Should VR Headsets be Agnostic?

Tirnanog said:

I find both hardware and store front exclusivity a
reasonable excuse for piracy.

And all around the world game Devs are getting ready to worship you as their savior

We didnt need to feed our families anyway. Thats so last decade!!!

vannagirl said:

Tirnanog said:

I find both hardware and store front exclusivity a
reasonable excuse for piracy.

And all around the world game Devs are getting ready to worship you as their savior

We didnt need to feed our families anyway. Thats so last decade!!!

I write software for a living. Self taught from the age of 12, working for a company at the age of 16 then moved on to start my own company at 21. I'll be 49 this year. Trying the pity card is not going to wash with me when it's really just the greedy investors that will hurt.

Tirnanog said:

I find both hardware and store front exclusivity a
reasonable excuse for piracy.

Hmm. I find pirates a miserable excuse for humanity.

I just bought the Rift yesterday, I bought it to play DCS and IL2: BoS, both of which are totally agnostic and not even available in the Oculus store. They aren't VR exclusives either, been playing them for years and both predate the DK1 I think. Admittedly I've had a blast with the few minutes of Robo Recall I've played, but that isn't the reason I bought it. The point is, the main selling point of the Oculus, for me, was that it is a good quality HMD for a whole lot less money than the Vive thanks to the summer sale. These devices are nothing more than fancy monitors, the sooner their creators realize that, the better.

That said, I do understand why they are making a handful of exclusives early on. Flight sims and racing games may have been the driving force behind the creation of HMD's in the first place, but those are not popular genres. To gain more mainstream appeal, shooters and other game types need to come for HMD's. Unfortunately, tacking on VR support to those isn't as easy as it is with cockpit oriented games. No serious developer is going to make a VR exclusive since there are too few VR users to sell to. And of course, there will remain few VR users as long as prices remain high and there are few compelling games for them. It's a chicken and egg problem with the only viable solution being VR exclusive titles knowingly made at a loss. The only people willing to do that are those trying to sell the devices, hence Vive and OR exclusives. It's a necessary evil at the moment. It won't last, but for now it's the way it has to be. But as said, the vast majority of VR titles right now are not exclusives or even exclusive to VR.

lunaticedit said:

 There's only 5 games worth playing right now,

disputed! ;)
(my steam / oculus library is over 60. My bank balance probably wishes it was only 5 however )

Store exclusives are a necessary evil.. but personally i just do not see a need for hardware exclusives.
TBH things are ok for the most part in the pc space (forgetting the usual console exclusivity)

its not perfect but most steam stuff is usable on the rift, and most oculus stuff usable on the vive. 

They should be agnostic otherwise we end up with the same garbage that console games have: You either own a Playstation or a Nintendo (or both) which is absurd given companies that make the games HAVE to choose which platform to make their games for and lose out on a huge market on the other side..and doing their game for both platforms ends up with the console maker punishing them (not 'allowing' the game or future games in their console line up).

You can play many Vive games in the Rift..the only real incompatibility is in the hand controllers (so far). I hope this all moves towards a universal access for games/software and leave the hardware itself to compete based on its capabilities not what software they have backdoor-dealed or forced developers to cater to them.

OpenXR may become what we have been hoping for.

https://www.khronos.org/openxr

Oculus, samsung, valve and htc are involved

@protocol7 i hope so...

i get having storefront exclusives and i am fine with it.

i get "oculus funded" titles may make specialised use of touch and wand support would be a "best fit as much as possible"..... and the same if valve fund a game, it would be made for wands with touch support added as best as possible AFTER the wands support.

so sure, some games would work better on 1 hmd than on another.... but ultimately i would like to see a scenario where all PC VR games are playable on all PC HMDs within the limits of the hardware you own.

I dont think it is too controversial to suggest that most profit long term is from software sales anyway.. so the only loser in this would be the company who currently own the lions share of the store front sales, which would be valve.

but everyone keeps telling me how valve are the saviour of PC gaming and Gabe is a gaming philanthropist who shoots rose scented rainbows out of his ass when he goes for a crap.... so surely he would never try to stop HMD parity across all store fronts? ;)

I think people should (and are apparently) hack the s*** out of them until the... er... 'discrimination' (for want of a better word) against the consumer ends. I understand that exclusivity is a part of business, but I dont think it is the deciding factor in forking out cash for a HMD (at the moment, anyway).

I also think apps like Vireio, VorpX and Trinus are things that should have been part of the deal when buying a HMD, included in the software, as well as Virtual Desktop/Bigscreen... PnP VR anything! I remember last year, my house mate *strongly* disagreed with me that playing non VR games in VR would be as simple as an app and some minor UI adjustment.

As an Oculus Rift owner I am very much hoping Bethesda come good with 'supporting as many platform as possible' with Doom, Fallout and Skyrim.

Some sort of universal VR API is inevitable.