
HTC's Vive will cost $799, ship in early April - Roritharr
http://www.engadget.com/2016/02/21/htc-vive-price-release/
======
haydenlee
Context for people not following VR religiously: the Vive is $200 more than
the Oculus Rift however it includes hand controllers and an extra tracking
device. Both come bundled with 2 games if you pre-order. The Rift also has
integrated headphones that are attached to the strap whereas Vive has a
headphone jack on the headset. They both have integrated microphones.

Edit: Rift also includes an Xbox controller in the $599 bundle and Oculus will
be selling their own hand controllers (called Touch) in H2 2016.

~~~
IshKebab
But you didn't even mention the biggest difference - the way they do
positional tracking.

The Rift uses a camera pointing at the headset to track it, which means you
have to be in the field of view of the camera. It's designed primarily for
seated experiences.

The Vive uses two laser "lighthouses" and phototransistors on the headset to
triangulate its position. It's actually really clever and allows room-scale
VR.

I somewhat suspect that the Rift will be more successful - not many people
have an entire room to dedicate to VR, it's cheaper, easier to set up, the
dangling cable problem isn't so severe when seated.

I'm going to predict that Vive-style VR will be most popular in dedicated VR
venues - i.e. instead of going to laserquest or paintballing, you go to a VR
place. There are actually already some in the UK in shopping centres. I think
they're called VR Zone or something like that. They're seated though, and I
haven't tried them.

~~~
yaegers
>the dangling cable problem isn't so severe when seated.

That is exactly why I don't get how people say the room scale thing makes the
Vive the winner in this VR race.

As long as there are cords involved, being able to move around is not a game
changer. Especially the way the Vive does things. Didn't HTC say they adressed
the issue of being caught in the cords by making them visible in VR? Talk
about immersion break. There you are, in the VR world and you look around and
see the cords that actually bind you to a very narrow sector in real life.

This whole room scale VR can only become a thing once the tech is wireless and
by there own statements, that is still a looong way from being a reality.
Especially seeing as these are the 1st generation devices, I say you save
yourself some money and get the rift seeing as you will not get much out of
that feature that only the vive offers currently.

~~~
ohaal
Really what makes the Vive the superior option (in my eyes) is that you can
have both a seated experience and a roomscale experience. A roomscale
experience also removes any "VR sickness" because all your movements translate
1:1 with the virtual world, so anyone who struggle with movement while being
seated won't have the same issues with the Vive headset (in roomscale VR).

If you have tried VR, you will realize that one of the first thing people do,
is try to look at their hands, only to be disappointed as they can't be seen.
The Vive makes this possible on day 1. (Obviously not a 1:1 mapping of your
hands, you'd need something like the Leap Motion Orion[0] for that.)

Most everyone who has tried the Vive have not found the wires to be a problem.
Also what you say about seeing the cord in VR is not true, there is however
something Valve calls the Chaperone[1] system which activates the camera when
you are too close to the edges of your play area. The picture has a bluish
tint, because the resolution of the camera is sub-par, so this is a cool
workaround. It also prevents you from going around "worrying" that you will
break something outside of VR, because as long as the system doesn't warn you
about anything: You are good to do whatever you want in VR.

[0]:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rnlCGw-0R8g](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rnlCGw-0R8g)

[1]: [http://i.imgur.com/N5UQrk9.jpg](http://i.imgur.com/N5UQrk9.jpg)

~~~
dogma1138
You are not going to have room size experience with any of those headsets at
home at least it's not feasible you are tethered with so much crap that you
need a man servant walking after you ensuring that you don't hang yourself on
that tether.

If you want a room size experience just hook up 2 OR cameras it will work the
same way (but better) as the lighthouse approach that HTC took, and you can
hook upto 50 of those cameras currently to track I believe up-to a 100
players.

As far as commercial room sized experience goes Vive is sub optimal, it's
heavy, wobbly, doesn't have good audio support and you can't currently track
more than 5 people at the time and since Vive only supports 2 trackers per
space it's also going to have issues with commercial applications that aren't
a single open room.

~~~
ohaal
> _You are not going to have room size experience with any of those headsets
> at home at least it 's not feasible you are tethered with so much crap that
> you need a man servant walking after you ensuring that you don't hang
> yourself on that tether._

Depends on the size of your play area obviously, but looks pretty good from
this[0], and this _" crap"_ you're talking about doesn't seem very bothersome.

> _If you want a room size experience just hook up 2 OR cameras it will work
> the same way (but better) as the lighthouse approach that HTC took, and you
> can hook upto 50 of those cameras currently to track I believe up-to a 100
> players._

Better how? I haven't seen a good comparison of them yet. I'm curious tho, how
do you intend to scale up to 100 players using USB3 connections? That would be
a MASSIVE amount of data flowing through the computer powering all of this(,
the reason it requires USB3 is because it needs 60Hz high resolution image to
have good tracking). The Vive takes a completly different approach by having
the headset (and controllers) catch and interpret the (infrared) light emitted
by the (dumb) lighthouses.[1]

> _you can 't currently track more than 5 people at the time_

Do you have a source for this? I can't seem to find anything about this. Is it
a limitation of the hardware or the software?

> _Vive only supports 2 trackers per space it 's also going to have issues
> with commercial applications that aren't a single open room._

I'd be very surprised if this was true. Everything I've read seems to indicate
lighthouse is built to be scalable from the ground up. The whole idea of it
being wireless, only requiring a power outlet, makes it infinitely more
scalable than any USB3 solution.

Again, would appreciate sources for any of your claims because I can't seem to
find any of them...

EDIT: Here is a more indepth look at how the lighthouse technology actually
works, because you seem slightly misinformed:
[http://www.hizook.com/blog/2015/05/17/valves-lighthouse-
trac...](http://www.hizook.com/blog/2015/05/17/valves-lighthouse-tracking-
system-may-be-big-news-robotics)

[0]:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WIEuB7H9TOE](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WIEuB7H9TOE)

[1]:
[https://www.reddit.com/r/Vive/comments/40877n/vive_lighthous...](https://www.reddit.com/r/Vive/comments/40877n/vive_lighthouse_explained/)

~~~
dogma1138
>Depends on the size of your play area obviously, but looks pretty good from
this[0], and this "crap" you're talking about doesn't seem very bothersome.

That's not a room experience they aren't moving, rotation slight side to side
movement isn't an issue. If you haven't been to the demo's look at the demo's
from CES/PAX/Gamescon for VR headsets that actually do whole room experience.

>Vive only supports 2 trackers per space it's also going to have issues with
commercial applications that aren't a single open room.

You can't install more than 2 lighthouses it's the current system limit I'm
not sure what is surprising now, HTC said that future versions might have
support for multiple trackers and that they are working with their commercial
partners on another set of trackers that could both sense other trackers and
have a wider spectrum range to support large scale commercial installations.

In the Vive demo's I've been too they went as far as putting up partitions in
order to prevent interference if they were running multiple demos at the same
time.

>Do you have a source for this? I can't seem to find anything about this. Is
it a limitation of the hardware or the software?

That was the figure that was talked about during the demos, upcoming
promotional events like
[http://virtuallydead.co.uk/](http://virtuallydead.co.uk/) also limit it, I
would say the limit is probably both in hardware and software but mainly
"hardware" atm since the Vive room tracking only works when the room is upto
15 sq. feet anyhow (and technically only works when the room is at least
around 15 sq. feet to begin with).

------
yoodenvranx
Does anyone have information about compatibility? Do all these VR things use
the same API or must a game support each product seperately?

~~~
iLoch
There are indeed competing standards but Valve has introduced OpenVR which is
what Steam games will use, which is sure to be an important factor for VR
studios. I suspect OpenVR will be the common choice going forward.

------
CydeWeys
I hope this isn't the VirtualBoy all over again. I really love the idea of VR
gaming but I'm not yet convinced that these platforms will succeed. I'm
certainly not willing to shell out $800 on it knowing what I know now.

~~~
evv
> knowing what I know now.

What are you referring to?

~~~
CydeWeys
Let me elaborate: It doesn't seem that compelling to me yet. I haven't seen
any must-have launch games for the system, and I'm concerned that I might end
up with an expensive system that I don't use much at all. It's firmly in the
"wait and see" territory for me, which I suspect it is for lots of other
people. That's unfortunate, because if most people don't find it compelling,
and decide to wait on the sidelines like me, then it won't sell much at
launch, it won't justify investment by lots of gaming companies, and it's much
more likely to fail.

~~~
haydenlee
For interest's sake, what's the latest VR HMD you've tried?

~~~
CydeWeys
I've tried both Oculus Rift and Google Cardboard. I'm wondering what your
thoughts are here too.

~~~
haydenlee
Consumer Rift? It's worlds better than the DKs.

My opinion is that the consumer headsets launching this year already offer too
good of an experience for VR to 'fail' this time around. Virtual boy was a
miserable experience from what I've heard (I never got to try one). The CV1
changes people's perception of whats possible with computers.

Obviously we are in the early adopter phase of VR where the utility is not
obvious to many people but that's always how great technologies start. Gaming
will provide enough momentum to keep the industry alive even if a killer non-
gaming application isn't found in the short term. We are in the Apple II phase
of VR for sure.

In 5 years once there are portable all-in-one headsets that give better-than-
current-desktop quality experiences for <$500 and with applications built from
the ground up for VR... I can absolutely see every other house in america
owning a kit.

~~~
CydeWeys
It was over a year ago, so I'm pretty sure that means it was a dev kit Oculus.

> My opinion is that the consumer headsets launching this year already offer
> too good of an experience for VR to 'fail' this time around.

I really, truly hope that you are right about this. VR is a technology with
such awesome potential. It'll be like living in a William novel. I'm just not
yet convinced that this generation of devices will be what actually pushes it
into the mainstream. That's the reason I brought up the VirtualBoy; not
because the devices have similar technology, but because I'm worried that
market performance may end up being the same.

------
anindyabd
Will there be "Vive ready" PCs for sale too?

~~~
_pius
Yep.

[http://www.htcvive.com/us/product-
optimized/](http://www.htcvive.com/us/product-optimized/)

------
dogma1138
I don't understand how people claim that Vive is currently "superior" to
Oculus.

The approach that Oculus took on virtually every aspect is better than what
HTC/Valve went with.

It will launch at 600$ which is 200$ and while it comes with a traditional
controller (more on what it's a good thing below) it doesn't matter as much as
the pricing does getting more stuff only works when the prices are equal when
they aren't the cheaper device wins.

It launches with a traditional controller which is the most important aspect
of this as it comes with a control scheme that both gamers and developers are
familiar with which will help to bridge the gap while developers work on good
motion / acceleration control scheme for their games.

If we take the Wii for example then allot of the early games came out with
traditional controls and through out it's life span even 1st party games from
Nintendo continued ship with traditional controls only for titles that motion
controls didn't made much sense for e.g. Smash Bro's.

The OR Xbox 360 style game pad is something that everyone is used to and knows
how it works, it means that developers can focus on utilizing the VR aspects
of OR instead of trying to work extra hard on making a more complicated
control scheme work. Traditional gamepads are also considerably more easy to
implement for seated gameplay which is how most consumers will end up using it
any how. Sure a whole AR/VR room size experience might be cool for 15-30min
ala Lazer Tag but no one will have that at home.

On a side note playing with both Vive's and OR's touch controllers OR wins
here too, the Vive one isn't as comfortable especially for mixed control
schemes which is what even the best motion controlled games eventually opt
for.

Now tracking, people say that the Vive tracking is superior it's not really,
you can stack multiple (upto 50 in the SDK iirc) OR cameras to track multiple
players across a large room, from talking to people that were interested in
large scale installations (5+ players in a single room) OR is pretty much the
only way to currently go because the camera setup can correctly directly track
multiple players without any interference.

And it's not like room scale VR is going to be viable both are still tethered
headsets in all of the demo's I've been through there was a guy behind each
player which was pretty much holding the tether ensuring that it won't tangle
or snap off and that the player wont end up on the ground or with the tether
around their neck. The installation of a single frontal camera is easier than
installing the lighthouses as far as a home setting go, people are used to the
Kinect and the Sony Eye cam, the OR camera could also be used for additional
full body tracking and object recognition.

Overall as far as build quality and comfort goes the OR is more comfortable
(subjective) the rift is considerably lighter and the weight is much better
distributed meaning it sticks in it's place better I had issues with the Vive
wobbling which can cause major issues for people who suffer from borderline
VR/Motion sickness, the OR also comes with great built-in headphones which are
definitely of high quality the sound quality from the demos I've experienced
as well as the overall noise isolation is about the same level as my Shure
premium earphones, the Vive took the bring your own headphones approach which
doesn't work well as it puts limit on the size, shape and strap of the
headphones and even in the demos it didn't seem like they've managed to find a
perfect fit.

On the software side Oculus also has a big advantage they were first and
they've scored most developer deals atm, since Oculus is also what drives
Samsung VR (which I actually own and even it is superior to Vive as far as
comfort and many other things go) and they also plan to licence their software
and hardware IP to other companies it looks like Oculus will have the better
support out there.

Sorry Valve but Vive atm seems more like a me-too product than a true
innovator and industry leader, their bet to go with HTC is also problematic
for the long term aspects of the Vive since HTC is in quite a bit of financial
trouble.

~~~
nilkn
This is a strange post.

How can you reasonably claim that OR is "pretty much the only way to go
currently" when the Vive has done perfectly well with lighthouse tracking? You
mention tracking multiple players at the same time, but not a single developer
is even trying to do this. Maybe Oculus will tackle this at some point in the
future, but they certainly aren't right now.

And while it's true that the Vive headset is still tethered, many folks have
tried it out and almost none have reported any real issues with the cable.

Some of your points are correct and legitimate, but I think in these two areas
you're showing some real bias.

Regardless, I don't think there's any reason to really be worried here. These
are two very expensive devices geared towards affluent early adopters. The VR
space is going to evolve a lot in the next few years. If room-scale takes off,
Oculus will possibly have to redesign their tracking system, but they have the
money and the manpower to do so. So if you're a big fan of Oculus, I don't
think you need to worry about the company going bankrupt over this.

