Oculus may be be closing out 2016 with a bang with the launch of its Touch controllers, but HTC is going to kick off 2017 with something special: a peripheral that makes its Vive headset wireless.
HTC today announced a tether-less VR upgrade kit for its SteamVR device, made by TPCAST, one of the first of 33 companies to join the Vive X Accelerator. A preview version of the kit was shown off today at Alibaba’s “11/11” global shopping festival in Shenzhen, China. This is not the wireless prototype device in the works at Quark VR.
Below we have exclusive footage of the upgrade kit being sampled by Alvin W. Graylin, China Regional President of Vive at HTC. There are no wires connecting the headset to the PC behind the monitor.
Speaking to UploadVR in a phone interview, Graylin said that the experience would “greatly improve” the overall Vive experience, with no “noticeable difference” for factors like latency. The product will be available to pre-order with a standard battery, though Graylin said that a bigger battery will be sold eventually. We’re told the standard battery can deliver around one and a half hours of power. The bigger battery would rest in a user’s pocket.
HTC expects the device to be adopted by “avid” Vive users, though it could also be useful for businesses. Arcades, an area that the company is placing a big emphasis on of late, could have multiple Vive units without worrying about tangled wires and fewer tripping hazards, for example.
Former NBA Superstar Kobe Bryant (pictured) was the “first consumer” to try the new wireless setup.
The upgrade kit will be available to pre-order on Vive’s Chinese website “in limited quantity” for 1,499 RMB ($220.33). The kit is said to ship starting in Q1 2017. According to HTC, pre-orders go live at 7 a.m. Pacific on Friday. Graylin said anyone could order the unit from there and pay for shipping. According to HTC, in a press release, “Order fulfillment will be prioritized to existing customers who can provide a valid Vive serial number.”
Graylin said plans for local releases haven’t been discussed and he wouldn’t confirm if the tech could be integrated into future versions of the Vive, though he does “imagine technologies like this will become an option for future products.”
Wireless PC-based VR is the third type of tether-less VR headset to emerge in the VR industry, the others being devices that use mobile phones and entirely standalone systems. The latter category is quickly gaining interest, with major players like Oculus recently showcasing their own solutions. Products like this upgrade kit might hit a nice sweet spot, allowing people to immerse themselves in complex virtual worlds with hand controls and full freedom of movement throughout a room.
The white light of the real world was visible out the bottom of Daydream View both for myself and a couple family members who tried the new $80 mobile VR headset from Google. After some tweaking to the head strap I found a relatively comfy fit, but others felt front-heavy pressure from the weight of the phone. In dark lighting and the seclusion of headphones, it blocks off most of the outside world.
Even though the fit is odd — you can see around the side of the headset too — the Daydream View is a convenient package. It is the first mobile VR headset I’d want to take with me on trips carried loose in a bag.
Gear VR vs. Daydream
Side view showing spacing between face and headset in the Daydream View.
I praised the last Gear VR as being one of the most comfortable VR headsets yet, but it can be a pain to get a phone fitted perfectly into the connector. Daydream doesn’t plug into the headset — it just straps in. And though Daydream View is lightweight, small and feels nice to hold, on your head its rigid body and single strap doesn’t match Gear VR. Google says the fit was designed to “work for a majority of faces.” It may not bother some people while others might find it very uncomfortable.
I only accessed three games with Daydream prior to launch, and while they showcased an impressive range of input methods for the touch-sensitive pad and motion controls, Oculus had nearly two years to build up a library of content for mobile VR. While some of those experiences are being adapted to Daydream, like VR Karts Sprint and Keep Talking and Nobody Explodes, it is unclear just how many will end up making the jump.
The Daydream controller and headset needed to be re-centered from time to time. Resetting is a simple process of just holding a button on the controller, but it is an annoying step to repeat.
From Cardboard Apps To Daydream
Daydream as a platform debuts with a limited set of apps, but the five initial ones from Google (YouTube, Photos, Play Movies, Street View, Arts & Culture) put some of the best of the company in VR, and provided wow moments for myself and family members. A ton of Cardboard apps might also find a second life upgraded for Daydream in the coming weeks.
“For Cardboard apps to operate with Daydream, apps will need to use an upcoming version of the Google VR SDK which will be available in the coming weeks,” Google spokesperson Liz Markman wrote in an email. “This release contains a new API that allows the Daydream controller to act as a Cardboard button.”
I tried Wonderglade (free with in-app purchases), which is a mini-game title that uses the controller to spray, spin or tilt through different levels. Mekorama ($4) is a diorama puzzle game while Hunter’s Gate ($6) is a shooter that makes clever use of the controller and promises multiplayer. In addition, Star Chart VR ($5) offered a simulation of the solar system and a free app from The Wall Street Journal offers a real-time market data visualization and 360-degree videos. While additional apps are available today, the above apps combined with Google’s own were the only ones we looked at prior to launch.
Pixel XL Camera
Enhancing Daydream’s case versus the fire-prone Note 7 and its Samsung kin is the Pixel’s camera, which forces its way into your pocket after you’ve captured a couple photos with the eye-catching shallow depth of field effect. The Note 4, Galaxy S6 and Note 7 (Rest In Peace) all took good pictures in their respective generations, but the Pixel is on a different level. It features an automatically stabilized video camera that can make footage of my children running around look almost cinematic. That’s not something I’ve had in my pocket before and I don’t want to be without going forward.
More than any other phone before it, the Pixel’s camera combined with Google’s services like unlimited photo backups — with the added bonus of inexpensive VR — makes for a combination that’s ready to supplant the iPhone in many pockets. Unlike Gear VR, Daydream View blocks the phone’s camera, with no passthrough option to see into the real world when in use.
Google Photos VR
Google Photos got big wows from my family in VR. The app loaded panoramic photos automatically from my account, with pictures of rainbows and snow flurries taken months apart ready to view. A turn of my head let me examine features as if I was standing on my porch checking out the weather.
There’s also an impressive 360-degree photosphere mode on the Pixel’s camera that stitches together your surroundings from a series of stills. There were still stitching errors — problems where the different photos met — but I was impressed by the quality of the finished sphere. The photosphere software existed before, but Google told UploadVR it is enhanced by the Pixel hardware. You could also try the Cardboard Camera app for stereoscopic captures.
YouTube VR, Google Play Movies And More Personal Theater Apps
A private theater is the most likely use case for Daydream View at its launch, either on a flight with a downloaded Google Play movie or streaming on YouTube with the screen seemingly stretching across the ceiling of your bedroom. Moving and resizing the virtual screen into the perfect position with the simple motion controller is simple and delightful in YouTube, but I couldn’t find the same feature in Google Play Movies. You can also voice search in YouTube, which is a very nice touch.
YouTube plays 360-degree videos too, of course, though you’ll likely need a high speed connection to stream high quality. Apps like Hulu, HBO Go and Netflix are on the way to join the Google apps.
Street View and Google Arts & Culture
Street View elicited some of the biggest wows from both myself and other family members, with destinations visited ranging from our street corner to the Taj Mahal. Street View displays teleportation points that show you where you can go next with the controller, and the movement method was found intuitively by people who had experienced transporting from place to place in Valve’s The Lab.
Google Arts & Culture is much like the Woofbert art musuem app, allowing you to skip the crowds at a museum but still get up close to the art.
Update: According to a statement provided to UploadVR during CES 2017, FOVE has announced that they will begin shipping their FOVE 0 eye-tracking VR headset around the world this month in January of 2017 to customers. “This is the culmination of a two and half year adventure,” said Yuka Kojima, co-founder and CEO at FOVE. “We started FOVE as a small team back in 2014, and now we’re finally realizing an entirely new way for humans to interact with a virtual world.” Kojima also announced that FOVE will focus exclusively on white headsets, another unique aspect to the FOVE 0. The black headsets were part of a limited edition launch wave of headsets, and Kojima mentioned that FOVE will stop selling them by the end of January.
Original: Back in September we reported that eye-tracking VR headset, FOVE 0, would be going up for pre-order on November 2nd. As promised, orders are now live, and the kit’s price as been revealed.
FOVE 0 costs $599, though it’s available at a discounted price of $549 for its first week on an official website. That’s the same price as an Oculus Rift without the Oculus Touch controllers. The device will start shipping to Kickstarter backers by the end of this year, while those that pre-order it now should get it in early 2017. It’s shipping globally, with 29 countries set to receive kits in the initial Kickstarter roll out.
The 520g kit boasts a 2560 x 1440 OLED display with a 70Hz refresh rate, which falls a little short of the 90Hz rate seen in the Oculus Rift and HTC Vive. It has a field of view (FOV) between 90 and 100 degrees, and comes with an external sensor for positional tracking. Unlike other VR headsets on the market, though, FOVE 0 tracks the direction your eyes are looking in with a 120fps infrared tracking system that offers accuracy of less than one degree.
This tech has multiple applications for VR. It can be used as a form of input, as seen in first-person on-rails shooter, Project Falcon, which we’ll have a hands-on with later today. It’s also crucial to foveated rendering, a development technique that will only fully render the area of a display your eyes are focusing on, taking much of the processing strain away. You can expect to see it integrated into virtual avatars of ourselves in the future too.
Whether FOVE 0 offers the definitive answer to eye-tracking in VR headsets remains to be seen, but we’ll certainly be interested to try out the consumer-grade device at VRDC this week. We still have plenty of questions about input, content delivery and more, which we’ll hopefully find out about this week.
Additional reported on this story was performed by Games Editor David Jagneaux.
Microsoft’s surprise new VR headsets, revealed last week and expected to ship next year, remain something of a mystery right now, but we should find out more about them in December.
Speaking to Polygon, Microsoft HoloLens chief Alex Kipman revealed that these headsets will be further detailed at two WinHEC events, one of which runs from December 8th – 9th in Shenzhen, China, the other held from December 14th – 15th in Taipei, Taiwan. According to Kipman, specs like field of view (FOV) and display resolution will be revealed at these shows. We’ve reached out to Microsoft to confirm that this is the case.
WinHEC shows are developer-focused, and these two events will be give “directional guidance for building PCs optimized for a variety of Windows Holographic HMDs and content.” We wouldn’t expect them to be livestreamed.
Kipman did tell the site that the devices, made by Dell, Lenovo, Asus, Acer and HP have a “high” FOV, though it’s impossible to know if Microsoft’s definition of the word matches the level seen in both the Oculus Rift and the HTC Vive. He also reiterated what we already knew; the devices are connected to PCs via a wire and each features inside-out six degrees of freedom (6DOF) tracking. As expected, he confirmed that this has been achieved with the same tech used in the HoloLens.
“Nobody in the world has this,” Kipman said. “This is HoloLens technology.”
The company has also lowered the spec requirements to use these headsets, with Kipman suggesting that $500 PCs will be able to run them. With the headsets starting at $299, you can expect the all-in cost to be around $800. Back at Connect, however, Oculus also revealed a $499 PC that would work with its Oculus Rift. These new headsets won’t support games that run on Rift and Vive out of the box, but porting those experiences over should require “minimal” effort.
As for possible support for Project Scorpio, Microsoft’s VR-ready upgraded Xbox One console? Microsoft still won’t give a definitive answer, but Kipman certainly makes it sound like a possibility. “At E3 this year we said that Scorpio is VR ready, that’s because it’s that same Windows platform, it has the same Windows Holographic bits,” he said. “Our vision for the longest time has been one operating system with a single universal store, with a single universal development platform.”
Earlier this month Sony launched its PlayStation VR headset into the wild, sporting a large launch lineup of games from the pulse-pounding competitive shooter, Rigs, to the white-knuckle racer, Driveclub VR, and an excellent assortment of smaller games such as Thumper, Bound, and SUPERHYPERCUBE. There is assuredly something for most everybody on PS VR already. And it appears that diversity and quality has translated to strong popularity thus far.
“PS VR is off to a great start at GameStop, having already exceeded our early expectations,” senior VP of merchandising Bob Puzon said in a press release. “Due to the popularity of the system with our customers, we have received additional units for holiday.”
For anyone that’s been paying attention, the surge of demand should come as no surprise. Not only did PS VR sell out at GameStop faster than any other hardware of all-time, but it’s already been hinted to be in the “many hundreds thousands” range to date in terms of total sales. After the headset released, coverage from media outlets nearly doubled that of the Rift and Vive.
The press release also indicates that “demand remains high” for the unit, which should help to spur adoption and market growth into next year. As it stands, Sony’s flagship headset is in a great position to drive mainstream adoption of VR.
PlayStation’s VP of Marketing views the headset as a step towards achieving the “holy grail of gaming,” and while we are definitely fans of the device, it isn’t quite there yet. Whether or not they can sort out the often pesky tracking issues and continue to deliver on the promise of consistent, high-quality software will be the biggest signs of whether or not the HMD has what it takes to go toe-to-toe with its more powerful, but much more expensive, rivals in the HTC Vive and Oculus Rift.
With the heavy hitting virtual reality devices carrying fairly stout price tags, many point toward mobile VR as the consumer friendly entry point for those that have yet to try VR. The Gear VR and the upcoming Google Daydream are the primary devices in that market, carrying a price between $79-$99. Now, we have a new contender for mobile VR: Xiaomi’s Mi VR.
Since the founding of China-based Xiaomi in 2010, the company has built its reputation on providing quality technology without charging a fortune and building on that quality with feedback from fans of their Mi (mobile internet) line of gear. The Mi VR continues with that foundation in mind, providing a sleek looking device for only $30. The device’s design floats between the Samsung Gear and PS VR, leaning more toward the former and looks to fit quite comfortably. As far as specs, the gadget works with Xiaomi smartphones and is said to include a motion sensor, 16ms latency time (which should alleviate VR sickness), and a motion controller. The Mi VR is following up the Mi VR Play, a device with various stylish customization options and resembles the Daydream’s soft design. The Mi VR app ecosystem is light currently, but Samsung’s recent hardware missteps may open a window of opportunity for growth (over 200 developers are said to be working on new content for the Mi VR store).
The device has no release date yet, but likely won’t be available internationally just yet simply because the smartphones they’re compatible with aren’t available outside of China either.
PlayStation VR is a promising new contender on the scene, but all eyes are still on the HTC Vive and Oculus Rift when it comes to VR rivalries. One HTC figurehead doesn’t think we should be looking at it that way, however.
Alvin Wang Graylin, China Regional President of Vive, made this point during his talk at last week’s Vive developer conference in Hangzhou, China. As he later shared on his Twitter account, Graylin compared each of the three major headsets to electric cars to explain his reasoning. The Vive itself he compared to Tesla’s Model X, describing them both as “Full-Featured” products for “Versatile Use”. The Rift, meanwhile, was likened to a Chevrolet Volt with its “Compact design” for “Home Use”.
As for PlayStation VR? It’s a Toyota Prius: a “Modern Design” for “Younger Customers” that’s “More Affordable” than its contemporaries.
Graylin also used the same comparison for mobile VR. An E-Motorbike is, in his mind “Versatile” and “Sexy” like Google’s Daydream platform, while an E-Moped has “Limited Features” and is “Easy to Use” like Gear VR. An E-Scooter? That’d be Google Cardboard: “Affordable” VR that’s “Low-Thrills” and “More of a Toy”.
Graylin later said: “my key point in slides is these vehicles don’t compete w/ each other, they are all needed to serve diff segments.”
my key point in slides is these vehicles don’t compete w/ each other, they are all needed to serve diff segments @UploadVR@htcvive#vr
It’s a noble thought, though it’s tough to look at those slides and not feel like Oculus has come up a little short-changed. With the arrival of the Oculus Touch controllers in early December, the Rift and Vive will on pretty equal footing with both offering room-scale VR with position-tracked input, and Gear VR is very comparable with Daydream too.
Still, we can get behind a high-level executive stressing the importance of cooperation and not dominance in the VR space which, given the amount of money Oculus is spending on content at the moment, might not be a mutual feeling.
One of the biggest (literal) obstacles facing desktop VR right now is the cord. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve tripped or become tangled up in it while playing some of the more active titles out there. Making VR completely wireless has been an obvious target for VR hardware companies for a while now, but it is a problem without an easy solution. Now, Valve has announced that they have invested in Nitero, a company working on a 60Ghz wireless solution for VR.
Speaking with Sven Mesecke, Nitero’s Co-Founder and Vice President, Valve has invested a “significant amount” in the company – who showed us an early demo of their technology this year at CES. Nitero’s solution for wireless VR involves two key parts, wireless transfer via a 60Ghz transmitter and encoding to help make sure all the image data reaches the headset without dropping latency. According to Mesecke, Nitero’s technology, “is a robust, low latency, solution that has been crafted for VR.”
One of the biggest obstacles Nitero’s technology faced when we first tried it was losing signal when the transmitters’ lost their line of sight. This issue, Mesecke says, has been solved with “customized beam forming” that will help locate the user, saying that “you no longer need line of sight” for the solution to work.
Back in January the company was aggressively targeting a release by the end of this year, however Mesecke says that timeline has shifted. As a technology supplier, Nitero does not actually create products to sell to consumers, rather they work with third parties to supply their tech for new products, “it is up to our partners to decide when to release this product.”
Nitero says Valve is not the only partner they are speaking with, including those outside of the headset space. “We are also speaking with 360 camera companies and other peripheral makers,” Mesecke says.
Valve is also not the only one investing in Niteros tech, Mesecke says the company has “a number of other” investors but decline to reveal who they were.
Just last week at Oculus Connect, Oculus’ chief scientist Michael Abrash listed wireless desktop VR as a part of VR’s five year timeline. This announcement from Valve and Nitero seems to add credence that it may be coming even sooner than that.
PlayStation VR reviews hit last week and, while mostly positive, many flagged issues with tracking either of the headset itself or its controllers. According to Sony, this could be down to issues with light.
According to Gamasutra, Sony updated last week’s PlayStation VR FAQ just a few days before release with new details on setting up the anticipated headset. One new question asks if a room has to be dark to use PS VR, to which the company states that ambient lighting shouldn’t affect gameplay but “bright light sources” can if they’re positioned directly behind a player or coming in from windows or room lights.
You’ll also want to make sure any light isn’t reflected off of mirrors. Sony says that smaller shiny surfaces should be fine, but that PlayStation Camera can get confused seeing other light sources in reflections.
Our advice? Close the curtains and turn off the lights whenever possible. It might be a bit gloomy but that should ensure you’re getting the best results. That way the camera should be able to pick up both the LEDs on the headset and those on the DualShock 4 and PlayStation Move controllers pretty easily. You’ll look a bit unsocial during daylight hours, but you’ll always look like that with a VR headset on anyway.
For clarity, here’s the full statement:
Ambient lighting will generally not affect PS VR gameplay. Bright light sources directly behind the person using PS VR, lights coming in from windows and room lights, and lights reflecting off mirrors can interfere with the PS Camera and interrupt the tracking of the LED lights on the headset. It is recommended to eliminate bright light sources behind the PS VR player.
It’s a shame players will have to go to these lengths, though it’s an issue we’ve been well aware of for some time. If PS VR takes off we’d certainly like to see Sony make strides to improve tracking, either through system software updates or hardware additions.
PlayStation VR is launching this Thursday, October 13th.
PlayStation VR could trigger massive growth for the virtual reality industry.
A new report from market analysis group Juniper Research states that VR hardware will be worth $50 billion by 2021. By hardware, Juniper means VR headsets, peripherals, and 360 cameras. To give you an idea of how much growth that would be, Juniper projects VR hardware revenues to hit $5 billion this year.
The rapid growth will come from gamers. PlayStation VR launches for the PlayStation 4 on October 13. Its relatively low price of $400 when compared to PC VR headsets like the $600 Oculus Rift and $800 HTC Vive could jump-start the virtual reality market. According to Juniper, console VR offers a good middle ground for consumers. The experience is better than it is on mobile VR (including Google Daydream) but is more affordable than PC options. Juniper says that console VR will account for 50 percent of VR hardware revenues in 2021.
Consoles also have another benefit compared to PC VR, at least when it comes to publishers and developers setting prices.
“Some of the most popular VR titles are currently priced much lower than traditional triple-A games, sometimes as low as half the price,” remarked research author Joe Crabtree in an e-mail sent to GamesBeat. “In the several months since the launch of PC-based VR this year, consumer expectations are likely to have changed to expect shorter, cheaper games. When triple-A publishers release to PC, they may have trouble selling with traditional triple-A prices, while console users have no such habit to break.”
Good news for the people selling those games, but not so great for consumers.
