I don't think it will harm anything. A DK1, with its awful res, probably 50ms or so lag for the rotational tracking, and horrific motion blur when turning you head convinced me VR was here to stay, and also blew away most people I showed it to just using the Tuscany demo and the old Castle Coaster.
You've got to remember that a majority of people still haven't tried VR and I think this will be good enough to at least put it on their radar. The worst thing about mobile VR is the flood of awful 360 videos, which can instantly give people the wrong impression of what VR is.
For those of us with Rifts or Vives, ok, it's a step back, but for someone curious about VR, $200 isn't a lot to ask if they don't have the prerequisite phone, or a PC/PS4 to buy higher end headset.
This 100%. Everyone seems to forget that for a lot of VR enthusiasts the original DK1 didn't turn people off, it made them eager for more.
But it wasn't just enthusiasts - I still have friends and family asking me to show people demos I showed them on the original DK1. They thought it was fantastic, and have nothing but positive memories about it.
I also agree that it's not the hardware that's going to give people the wrong impression, it's the content.
Low quality 360 degree videos that seem to penetrate trade show and public demos are what has the potential to really put people off.
I don’t see the point in this, where I can it’s potential for watching media, the short battery life makes binge watching a box set or a long film a no no. Gaming is also out of the question with its single remote and it being 3dof.
I’m firmly in the ‘do more harm than good to VR’ camp, some people will buy this thing thinking it’s basically just a cheap Oculus Rift or HTC Vive, the same people who say they HAVE tried VR, and wasn’t impressed and when you ask them which one? They say “the one you put a phone in”
When they say "the one you put a phone in" remember that there's more than one version of this. The GearVR (that you assume they might have tried) is a well made piece of kit with additional hardware that supplements the phones tracking and when combined with some of the better phones and the right content (i.e. not low quality 360 degree videos) can be really quite good.
BUT there's also loads of google cardboard clones out there that are actually made from plastic and don't have the additional hardware. Typically, because the experiences on these devices is so low quality, the "go to" demos are 360 degree videos with choppy framerates, low resolution and when combined with awful tracking THAT's when you get people complaining that VR is bad.
I mean I challenge anyone that doesn't know the difference between mobile VR and the Rift/Vive to see the difference between these two headsets. The one on the left is £14... the one on the right is £99 and includes the Oculus IMU hardware.
The Oculus GO beats the Rift and Vive (although I don't think the Pro) in terms of screen quality and ease of use.
The one limitation is 6DOF, but when you break it down, I've got plenty of flight sims, racing games, platformers and video content that I can play and watch for hours without moving my head. Don't get me wrong, when you put it on and immediately focus on it's flaws it's going to be glaring, but if you just sit back and enjoy I can imagine it being perfectly fine.
Saying that, I also agree the battery life is a killer
If it did three hours on a charge meaning I could watch almost any movie I want without issue I'd be snapping one up...
Still, John Carmack has said it's fine to use while plugged in to charge - obviously it half defeats the point, but it's obviously still a lot more flexible in terms of where you can use it.
I feel I just want to try one first to see if the screen resolution bump is enough not to annoy me.
