To be fair Oculus are one of the ones in the industry looking beyond games. Look at Oculus Medium[1], it makes something that was extremely fiddly and required hours of practice into something instantly intuitive.
I don't actually think VR will hit the mainstream, work like spreadsheets just don't benefit much from being in 3D space. The true magic of VR is the hand tracking, being able to interact with computing with both hands in 3D space.
Definitely feel VR will find it's workplace niche in the creative space rather than standard office work. Worth mentioning too that games are an innovation driver, so don't discount them so fast.
https://www.gravitysketch.com/
https://www.masterpiecevr.com/
http://store.steampowered.com/app/606920/EXA_The_Infinite_In...
That's not even mentioned lots of other non-game applications. I've been trying to keep tabs on what's available on Steam and the Oculus Store: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1xwqLF3CpYWxZ6kipzWGH...
Real estate virtual tours, interior design, architecture...
It's less of a walled garden than tablets, smartphones or consoles which almost everyone just seems fine with.
Also, I know that you can run SteamVR apps - I develop a VR game with hundreds of thousands of dollars in sales on Steam, but I've been locked out of the Oculus store for...unknown reasons? Someone behind the black box must've made a decision to block it.
I never had any big issue having to deal with Spectrums, C64, Atari, Amiga, PC and their exclusives.
Likewise with all the game consoles I've owned.
I'm can't think of anything that has transformed computing within months out of nowhere. Usually decades of research and trial-and-error happen before everything falls into place and a new way to do things becomes 'obvious' within a short time. But you cannot ignore the decades of work that went into it, even if it isn't visible from the outside. VR is no exception, it's the 3rd decade (or more?) of serious VR research, and I guess it takes a few more decades until everything falls into place and VR becomes 'obvious' (or more likely, disappear from the public for another 20 years until the next hype cycle). Still, what happens right now is very important work for the coming generations.
Honestly I think the best application so far has been spicing up amusement park rides. Some of those new VR rollercoasters look amazing.
"640K ought to be enough for anybody."
More importantly : no one is forced to look at their computer screen for 8 or even 12 hours a day. You can take a break when you want. You can stare at the window or the roof or your nails every 5 minutes if you want. On the contrary, with a VR headset, you would have to pull it off even for a 2 seconds break. It would be a nightmare, no one is going to accept that and no one should be forced to do that (except maybe in North Korea ?)
This is one of the reasons VR will disappear once again. On the contrary, AR (augmented reality, e.g. hololens) may very well be the next big thing, once they resolve the current issues with hololens (resolution and most importantly field of vision)
It is equally full of eager evangelists who were also wrong.
Or as Alan Kay puts it, imagine what you would like to have 15 year from now, not what you can get today (or something like that, paraphrasing).
Field trips. Highly accurate (to the best of our ability) and high quality, free-roam field trips. Present day, or through time. I would LOVE to visit historical sites from various time periods, to see them in their (as known) beginning, prime, and decay.
The amount of research and work to be done to accomplish that would be staggering... but the potential for improved global and historical understanding, the impact on education, and just weeknight entertainment would be immense.
I've seen a couple primitive efforts, and they were a bit disappointing.
Let me walk around a living 19th century England. Let me visit Dylan Thomas in his writing cabin. Let me see the Parthenon and Han Dynasty China.
I would love to have this 15 years from now. Sooner, if possible!
It's a step in the right direction. I want, greedily, a fully immersive, interactive view of historical places in their time, or at different times.
I'll definitely have a look at this, though.
It can take years or decades (or more) for people to figure out how to really use a new technology.
People tend to assume that the sorts of timescales that apply to applied research or product development, apply to cases like this (figuring out what to do with VR) which are basic research.
VR won’t be a thing until headsets just start coming with new computers, and the base models of new computers have video cards fast enough to run them. It might take 5-10 years before that happens.
For me that is what makes it interesting though that you can still get in at the ground floor and have plenty of time to figure out things and be an expert before the crowd.
" Today I sat at a virtual bar and pretended to drink with a cat, a xenomorph, and a tiny anime girl.
What am I doing with my life.
UPDATE: So a bunch of bu's from dragon ball just invaded a cafe I was working in and started asking if we wanted to invest in bitcoin. I can't make this stuff up. This is their discord; <address> "
If that's the killer app, I wouldn't be too optimistic.
You could have said the same thing about the internet after seeing the web in Mosaic.
People are using VR Chat, and adoption alone is what makes a "killer app." Complexity and depth and such can come later, but only after the masses have cared long enough to build on the foundation.
But that doesn’t exist!
Imagine if the PC sector totally ignored all PC uses except gaming, it would still exist, but it would be a much smaller market.
- VR only works well for some (fairly unpopular) gaming genres, like hardcore flight- and car-racing simulations
- it's expensive besides the headset you need a powerful gaming PC at a time when the majority of 'normal' people just use their mobile phone for some light gaming
- wearing a VR headset for more than 30 minutes becomes really uncomfortable
- the new sensation quickly wears off, same as motion controls, everyone is back to gamepad, or mouse+keyboard
- even though VR is available for mobile phones, it's not common to hang around in public with a VR headset on
Those two genres are a strange choice considering the most popular VR titles fall into entirely different categories. The VR gaming ecosystem is actually fairly diverse. The main issue is 1. too many shooters and online multiplayer titles 2. Most games are short (mainly because the economics of the size of the market pushed things that way right now)
> wearing a VR headset for more than 30 minutes becomes really uncomfortable
I'd dispute "Really". Very much depends on the headset.
> the new sensation quickly wears off, same as motion controls, everyone is back to gamepad, or mouse+keyboard
This isn't true for me and many others. I'm over a year in and still regularly have that "wow" moment again. I don't think we've scratched the surface of what's possible in VR even with the current technological limitations.
Ah ok, I didn't have commercial success in mind, only that 'cockpit games' are a more natural fit for VR than other genres (you're sitting in a cockpit, and you're usually sitting in the real world, unless you have a enough space for room-scale VR), and the fixed reference point of the cockpit frame seems to be better for avoiding VR sickness.
We haven't seen a lot of either yet, because both require considerable investment, but the first VR MMO, Orbus, is going very well, and Skyrim VR on PSVR is one of the first VR apps to really sell headsets.
(My own VR RPG also did very well, and convinced me it's a great use of the medium.)
I have spent a long time in electric wheelchairs. I can move around a room with a control pad and am comfortable without getting nausea.
After a few hours won't people's brains just start to accept that walking is something we do with our thumbs now?
I'm enjoying (in a friendly way) that many people have already given up on the technology and think it's going to fade away again. Because anyone that doubts VR is real and going mainstream is going to be in for quite a surprise!
Oculus is still figuring out what the killer app for VR is, which means they've done a pretty bad job. That's what has slowed progress so much. Even this attempt at encouraging developers is weak. Where's the actual funding?! It's almost as if they don't get how big what they're doing is.
To be fair though, transforming computing can take many months even in the modern world.
Oculus should put games on the back burner and ask themselves what really cool life-improving things they could do with VR if they weren't limited by consumer pricing. They need to jump start the industry with a truly compelling experience and that might not be easy at $300.
Business customers can afford much, much more.
Just like VisiCalc launched the personal computer, so could a VR app that enables virtual offices, for example. Every tech worker could be afforded a $1-$3k head mounted display if it improved their productivity even slightly. Something like a 16K-16K display. That's a solid multi-billion dollar business that they can use to bring the amazing version mainstream.
VR could plausibly trigger a seismic shift towards remote work, transforming cities, economies, and the world. That ought to be a big enough thing to get VR off the ground initially.