Virtual Reality

Why we think the Oculus Rift is still the best VR headset (hands-on)

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Of the three big PC or console based VR platforms, Oculus' is the one that feels the most mature and ready for primetime
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"Eeeeeey" – is this a VR Fonzie simulator?
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Picking off targets with a virtual six-shooter, using the Oculus Touch controls
Will Shanklin/Gizmag
Of the three big PC or console based VR platforms, Oculus' is the one that feels the most mature and ready for primetime
Will Shanklin/Gizmag
Staring wide-eyed into the virtual abyss
Will Shanklin/Gizmag
Oculus Touch will release in the second half of 2016
Will Shanklin/Gizmag
The Rift headset starts shipping in late March
Will Shanklin/Gizmag
A seated Rift demo, using the bundled Xbox One controller
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Playing a demo of Lucky's Tale
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Oculus Touch
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Oculus Touch
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The Rift launch package
Will Shanklin/Gizmag
Our latest demos of the Oculus Rift and HTC Vive
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Playful Corp. founder/CEO Paul Bettner showing off his beloved Rift launch title, Lucky's Tale
Will Shanklin/Gizmag
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At this point, you're probably getting tired of hearing about our (and other media outlets') event demo impressions of the big VR headsets. After three years worth of this, we're all pretty much to the "release the damn things already!" stage. And we're almost there. But as final forms become apparent and content continues to fill up, we have some new thoughts on the Oculus Rift – and why it's the best VR headset right now.

We used the Oculus Rift, HTC Vive and PlayStation VR this week. It wasn't our first time with any of the headsets, but it was the first time we used all three at the same event, and within the same week-long time frame.

The first thing to know is that none of them suck. All three give you the basic VR experience of transporting you somewhere else. There are greater and lesser degrees of this, which vary across platform and across individual titles, but it's not as if one of them is 100 percent pure VR and the others are ... something far short of that. If any one of them were the only virtual reality that existed, we'd still be excited about this emerging frontier.

So why do we think the Oculus Rift is the best? To quote a famous ex-Microsoft CEO: "Developers, developers, DEVELOPERS!"

Playful Corp. founder/CEO Paul Bettner showing off his beloved Rift launch title, Lucky's Tale
Will Shanklin/Gizmag

Oculus has shown by far the best and biggest variety of VR content. Part of that is because the company is very open showcasing content for the media, but what we've seen on the other platforms is very thin by comparison. For example, the Vive demo we saw this week was basically the exact same thing we saw last July – it added a showcase of the headset's new camera system, but the game/experience demos themselves were nearly identical.

In our Oculus demos, meanwhile, we could choose from around 20 demos to play – half using the wireless Xbox One gamepad that ships in the box, and half using the Oculus Touch controllers that will ship later this year. Some are better than others, and not all are Rift exclusives, but when we play Oculus games, we see at least five or six that have the potential to be generation-defining experiences (two of them, Lucky's Tale and Eve: Valkyrie, are bundled with the Rift). We just haven't seen that on the other two platforms. At least not yet.

Oculus Touch will release in the second half of 2016
Will Shanklin/Gizmag

The Oculus Touch controllers are still outstanding – these are going to be must-have accessories for anyone buying the Rift. They give you hands in first-person games and experiences; they're light, comfortable and responsive, and their buttons correspond perfectly to natural gripping gestures. Oculus Touch demos where you have pistols in your hands, like Bullet Train and Dead and Buried, are some of the best experiences you can have right now in VR.

The Vive's controllers are also very good, to the point where Oculus Touch shouldn't be the deciding factor between the two products.

The walking around aspect of the Vive is still awesome, following up on our first demo in 2015 which had us using words like "mesmerizing" and "next-level VR." The room-scale aspect is extremely cool, and one possible destination for the majority of VR content years down the road.

HTC also added an important – and very smart – element to that in its new Pre headset: a front-facing camera that pops up nearby walls, objects, boundaries and other obstacles before you have a chance to smack into them. The Rift doesn't have that.

Our latest demos of the Oculus Rift and HTC Vive
Will Shanklin/Gizmag

So why doesn't that give the Vive the edge in our current "best VR headset" conversation? Because – this isn't something Oculus has talked much about – the Rift is going to be able to work on a room-wide scale as well. The company isn't making it an early focus because, well, baby steps and all that. People who haven't been using VR at meetings and events for the last three years need to start with something manageable and progress in logical and easily digestible increments when the time is right. Start with gamepad-based stuff, release Touch a few months after that, and then take it from there. And when it is time for room-scale VR, the same Rift that you can pre-order today will be able to do that as well as the Vive. You'll just need a second positional sensor, which will be bundled with Oculus Touch, to go with the one that's bundled with the Rift.

That leaves Chaperone, HTC's feature that uses the front-facing camera to show you obstacles, as its only clear advantage right now. If you're 100 percent invested in the room-scale aspect from the get-go, then that could make it the better choice for you. For everyone else, though, we'd recommend going where the content is, and so far that's the Rift.

The Rift launch package
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Much stink was made this week of the Oculus Rift's US$599 price, and it is on the higher range of what we were expecting (we predicted something in the $500-600 price range). Hey, we get it, it ain't cheap at all. Especially when you factor in the cost of the PC you'll need to power it, which will set you back roughly another $900 (Oculus' partners will be offering Rift/PC bundles in the $1,500 range).

Just remember to keep things in perspective. Virtual reality may seem established, because we in the tech and gaming press have been blabbering on about it for years now. But this is just the very beginning – and being an early adopter has never been cheap (remember, the first iPhone launched at $499, and that was with a two-year contract!). From where we stand now, the Oculus Rift does exactly what first-generation products need to do: it provides a premium, uncompromised experience that's going to blow people's minds when they try it.

As Oculus founder Palmer Luckey tweeted last month, "VR will become something everyone wants before it becomes something everyone can afford."

The Oculus Rift is available to pre-order now, from the product page below. The very first shipments start going out late March (a ship date you probably missed if you haven't ordered yet).

Product page: Oculus

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14 comments
Derek Howe
I've been wanting a VR headset for awhile now, But I'm waiting to pull the trigger until a few weeks after it releases. I want to gauge, well, everything. Plus I'm hoping I can try one out first at BestBuy or something. I would be pissed if I spent 800 dollars (200 on a video card) on an Oculus and hated the experience.
MuhammedAbdallah
so Rift is better than Vive due to " progress in logical and easily digestible increments when the time is right." how !!!!! why I have to pay for each "baby step" while I can pay once for a future step if i bought Vive.
MaximePare
I tought PSVR was skipping CES 2016...you sure you really tried it lol?
Augure
Highly disagree. The price, of course, is the first major step back which will alienate VR mass market launch. The specs then, are a huge step back because it means you either get a 300$ dollars or a full 1000$ computer to be able to use a 700$ VR headset. And finally the fact that it is still reliant on PCs which are highly unoptimized and messy (if you've used a DK1/2 or any PC you know what I'm talking about).
The PSVR is by far the best headset (although one can regret the lower resolution even if the technology seem to imply that it won't have any SDE or aberration), not only for the price which is probably going to be around 400/450$ and the fact that it's compatible, optimised and usable out-of-the-box with any PS4 (which is also cheaper and optimised). I'm pretty sure that if it's well marketed and priced by Sony, the PSVR will sell way more than the Oculus thus paving the way for VR.
hkmk23
3D cinema, 3D TV......dead and buried now VR headsets....the only people going to sit around wearing this ridiculous gadgets are the unfortunate ones who have no mobility......
Steve Jones
I'm going to get VR, but I'd need to buy both host machine and headset (and controllers and games etc of course). The best games we've seen previews of (in print), are for the PSVR. And that will be close to half the price of Oculus if you need to buy the host machine as well. And with PSVR, even if VR is a let-down, you've still got a lovely new PS4.
FollowTheFacts
...I've tried VR goggles a couple of times...it was horrible, absolutely worthless (at NAB) – theoretically, it could be spectacular, but...what would that require....? I saw 3D IMAX....1986...spectacular....3D television...spectacular – VR goggles..? – ...15 seconds and you want to get rid of them....
David A Galler
These higher tech VR systems could possibly take over some of the functions of of flight or other simulators at considerably less cost.
Mr. Hensley Garlington
I am looking forward to StarVR, if just comparing specs. Though I think that needs to improve its response time/delay whatever they call that lag, and the screens need to be curved around the wearer instead of just two flat screens in sorta delta wing formation.
But, I know with the crazy high 5K resolution they are bragging about, its going to take some serious hardware to take full advantage of that setup. Which I think will be achievable on a budget within the next two years.
SeanStashuk
You've suggested that the main reason for Oculus being "still the best" is due to the more plentiful and varied software that's available for it. Does this mean that Oculus and Vive are planning to release EXCLUSIVE games for each platform?
From what I've been able to learn it appears that both Oculus & Vive have nearly identical capabilities in terms of interacting with software, so I really hope these companies aren't going to try to force a console style rift between consumers of each VR display device...