The Game Developer’s Conference is right around the corner. For video game creators, both old and new, this means a lot of sleepless nights excitedly reading over the session list and carefully planning your trip. For journalists like us it means the PR wheel has begun turning, trying its best to crush us with emails, meeting requests, and potential demos.
Among the deluge this morning was a missive from GDC itself. Inside were several short interviews with some of the big companies attending the show this year. Included were chats with Steve Arnold, the head of studios at Oculus. Arnold’s job is to work with game developers to create top-quality content for the Oculus Rift VR headset. Most of what Arnold said in this piece is boilerplate “we’re excited for this chance to work with developers” GDC-talk. However, a few lines stood out as being particularly interesting.
Lone Echo from Ready at Dawn.
When asked what Oculus’ “big goals” for 2017 are, Arnold responded:
“We want to show the world a glimpse of the future of gaming and entertainment. Now that hardware is out there, the real interesting part is to see what developers will make. At this point, dev kits have been in the wild for a couple years now. Some studios have started shipping their second or even third game.
With that sort of time investment and knowledge base behind them, we’re confident that the 2017 game line-up is going to start showing the depth and engaging narratives that people have come to expect from existing games. Some of these will be reinventions of traditional genres in VR, while others will be explorations of new genres.
I’m personally most excited about the games get us even closer to what most perceive as AAA quality, especially those from top tier studios like Epic, Twisted Pixel, 4A, and Ready at Dawn. We can’t wait to help launch those games and see what people think.”
This coincides with the promise of “months of high profile rollouts” the company has talked about previously. What Arnold seems to be driving at here is that the Rift’s content library this year will bear a stronger resemblance to traditional, AAA console and PC titles. These are games like Fallout 4, The Witcher 3, Deus Ex: Mankind Divided, Call of Duty, etc. None of these properties are mentioned of course, but that’s the level of quality and production values that they appear to be shooting for.
Oculus has made it clear that they are committed to the creation of top-tier VR content. At last year’s Oculus Connect 3 conference, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg announced that his company had spent $250 million on the development of VR experiences and that it would spend at least that much again in the years to come. That amount of capital is certainly enough to create many unforgettable titles for 2017 and beyond.
We already know many of the games Oculus is touting this year including those being worked on by the studios Arnold mentions above. There is: Epic (Robo Recall), Twisted Pixel (Wilson’s Heart), 4A (Arktika 1), and Ready at Dawn (Lone Echo). All of these are promising games that we’ve tried at various shows. But, as Oculus’ head of content Jason Rubin is so fond of reminding everyone: this is just the beginning.
We know Oculus has had teams working in long-tail development cycles on bigger games that we’ve yet to see or hear anything about. GDC may be a time for Oculus to showcase it’s previously revealed heavy-hitters more thoroughly, but it could also be where we start to see just how much “depth” this young company is willing to provide.
Either way it should be quite a ride. We’ll be bringing you full coverage on the show floor and beyond at GDC beginning on February 27.
Last year, we rounded off a list of 35 VR games we couldn’t have to play in 2016. We’ve had some great times playing great games, and last week we picked the best of the bunch with our 2016 Game of the Year Awards. But VR has only grown in 2016 and so it’s only fair that our 2017 list grows too.
So without further ado we present the 50 VR games we can’t wait to play in 2017. Looking at the list it’s going to be quite a year, and who knows what else is being prepped for reveal?
Ace Combat 7
Project Aces & Bandai Namco Entertainment
With intense cockpit action, the Ace Combat series makes perfect sense for VR. Fortunately, the series’ first game since 2014 will be supporting PlayStation VR on PlayStation 4. Expect exhilarating dog fights, but hopefully no blackouts.
Supported Headsets: PlayStation VR
Allison Road
Far From Home
Allison Road is a horror game many hope will match the super-spooky P.T. in terms of scares, especially considering the game is planning to support VR. The project had a rough 2016 after being outright cancelled at one point, but it looks back on track now and we’re eager to see what’s become of it.
Supported headsets: TBA
The American Dream
Samurai Punk
In retro 1950s everything you could ever need can be acquired with the help of a couple guns. The American Dream’s sarcastic humor looks to thrive during the game’s trip to the 1950 World Fair where you use guns for every day tasks such as eating and driving.
Supported Headsets: Oculus Rift, PlayStation VR, HTC Vive
Ark Park
Snail Games
The open world action-adventure game ARK: Survival Evolved is expanding its prehistoric world by allowing players to get an up-close look at the many different habitats the dinosaurs may have called home. You’ll be riding dinosaurs, crafting tools, and completing puzzles as you attempt to collect Gene Cubes for over 100 species. Let’s just hope ARK Park doesn’t suffer the same fate as another popular prehistoric playground.
Supported Headsets: HTC Vive, Oculus Rift, PlayStation VR
Arktika.1
4A Games
Metro developer 4A Games makes its VR debut with this Oculus Studios shooter that doesn’t look a whole lot different from its last post-apocalyptic shooter. That’s not a bad thing: our hands-on with the game at Oculus Connect 3 proved hugely promising.
Supported Headsets: Oculus Rift
Blunt Force
G2A
This shooter is set shortly before and during WW2 with a different style of gameplay for both. The former is an exploration experience while the later is your expected intense shooter with manual reloading and fixed teleportation spots.
Supported Headsets: Oculus Rift
Budget Cuts
Neat Corporation
Budget Cuts is a room-scale stealth game that has a teleporting mechanic where you can preview the area before making your move. As a trainee, you move around to take out your robot assailants as quickly as possible and the title encourages speed runs.
Supported Headsets: HTC Vive
Dreams
Media Molecule
Media Molecule’s strange new creation game skipped a 2016 release, but we’re still intrigued. This could be PS VR’s Tilt Brush/Medium, only going even deeper and allowing you to create full games with its tool set. It’s ambitious to say the least.
Supported Headsets: PlayStation VR
Fallout 4
Bethesda Softworks
One of E3’s biggest surprises on the VR front, Bethesda is trying to fit all of its popular 2015 RPG into the HTC Vive with position-tracked controls. History tells us that porting existing games to VR doesn’t wield great results all of the time, but we’re holding out hope that the team puts the time and effort in to make it shine.
Supported Headsets: HTC Vive
Farpoint
Impluse Gear
Big names came to PS VR at E3 this year, but this new IP from a new studio using a new peripheral proved the most promising. Farpoint gives you a gun-shaped controller to blast away bug-like aliens on a strange new planet. Sign us up.
Supported Headsets: PlayStation VR
Front Defense
Fantahorn
Front Defense was revealed in Asia earlier this year. At the time we didn’t know it was really the first Vive Studios game. It’s a World War 2-themed first-person shooter in which you defend a street from invading Nazi forces. It lets you fire a bazooka, which automatically makes it a land mark game.
Supported headsets: HTC Vive
The Gallery Episode 2: Heart of the Emberstone
Cloudhead Games
We are excited to announce a new Dev Diaries series w/ @CloudheadGames. Stay tuned for future episodes leading up to the release of Ep 2! pic.twitter.com/QATupB78fw
The Gallery’s first episode left us with our jaws dropped, and Cloudhead Games has just started teasing the next entry. We can’t wait to dive further into this mysterious world and explore the fantastical side in its second episode.
Supported Headsets: Oculus Rift, HTC Vive
Giant Cop – Justice Above All
Other Ocean Interactive
Giant Cop has one of the most unique elevator pitches yet seen for VR; patrol your beat as an enormous police officer. Pick up criminals and toss them in jail, or simply toy with your tiny world to your heart’s desire. This is one of the most promising games on the horizon.
Supported headsets: Oculus Rift, HTC Vive
Golem
Highwire Games
We haven’t seen much of Highwire Games’ Golem in 2016, but the very fact that former Halo developers are working on it still gives us hope for a great game. Take control of giant stone Golems and use your PS Move controller to take on enemies.
Supported headsets: PlayStation VR
Gran Turismo Sport
Polyphony Digital
Gran Turismo is one of the longest running racing simulations in the world, competing mainly with Forza in the console arena. GT Sport is supposed to mark the beginning of a new era for the racer and they’ll be including a special VR Tour Mode in the experience.
Supported Headsets: PlayStation VR
Into The Black
NFTS Games
Students of the UK’s National Film And Television School are banding together to make this gorgeous new adventure that’s set to carry a strong environmental message. Help guide the unusual pairing of a fox and a bear through the disastrous fires in Yellowstone National Park in 1988 in this promising adventure game.
Supported Headsets: Oculus Rift
John Wick: The Impossible Task
Starbreeze Studios
Keanu Reeves endured months of training to translate one of the most badass characters onto screen as John Wick and now we’ll be able to become the infamous hitman as he ascends through the different levels of the Continental Hotel that serves as an assassin hub of sorts.
Supported Headsets: HTC Vive
Korix
StellarVR
After your home is destroyed, play the role of a commander as he fights for his race’s survival and takes the fight to the enemy. Manage your resources, build your defenses, and strategically attack the opponents in this retro styled VR RTS.
Supported Headsets: PlayStation VR
Lone Echo
Ready At Dawn
Ready At Dawn is known for making visually astounding games, and it certainly isn’t disappointing with its VR debut, made under the Oculus Studios banner. This is a fascinating Touch title with its own ideas about VR locomotion and both single and multiplayer modes.
Supported Headsets: Oculus Rift
Megaton Rainfall
Pentadimensional Games
Becoming a superhero in VR could be a potentially nauseating experience, but Pentadimensional Games is giving it a shot all the same with Megaton Rainfall. This unique game has you flying around procedurally generated planets to stop an alien invasion, protecting mankind at all costs.
Supported Headsets: PlayStation VR
Paranormal Activity: The Lost Soul
VRWERX
The Paranormal Activity series may have ended its long run in cinemas, but it’s far from over. If anything, The Lost Soul could be the scariest entry in the franchise yet, making full use of VR to make you feel like you’re really in the horror. Doesn’t that sound lovely?
Supported Headsets: HTC Vive, Oculus Rift, PlayStation VR
Polybius
Llamasoft
Gaming veterans will know Polybius as a fabled arcade cabinet that was said to have disappeared from arcades due to health issues. Industry legend Jeff Minter, though, claims he’s played it, and will be making his own take on it for PlayStation VR. It looks trippy to say the least.
Supported Headsets: PlayStation VR
Private Eye
Slacker Games
Private Eye is another game that’s been a long time coming and, based on its most recent teaser trailer, has been radically transformed with the advent of motion controllers. It’s New York noir setting and thoughtful story in which you piece together an accident which left you wheelchair-bound are what keeps us interested.
Supported Headsets: HTC Vive, Oculus Rift, PlayStation VR
Project Cars 2
Slightly Mad Studios
The first Project Cars is one of the deepest racing simulations available today and stands as one of the best experiences to be had in VR to date. PC2 is looking to take the white-knuckle sim across even more racing disciplines including Touge and Rallycross with one of the largest track rosters ever.
Supported Headsets: Oculus Rift, PlayStation VR, HTC Vive
Psychonauts in the Rhombus of Ruin
Double Fine
People have long called for the return of the Psychonauts franchise, and Double Fine is bringing it back in the best way possible: with VR. Take control of Raz once more in this mission that will have you really using the supernatural powers you dreamed of using in the first game. A full sequel is also in development.
Supported Headsets: PlayStation VR
Resident Evil 7
Capcom
The Resident Evil franchise has changed up their formula in a big way every few main entry. This seventh one is delivering a more intimate fright-fest from the first-person perspective. Resident Evil is one of the most notable series getting a full-fledged VR release (not just a themed experience) and will potentially set the bar for other major developers.
Supported Headsets: PlayStation VR
Rick and Morty Simulator: Virtual Rick-ality
Owlchemy Labs
Job Simulator is one of the craziest, most hilarious games in VR, and Rick and Morty is one of the craziest, most hilarious shows on TV, so it only makes sense the two would mash up for one of the most anticipated VR experiences of 2017. Fans of both will definitely want to keep an eye on this one.
Supported headsets: HTC Vive
Robo Recall
Epic Games
Epic Games has a gift for all Oculus Touch owners next year, moprhing its impressive Bullet Train demo into a bigger, much funnier game in which you battle malfunctioning robots with guns and, sometimes, their own legs. It looks like a great time.
Supported Headsets: Oculus Rift
Rock Band VR
Harmonix
Harmonix’s Rock Band franchise returns once more, this time with an idea that just makes too much sense to pass up on: playing live in VR. Stick a Touch controller on your plastic guitar and you’ll really be in the experience.
Supported Headsets: Oculus Rift
Stifled
Gattai Games
Survival horror is already no stranger to VR headsets, but Stifled sets itself apart by having the user make real world noises to light up the darkened path in front of them. It’s unlike anything else in the genre and we’re rooting for it to make an excellent game.
Supported headsets: Oculus Rift, HTC Vive, PlayStation VR
Skyworld
Vertigo Games
Now that Arizona Sunshine is out, we’re hoping to see this intriguing turn-based strategy from Vertigo Games next. Set in a beautiful toybox world you can walk over a fantastical map with room-scale support, ordering troops to do combat and even taming dragons.
Supported Headsets: HTC Vive, Oculus Rift
Star Trek: Bridge Crew
Redstorm Entertainment
Although it was suddenly delayed shortly before release, we still have Star Trek: Bridge Crew to look forward to in 2017. Team up with friends online and fulfill your dreams as you help pilot a U.S.S. starship across missions that will have you beaming up and firing torpedoes.
Supported Headsets: Oculus Rift, HTC Vive, PlayStation VR
Statik
Tarsier Studios
Tarsier Studios looked at the way you hold a DualShock 4 in VR and came up with an innovative new puzzle game that we’re really excited to take a look at next year. You’re trapped in a lab with strange experiments taking place, and you’ll solve increasingly trying puzzles in order to escape.
Supported Headsets: PlayStation VR
Starblood Arena
Whitemoon Dreams and Sony San Diego
Six Degree of Freedom (6DOF) shooters are seeing something of a resurgence with the arrival of VR headsets, and Starblood Arena is the latest to join the fray. This cartoonish shooter promises multiplayer thrills with lively characters and two to four player co-op to boot.
Supported Headsets: PlayStation VR
SYREN
Hammerhead Games
SYREN‘s brand of underwater scares come with a loving helping of cheesy B-movie horror too. Set in a deep sea lab, you fight off horrific mechanical syrens that have overrun the facility, looking for a means of escape. It’s the first in a series of themed stories from the developer.
Supported Headsets: HTC Vive, Oculus Rift, PlayStation VR
Tekken 7
Bandai Namco
Tekken is a long running franchise where a colorful and diverse collection of fighters engage in the Iron Fist Tournament. This 7th entry will serve as the conclusion of the series’ story arc involving the Mishima clan and will feature a VR mode where you can appreciate the eclectic roster of characters.
Supported Headsets: PlayStation VR
Unearthing Mars
Winking Entertainment
The Red Planet is no stranger to VR headsets, but Unearthing Mars promises an epic story of alien invasion and survival. We’ve only seen a glimpse of this strange new sci-fi adventure, but its enough to have us hoping that it ends up being one of PS VR’s better action games.
Supported Headsets: PlayStation VR
Untitled Valve Content
Valve
Image credit to Damien Labonte
Valve has so stubbornly not made a full game in so long now that it seems almost too good to be true that it might be working on something for VR. That’s what the SteamVR creator teased at its Dev Days event this year, though, and just the thought of a Valve VR game makes it one of our most anticipated upcoming projects.
Supported Headsets: Unknown (Vive is a safe bet)
Wilson’s Heart
Twisted Pixel
One of the most cinematic and unique games coming to Touch, Wilson’s Heart is a hugely promising VR adventure game that has you exploring an abandoned hospital with no real clue of why you’re there. We’ve already seen inventive use of Touch in the demo, and we want more in the full game.
Supported Headsets: Oculus Rift
XING: The Land Beyond
White Lotus Interactive
XING: The Land Beyond has been a long time coming, but 2017 might finally be the year we get our hands on this gorgeous adventure game, which was Kickstarted all the way back in 2013. Solve puzzles on tropical beaches and lush forests in a surreal story about the afterlife.
Supported headsets: HTC Vive, Oculus Rift, PlayStation VR
Bebylon Battle Royale
Kite & Lightning
If you’ve been craving some vehicular melee, Bebylon Battle Royale is here for your fix. This party brawler includes 3rd and 1st person dynamics with the humorous arsenal the genre is known for. Could this be the Twisted Metal of the VR ecosystem?
Supported Headsets: Oculus Rift, HTC Vive
Classroom Aquatic
Sunken Places
Born through Kickstarter, Classroom Aquatic is a humorous stealth-trivia game where you cheat, sabotage, and manipulate your way through a classroom of dolphins. Use your fellow students while trying to avoid the gaze of the teachers as you survive the semester.
Supported Headsets: Oculus Rift, PlayStation VR, Daydream
Essence
ONEVISION GAMS
In a world forgotten by time and space, you wake with no memory of what happened or why. Explore the majestic world as you begin to remember your own abilities and solve the puzzles to reveal the history of this world.
Supported Headsets: HTC Vive
Futuridium VR
Mixed Bag
This low poly arcade style shooter is a port of the EP Deluxe version for PS4. From the cockpit, you’ll engage in gameplay that is reminiscent of classic Starfox with an high energy soundtrack as the accent for the excitement, so strap in.
Supported Headsets: Oculus Rift, PlayStation VR, HTC Vive
Get Even
The Farm 51
Get Even is a photo realistic shooter with a horror theme. In both the single player and multiplayer modes, the scanned environments and weapon physics provide an authentic and realistic experience to draw you deep into the action.
Supported Headsets: Oculus Rift, PlayStation VR
Gnog
KO_OP
With an abstract art style and vibrant colors, Gnog is a 3D puzzle adventure where you venture into monster heads and decipher the unique puzzle of each.
Supported Headsets: PlayStation VR
Knockout League
Grab Games
This arcade style boxing game will incorporate realistic movement and punch physics as you take on your toon style opponents. Take on monsters and humans alike as your ascend to the top of the Knockout League.
Supported Headsets: HTC Vive
Landfall
Force Field
Landfall is an intriguing top-down tactical action shooter hybrid where the devs are hoping to redefine the genre with the VR vantage point. It’s immediately noticeable as different than real-time strategy games and features the ability to take control of individual hero forces against other players.
Supported Headsets: Oculus Rift
Narcosis
Honor Code
This title is a first person survival/horror that takes place in one of the most terrifying places in the world: the depths of the ocean. Within the confines of your suit, you must endure the terrifying experience as you try to get back to the surface.
Supported Headsets: Oculus Rift
Panoptic
Team Panoptes
Panoptic embraces the unique asymmetrical multiplayer style for a local match where one player uses the VR headset as the overseer and the other non-VR player moves as a tiny citizen through the area as they seek out the orb of power.
Supported Headsets: HTC Vive
What are some of the VR games you can’t wait to play in 2017? Let us know in the comments!
Some portions of this story were contributed by Jamie Feltham.
Welcome back. Had a nice break? Well that’s great because there’s a lot of work to do over the next 52 weeks. We’ve got our three major headsets and our mobile devices, we’ve got ecosystems and apps and developers. We’ve got millions in investment and mountains of promise.
Now, what are we going to do with it all?
That’s a question that expands well beyond 2017, but there’s still a bunch of big questions we’re expecting to answer next year. From apps to tech, the industry needs to push on with breakthroughs both big and small. Let’s take a look.
Will Someone Crack VR Locomotion?
This is a loaded question. Room-scale tracking is still an amazing breakthrough in consumer VR, but it’s not perfect, and not everyone is fortunate enough to have the space, or the systems that support it. We want to see room-scale evolve beyond teleportation for sure, but we also have to work at artificial locomotion. It’s how people with PlayStation VRs and are going to be moving within VR for the next few years, and we even see it in Vive games like Vertigo when developers want to design a traditional level, not work around the constraints of VR. It needs a solution that combats nausea and feels immersive. Will we finally crack it in the next year?
What Headsets Will Support Project Scorpio?
Six months on from its reveal, Microsoft’s Project Scorpio remains a promising mystery for the VR industry. A big part of the upgraded Xbox One’s E3 reveal message was support for “high-fidelity VR”, but that’s about all we know. A few months ago, our money would have been on Microsoft integrating the console with the Oculus Rift, which still may well be the case, but since then the company has also revealed its own range of Windows 10 headsets made in partnership with other tech giants. Will these be the headsets that support Scorpio? Will they match Rift and Vive? And what kind of pressure will Xbox VR support place on PlayStation VR?
Which Big Developers Are Going To Jump Onboard?
Oculus is spending the kind of money that gets Epic, Square Enix and Insomniac involved with VR. Sony has partnered with Capcom and is utilizing its own first-party studios. Bethesda is jumping on board with one of the biggest games of the past two years. That’s all great, and it’s happening much faster than many of us thought it would, but gamers get hungry quick. So one of my biggest questions is, once Resident Evil 7, Fallout 4, Robo Recall and more are out, who’s next? I want to see big studios get involved in this industry. CD Projekt Red, Kojima Productions, Telltale Games, Naughty Dog; there’s no end to the studios that should get involved in VR.
Are We Going To See The Next Rift Or Vive?
We know we’re not seeing Vive 2, whatever that might be, at CES next week. That will come as a relief to many, as the original unit is less than a year old, but it won’t be by the end of 2017. Could Oculus be preparing a Rift 2 reveal for (the unannounced) Oculus Connect 4, for release in 2018? VR is going to see a rapid upgrade cycle as technologies like 4K displays become more commercially viable and we continue to make breakthroughs, so we’re expecting to see the next generation of headsets sooner rather than later, even if they don’t release this coming year.
Who Will Crack Mobile Position-Tracking First?
There isn’t a great position-tracked mobile headset on the market yet. Google thinks it’s on the right path, it just has heating issues to sort out. Oculus has its standalone headset, but it’s only in the prototype stages. I expect that we’ll have a solution for an inside-out tracked headset as an official product this time next year, I just don’t know if we’ll actually have it on our hands or not. As PC headsets continue to improve, though, the gap in mobile VR becomes more and more noticeable. It’s time that gap was closed a little.
Now that we’re past 2016, this year looks to be brimming with interesting new concepts and sequels designed to broaden beloved franchises. Here’s what we’re most excited for in 2017.
Of all the verticals people are talking about in virtual reality, music is easily one of the most exciting — and the most frustrating. While there were predictions that VR music videos would dominate in 2016, the industry was generally slow to adopt the technology, and great content was scarce. As 2017 approaches, however, it seems that music is finally catching up, and the next year will see much broader adoption. There are four major areas where VR could change the game in the music world, from the traditional to the more forward-thinking.
Making traditional music videos even better
The eighties and nineties were the golden age of music video, but by the middle of the 2000s, the format was in decline. Where big budgets and lavish premieres were once standard, the shift away from MTV and toward YouTube means that music videos are widely seen as less important, and unless an artist is making a huge artistic statement and has the deep pockets to back it up, they’ll likely be cheap and forgettable affairs. Where iconic videos like “Smells Like Teen Spirit” and “Thriller” were once cultural touchstones, a whole new generation has grown up using video sites to listen to music, but not watch videos.
360 video and virtual reality could change all that, and perhaps usher in a new golden age for music videos. For one, they could provide a reason for people to re-engage with the medium — while 2D music videos have become stale, interactive videos are much more likely to draw viewers in and create excitement. There’s already great data about how people are far more likely to rewatch 360 video than flat video, because each viewing provides the potential for a new experience. In a way it’s almost a complete departure from the MTV model — where they determined what you would watch and when, 360 video on demand allows the viewer to fully customize their own experience.
This doesn’t mean that every music video should be in 360 starting next year. There were some amazing 360 music videos released this year, like Run the Jewels’ “Crown” (embedded at the top of the post).
But for every video like that, there was an example of someone showing up with a GoPro and calling it art. Video concepts have to be immersive, otherwise users will just scroll around and get bored, and that’s not much of a change from the status quo.
Letting everyone see the show from the front row
Live music in VR got off to a bit of a bumpy start in 2016, primarily due to bandwidth problems the left streams feeling glitchy and low-rent. Luckily, there’s a decent chance things will change in 2017, and the predicted live revolution in VR will come to pass.
Watching live music in VR is one of the most obvious use cases, but that doesn’t mean it isn’t interesting and there won’t be creative applications of the technology. Companies like VRtify live-streamed a show with artist Jacob Whitesides and made viewers feel like they were in the center of an intimate log cabin, watching him perform for a handful of his closest friends. Big arena acts could easily record and stream much more intimate performances, and fans could feel like Taylor Swift or Chance the Rapper were addressing them directly, as opposed to seeing them with hordes of other people.
But beyond that, live-streaming in VR is really a revolution of access. It’s easy to forget if you live in a major media market and make a middle-class living that lets you buy concert tickets when your favorite band comes to town, but huge numbers of people lack the ability to see the music they love. Many venues don’t provide great access for people with disabilities, and some people feel unsafe in other venues. Furthermore, there are lots of music fans who live far outside big markets, both in the US and overseas, but still want to participate and feel like part of the scene.
Live concert VR can also serve as a path to monetization, as artists can charge a small fee to watch a show and do it without taking anything from their traditional live music revenues. There’s still nothing like being in the room with your favorite artist, but VR can provide an experience that comes a close second.
Telling stories beyond the songs
Ask anyone who watched “Lemonade,” what they thought of it, and they’ll tell you that the songs were only half the story. The visual album concept exploded in 2016, as an increasing number of musicians decided they wanted to create broader narratives around their work. This trend seems likely to continue, and this is where VR can shine in music.
The oft-repeated line about VR being an empathy machine leads to eye-rolling from some, but for artists who want to invite fans into their experiences, it’s groundbreaking. Political artists have long talked about being at the front lines of protests, but it’s different if a fan can also be there and feel like they’re part of the action. It’s one thing to listen to a verse about being pulled over and fearing for your life; it’s quite another to put on a headset and feel like you’re right there in the front seat. Artists have always sought to share their perspectives and help listeners see stories through the eyes of the characters they created, and now they can use VR to make that even more immersive.
Artists don’t even necessarily need to base the experiences around songs. If an artist is particularly interested in a cause or region of the world, they can create an experience to transport their audience and take them on a virtual tour, or to be part of a situation firsthand. Doing this creates a deeper connection with their fans, and helps foster a new level of understanding.
Activating on the ground
VR has often been criticized for being isolating, but some activations can actually help create a sense of real world community in the virtual space. There have been a handful of virtual discos, and more festivals will likely start experimenting with VR experiences in the next few months. After all, if you’re wandering around Coachella and there are a hundred booths all just giving things away, wouldn’t you be drawn to the one that allows you to experience something more and step into a virtual space, if only for a few minutes?
VR can also be fantastic at live shows — an artist can create a piece to go with a certain track, and at the point in the show, fans can put on headsets and experience their own custom version of a communal event. An artist who goes by EMA created a fantastic piece called “I Wanna Destroy,” where an experience built in the Rift was synched to her music; she sat onstage performing while fans watched other people’s experiences being projected on the wall as they waited to wear the headset. Fans came away having been part of a unique experience and getting to create something of their own within a set of parameters, while also being part of something bigger.
There’s no doubt that VR is going to be huge for music in 2017 — the only question is which artists and labels will make the leap first, and which will get left behind.
Cortney Harding is a consultant working at the intersection of music and VR. She is an adjunct professor at NYU’s Clive Davis Institute and a regular commentator and speaker on music and tech issues. Her latest book, “How We’ll Listen Next: The Future of Music From Streaming to Virtual Reality,” will be released early next year.
John Riccitiello, CEO of Unity Technologies, predicted that tech journalists would start gleefully writing that the virtual reality revolution is over because sales of VR headsets fell short of expectations, and analysts are in the midst of shaving back their predictions. I’m not one of those journalists. For AR and VR, I see 2017 as a year full of two steps forward, one step back and two steps back and one step forward. It’s a complex market with winners and losers for a technology that could change the world and many industries beyond gaming. It’s not a fizzling bubble that is going to disappear like 3D glasses.
Yet I see the market at a point of confusion, poised between action and inaction. Speaking at the recent VRX virtual reality event in San Francisco a couple of weeks ago, Riccitiello wasn’t gleeful about it, but he noted he was right about the “gap of disappointment” at our GamesBeat Summit event in May. Back in May, he said, “From a hardware and a software perspective, it’s a masking tape and twine year. These things are barely making it to the shelf. They’re barely making it to the consumer. They do magical things. I’m a giant bull on the long-term opportunities for VR and AR. But these revenue forecasts for the early years — they’re going to miss their numbers in 2016 by 80 percent. They’ll miss them again in 2017 by 60 percent or more.”
During his talk in May, Riccitiello said, “In the fullness of holograms dancing on your coffee table — $120 billion is not enough to describe that marketplace. That’s coming. But it’s a longer-term burn. The hardware is not there. It’s way too expensive to attract a mass market in the near term. Mobile VR will give you a good experience, but it’s not a good enough experience to hit that ‘Wow!’ point. When I talk about the gap of disappointment, what I’ve referred to is — the bullish analyst forecast is like this. The reality is going to be like this. It’s only a matter of time before people say, ‘Oh, it didn’t happen. VR and AR is all a hoax. It’s a fizzle.’ The New York Times is going to run that on the front page, right before Christmas, to piss us all off. We’re going to get that.”
John Riccitiello (left), CEO of Unity Technologies, and Mike Capps, former president of Epic Games.
In fact, SuperData Research did recently retreat from a rosy VR forecast for 2016. The big change was the weakness of PlayStation VR sales. As late as October, the market researcher thought Sony would ship 2.6 million VR headsets in 2016. Now it has shared that forecast back to 745,434 units. SuperData still believes VR consumer software will grow from $407 million to $14 billion. But Riccitiello said that we shouldn’t expect that to happen in a straight line.
“I expect a journalist in December or January to say that the industry is a disaster. That’s the gap of disappointment. But that’s a bad conclusion off of a bad forecast. Zero to three billion ain’t bad,” he said, speaking about the growth of both hardware and software VR sales for the past year or so. “It doesn’t mean the industry is bottoming out. Smart money knows that. Don’t get disillusioned.”
The investors who have put money into both the AR and VR industries could get spooked by recent events. Those investors have helped create more than 1,000 VR and AR companies around the world, according to one VC’s observations. Brendan Iribe, the fearless CEO of Oculus, stepped aside from that job to run the PC VR division of Oculus, which could be perceived as a step down. Oculus is searching for an overall leader again, and that comes after a rocky year. The Oculus Rift VR headset is expected to hit only 355,088 sales this year, after eight months of selling, according to the revised SuperData forecast.
And the AR industry took a major blow when The Information published a well-reported but speculative story saying that Magic Leap’s technology is not likely to live up to its demos. That’s pretty scary for the AR industry because Magic Leap raised $793.5 million in its latest financing round, or about half of all the capital invested in both AR and VR in the U.S. in 2016, according to data firm PitchBook.
Based on the poor results, investors who look only at the surface might go into retreat, exacerbating the “gap of disappointment” in 2017. VR and AR startups have been warned to worry about whether they’re going to get their second or third rounds of funding when the money dries up. If the herd of dumb money, including the Asian investors, moves on to other things, it could become very painful and easy to lose your nerve.
VR investment panel at VRX.
My mother-in-law Tan Chin tries out VR.
There is some smart money in this space. Tipatat Chennavasin, cofounder of the Venture Reality Fund, said in a panel at VRX, “VR is here now. I’m not that concerned about how many units that have sold as much as how startups are doing. Is this a good ecosystem where startups can monetize and survive.”
And even if the pure investors get spooked, money is still flooding into the platform companies. Mark Zuckerberg, CEO of Facebook, said in October that the company had invested $250 million in the VR ecosystem, and it expects to invest another $250 million, despite the slow start with Oculus Rift sales. Google just launched its Daydream mobile VR headset, and it is getting behind VR and AR in major ways. By all accounts, the Chinese are racing ahead even faster. Joe Kraus of GV (Google Ventures) said he took heart from this commitment, as the platform owners can fill any disappointment gap with their own money and engineering efforts.
If this was all a big mistake, we should start seeing some wrecks. Perhaps the craziest of VR firms was CCP, the Iceland-based company that dove in head first with the VR games Eve Gunjack and Eve Valkyrie. Hilmar Veigar Pétursson, CEO of CCP, acknowledged that his company was fearless in moving so fast into VR. It published 11 products across all the platforms in one year. That could have been disastrous. But Veigar Pétursson said that the company invested more than $30 million in that work and it is almost profitable, generating at least $25 million or so in revenue. I saw Veigar Pétursson having a conversation at VRX with an executive from a very large game company. But rather than taking pity on CCP, the executive was bemoaning the fact that his own company was too risk averse and, as a result, didn’t learn anything in VR yet. He actually envied Veigar Pétursson.
According to Steam Spy, five VR firms have generated more than $1 million in revenue, even with the weaker sales this year. Survios, one of those firms that earned its spot on this list with its Raw Data VR shooter game, was able to get two rounds of funding totaling $50 million, including some money from MGM. If it’s all going to collapse, Survios might be wise to slow its spending and sit on that cash as “dry powder.” But James Iliff, cofounder, said in an interview that they’re put that money to work, starting with funding for other game developers.
“VR is in a very exciting time and also a very scary time,” Iliff said. “Everyone is in VR because they are passionate about it. We believe VR is the ultimate entertainment medium. It’s an amazing dream to have. But it’s also risky. There are failures along the way, and we will learn from those. It’s not a bright and shiny time for everyone in VR all the time. We want to build a healthy VR market.”
I am not risking any of my own money on AR and VR, so take what I say with a grain of salt. I’m not becoming a VR journalist. I’m remaining a game and tech journalist. But I think the worst strategy in this new medium is to slow down and be cautious. I think everybody should put their money and their ideas to work to make the promise of AR and VR come true. The strategy of waiting for some other guy to innovate ahead of you to show you the way is timid.
I can foresee massive consolidation as many of the poorly conceived companies die. But I can also foresee gold miners who strike it rich, and the way to make that happen is to dig for gold. You can’t retreat your way to success.
The way forward isn’t always obvious. The iPhone ramped slowly in its first year, and then it exploded. The adoption curve could be slower for VR, but just as promising, Kraus said. Niantic Labs showed that with Pokémon Go, which generated $600 million in revenue in its first 90 days. That created more excitement for AR, but it reminded us that mobile gaming is alive and well, as it reaches a billion people.
I still see a lot of optimists. SuperData expects the combined AR and VR hardware and software markets to hit $5.4 billion in 2017. And that’s just a stepping stone to true nirvana. Fans who come out of The Void GhostbustersDimension VR exhibit at Madame Tussauds in New York are truly wowed by the experience, said Michael Yang at Comcast Ventures. Those of us who have shown VR to people for the first time get a kick out of how excited they can get.
I think that these people should address one problem that the early fans of VR have all faced. Kraus mentioned that, were he not a VR investor, he would not put his VR headset on every day. That means he hasn’t found a killer app yet, and Kraus sees no absolutely compelling reason to engage every day with VR. We don’t have our Pokémon Go yet in VR. Or, perhaps more appropriately, we don’t have our Call of Duty, Uncharted, or Mario. But we’ll get there. I believe it.
Before the calendar ever turned over from 2015 to 2016 people were already dubbing this as the “year of virtual reality.”
This monicker was given for good reason. In 2016, we’ve seen not one, not two, but three high-end, ultra-powerful virtual reality headsets go from hyped future products to fully released consumer electronics, as well as a few new contenders on top of that. It may seem hard to believe now, but just a few months ago the HTC Vive, Oculus Rift and PlayStation VR HMDs were available active developers only. Now, hundreds of thousands of us have portals to the metaverse sitting in our homes. Our access to VR, therefore, has undergone a gargantuan shift in the past twelve months. The question now becomes what a societal transformation on this level will mean for the future.
Our question for you readers today is this: What will happen to VR in 2017? What effects will the steps taken today have on the VR community of tomorrow? Before you devour each other in the comments let me outline a few considerations.
The first is to remember where we currently stand. The best and most recent estimates sales for the “big three” headset manufacturers at about 350,000, 450,000 and 750,000 for Oculus, HTC and Sony respectively. These devices are most likely not going to be million sellers by the end of 2016, but what do you — the savvy VR enthusiast — think will happen to those numbers in the year or years to come?
Secondly, consider the scope. When you throw chum in the water you attract sharks. This year the waters of consumer electronics have begun to run red with the attractive scents of a growing immersive industry. What this means is that all of those ancillary industries are beginning to stir their collective energies towards VR. Content creators, accessory manufactures, and other third party entities have certainly begun to swarm towards the VR gold rush, but do you think that enthusiasm will hold as we move into 2017 and beyond?
Lastly, try to think big. If someone told you ten years ago that you would have an honest-to-goodness virtual reality system in your home you would’ve blocked them from your MySpace page for life. So what about the next 10 years? How much cooler do you think things can get for VR as time, money and interest increase?
The next Assassin's Creed is coming along nicely, according to Ubisoft, with executives claiming that the game looks good. However, we can't expect it any time soon, as the French publisher wants to put a lot of polish on it before release.
Have you ever played a game that's main focus was "giving?" We haven't either, but we'll all be able to next year when thatgamecompany releases the next title it's been working on. We don't know it's called, but it's probably going to be blue.
Two reports reveal that Ubisoft will take its time with the next "Assassin's Creed" and "Far Cry" installments, indicating new games may not arrive in 2017. As reported earlier, Ubisoft is getting out of the routine of releasing sequels rapidly.
