Oculus Touch won’t launch until the second half of 2016, but the company continues to iterate on the impressively ergonomic VR controller. We went hands-on with their latest prototype at GDC 2016 last week.


This article discusses the changes between the Touch Half Moon Prototype (mid-2015) and the latest Touch 2016 prototype. For a more substantial overview of my thoughts on Touch as a whole and how it stacks up to the competition, be sure to read our initial hands-on: 

Oculus Touch is an Elegant Extension of your Hand for Touching Virtual Worlds


Although Oculus focused the spotlight on their gamepad-only launch titles at GDC, some of the most impressive Rift games we saw were built exclusively for Touch.

When Oculus first revealed Touch back in mid-2015 they showed us the ‘Half Moon Prototype’. What I’m calling the ‘2016 Prototype’ is the version of their VR controller that they first teased us with on the last day of 2015 (and were never shown in the flesh until after the New Year); the 2016 Prototype is visually distinct and no longer holds the ‘Half-Moon’ designation. Technically the version we tried was Touch ‘Engineering Sample CO6AC’.

oculus touch 2016 prototype hands on gdc (3)

First and foremost we can see that the Touch 2016 Prototype has had its IR-LEDs (part of the tracking system) covered over with IR-transparent plastic for a more sleek look. The rest of the shape has been tweaked slightly, most noticeably on the triggers and handles which are more rounded.

oculus-touch-new-design-2016
Oculus Touch 2016 Prototype (top) and Half Moon Prototype (bottom)

The biggest changes come to the thumbsticks and button layout. Although not included on the initial Half Moon prototypes, later Half Moon variants would see an ‘Oculus’ button included on the controller, and this has carried over to the 2016 Prototype (this will be used to access the Oculus Home menu). The Oculus button, along with the A/B/X/Y buttons (A/B on right controller, X/Y on left), have been scooted aside to make way for a small patch of tactile bumps.

SEE ALSO
22 Great VR Games for Relaxation & Meditation on Quest, PC VR, and PSVR 2
oculus-touch-2016-prototype-half-moon-prototype-comparison
Oculus Touch Half Moon Prototype (left) and 2016 Prototype (right) button layout. | Left photo courtesy Android Authority

The bumps seem to serve as an indicator of the intended default position of your thumb, whereas the thumb’s resting position on Half Moon was actually on the buttons themselves. My guess is that Oculus opted to move the thumb’s resting position away from the buttons to prevent people from accidentally pressing them when using the controller’s ‘hand-trigger’ to grip objects (as the thumb is a natural part of the gripping gesture).

While the buttons, triggers, and thumbsticks on Touch are capacitive (touch-sensitive) to aid in posing the user’s in-game hand, it isn’t clear to me yet if the tactile area will be capacitive as well.

oculus touch 2016 prototype hands on gdc (5)

The resting angle of the thumbstick on the Touch 2016 Prototype has been tweaked slightly compared to Half Moon, as has its height. This seems to have made it somewhat easier to achieve a thumbstick ‘click’ when the stick is tilted.

See Also: Preview – ‘Dead & Buried’ Action Packed Multiplayer Could be the Killer App Oculus Touch Needs

When touching the 2016 Prototypes to each other, I could feel a magnetic attraction between the two controllers at the inside point where the tracking ring connects to the controller’s face. My best guess is that the magnetism has to do with the controller’s haptics, which may lend further support to the idea that Touch uses a linear actuator for haptics rather than the usual ERM motor that produces the rumble in many gamepads.

oculus touch 2016 prototype hands on gdc (2)

The haptics themselves seemed perhaps more powerful than before, possibly due to a change in position of the haptic components (which might explain why I quickly noticed the magnetism). Alternatively, it could be that haptics were simply better utilized compared to when Half Moon first went out the door and developers were still learning the best ways to use the feature.

SEE ALSO
Valve Keeps Making Quest a Better PC VR Headset with Continued Improvements to Steam Link

See Also: Including Controllers, Vive and Rift Could be Evenly Matched on Price

At GDC 2016 we also got a peek at a box in which Oculus appears to be distributing Touch Half Moon Prototypes to developers. With styling akin to that of the consumer Rift case, we imagine Touch will eventually ship in something similar.

Although the company is distributing the device to select developers, they don’t intend to launch an open dev kit.

To my hands the Touch 2016 Prototype still has class-leading ergonomics (even compared to the Vive’s newest VR controllers) and the tracking works as well as ever. The ‘hand-trigger’ in particular is an exceptionally well executed idea, affording users an intuitive ‘grab’ function while leaving their trigger finger and thumb free for further interaction. The HTC Vive controllers of course have a similar grab button along their length but its placement doesn’t lend itself to being continuously held as a virtual ‘grab’ while still allowing natural use of the controller’s remaining buttons.

Oculus plans to release their Touch VR controllers in the second half of 2016. The cost of the controllers (and additional tracking sensor) is still unknown.

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Ben is the world's most senior professional analyst solely dedicated to the XR industry, having founded Road to VR in 2011—a year before the Oculus Kickstarter sparked a resurgence that led to the modern XR landscape. He has authored more than 3,000 articles chronicling the evolution of the XR industry over more than a decade. With that unique perspective, Ben has been consistently recognized as one of the most influential voices in XR, giving keynotes and joining panel and podcast discussions at key industry events. He is a self-described "journalist and analyst, not evangelist."
  • polysix

    not much good if it doesn’t ship with the HMD. Less than half of rift users will ever buy one and most games shipped for rift will be shitty tacked on VR gamepad games now thanks to the oculus blunder.

    Touch looks nice but it’s too little too late. When its packed in on Gen 2 and IF oculus can get their tracking (for roomscale) up to par with Vive then maybe they’ll have a VR system worth investing in.

    Gen 1 is already won by Vive. Gen 2 is open to everyone so I emplore oculus, valve and others to do their best for Gen 2 as that’s where the real mainstream are going to start leaking in. Late 2017 or early 2018 is my estimate for the next gen VR systems.

    Anyone undecided should probably wait till then, but for real VR fanatics in 2016? Vive is the clear choice as it does everything rift does and way way more (inc front cam, bluetooth phone comms, packed in controls, superb tracking and ALL in one price ALL on day one – April 5th 2016).

    • Justos

      This is an 800$ investment, and you would be foolish to spend that now when Touch is coming sooner rather than later for the full package. Vives only advantage is time, why do you think it was rushed?

      Less SDE, better optics, more comfort, integrated headphones and content. Rift users will be just fine until Touch launches in a few months. Stop spreading FUD. All “roomscale” titles will support Rift even with the inferior SDK.

      Also this isnt a camera tacked on to the PS4. This is a controller! I expect much higher attach rates.

      • Bryan Ischo

        I struggle to imagine what makes you say that the Vive was rushed. Which component do you feel was clearly rushed? I can’t think of any.

        One could make the argument that the Oculus was rushed, given that it doesn’t even include touch controllers. I personally believe that the headset is being released at or close to its original schedule, but that Oculus just whiffed on realizing that the touch controllers should be a part of the initial release and didn’t prioritize them soon enough.

        Also the Vive’s only advantage is *not* time. It has some other clear advantages. It has a front facing camera. It has a superior tracking system. And it has hand controllers in its initial release.

        Oculus obviously has its own places to shine (weight, comfort, optics (possibly), built-in headphones).

        I think it is premature to say that one or the other headset has “won”, because neither is in consumer’s hands yet on any scale. In six months we’ll have a much better idea of which headset, if either, is favored for the first generation.

        • Ben Thompson

          > Which component do you feel was clearly rushed?
          Perhaps the fact that they had always said audio would be built in and was coming, but in the end they just threw in a pair of ear buds? Also, according to this verified leaker who broke NDAs their software is well behind Rifts. https://www.reddit.com/r/oculus/comments/4bbrtg/insider_leak_readible_summary/

          Also, it wasn’t that they didn’t prioritize the controllers, they started development for them later. Later they said they had learned a lot in the background so decided to include their new knowledge on the subject and improve them which caused the delay.

          • Bryan Ischo

            I read the reddit article you linked to. Nothing indicates that the Valve software is “well behind Rift’s”.

            About the audio, if what you say is true then yeah, they apparently ditched an integrated audio solution. Can’t say that I mind personally though, it seems like a pretty minor issue to me. Others may feel differently.

            What you say about starting controller development later is pretty much what I was saying. They didn’t realize how important that feature would be and started late on it. If they’d realized its importance they would have started earlier and finished the implementation before shipping the headset.

            Although, it’s clearly too early to say if Oculus really did make a bad call there. Maybe the Rift and its seated game controller focus will be the more popular option. Only time will tell.

          • Ben Thompson

            “For consumers the Oculus software is way ahead at the moment. It’s completely plug and play in our experience and feels like a polished console UI, even in its current beta state..”

          • Bryan Ischo

            You cherrypicked one tiny note out of that entire long document. It is true that this was said, it was a very minor issue in a much larger discussion, none of which indicated that there is any clear difference in software or SDK quality between the two platforms.

            For what it’s worth, I’ve seen the SteamVR in-headset menu system on the Vive (it’s in tons of YouTube videos) and it looks just fine. Maybe not as “polished” as what Oculus offers but I highly doubt it will be a signficant issue when comparing the two headsets.

            I thought that the original poster was talking about the SDK or the quality of the tools that the developers use for developing content on the platform. *That* would be an important and interesting difference between them. But how much eye candy is in the game selection menus? Doesn’t seem so important to me.

          • Ben Thompson

            Cherry picked? No, just one of summary points he made. I merely mentioned in particular because you asked “Which component do you feel was clearly rushed?” so I listed 2 examples.

          • Bryan Ischo

            Sorry, “cherrypicked” was probably too strong of a term. I just mean that I didn’t feel like the overall tone of the article indicated that the software experience was significantly different, so one small snippet taken out of context I think isn’t really representative.

            That being said, the article said that the Oculus in-headset menuing system was clearly superior, there is no dispute about that.

          • jimmydontcare

            You’re complaining about non-integrated headphones BUT your idol is quoted saying exactly this: “Traditional gamepads are not a good virtual reality input device, you really need something better […] gamepads just don’t stack up, they’re pretty shitty.”

            https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4CoDJttJofg

            You oculus fanboys are seriously giving apple fanboys a run for the money.

            “Also, it wasn’t that they didn’t prioritize the controllers, they started development for them later.” That’s because they were the only ones on the block. Once pressure was applied they opted to rush out their unfinished package.

            Valve has been tinkering with VR as long, probably longer. In fact, Valve helped out a lot in the early stages of oculus, until they sold out to

          • Bryan Ischo

            Oh my god with the fanboy crap. Can we just talk about the products at hand without having to accuse each other of fanboy-ism? Do you people understand that different people have different viewpoints, and that other viewpoints that do not necessarily correlate with your own can be completely rational in the face of uncertain information or personal preference?

          • jimmydontcare

            Positive points on hardware and excuses are two different things, so no.

        • Justos

          I wasn’t making the statement that either has won anything. I am pro VR. Just stating the facts since Vive fans seem to forget everything else but their prerogative..

          I can name a few things that were rushed. Software is a big one. Valve has steam to power the store and that gives them an advantage, but is lacking in terms of first party VR content. The Steam theatre is a good example. Its a screen in a room. YAY VR! Oculus has Video, 360 photos, Social, Story Studio, etc which gives users a whole bunch of made for VR content by the pioneers of this medium.

          Another one would be the design of the headset itself. Some say it looks fine but I personally think it looks like Apple VS Windows laptops back in the day. One is clearly refined and polished while the other is ‘good enough’. Its front-heavy and not as comfortable.

          They also completely ignored the headphones which they said were coming. You guys forget about all the lies HTC told? Remember that December launch date right up until the day?

        • Nathan Daughdrill

          Not enough touch games is what it’s not released……..

        • Andrew Jakobs

          But comfort is what makes or breaks a headset.. If the vive is larger/heavier then the camera isn’t really usefull anyway, as you’ll put your headset off because it’ll weight down too much.. And if you’re talking about boundaries, well, any tracking system is capable of preventing you from going beyond a border (that’s what valves own system already works with), Do you really want an image of the surrounding (even if it’s a silhouet) while you are playing or do you just want the game itself present some kind of ‘natural’ boundary)..
          Personally I had no trouble getting my drink or typing with the DK2 on, but the flipup vizor principe of the forte VFX-1 is even much better..
          I think both headsets will have their own crowd..

          • Bryan Ischo

            I disagree with your premise that comfort is what makes or breaks a headset. And yes, I want an image of the surround while I am playing, because it is a hard indicator of where I might hit the wall, whereas in-game geometry is just a hint and likely to be ambiguous. Not to mention the fact that the wide unobstructed vistas appear to give people a very strong sense of a wide space, and I wouldn’t want games to always put me in a box just because my room is actually a box.

            Also I have a DK2, and flipping the visor up is a major pain for me. I don’t want to do it because it’s so hard to get the thing into the correct position for comfort and the viewing sweet spot, not to mention the awkward cables and headphone issues. I do not expect this issue to translate to the release headsets because of their greater comfort, less fidgety fitting, and wider sweet spot, which does mean that the forward facing camera will be less important than it would have been on the DK2. That being said, everyone that I’ve seen using the Vive on YouTube seems to like and appreciate the feature, so I expect I will too.

    • Christopher Barnhouse

      “Gen 1 is already won by Vive” LOLOLOL

      • Kendama Bands

        Yep, totally agree. Vive is superior as all the rift fan boys are in denial. I was pulling for Oculus, but they had a poor showing at GDC with most games as ports and Oculus touch not being available at launch. Not only that i have yet to see a negative review of the Vive as Oculus there are reports of tracking lost and motion sickness.

      • shijocj

        Fyi.. there is a 360 degree turn limitation on touch controllers which is a killer for it!! Read it here..

        http://www.borrowedlightvr.com/2016/02/29/room-scale-vs-seated-vr/

        I am trying to find this will be fixed else I am out of Rift to Vive!! Ergonomics is good but if I turn to my back and then I cannot track my controller there to take an action then what is the purpose it using it.. Ignore roomscale, but this is a very much required feature!!! Re-positioning of cameras will not fix it since rift demos shows them still in front and they would have used it if it could do 360 turn with face to face camera positions!!

        • iceblast

          You can set the Rift cameras up the same as Vive on either end of the room and have complete 360 degrees just like Vive. There was a developer on Reddit that said they have it setup that way, and that the Rift and Vive were equally seen without being blocked.

          Oculus obviously does room scale, the question is, can it do full room scale, meaning walking to the wall of you room. Yes, it can, but Oculus doesn’t see that as that important right now. That’s more a gimmick, it will be hard to give a natural, and logical reason to have a user walk all the way to the walk, and have to turn around and come back.

          Every video for both the Vive and Rift should the users staying in the center of the room, moving around in like a 4×4 area of space. I see no videos of people using the Touch complaining about how limited it was to use, or moving to fast made Touch lose tracking, and that’s with the old Touch controllers, the new and improved one’s haven’t been release yet.

          Yes, 360 degree tracking for the Rift can be done.

          • zambutu

            The issue is a bit bigger than that when people are trying to decide which unit to buy. It’s not about whether technically room scale can be done, it’s about if it’s a viable expectation with the Rift platform.

            The Rift with Touch system is targeting a front facing dual camera setup. We know that the touch controllers are better optimized for this and we can expect developers will support this configuration.

            Having to reconfigure your constellation setup everytime you go into roomscale mode is not realistic, especially if it’s not properly supported. Until we hear more, the Rift is simply not a roomscale VR platform.

            The front facing camera occlusion concerns are valid based on Rift platform design target. Whatever Oculus “says” is important is going to be slanted towards the decisions they’ve made. Time will tell and may VR win in the end.

          • iceblast

            Both Jason Rubin and Luckey both have said that Rift can do max room scale. But it wasn’t a big concern right now, because there really aren’t any games that use it.

            There was a developer on Reddit, that said, they have the cameras on either side of the room, and they had the same Occlusion issues as Vive.

            Oculus wants to take it slow. This is all new for people, and they don’t want people getting hurt, damaging equipment, or having a bad experience.

            As time past, and people start to feel comfortable using VR, games that push the limits will start coming out, and people will be ready to try them.

            Small room scale is what every developer is targeting, not max room scale. Not only doesn’t everyone have the space for max room scale, but there aren’t going to be many games taking practical advantage of it. The cable on the headset is about around 15 feet, so you’re only going to be able to go so far anyway.

            It’s more important to sell the games and make the money now, then focus on only a very portion of the users that can use max room scale.

            Both Rift and Vive can use like a 5×5 space, with awesome results, with a great deal of fun had. All the demos you see, are of all small room scale. They move around in the center of the room.

          • zambutu

            This still doesn’t address the issue of controller occlusion from a front mounted constellation setup. Considering this is THE target setup, one could argue that the Rift is a 180 deg experience (with Touch controllers), or perhaps 270 with some occlusion. That is NOT room scale at any size. We are not getting satisfactory answers for this.

            It’s easy to visualize how Occlusion can occur, even with Vive if your body blocks one base station. If Constellation was wireless, they could likely tack on a third camera for the hardcore room scale gamers, but that wire will be a pain.

            I maintain that Oculus underestimated “competition” and locked themselves into some restrictions with their tech choice and they have every reason to anti-hype roomscale.

            People vote with their wallets and we’ll see in a month where all the hype is, but in the meantime go take a look at Vive reddit to see all the posts of people shitting their pants and opening their wallets after trying roomscale for the first time.

          • Frank

            Yeah, they get to spend all that cash on about two or three room scale *games* that are still in development (not 15-30 minute trade show demos).

            Don’t get me wrong, those games look cool as heck, but it’s not like there’s a plethora of things to spend money on yet.

            I do believe Oculus’ roadmap was disturbed by Valve. I also believe that if Valve/Vive proves room scale to be a mass market appealer, Oculus will shift its recommendation. Presumably with a third or fourth camera as well, to prevent close-area occlusion while keeps the controllers hand-sized.

            There is no problem with Rift 360 degree tracking technology, as someone here has repeatedly spammed.

            The difference is in development focus. Focusses shift to accommodate market changes.

          • shijocj

            Wish what you told is true or will be true when it comes out! but researching more give me bad results.. see this.. https://www.reddit.com/r/oculus/comments/3pnkfi/preview_job_simulator_on_oculus_touch_office/

            Even Palmer had his reply on this…which gives me an impression that touch will not support 360 on release..

          • iceblast

            That article is over 5 months old.

            The Touch controllers won’t even be out for another 4-6 months, and with all the room scale talk going on, they may choose to make sure Touch ready for it.

            Both Vive and Touch are 1:1 tracking. You can move as fast as you want, and not have a issue. The differences between the Rift and Vive aren’t much.

          • shijocj

            See the comment from zambutu. That’s the same case with me. I am trying to decide which one I should go with. I do not want to go for VR device which cannot give me sub standard experience. And there is not word yet from Oculus telling this will be fixed.. All I see is excuses and justification about why it is like that. Its bad since I like touch controllers and Rift screen very much(no SDE) but as of now mind mind is with Vive :(

    • iceblast

      Not a single headset has shipped, but Vive already won??
      Oculus Rift has back orders till July, and Touch could be coming out around the same time.
      I think you forgot, that the motion controllers didn’t exist, and that’s why games were targeting the Xbox controller. They still had to invent the motion controllers. See, they were too busy inventing the headset to make the controllers. Now, games are being made with motion controllers in mind, but that’s going to take time. There might only be a hand full of games, that will take advantage of them, and most people still have to wait months before their Rift even ships out. Also, people were still trying to learn how to make games for the VR environment. That is a lot of things that had to be worked out.

      The Touch controller looks like a much better design, they can either be motion controllers, or gamepads, or both. Vive wands….

      Since the Touch controllers are being sold separately, regular pc games probably could use them. Since all data from the cameras are sent to the pc. Who knows what they could do with them.

      Also, people seem to over look the headphones built into the Rift. Sound is going to be incredibly important for VR, and having headphones that every single Rift owner has, and the developer has as well, allows them to give us the best experience, exactly as they want it. You don’t have to struggle with putting on your headphones every time after you already put on your VR Headset, like the owners of the Vive.

      Yes, the Vive did a great job on their tracking system, but, will the Rift really be unable to do the same. From all the demo videos I’ve seen, people seem to being using the touch controllers just fine. Are there any games that really take logical advantage of full room scale, or are most just using like a 4×4 square area. Yes, it’s cool to be able to walk to the walls of your room, but can you give the player good enough reasons to actually have to do it, without it getting old. Worrying about hitting the wall will break immersion.

      The race hasn’t started yet, both companies have their pro’s and con’s, both headset will give the player a excellent experience. I really don’t think their will be any losers in the race. I think VR will be the winner.

      • jimmydontcare

        This is the most fanboy thing I’ve ever read. Half of it doesn’t even make sense. I’d be willing to be you buy Apple products, too.

        The best part “struggle with putting on your headphones every time after you already put on your VR Headset, like the owners of the Vive.” Struggling.. lol. The vive comes with ear buds and has a usb port for headphones, most of us enthusiast already have a better pair than what both companies are offering. Not to mention wireless is a thing. I’ll be struggling with nothing. Enjoy being completely blind to your surroundings in the real world when you’re in VR because I’ll have chaperone/FFcamera to take drinks, find seats, other head sets/hand controls, etc. My headphones will stay on while you have to lift your headset off everytime you want to see your keyboard, drink, mom.

        Only thing I can agree with here is that the controllers -look- better but they won’t feel natural in every situation.

        I could list what’s better and what’s worse about each system but I don’t want to argue with such an obvious fan boy. Neither are perfect.

        • iceblast

          Sounds like you are the fan boy, not me. I haven’t decided which headset I’m going to get. I was just pointing out, that the Vive hasn’t won anything, the race hasn’t even started. The only real winner is VR, and that’s all I care about.

          If the Vive controllers looked better, I would be leaning more in their direction. But I just dislike their looks.

          No, I don’t own any Apple products. I have high end headphones as well, but I’d rather not have to deal with them if I don’t have too.

          I won’t be buying either headset till probably the 3rd quarter. There will be plenty of reviews in by that time, along with the Touch controllers. I’m in no hurry.

          • jimmydontcare

            Funny. As someone who had both DK1, DK2, and am waiting on my backstarted cv1- so I Can sell it on Ebay to pay for my Vive. I just roll with the better tech. Simple as that. I don’t make excuses like you.

          • iceblast

            No excuses needed. I haven’t even decided what headset I’m buying yet. Hmmm, Both headsets are pretty much the same, and though Vive will come with motion controllers, the Touch are a much better design.

            This whole thing is a early adopter problem. It won’t be a issue, come Christmas time. And both headsets can do pretty much the same thing, so, the tech is pretty equal. Buy what you like, you’ll get good experience with either.

        • Aaron Hillaker

          The Vive is bulky, much like the DK2. I hate putting on my headset over the DK2, it’s a huge pain. Doing it with the vive is the same, most likely. However, the CV1 is super lightweight and much smaller. Putting my headset on overtop of it is super simple, and not a hassle at all. And even then, the built-in sound is very high quality. You literally have no idea what you’re talking about. And the Vive wands just don’t really feel natural at all. The touch is extremely natural, and highly preferred by myself.

          Not a fanboy of either, just my impressions of both HMDs hardware-wise.

          • Bryan Ischo

            I agree that putting the headphones over the DK2 is clunky and annoying. I expect it to be a bit better with the Vive because of the audio jack at the base of the headset, but even still, it will be clunky no doubt. However, I also expect that because the experience has been engineered to require taking the headset off rarely during play sessions (unlike the DK2 where I have to fumble with the mouse and keyboard every time I want to launch a new game), the overall impact of the clunky headset will be minimal.

            I also agree that the CV1 clearly has the Vive beat in this area.

            You talk about the touch and vive controllers as if you’ve used them; but I don’t think you have, because you said earlier “doing it with the vive is the same, most likely”, implying that you’ve never actually worn a vive.

            Given that, I’d advise not claiming a preference until you’ve tried both.

            And given *that*, the touch controllers sure do *look* better, but we won’t know for sure until we’ve tried them both. And even then, some people will still prefer whatever groupthink says is the inferior one.

          • Aaron Hillaker

            My wording was strange I suppose. I’ve never put a headset on over a Vive, but as the overall size, shape and weight is relatively similar the DK2, I assume it’s pretty similar in that regard as well, at least when compared to CV1, which literally is almost perfect in terms of shape, weight and overall design and comfort. I’ll have a chance to use the Vive wands and put a headset on over the hmd in a few weeks here, so then I’ll know for sure.

            And I’m not discounting the Vive as crap or way worse than the Rift here. I’m sure it’s gonna be great. I just feel like the Rift is the better of the two for me.

          • Mucker2002

            Sounds like you pre-ordered Rift to me.

          • Aaron Hillaker

            Well, yeah, and I’m glad I did, because I like it more than the Vive. The vive is cool, really cool, but for me the Rift is better. Different people will like different HMDs, I just don’t find the vive to be practical, and I don’t really like the controllers very much. They’re bulky and topheavy and just not comfortable like the touch.

          • Aaron Hillaker

            I’ve used both now. Both are very cool, extremely cool, but the Rift is definitely the winner for me.

            The Vive is just not practical for the everyday consumer. It’s cumbersome, that’s the best word I can use to describe it. You have to dedicate all that space if you wanna use it, and it’s just a hassle, wall mounting the lighthouses, strapping on the heavier hmd, and the wands are bulky and sorta topheavy, not really comfortable to hold, whereas the Touch controllers are just so natural feeling, and extremely lightweight.

            The Vive is not bad, it’s really good, and I’m glad it exists, and I hope that Valve and HTC work together to make VR even better, but the first generation, for me, goes to Oculus. I can’t really think of a whole lot of cons about the Rift and the Touch, and the software for the rift also seems better, and is definitely more abundant.

    • David Herrington

      People don’t care about who came up with the idea first. People care about who has the best idea. Early adopters are going to buy on their whims but most people will wait for verified reviews and content before making any large purchases. I bet you own a Betamax as well…

      • yag

        Polysix bought a Betamax, then a dvd-hd player. Now he’s a bit worry about his last buy.

    • Nathan Daughdrill

      You’re an idiot. Almost $900 for the Vive. Means no one has won shit. If anything PSVR will be the winner.

      • Bryan Ischo

        I can definitely see how someone who has to resort to calling other people idiots on internet forums would find $900 to be out of their price range.

        • Nathan Daughdrill

          That is the best you have? You can’t debate me on the point I made you just got a call out that I called you an idiot which is clearly an observational facts. Your post was full of ego and bullshit claims.

        • Nathan Daughdrill

          By the way that’s an ad hominem fallacy. I called your ideas idiotic by calling you an idiot for them. You called me poor based on me clearly pointing out that almost $900 and an over all consumer investment of over $2000 is why the Vive hasn’t won shit jackass.

          • jimmydontcare

            2900$. STill not as pricey as HD tv’s when they came out. We all know NOONE BOUGHT THEM, right guys? Right? I won’t even get into the price of Computing when it was released to the masses. You’re the idiot here.

      • Nathan Daughdrill’s mother

        Haha PSVR won? Why? Because they might sell the most? And then what? Play super jaggy 1080p games? Bro, the PS4 is an underpowered piece of hardware. The following games cap their framerates at 30fps 720p-1080p:

        Blooborne: 30fps.
        Fallout 4: 30fps
        GTA 5: 30fps
        Watchdogs: 30fps
        All Far Cry games: 30fps
        All Assassins Creed games: 30fps
        Just Cause 4: 30fps
        The Division: 30fps
        Batman: Arkham Asylum: 30fps
        All Battlefield games: 30~50fps
        Battlefront: 720p/60fps

        Get real.

        • Nathan Daughdrill

          Yeah fucktard the one that sales the most wins for VR. Fuck you dumb fuck.

          • jimmydontcare

            YO, you are fucking retarded. lmao. Not even enough evens to give. Wii out sold the other consoles but which one collected the most dust? Only reason it sold more was because it was cheaper. PSVR may hurt the adaptation of VR, hopefully it doesn’t.
            Fuck, you are dumb.

          • greeneblitz

            ummm, them wouldn’t the Gear VR win as they will clearly sell the most?????

        • Ben Thompson

          Actually he’s right in a lot of ways, the projections are that the PSVR will take the lions share of VR, predicting that even Vive and Rift combined won’t match, purely because so many have consoles. Also the PSVR has RGB screens vs the pentile screens of Vive/Rift giving a higher perceived resolution as RGB have more subpixels than pentile displays.

      • jimmydontcare

        You do know a lot of people paid 1,000+ to get their rift, right? You’re a moron. Even more of a moron if you think 2 controllers and a camera will sell less than 100-150$ thus making rift the same price as Vive.

        The fan boy is strong with you, too. Holy hell. PSVR is more of a gimmick than anything VR. It’s the Wii(Not wiiu.) of VR. Sure it’s fun but it’ll never be as good as the real players. It’ll sell well because of the price of entry, That doesn’t make it the winner. Look at wii vs xb/ps4. Wii may have sold more because of it’s much cheaper price tag but way more people were on xbox/ps3 constantly.

    • Andrew Jakobs

      BS, Gen1 isn’t already won by Vive.. YOU have set your mind on Vive.. And let’s not forget, a lot of people don’t really care for roomscale VR, as they mostly will use it sitting down anyway (or don’t have the free space for it)..
      Also it’s still unclear how many games actually will use the vive controllers, as most VR-games at the moment are designed for use with a xbox controller anyway, so with the vive you’ll also have to buy a xbox controller..
      And good luck getting a vive on april the 5th if you didn’t already pre-order one, just like the Oculus, if you order now, you’ll get it much later than the actual releasedate..

      • shijocj

        Yes…This is the real picture and I am still trying figureout which side to go with… and Fyi I found one serious thing with touch.. There is a 360 degree turn limitation on touch controllers which is a killer for it!! Read it here..

        http://www.borrowedlightvr.com/2016/02/29/room-scale-vs-seated-vr/

        I am trying to find this will be fixed else I am out of Rift to Vive!! Ergonomics is good but if I turn to my back and then I cannot track my controller there to take an action then what is the purpose it using it.. Ignore roomscale, but this is a very much required feature!!! Re-positioning of cameras will not fix it since rift demos shows them still in front and they would have used it if it could do 360 turn with face to face camera positions!!

    • greeneblitz

      haha, yeah, ok, we’ll see who out sells who, come see us again a year from now, with a total lack of any gimmicky “room scale” games, an inferior software line up, inferior HMD quality and inferior controllers, Vive is for suckers who can be sold on gimmicks over quality, and are willing to settle for a worse experience over the course of years, for the benefit of a extra few months while waiting for Touch.

  • davis

    biased much?? lol
    most people give two fucks about the touch controllers…its called Wheel, HOTAS…perfection. project cars, elite dangerous, valkerie, are real games. touch controller games are gimmicks at best. you want content and immersion, real controllers are required. gotta pay to play.

    • Bryan Ischo

      You have no idea what most people care about. Watch YouTube reviews. Most non-hardcore-VR types are blown away by the room scale aspect of the Vive. Almost nobody cares about, or will care about, steering wheels and HOTAS. Those are already only niche controllers appealing to hardcore fans of certain genres of games. They will not make up any more significant percentage of VR gaming than they do of flat screen gaming.

      • Justos

        VR is much bigger than motion controllers. They are not the end all be all of VR.

        • Bryan Ischo

          I think it’s accurate to say that steering wheels and flight stick setups will be a minor player in the VR gaming world, as they are in the flat screen world. It’s not a criticism of those controllers, which I am sure are fantastic for what they do, but those setups are just not that popular because those types of games only appeal to a subset of players enough to justify the purchase of additional equipment.

          I am not saying that touch controllers will be the only type of input used. I’m just saying that davis was wrong to say that nobody cares about touch controls because steering wheels and flight sticks are all that people want.

      • iceblast

        I agree, they are more niche controllers, but VR is going to bring more people to steering wheel and Hotas required games. There are plenty of people that would love to be in the Cockpit for car, plane, or spaceship. Think it would be really cool if Nascar made a legit game. They haven’t had a good imo since the 90’s

        Motion controllers will be the primary controllers for a VR environment though, and the Touch can actually act like a gamepad as well. The Vive wands look a bit difficult to use as gamepads.

        Who knows, you might be able to use the motion controllers as virtual steering wheels, and Hotas, even have a virtual gear shifter.

  • Frank

    Looks good. Many more input methods than Vive (capacitive touch) and a better gripping mechanic. Looks ergonomic, and the thumb resting position looks good; I’d be surprised if this wasn’t capacitive.

    Not launching it with the headset is a shame, especially given the competition.

    • Bryan Ischo

      I agree that the touch controllers looks to be superior in ergonomics and functionality to the Vive controllers. However, not being available out of the gate is a huge mark against them. And I do worry about the fidelity of camera tracking vs. the Vive’s so much more intrinsically accurate and scalable solution.

      • VR Geek

        I could not agree more, especially the less than seller camera tracking system.

      • Micah Taulbee

        Exactly, and I also cannot remember a time where developers flocked to a fragmented system, Kinect, Wii Fit even the PS Camera which sold OK is barely supported and I doubt barely anybody actually uses the functionality. It just seems like every system has to be the same for developers to invest. And as we all know for systems to succeed developer support is the key. Vive all day.

        • Mucker2002

          Valve ditched camera tracking early on in favour of lasers because of the issues you can read here, it just didn’t do the job.

      • Kyle Rybski

        They are both at sub-millimeter accuracy, much smaller than the tiniest of your clumsy human motions.

        In the case of both the Rift and Vive, most of the motion tracking work is done by the IMUs sampling at 1000Hz and reporting at 500Hz. Constellation and Lighthouse provide error correction at 60Hz.

        Also, if internal tracking is more scalable in terms of volume because it’s easier to add emitters than sensors, then by the same token, external tracking is more scalable in terms of content.

        • Bryan Ischo

          Yes, you’ve said that before elsewhere. I appreciate the extra detail, and what you say makes sense, but I have this suspicion that camera tracking just won’t have the same fidelity as lighthouse. I say this because lighthouse is a much more mathematically simple mechanism than constellation; one is just based on sensor pulse timing and the other requires image analysis.

          I do not understand what you mean by “external tracking is more scalable in terms of content”. That just does not parse for me. Can you elaborate?

          • beestee

            If I had to guess at what was meant by it, it would be easier to make custom peripherals with IR emitters and then use the SDK and your own software to track said content (custom physical objects). Using Lighthouse, it would be more expensive and impractical to make custom peripherals due to the need for tracking sensors as opposed to plain jane IR emitters.

          • Ben Thompson

            Actually in tests its the other way around, the Vive seems to be a bit unreliable with tracking with loss of tracking for both the controllers and headset, getting jitter, and is more prone to interference from reflections and light sources. Tested talk about how unreliable the tracking is here https://youtu.be/EBieKwa2ID0?t=19m49s they say they’ve never experienced tracking issues on the Rift.

          • Bryan Ischo

            Sample sizes too small. I’ve read about 5x as many Vive reviews, both short term and longer term, as I have for the Rift (there just seem to be more Vive reviews for whatever reason), and I have not heard of problems with Vive tracking overall when compared to Rift, when both are used properly (i.e. keep base stations stable in Vive; place camera correctly with Rift and keep it stable too). There may be a difference, but right now I don’t think there is any conclusive evidence of such.

            Also in general people move around alot more in Vive experience, so one might expect that the same fidelity tracking would show issues more often when used in that way. So I guess we’ll have to see how Rift tracking compares once its full feature set is enabled some months from now.

          • Gregory Scott Hanna

            I know it’s been over a month since your last comment, but I had a chance to try both systems when I was up at PAX East this year.

            I had no issues in tracking with either but the Vive did have all their setups in clear areas surrounded with black curtains (which would certainly limit chances for tracking issues).

            I personally will end up purchasing the Oculus with it’s motion controllers later this year over the Vive mostly because of the ergonomic design of the controllers. I found myself at points forgetting I was even holding a controller while playing through some of job simulator, I didn’t have that with the Vive’s controllers.

          • Bryan Ischo

            Good to know. Those Rift motion controls do look to be very well designed. Just be aware that by purchasing a Rift you are supporting the fragmentation of the nascent VR industry …

          • Gregory Scott Hanna

            The same is true of purchasing a Vive. Both systems have enough different (specifically with the controllers) that you would need to adjust builds across the platforms. However, with OpenVR you can build and release for the Rift on Steam right along with support of the Vive. You of course would still need to adjust how you handle input. Peripherals (such as Omni) will also cause a level of fragmentation.

            Until certain conventions are established and integrated into each set of hardware fragmentation will occur, but hopefully it sorts itself out over future generations of hardware.

          • Bryan Ischo

            I’m talking more about Oculus’ DRM based approach to prevent use of software from Oculus Home on the Vive, versus Valve’s approach of allowing any product purchased in the Steam store to be used with an Oculus headset. This would seem to indicate that Oculus is willing to do anything necessary to try to gain leverage for their platform regardless of its detrimental effects on VR as a whole. If you don’t mind supporting that, then by all means, buy a Rift.

          • Gregory Scott Hanna

            I personally am going to support the company with the product I feel gives a better VR experience and let the politics sort themselves out.

            As far as I can tell from my own research both companies seem to have a hand in why Vive is not supported in Oculus Home.

            However, even if it is simply on Oculus’ side the fact is buying the unit and then playing on steam instead of Oculus Home will sort the problem out. It makes it so developers can work to release on a single platform (Steam) if they see large enough number of Oculus users play their games through it. Eventually, Oculus would have to attempt to fix the issue or continue to suffer on their storefront.

          • Boondock5aint

            I can’t see how you can think Oculus don’t want to make money selling Oculus Store content to Vives? That only benefits Valves dominance on PC game sales in VR. Ergo, it is far more likely Valve is saying no behind closed doors to Oculus selling to vive users on their store.

            You have it completely the wrong way round. Software sales make money, and you make that money based on what store sells it. Neither HMD likely made a profit at all on hardware.

          • Bryan Ischo

            You really, really need to keep up with VR news if you’re going to comment on these topics. Oculus is specifically and intentionally attempting to prevent the use of games bought and paid for in Oculus’ store on the Vive. If Oculus just wants to make money off of their games, there is no reason for them to do this. What they are actually doing is trying to use game exclusivity to drive adoption of their hardware/platform, which is specifically bad for the developing VR industry.

          • Redwalljp

            Just curious, but why would the Omni cause fragmentation? It imitates the AWSD keys which have been a standard combination for movement in computer games since the 1980?
            The main difference between the Omni and your keyboard is a slight difference in footprint :)

          • Gregory Scott Hanna

            A game designed for the Omni will likely contain a lot of movement. The walking motion you make in the Omni helps deal with the VR sickness some feel when moving around in VR. So while a controller can duplicate the movement I think VR sickness may be a problem for those games when played with out a VR treadmill. At least this is my best understanding as I haven’t had a chance to test any of the VR treadmills myself yet.

          • Redwalljp

            I think fragmentation is when people are forced into making a choice between at least two products and end up bickering over which device is better.

            Oculus’s 1.4 update that essentially prevents non-Rfit users from playing Rift games is a prime example of that.

            I don’t think motion sickness will cause fragmentation. If people don’t want to play a game because of motion sickness, they won’t regardless of the input method. The same applies to somewhat to headsets, but that is a case where the user is making the choice themselves and they are not being forced to do so.

          • Gregory Scott Hanna

            I agree that purposefully blocking another VR system from working with Oculus Home is a problem I’m still not sure that it’s entirely on Oculus. I’ve read that Valve wanted them to place a full Steam layer over their code. It would mean that Valve would end up still having player’s use Steam (friend list & store) through Oculus Home. Without being able to talk to the proper people from both sides I can’t lay blame on either. If you’re worried about the software Steam supports both headsets and you’ll be able to find most third party games for Oculus on it.

            Suffice it to say, I will continue to stay out of the politics and back the unit I think provides the better experience.

          • David

            I did notice a problem with the Vive tracking when I had a mirror in my play area. Once I removed it no more judder or grey screen

    • Nir

      The vive has a touchpad.

      • Ben Thompson

        A lot of people don’t like touch pads, I’m one of them.. I don’t like how you don’t know exactly where your finger is on the pad as the Vive controller has no grooves or anything.

        • Kamikaze_Ice

          The same way a Trombone player knows where his notes are.
          And if you was to use the controler, you would be holding it in your hand. You know where you move your fingers, and unless you play games without holding a controler, you always know where the buttons are because they don’t move.

          But I agree about the touchpad texture, it’s lacking. But that’s what haptics are for, you can configure the “texture” as you move your finger around (it’s a gotta try to understand thing, just like VR)

    • zambutu

      Well the touch controllers may be better ergonomically but they are 6 months behind the vive wands. This is how tech works…Valve can come up with better options in that time too

      • Kyle Rybski

        What do you mean? Is there a Moore’s law for ergonomics or something?

        • zambutu

          By ergonomic I mean every aspect of their design and function.
          What i’m saying is HTC rushed this “less refined” “DK2+” kit out the door to beat Oculus, and Oculus is spending extra time trying to make an arguably superior input solution.
          My point is that everyone is comparing the Vive wands (today) to future Touch. HTC is free to refine their wands/tracking or even come up with another input solution add on. There’s also third party developers waiting to pounce when Valve releases Lighthouse tech (ie Manus gloves)
          It’s like comparing the future IPhone 7 to the Galaxy S7 today. We have no idea what Samsung is going to pull off with tweaks when the 7 finally comes out…aaannd we don’t really know how well the iPhone will perform anyway. /analogy
          Oculus is also free to do more or different, but it sounds like Touch controllers are quite a challenge to engineer

          • Nathaniel

            What most people don’t know is that Valve spent millions of dollars prior to the VR craze developing VR. They had a whole department dedicated to researching the technology. They then took this technology and handed it to Oculus as a “good luck” before they got bought out by facebook, at which time they partnered with HTC to ensure their vision of VR met their expectations. This research served as the platform for BOTH companies, the only difference being HTC already had a streamlined engineering team with established processes for developing new hardware. Oculus and Facebook? not so much. It’s taking them longer to make the same product simply due to a lack of experience. Though admittedly they have made up a great deal through talent acquisition, grabbing some of the brightest minds available made possible through certain key players in both companies.

          • zambutu

            Oculus also poached, or otherwise acquired a number of top VR employees from Valve. I can’t see this sitting well with a company that shared their tech and tried to help. There were no lawsuits or settlements that we heard of but Oculus definitely had a run in with Zenimax. Right or wrong, Oculus got their share of help from other companies at the beginning.

      • greeneblitz

        Nonsense, likely, Touch is only 3-4 months away, Vive won’t be coming out with anything better for the current gen either, as they would be charging their customers for garbage controllers and asking them to pay for new ones so quickly, would not go over well, last, Oculus will sell many times more Rifts then HTC will Vives, even without the Touch controllers Vive made a huge mistake by rushing inferior controllers out for some very short term gains at the expense of years of being the inferior VR product.

        • zambutu

          Im sure the wands are good enough for a full first gen, but what we are going for is full hand tracking and even Touch is a stop gap. If valve isn’t working a a solution id be shocked, we know that third-party devs are working on this for lighthouse.

          Ultimately the wands need to be retired to guns and swords

        • shijocj

          greeneblitz, Fyi.. there is a 360 degree turn limitation on touch controllers which is a killer for it!! Read it here..

          http://www.borrowedlightvr.com/2016/02/29/room-scale-vs-seated-vr/

          I am trying to find this will be fixed else I am out of Rift to Vive!! Ergonomics is good but if I turn to my back and then I cannot track my controller there to take an action then what is the purpose it using it.. Ignore roomscale, but this is a very much required feature!!! Re-positioning of cameras will not fix it since rift demos shows them still in front and they would have used it if it could do 360 turn with face to face camera positions!!

          • Christopher Barnhouse

            This is silly. He put both cameras in front. The Vive would have the same problem if you put both light houses in front of you. The cameras are supposed to go in opposing corners just like the Vive.

          • shijocj

            nope problem is bigger than that..

            https://www.reddit.com/r/oculus/comments/3pnkfi/preview_job_simulator_on_oculus_touch_office/

            Rift will never support 360 degree officially one default setting and they asked Job simulator to make it front facing mode already!!
            So I expect 360 only on CV2.

          • Christopher Barnhouse
          • shijocj

            Wow! this is a hell lot of information!! Thanks Chris!!

          • shijocj

            This one helps me a lot!! think It got all of what I am looking for Great link!!!

          • Mucker2002

            Yea, why don’t they release a laser TV remote? Oh just realised it works when you sit in front of the TV, I can even bounce the beam of the wall. Maybe Oculus is hoping for that?

        • Mucker2002

          Ha hah, pissing myself reading this post. Looks to me like you had a ‘Oops I pre-ordered Rift and now wish I had (laser) tracked controllers and room-scale VR’ moment.

          I doubt you have even tried the Vive controllers or the Touch for that matter.

          Enjoy your 180 degree, seated, IR tracked experience next week.

          • Redwalljp

            Why’s everyone so hyped about “room scale” VR? If I start walking around my room with a headset on I’ll hurt myself!
            I’d rather use a controller, or the Omni, to allow movement in a world larger than the size of my room.

            Jokes aside, the Rift does allow 360-degree tracked rotation and distance tracking even with one sensor so a Rift user can quite happily walk around their room blind to the real world if they wish.

          • Mucker2002

            You speak like someone that hasn’t experienced roomscale? And you are deluded if you really think rift/touch can handle it well with 1 camera let only 2. Also the vive has the safety net of chaperone.

          • Redwalljp

            Correct, I haven’t experienced it. Hence my question about the hype. I’m curious in knowing how room scale VR would allow a virtual character to travel in one direction for a distance that exceeds the physical room without the user hitting a wall (and without turning).

            I googled Chaperone to find out what it is:
            http://www.engadget.com/2016/01/05/htc-vive-virtual-reality-chaperone/

            So, Chaperone warns you when you get close to the confines of your room by placing an overlay of the physical world over the virtual one? That’s great for safety, but doesn’t do much for immersion.

            I suppose it depends on why you get into VR in the first place. I live in Tokyo so I get “room scale VR” just sitting down in my game room anyway :P. That could also be why my Rift has no problem tracking me where ever I go in the room (not that I use it to walk around my room).

            I got into VR for greater immersion and being able to go anywhere I want in a virtual world. “Room Scale VR” doesn’t appear to allow that. If it does, I’d love someone explain what happens when you reach the physical limitations of your room. Seriously, if it is that good, I might splurge and pick one up.

            Edit: I found an article reviewing the Vive and “room scale VR” that explained everything:
            http://www.roadtovr.com/htc-vive-review-room-scale-vr-mesmerising-vr-especially-if-you-have-the-space-steamvr/

            All I can say is thank god I didn’t bother with it. Each to their own, and if that is for you, then Kudos. Jokes of small rooms in Japan aside, I didn’t get into VR just to limit it to the confines of the physical world (I can take my headset off if I want to do that). With the Omni and other 360 treadmills coming out (estimated Q3 for the Omin), room scaling will be just a stop gap until the treadmills become affordable for those who want them.

      • shijocj

        zambutu, Also I found there is a 360 degree turn limitation on touch controllers which is a killer for it!! Read it here..

        http://www.borrowedlightvr.com/2016/02/29/room-scale-vs-seated-vr/

        I am trying to find this will be fixed else I am out of Rift to Vive!! Ergonomics is good but if I turn to my back and then I cannot track my controller there to take an action then what is the purpose it using it.. Ignore roomscale, but this is a very much required feature!!! Re-positioning of cameras will not fix it since rift demos shows them still in front and they would have used it if it could do 360 turn with face to face camera positions!!

        • zambutu

          I am waiting to hear a proper test and review of possible occlusion with these controllers. We all know that the cameras “can” be set up in an opposed configuration, but it’s not their target application and the wires/length will be a pain. Palmer also said that you will lose some of the precise controller tracking ability in that configuration.

          The fact that room scale is readily available makes me not want to miss it. Even though my ideal game would be standing facing one direction and using the controllers for locomotion (HL2, Fallout 4, FPS games…). Sadly, developers and the headset makers are not targeting these types of games due to the weaker stomach’d populace. But NO WAY do I want to miss out on full 360/roomscale ability.

          • shijocj

            Seems like you are in the same train as I am. Here I found a link which contains replies from Palmer himself..

            https://www.reddit.com/r/oculus/comments/3pnkfi/preview_job_simulator_on_oculus_touch_office/

            I play games like Skyrim and Doom 3 and in every FPS game I imagine using controllers to move forward or backward but I believe the head movement can be used for turning backwards and looking back /sides up and down. That would be the best scenario to go room scale and we can move a little left and right and I believe we will be able to learn to keep center of play area in sometime with avoiding cables…. But for this even if big room scale is not required , we need 360 and I am just trying to confirm this will be provided. If it will be there then I would go with Rift else Vive.. And as of today I do not see much hope with Touch controllers as per link above.

          • Mucker2002

            Yep, and Palmer gives up when it gets tough. He shouldn’t have responded in the first place.

    • shijocj

      Also I found there is a 360 degree turn limitation on touch controllers which is a killer for it!! Read it here..

      http://www.borrowedlightvr.com/2016/02/29/room-scale-vs-seated-vr/

      I am trying to find this will be fixed else I am out of Rift to Vive!! Ergonomics is good but if I turn to my back and then I cannot track my controller there to take an action then what is the purpose it using it.. Ignore roomscale, but this is a very much required feature!!! Re-positioning of cameras will not fix it since rift demos shows them still in front and they would have used it if it could do 360 turn with face to face camera positions!!

      • Bryan Ischo

        Stop spamming the comments.

        • shijocj

          yup I know.. :D ..But this is a serious limitation which they need to work on..I wonder why no one raised a voice on this!! I want people who are blind after technology and devices to be aware that there is some limitation do a research so that I will get some reply!!

      • Frank

        This is actual grade-A bullshit.

        There is full 360 degree tracking on both the headset and controllers.

        Where people go wrong is the recommended setup. If you place camera’s two in front, obviously you’re going to have a small cone of occlusion near the back where camera’s can’t pick up the controllers.

        By opposing the camera’s you solve that problem.

        The reason the recommended setup is two camera’s in front is because it enhances fidelity in the area where Oculus believes most experiences will and should happen realistically. They could be wrong. In that case they’ll adjust their recommended placement of camera’s and everything’ll work just fine.

        • shijocj

          In every FPS game I imagine using controllers to move forward or backward but I believe the head movement can be used for turning backwards and looking back /sides up and down. That would be the best scenario to go room scale and we can move a little left and right and I believe we will be able to learn to keep center of play area in sometime with avoiding cables…. But for this, even if big room scale is not required we need 360 turn and I am just trying to confirm this will be provided in Touch release. If it will be there then I would go with Rift else Vive.. And as of today I do not see much hope with Touch controllers as per link below.

          https://www.reddit.com/r/oculus/comments/3pnkfi/preview_job_simulator_on_oculus_touch_office/

          • Frank

            That is a post from 5 months ago.

            Go with whichever system you prefer. Both have the technology to do the same thing.

            Vive comes with motion controllers out of the box, and seems like a good fit for you, but the difference will be small once Touch releases.

          • shijocj

            Yup… But I like Rift more since Vive got worse SDE, controller design is bad , heavy weight, low content(atleast for now don’t know abt future), less dev support (no tweaks available for now and may be less in future eg: Vorpx). Considering these things Only thing I could find with rift is touch controller 360 and USB cables issue(which I ignore). I wish these guys clarified on this so that even if it comes next year I want 360 tracking to be there.. but even the attitude from Rift shows they are not having any plans to fix it (for that first they need to admit it saying it is a prototype and it is a bug we are working on!!!) U see why I got confused? !!

        • Mucker2002

          Hah, should have packed in two cameras in the first place if that is really the case. Perhaps one fixed to the ceiling and one on the floor or facing up from your groin will solve the problem. And if you have six USB 3.0 ports on your PC (i’m guessing there)

  • Christiaan

    Gen 1 won by someone already ??? Whoa, hold you horses. …let’s wait til some folks that bought them have them. Lol. Both players have sold through everything afaict.

  • petzi

    Thank you Ben for this overview!

  • AuxPlumes

    Any words on how you recharge them ? Base station ? Removable battery ?

    • Kyle Rybski

      Might be a good opportunity for motion-charging. But I suppose the haptics probably draw too much for that to be sufficient.

  • Sebastien Mathieu

    Guys??!!! console war again?? come on are you 12??? preordered the rift and the VIVE…. but I think it’s PSVR with it’s lower price that will bring VR more mainstream, even if the hardware is more somewhat limited….

    • realtrisk

      No kidding. I can’t believe the toxicity and childishness in every single comment section on this webpage.

      • Albert Walzer

        Not only here, on all big VR Sites.
        What i find really funny about that is the shortsightedness of the arguments.
        For VR to succeed, you don’t want any company to “win”. Because that would raise a monopoly, which means quality goes down, price goes up, customer gets out, and VR is dead.

  • Ned Hoon

    Going with a Rift myself I prefer the ergonomics of the Touch controllers but that wasn’t the main factor in my choice.I like the fact the Rift is lighter and has the built in head phones so more comfortable to wear and one less hassle to deal with when using them.I will be buying the Touch controllers as well.

    • shijocj

      I am also still deciding on which to go with I am worried about SDE on Vive and Fyi.. there is a 360 degree turn limitation on touch controllers which is a killer for it!! Read it here..

      http://www.borrowedlightvr.com/2016/02/29/room-scale-vs-seated-vr/

      I am trying to find this will be fixed else I am out of Rift to Vive!! Ergonomics is good but if I turn to my back and then I cannot track my controller there to take an action then what is the purpose it using it.. Ignore roomscale, but this is a very much required feature!!! Re-positioning of cameras will not fix it since rift demos shows them still in front and they would have used it if it could do 360 turn with face to face camera positions!!

    • zambutu

      I’m waiting til fall to decide for sure. I want to test both units and also see what games are available by then (still waiting for something that makes me excited to play). I’m guessing Vive will be my choice simply because of the ready to go room scale option.
      I have little doubt most of the differentiating issues will be splitting hairs, people just use them to pad their decisions….with the exception of the Rift’s built in audio, which I don’t care about. Actually if Oculus pulled the built in audio and knocked of 50$ i’d be more interested in Rift. And if they pulled the audio, removed the dust magnet fabric covering, lost the xbox controller and knocked off 100$ …sold!!

  • Nashoba Darkwolf

    Look at all these wonderful, insightful, and well educated comments that really band the community together so we can show the masses that VR is the future…. NOT

    As only one other commentator has pointed out in this comment section here, the toxicity is starting to borderline League of Legends now. Seriously, what is wrong with you all? Do you want a company to have a monopoly with VR? Both have different styles of how they want to achieve their end goal. Both HMDs will be cross plat with nearly all their games. Even Valve said they wont stop Oculus users from using Steam Games with it. Both are reaching for distinction but also cross platform. With the advent of VRDesktop and BigScreen even older games that are only 2D will be just fine.

    Gimmick this and gimmick that, cry me a river because who cares! What matters at the end of the day, for our community, is that VR, ALL VR sells well. We are lucky to have CryTek and Ubisoft on our side but that could go away if VR does not sell millions of units. This is where the PSVR comes in. Yes its tiers lower than Rift, Vive, and Star. But, it will sell more. Google around and you will hear some reviewers say they think its better than Rift and Vive (why? I have no idea, probably because they didnt adjust the IPD).

    My only fear right now with VR is that it falls by the wayside like other technologies have because one big company flubbed it. I am looking at you Sony! The end goal of this generation is to show that VR is not just a viable choice for playing games, but it IS the future of gaming.

    Iam not saying to put on your suit and ties, get the monocle out and say what a cheery ol’ time you chaps are having. I am saying its time to stop beating each other over this nonsense and try to make this community last.

    • Bryan Ischo

      The comments on this forum will have nothing to do with the success of VR.

      • Mucker2002

        Bryan you made an error in your post. VR is spelt VIVE

    • Kylis

      Part of the problem is, they shouldn’t be platforms they should just be pc peripherals. When you make them platforms that is when you get the rift (no pun intended…OK maybe a little)

  • yannick

    Great site! head on over to http://vrwearhub.com for more vr related news
    peace out

  • Champion Hero

    My biggest concern with the Touch Controllers is that devs will HAVE to see these as optional component. Bar games specifically designed around them, they will almost always have to cater for gamepad/M&K users as their primary input function for Rift users – meaning that there is a very real chance that games will simply either not be as polished as they should be, or will make limited use of them.

    Not shipping these so that EVERY Rift user has them is going to go against them in the long run I feel. You only need to look at how the Sony and MS peripherals were implemented/fared.

    HTC did it right by ensuring that every Vive user has the same hardware. Devs KNOW what the users have, and can ensure that when designing their products, they can make full use of the available features. They can choose the controllers as their primary input every time should their product be suitable, and have no fear of the end user not having the best possible experience.

    Apart from the other reasons for tracking etc, that’s why the Vive got my money.

  • shijocj

    Anyone have any comments on 360 degree turn limitation when touch is used with Rift ..This is the crucial information I am trying to clarify. Just need to know Oculus is working on fixing this issue so that it will be fixed in final version … Read about the limitation in this Rift developer blog.. http://www.borrowedlightvr.com/2016/02/29/room-scale-vs-seated-vr/ .

    Yes I have seen people saying moving the positions of cameras will fix this but I am not convinced on that since Oculus itself recommends 45 degree angle in front so it will loose sensitivity on back turns.

    • Woolie73

      Would you please STFU.
      You dont need to spam the same darn comment 20 times.

      • shijocj

        Wow wow!! don’t get angry buddy… Yes Spammed for a reason.. Otherwise how do I know what is the opinion from others… And I think I got what I want in one day.. I got only one week left to decide !! Think It was a smart move!!!

  • Hans Wurst

    No information on the finger tracking?! Or am I imagining that feature?!

  • Rerry1000

    Someone knows if will be possible to play games with oculus touch without a oculus rift headset? like play the razer hydra and wi nunchuck?