Work on the Oculus Rift is coming along nicely, according to internal reports, although the device still has some way to go before it’s ready for a public market release. One of the features that people have been anticipating most, is VR input, something that’s been receiving a lot of attention from the public and media lately. And yet, while most people were convinced that the upcoming GDC would have a presentation that showcases the new feature, it’s just been announced that this is not happening just yet.
Palmer Luckey, founder of the original company, was recently asked about the possibility of seeing a VR input demonstration at GDC – and his response was that people “shouldn’t get too hyped on the possibility”. He went on to explain that VR input is a big challenge, much more difficult to implement than some people might suspect, and the development team is still trying to figure out how to tackle some of the problems with the technology.
The company will show the headset’s VR input capabilities when they have it working sufficiently well, not before that – they apparently don’t want to risk their public image in any way, especially now that other companies have started to come out with their own VR products.
It’s actually starting to become a very active market. On one hand, we’ve got Samsung pushing for their goggles that turn some of their smartphones into a VR headset; Microsoft are working hard on hologram-based virtual reality systems; and last but not least, Valve just recently announced that they’ll be joining the game as well.
The main advantage the Rift had was its originality – it was practically the first device to gain such popularity and exposure. And now, with so many other companies putting some serious work in this area, it could become a much more difficult game for Facebook (who now own the Oculus Rift). Unless they do some serious innovation to give people a good reason to go with the Rift over competing products, the device may soon fall out of relevance.
Hopefully, the VR input technology will be ready for a public preview soon. When that happens, interest in the Rift should definitely pick back up, as rumors claim that the solution implemented in the Rift is going to be the most advanced one on the market. The company certainly has a massive budget backing up their work now, with Facebook funding the project – but as we’ve seen so far, implementing virtual reality properly isn’t just a matter of having enough money, there are some very specific problems that have to be resolved first, and those require some serious engineering thinking.