Now that the news has hit the streets about the Oculus Rift release date coming in Q1 2016, the company has let fly an official blog post with some additional details. Confirmed thus far is that pre-orders for the headset will begin in 2015 and we can expect specs next week, and in the coming weeks, details on input and unannounced “made-for-VR games and experiences” that Oculus has in the works.
The first glimpses of the Oculus Rift CV1, the consumer version of the company’s hotly anticipated headset are finally here. Like the Rift DK2 and Crystal Cove prototype that came before it, the CV1 shares a clear lineage with the prior Crescent Bay prototype, but refines it yet further.
A report published last month in Fortune seemed to indicate that HTC would make the SteamVR / Vive Developer Edition system available for sale prior to the forthcoming launch of the consumer version of the headset. Speaking with Road to VR, HTC says that the notion was misunderstood.
Whilst the the virtual reality industry’s focus right now is largely on in-home entertainment, the out-of-home VR sector shows immense promise. A new project called ‘The Void‘ is an out-of-home experience that aims to let players explore physical environments in virtual reality. Confused? Let us explain.
VR on the web is still young but it’s making impressive progress thanks to pioneers like Arturo Paracuellos, creator of Inspirit, a responsive web VR experience. Paracuellos breaks down his approach to designing a scene that runs across multiple VR platforms directly in the web browser.
Sometimes we touch on a subject lightly in one podcast, only to expand on it in great length in a future episode. This is one of those cases. Previous guests, Rob and Dave for Earth & Sky, come back to dig deeper into education in VR.
With only 4 days left until the official end of its crowdfunding campaign, Wearality Sky has passed its funding goal of $100,000. The company will be offering trials of their 150 degree field of view (FOV) lenses in San Francisco May 1st (today!) and in New York on March 2nd (tomorrow!).
Perception Neuron, a VR motion input suit by Beijing-based Noitom Technology, took to Kickstarter on August 8th and came to a very successful conclusion, reeling in nearly $572,000, more than twice the campaign’s $250,000 goal. Now, the first an unboxing by filmmaker and VFX artist BrandonJLa has appeared showing one of the first Perception Neuron sets in the wild – and the video demonstrates some impressive looking mo-cap accuracy.
The video shows Brandon putting the system through its paces in various poses, some more challengingly bizarre than others, and the motion capture system performs admirably throughout, judging by the on-screen avatar’s actions.
The system has the potential to disrupt the traditional motion capture industry, allowing artists to gain access to the techniques which have, up to now, been largely prohibitively expensive.
If you’re a Perception Neuron Kickstarter backer, waiting for your kit to be shipped, let us know what you think of the video in the comments below.
Steam VR and Valve’s accompanying VR hardware, the HTC Vive, is on its way and with release windows already confirmed, the question is what content will be available for early adopters of the virtual reality platform? These images, found in a live directory on Steam VR’s mini-site, may give us some clues.
Some enterprising fellow over at the Steam VR subreddit has managed to unearth some interesting assets from the official Steam VR website. These images are not publicly used, but seem to provide an indicator as to what software owners of an HTC Vive can expect to be playing on their new VR hardware.
The images are merely titles and developers, but some appear to confirm not only the names of software we know is being worked, and that Valve have already demo’d, but previously unannounced titles for the platform.
Among titles such as Skyworld by Vertigo Games, The Blu by Wemo Labs and The Gallery by Cloudhead Games – all of which have been demo’d previously by Valve – we also have new titles such as Company Heroes 2 from Relic, Quar VR from Steel Wool Games and Game of Thrones from HBO. Intriguingly, Alien: Isolation – which had its VR support for the Oculus Rift pulled on launch makes an appearance and we see two new titles from Valve, Longbow and Secret Shop – speculation on the latter title may point to a DOTA2 related title.
Below, a gallery of the images, and a list of the titles and the developers referenced in the images:
We must be clear however, these images don’t accompany any official information from Valve or any other company listed above. However, it wouldn’t be the first time Steam accidentally revealed forthcoming announcements via similar methods. Previously, the silhouette of what we now know to be the HTC Vive appeared for download just prior to its announcement at the Mobile World Congress in March.
We’ll keep you posted on any verification of the leak as and when we can.
EEVO, a New York based cinematic VR video platform, is preparing to launch into the world of made-for-VR video with its Netflix-style service. Their hopes: to establish a paid (and therefore instantly monetized) service to immediately attract the most compelling premium content from big studios and Indie producers alike.
Epic Games has today announced that the company will be releasing an Unreal Engine 4.8 preview build next week which will offer support for Valve’s highly anticipated SteamVR / HTC Vive. Epic says that even developers who don’t have access to the HTC Vive headset can start building supported VR experiences with Unreal Engine 4.8.
Unity has officially joined Microsoft in its quest to render the world around us with fantastical interactive 3D imagery, an endeavor made possible by HoloLens, Microsoft’s as yet unreleased augmented reality visor. The game engine will fully support HoloLens and just like the all good things in life, it’s free.
HoloLens, Microsoft’s forthcoming AR headset, was today revisited at the company’s ‘Build 2015’ developer conference. Along with a number of tantalizingly smooth on-stage demos, the company also released a video showing some early prototypes, as well as an exploded model of the ‘mixed reality’ device’s inner workings.
Microsoft’s biggest event of the year, Build 2015, started today and amidst all of the Windows 10 reveals, the company also revisited HoloLens, the augmented reality visor introduced by Microsoft earlier this year.
