Starting June 27th, leading OEMs such as Clevo, ASUS, and MSI will begin to offer new high-performance Pascal-powered ‘Max-Q’ gaming laptops using GTX 1060, 1070 and 1080 GPUs. Max-Q is NVIDIA’s new holistic approach to notebook design, with claims of major thermal and efficiency improvements that result in much thinner and quieter gaming notebooks.
Kyle Russell is on the deal & research team for venture capital firm Andreessen Horowitz (aka A16z) where he’s focusing on investing in technologies ranging from virtual & augmented reality, artificial intelligence, drones, and other exponential technologies like quantum computing. A16z has invested in a number of prominent VR companies including Oculus, Magic Leap, Within, BigScreen as well as Lytro, & Improbable.
HTC’s new mobile VR headset dubbed ‘Link’—which curiously does not fall under the company’s Vive brand—is also not making use of the same tracking systems employed by the Vive headsets. Instead the company has teamed up with Ximmerse, makers of the Neon tracking system.
We have all experienced, while in VR, moments of discomfort. When it comes to the Vive, these moments mostly revolved around the stock headstrap. It was either too tight, too loose, or hung the headset too low on my face; I couldn’t ever seem to get it so I could play comfortably for long periods of time. Enter the Vive Deluxe Audio Strap, which has a much more structured build, adjustment knob, and integrated audio. To really put the Deluxe Audio Strap to the test, I decided to write this entire review while wearing the headset with the strap attached.
HTC have announced that, in addition to its TPCAST wireless add-on, it’s also working with Intel on a WiGig powered wireless VR solution and it’s keen to find more partners to work with on further solutions too.
Oculus’ founder Palmer Luckey, who left the company in March, recently opened up on record for the first time in an interview since September 2016. Among a range of topics discussed, Luckey spoke of the timeline of future VR headsets from major hardware players.
At last week’s Display Week 2017 conference, Samsung showed off a new ultra-high resolution display for VR headsets that more than triples the pixel count of the displays in the Oculus Rift and Vive.
Rockfish’s take on the still barren genre of epic space shooters is not only a wonderfully addictive arcade blast, it’s also one of the prettiest games available with VR support there is.
Ubisoft’s long-awaited Star Trek: Bridge Crew, the co-op space sim that puts you at the bridge of your very own Federation vessel, is nearly here (coming out May 30th), but we’ve had our mitts all over a pre-release copy for a few days now. Wherever you may fall on the spectrum of Trek fandom, Bridge Crew promises more than just a genuine Trek experience with its exciting gameplay and social component that is sure to immerse.
Early in development, Throttle Powah is a promising looking multiplayer racer with a VR locomotion mechanic which seems entirely unique and more than a little insane.
For a company that’s showed almost no one what they’re building, Magic Leap has been phenomenally successful at fundraising. The company has previously raised a staggering $1.4 billion, and if a recent report turns out to be true, they’re about to raise even more, reportedly pushing the company’s valuation to $6–8 billion.
Google’s overarching mission is to organize all of the world’s information, and so it’s a natural fit for the company to be one of the leading innovators for using VR for immersive education. Google Expeditions was born out of a hackathon soon after the Google Carboard launched back at Google I/O 2014, and it’s since been shared with over 2 million students who have gone on virtual field trips. At I/O last week, the company had Tango demos that showed me just how compelling augmented reality is going to be in the future of collaborative & embodied educational experiences.
Last week at Google’s I/O 2017 developer conference the company made a number of new announcements which are very exciting for VR consumers. Within the industry though, the announcements represent somewhat of a repositioning of industry players, one that puts Oculus’ mobile strategy in a rough spot.
Videogame publisher and developer Square Enix, famous for its Final Fantasy franchise, among others, has launched its first game for the HTC Vive, Kai-ri-Sei Million Arthur VR in Japan.
In a curious move, HTC has revealed a new mobile VR headset called Link that is not part of the company’s Vive brand. The move comes just a week after the company announced a mobile standalone Vive headset in partnership with Google.
