In 1896, a French short film called L'arrivée d'un train en
gare de La Ciotat was screened to the public. As the story goes, some
people were so terrified by the realism of the train coming towards them
that they fled to the back of the room in fear.
Since
then, nothing has quite aroused the same reaction in an audience. That
is, until virtual reality. It's an experience that can be incredible,
immersive and astonishingly real, and, like the Lumière brothers' movie,
we're still at the start of this story.
It's been more than two years since the Oculus Rift
became one of Kickstarter's biggest success stories yet. The Rift is
still a work in progress, but that hasn't stopped other players from
moving forward in this area. Samsung's horse in the race, the Gear VR,
is a big deal: the first and closest thing to a consumer-ready product
to hit the market. I
say closest because this is still a beta product - as signified by its
"Innovator Edition" subtitle - but one that's been designed in
partnership with Oculus VR, using the same optical technology as the
Rift. Plus the headset itself is just a conduit; the Gear VR uses the Samsung Galaxy Note 4 in lieu of a display of its own. But
Samsung isn't only first to market, it's also first to take virtual
reality mobile. Ever explored the far reaches of space from the backseat
of a bus? How about taking a trip to the bottom of the ocean from the
comfort of your bed? Heck, take it in the bath if you want the full 4D
experience (just don't get it wet).
The
headset itself is reasonably affordable at $199 (about £126, AU$228)
but with a catch: you need to own a Note 4 to use it, and at upwards of
£550 (US$700, about AU$900) they're not cheap. Portability
won't just make virtual reality easier to use, it'll make VR accessible
to everyone. The technology is already proving itself, but virtual
reality's biggest challenge is yet to come: edging out of the margins of
PC gaming and into the mainstream. The question is, will Gear VR be the
one to do that?
Design
The design of Gear VR
sits somewhere between Oculus Rift DK 2 and Google Cardboard. The white
plastic shell is moulded into the familiar ski-goggle headset design, on
the back of which is an elastic strap that fits around the sides and
top of your head. Even with the Note 4 inserted it doesn't feel too
heavy.
For obvious reasons Samsung has kept the device as
light as possible, and with a bit of strap adjusting the whole thing
stays nicely in position through any vigorous head movements, without
feeling like it's weighing you down. The
focus adjustor on the top might need a bit of tweaking, especially if
you're a glasses wearer. Despite the impressively low latency and high
resolution virtual reality is still at a point where some people will
come away feeling a tad queasy, so it's important that you're always
using Gear VR at optimum clarity. So,
how the hell do you control the Gear VR if the phone is inside it?
Samsung offers two means of interaction: a touchpad and back button on
the side of the headset, or an optional Android controller. Using the
swipe-based touchpad is easy enough for navigating menus and interacting
with some of the basic games and experiences, but as I'll get onto
later, you really need a controller to get the most out of Gear VR. Naturally,
Samsung's headset is nothing without the screen, and you'd be hard
pushed to find a smartphone better than the Note 4 right now. The 2,560 x
1,440-pixel, 5.7-inch OLED display provides a sufficiently rich image.
Married with that is a Snapdragon 805 processor, together making for a
respectable wires-free VR experience. To
create the optical illusion of virtual reality the Note 4 display
divides into two screens that blend together again when viewed through
the lenses. But while undoubtedly impressive, the limitations of the
Note 4 screen are still obvious.
The resolution and
latency are good but limited by a device that wasn't primarily built for
virtual reality. In particularly vibrant worlds the pixels are still
visible, creating a barrier to full immersion that's often hard to
overlook. But in less colourful environments, such as Oculus Cinema, the
Note 4's super deep blacks are impressively authentic. Once
perfect - and come Oculus market launch, it should certainly be a lot
better - VR will offer an experience that's difficult to distinguish
from reality. It's so close right now, but it's not quite there.
Features and games
I
hear a lot of people say that VR will need its "killer app" in order to
become mainstream. I'm not so sure about that, but VR does need to be a
myriad of games and experiences, and as far as that goes, Samsung's
swelling virtual reality marketplace is a promising glimpse of what's to
come.
The UI is rather bare-bones, which isn't
necessarily a bad thing. You've got the Home menu, the Library and the
Store, all of which are pretty self explanatory. Your most recently used
apps will show on the home screen, while the Library offers a complete
list of all your downloads with the option to filter. Jumping
between menus is as simple as moving your head and tapping the
touchpad, and just about everything can be done from within the headset,
negating the need to take out the Note 4 for any reason until you're
done playing.
I tried a number of different experiences
during my time with the Gear VR, most of which were free and many of
which required the optional controller to play. Anshar Wars taps into
the most primitive of our VR desires: to fly around in space and shoot
aliens. Then there's James's Legacy: The Prologue, a beautifully
designed adventure game made of colourful, cuboid worlds - think an RPG
Mario Galaxy - that goes against the grain by presenting itself in third
person. But
perhaps my most memorable experience with Gear VR so far has come from
Shooting Showdown, a simple first person shooter that pits you against
another random online player on a firing range.
Despite
the fact their "body" was hidden the other side of a dividing wall for
the duration of our contest, there was something rather awesome about
sharing an immersive virtual space with another player. I know I said
virtual reality doesn't need a "killer app", but the first proper VR MMO
is going to be incredible.
For now, most of these are
bite-size mini experiences; the sorts of things you'll keep installed
for the sake of showing your friends how awesome virtual reality is, but
there are only a handful that you'll go back to yourself. However,
between Samsung's Oculus store and Milk VR service, I'm hopeful the
library will swell rapidly.
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