
Update on Oculus Touch Ship Date - evo_9
https://www.oculus.com/en-us/blog/update-on-oculus-touch-ship-date/
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Tepix
A VR HMD without tracked hand controllers is not the real thing (I know, I
have owned the DK1, DK2 and Gear VR). The first thing someone new to VR does
after entering VR is raising the hands and looking at them (or not, due to
lack of tracking).

Bundling the Oculus Rift with a XBox One controller will encourage developers
to support this immersion-breaking controller instead of taking the leap to a
virtual reality environment where you manipulate objects by moving your hands
to their location in space, something that is completely intuitive.

I understand why Oculus is doing it - they originally stated that if they
don't ship by the end of 2015 something has seriously gone wrong - but I don't
like it.

It appears that Oculus' biggest competitor, the HTC Vive - which includes
tracked controllers - will be available earlier than the Oculus touch.

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daviddumon
Not sure it's a good idea to separate the 2 product launches. If the Oculus
Touch is necessary for a good VR experience, they take the risk of bad reviews
while waiting for the control device.

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haydenlee
I've used the consumer Rift with and without Touch and it really just comes
down to the specific applications. There are plenty of applications where it
doesn't make sense to use hand controllers (like space sims or car racing
games) and plenty where it makes sense (shooters, social communication). In
the long run my guess is more and more apps will use hands but we'll go
through a skeuomorphic phase in the beginning where there is no clear input
standard and we hold onto inputs from previous platforms.

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Tepix
Applications with custom controllers such as racing games or flight
simulations will work very well, however games that use keyboard+mouse or
gamepad represent concepts ported over from pre-VR gaming and in many cases I
believe they will be inferior.

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i386081
Some of those concepts never made sense to me. I'm talking about stuff like
Quick Time Events. CoD: AW even went as far as "press F to pay respects".

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gloves
Just an opinion, but all the hype around VR seems a little overblown so far as
the consumer side goes for me... the rift still looks too big and the
applications clunky. I haven't heard of any AAA games coming to the rift
(happy to be corrected) - so I wonder whether this is just another hyped
industry.

Where I can see it being more useful is things like heavy industry for
controlling robots and training for doctors - far more industrially based.
Even teaching would be cool - imagine the history lessons.

Will be interesting to see the industry develop...

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lhl
While it's natural to be skeptical, I'd withhold judgement until after you've
tried either the Vive or consumer Rift. One of VR's challenges is that it need
to be experienced to really understand it. Until you feel presence, the
excitement doesn't really make sense. On the flip side, I haven't met a lot of
people slag it once they have.

(Note: Prior DKs and mobile VR generally does not induce presence for most
people)

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ethbro
Or, to put it another way: would "staring a small screen that can display two
colors (something and black) and typing slowly on a typewriter-like entry
system" have sounded like a compelling experience? How about "maneuvering a
block on your desk that corresponds to a dot on a screen, with buttons to
initiate actions"?

Surely there's no way those would beat the experience of a time-tested, bona-
fide, genuine newspaper!

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te_chris
TBH, a newspaper is still a much better way to get my news than the internet,
especially with recent bloated design trends. YMMV.

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lhl
Really? Did you realize that the newspaper published only news from the day
before at the latest, once a day? (Crazy I know.) Just a few people called
"editors" decide what you read. And it doesn't ever get updated, even if it's
wrong or something new happened. You can't even find primary sources or
citations! God forbid you'd want to ever search for anything by a keyword.

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te_chris
I genuinely don't understand your point. You make it sounds like newspaper
editorial policy is some gross conspiracy, or that newspapers aren't published
_every day_. Or that I somehow even mentioned wanting keyword search anyway -
as if that's even relevant to getting a daily news overview.

Seriously, what's your point?

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lhl
Well, since you asked, I was merely noting the ways in which digital delivery
of news has more depth, breadth, relevancy, timeliness, and searchability, but
yes, those factors don't matter to some people.

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awjr
Subtle hint in that announcement that Rift is good to go this quarter!

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adgulacti
frankly, i was surprised noone mentions that. are we clear on the exact date
and price? for rift.

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Tepix
The details will be released at CES for sure...

