form, whether it's hardware or simply attitude/adoption.

Going back to my first counterpoint it's the largest easily identified targetable user base. Now that we live in a risk society, people don't like going into things blind.

 

[INSTG8R]

Interesting article with DayZ dev Dean Hall and how it's just not worth it.

http://kotaku.com/dayz-creator-on-vr-development-there-is-no-money-in-it-1789827173