NerdTopia Random Thoughts

Is it time for Virtual Reality to make a comeback?

For those of you that can remember, about 10 years ago Virtual Reality or “VR” as it was popularly known back then, was going to be the next “Big thing”. There were TV shows about it, movies (No, the matrix TM doesn’t count, I’m talking about goggles and gloves here, not direct brain implants) and even the major game manufacturers at the time were promising that VR games were just around the corner.

And then…. *Poof*… nothing… the hype died down. The VR bubble burst and other than the occasional obscure reference, it all but disappeared from modern vernacular. The reason? Well… do I have to remind you what graphics looked like 10 years ago? Did you see the “VR” programs that were available at the time? Face it; they were blocky, choppy, and just plain baaaaad. Nobody was going to be fooled into thing that what was being projected on the VR helmets at the time would make for a good cartoon reality, let alone a REAL reality.

I was thinking about this the other day after getting my “next-gen” game system in the mail. Now if you know about console gaming, then you know that the graphics on console games tend to get better with time. My game system is still very early in it’s lifecycle and the graphics are already amazing. We’re talking at the level of seeing sweat drip off a guys head on a hot day… okay, maybe that was a little gross, but you get the idea. It was realistic.. .not “real”, though pretty darn good. If  that’s on a ~$300 consol, you can imagine what a high end gaming computer can do with a top level graphics card. Heck, my computer has 2x 64 bit processors on a single core. By the end of 2008 you can expect 4 processor cores to become the norm! Will it good enough for VR? I guess that’s my question.

I think we’re getting close for the goggles to start coming back. Just as the internet has Web 2.0 ; largely moving towards following the promise of Web 1.0 I think we are on the verge of seeing VR 2.0… with idea of fulfilling the promises of VR 1.0. While I do not believe it’s going be very “Real”.. at least at the beginning. I am starting to see enough processing power, graphical knowledge, and just plain need for something new, that we might very well be seeing someone dusting off their goggles.

You heard it here first!... unless it doesn’t come to pass, in which case ignore me.