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Playstation VR GDC Presentation: March 15th

Maybe? SMI are an eye-tracking company who have worked pretty closely with SCE and Magic Labs over the years, and they just demonstrated a solution which is basically ready to ship, and costs less than $10/unit at scale. So, fingers crossed.

I've always wondered what that hole in the headset, between and just above the lenses, might be for. Is it this? Would be ridiculous if Sony come out and announce release date etc, and we find out we will get foveated rendering and it can pull off amazing, hitherto unseen graphics... *wakes up*

201601061011501152127.jpg
 
I've always wondered what that hole in the headset, between and just above the lenses, might be for. Is it this? Would be ridiculous if Sony come out and announce release date etc, and we find out we will get foveated rendering and it can pull off amazing, hitherto unseen graphics... *wakes up*

201601061011501152127.jpg

It is for your 'third eye' of course! That pineal gland rendering feedback!
 
Got to use PSVR recently, pretty impressive. I have a Gear VR, so thats my only comparison.
I played DriveClub, couldnt notice any SDE, like on the Gear, looked pretty crisp and I know people said DC VR is soft or has jaggies, but I couldnt really notice anything odd or bad in that regard. I only played a little bit of the free DC, and that was a long time ago, so I don't have a good frame of reference of what regular DC should look like. But DC VR looked great imo.

Was kinda cool, that I could look behind me, and then lean my head out 'the window' to see behind my car, with the positional tracking.

Some First Person games using a controller on Gear(Quake, Omega Agent, DeadHalls) would give me slight nauesa when using a controller to turn, but I didnt get any of that playing DC. Maybes just a different game, or because of the higher refresh rate.

Was also super comfortable. As for the FOV, I feel the Gear has a slightly better FOV maybe. PSVR felt like I was looking through 2 cylinders in a way, like maybe the view was chopped off top and bottom, while Gear is just chopped off on the sides. This is all off memory and short use so could be wrong.

Tried the Gear VR, loved the experience but some demos was very blurry and not that good looking. How will the Playstation VR compere? Will the graphics be much better and does it have any features that makes it better?

Was it videos that were blurry or games? Video is usually always going to be blurry compared to real time graphics. But yeah Gear using mobile graphics, so mostly pretty simple graphics with not a lot of shaders. PSVR will have noticeably better graphics. Besides that PSVR has postional tracking, so it can actually track when you translate your head. While Gear is just rotational view tracking. Its also much more comfortable and a better screen.
 
Tried the Gear VR, loved the experience but some demos was very blurry and not that good looking. How will the Playstation VR compere? Will the graphics be much better and does it have any features that makes it better?
It'll have positional tracking (using the PS camera) so you will be able to lean and move around more, whereas GVR only tracks the angle/360 movement of your head. Graphics should be significantly better. I believe the field of view is better so you will see more, and naturally controller support (DS4/Move) will be better than using whatever Android compatible controller you happen to have.
 
Looking forward to this presentation. I entertained the idea of them announcing it for $500+ but then I immediately chuckled and shook my head. Here's hoping for $299 and expecting $699.
 
I've always wondered what that hole in the headset, between and just above the lenses, might be for. Is it this? Would be ridiculous if Sony come out and announce release date etc, and we find out we will get foveated rendering and it can pull off amazing, hitherto unseen graphics... *wakes up*

201601061011501152127.jpg
It's where the screw for the headpiece is placed I'd guess

edit: check below for the correct answer :D
 
I've always wondered what that hole in the headset, between and just above the lenses, might be for. Is it this? Would be ridiculous if Sony come out and announce release date etc, and we find out we will get foveated rendering and it can pull off amazing, hitherto unseen graphics... *wakes up*

201601061011501152127.jpg


That's just a proximity sensor which detects whether the HMD is being worn or not. Yoshida confirmed it a few months ago during the Taipei Game Show.

*It says "Proximity Sensor" according to fellow GAF member DJmizuhara.

With regards to eye-tracking, I honestly doubt it is being added as a last minute feature. Let's not forget eye-tracking costs quite a bit of processing power, and PS4 already keeps (stereo 3D) track of headset + up to 4 controllers if I'm not mistaken. I don't think PS4 is powerful enough to keep track of two extra "markers" (pupils) moving so fast you'd need a pair of cameras running at the very least at 120Hz (I think much more that that would be needed because you can't predict saccades - we don't have IMUs built into our eyes)
 
Told ya :)

$299 Headset only, available online.
$349 Headset+ Camera retail, including a digital game

Launch Summer (June/ July) alongside Eve Valkyrie, No Man's Sky VR (day and date with regular version), Rigs, and a few others. Dreams VR heavily featured during presentation.

My 2cps.

This would be the right thing to do sku-wise and price-wise.
 
How could the Gamasutra guy do a cost/benefit of PSVR if the price hasn't been announced yet?

Like everyone else here, guesswork. ;)

My guess has always been this but I can't be bothered quoting my old, old old post so here t is.

£199 - £249. That's my min/max price but I am more confident it'll be the higher end of the price spectrum, but still.
 
Was listening to The Lobby, and yet another bunch of clueless journalist who thinks that the breakout box is some external GPU nonsense. =/
 
Was listening to The Lobby, and yet another bunch of clueless journalist who thinks that the breakout box is some external GPU nonsense. =/
The Giant Bomb guys were talking about it a couple of weeks ago and whether it could be used to make non-VR games perform better. =\
 
Was listening to The Lobby, and yet another bunch of clueless journalist who thinks that the breakout box is some external GPU nonsense. =/

The Giant Bomb guys were talking about it a couple of weeks ago and whether it could be used to make non-VR games perform better. =\

Why are people, who's main job is to follow video games so clueless about this break out box?
 
If they do not announce both date and price, there will be some laughs imo.

I have to imagine they will be.

This shouldn't be like their February 2013 event for the PS4 when we didn't even know the system officially existed yet. We've seen it demoed, the public has demoed it. It's out there. We've seen the hardware and the software. What we're really waiting on is final hardware bundles, price and a release date.

I expect the Move controllers may get a redesign to something more compact but the old ones will work just fine.
 
Why are people, who's main job is to follow video games so clueless about this break out box?

It's why I don't listen to basically any gaming podcasts outside of one or two very small hobbyist ones. It drives me mad when I'm listening to people whose job it is to know this stuff, simply don't, and not only that but they're often misinformed.

It's surprising how many gaming journalists don't seem to know the industry they're covering all that well.
 
Why are people, who's main job is to follow video games so clueless about this break out box?

Even the most heavyweight collection of tech journalists on TWIT (this week in tech) are apparently unable to discuss VR for some reason. I remember the first time I heard them mention VR on the show, my jaw was on the floor through the whole segment. It never got better either, after two years Laporte is still going on about how sick he got from the DK1 and kind of don't want to hear anything else about it. They can have serious discussions about the driest of things on the show for hours, but are clueless about even basic technical VR details, and even ridicule it as some silly videogame device.
 
In reference to there being little factually correct mainstream discussion on VR. VR is just too new and not yet proven yet. Can you imagine the conversations on cloud computing that took place before something like titanfall was actually released.
 
Honestly the biggest thing for me besides a reasonable price point and date is the games themselves. They need to make seem compelling enough to make us want to buy it. Personally I don't feel like I have felt that much excitement yet other than intrigue with VR itself.
 
Hey, I got my first proper experience of VR today, got an S7 and Gear VR. It's been pretty cool although far from perfect. It's pretty finnicky to get it in the sweet spot, and indeed the sweet spot for each of my eyes seems to be different. When it's looking reasonably clear it works pretty well but lacking in peripheral vision. Titans of Space was pretty mind blowing even given the low resolution.

One massive thing about it and all of the other headsets except for PSVR that it confirmed for me is that the ski mask style of fit is really not all that great. Tricky to get on and off, really claustrophobic over your face, gets hot and sweaty inevitably, and it constantly moves when you smile or make any kind of facial expression... which usually takes it out of the sweet spot and moves the screen around when you really wish it didn't.

I simply don't understand why no one has copied the PSVR design where the panel actually floats in front of your face, not touching your face at all, with the weight resting on the top of your head (and balanced too between front and back). I can't talk for Rift and Vive directly but they still fit snug to your face, they'll still move if you happen to smile while experiencing something in VR, and they'll still leave irritated sweaty marks on your face after any decent session with them, surely? Could be way off, maybe somehow the way they're designed works... but I do see PSVR as being a far more intelligent design of a headset for ergonomics and practicality.

Wonder what field of view and clarity of image is like. My Gear VR is very blurry towards the edges of the screen, distractingly so. I hope PSVR does manage to improve the optics over Gear VR.
 
Wonder what field of view and clarity of image is like. My Gear VR is very blurry towards the edges of the screen, distractingly so. I hope PSVR does manage to improve the optics over Gear VR.

Never tried any VR solution, really eager to do so. As far as I've read, the optics of Sony are of very high quality and the screen is curved which, along with the optics, reduces blurriness at the edges.

Please someone who has actually tried it correct me if I'm wrong.
 
Never tried any VR solution, really eager to do so. As far as I've read, the optics of Sony are of very high quality and the screen is curved which, along with the optics, reduces blurriness at the edges.

Please someone who has actually tried it correct me if I'm wrong.

Yeah heard that too. Looking at images of the inside of the headset the lenses seem like a much larger opening than on Gear VR, so maybe a bit less of the tunnel vision thing. While you can see the pixels and have a very subtle screen door effect as well (more like a fine linen texture that's perceptable at times) it's not my main issue with Gear VR, but that blurring as soon as you go away form the centre of the image is. With it's full RGB OLED screen and hopefully better optics I think PSVR could deliver pretty decent images. Certainly the 3D'ness of stuff even in the Gear VR is a revelation. The sofa in Netflix looks solid, like a real object. Lots to look forward to as this tech quickly improves.
 
I've always wondered what that hole in the headset, between and just above the lenses, might be for. Is it this? Would be ridiculous if Sony come out and announce release date etc, and we find out we will get foveated rendering and it can pull off amazing, hitherto unseen graphics... *wakes up*

201601061011501152127.jpg
That actually looks a lot like the camera described in their auto-IPD patent, which as I said, isn't really well placed for gaze tracking. Regardless, apparently it's been confirmed to be nothing more than a comically large proximity sensor… =/


With regards to eye-tracking, I honestly doubt it is being added as a last minute feature. Let's not forget eye-tracking costs quite a bit of processing power, and PS4 already keeps (stereo 3D) track of headset + up to 4 controllers if I'm not mistaken. I don't think PS4 is powerful enough to keep track of two extra "markers" (pupils) moving so fast you'd need a pair of cameras running at the very least at 120Hz (I think much more that that would be needed because you can't predict saccades - we don't have IMUs built into our eyes)
It wouldn't really be last-minute though. Sony and SMI have been working together for years; they showed gaze-tracking in Second Son at the PS4 launch event. Sony could've easily planned/hoped to include gaze-tracking all along, and simply haven't said anything yet, just as it was a while before we found out about 120 Hz support. The announcement may be "late" as far as third-party developers are concerned, but so what? They're gonna be stuck with this kit for years, so I don't think they'll be chapped if they're surprised to learn it'll be a lot more future-proof than they anticipated.

How much processing time are we actually talking though? Again, they already had it running with Second Son, which is no slouch. You should be able to track both eyes with a single, wide-field camera. Tracking four wands only used "a small fraction of an SPU" on PS3, and I think it's cheaper still on the PS4's GPU. Do you have any links about it being expensive? This is the first I've heard it mentioned.

Edit: The cameras for foveated rendering are 250 Hz, FYI. 60 Hz for basic targeting and such.
 
That actually looks a lot like the camera described in their auto-IPD patent, which as I said, isn't really well placed for gaze tracking. Regardless, apparently it's been confirmed to be nothing more than a comically large proximity sensor… =/



It wouldn't really be last-minute though. Sony and SMI have been working together for years; they showed gaze-tracking in Second Son at the PS4 launch event. Sony could've easily planned/hoped to include gaze-tracking all along, and simply haven't said anything yet, just as it was a while before we found out about 120 Hz support. The announcement may be "late" as far as third-party developers are concerned, but so what? They're gonna be stuck with this kit for years, so I don't think they'll be chapped if they're surprised to learn it'll be a lot more future-proof than they anticipated.

How much processing time are we actually talking though? Again, they already had it running with Second Son, which is no slouch. You should be able to track both eyes with a single, wide-field camera. Tracking four wands only used "a small fraction of an SPU" on PS3, and I think it's cheaper still on the PS4's GPU. Do you have any links about it being expensive? This is the first I've heard it mentioned.

Edit: The cameras for foveated rendering are 250 Hz, FYI. 60 Hz for basic targeting and such.

Thanks for the links.

I don't have links about the gaze tracking being expensive. I don't really know for sure (just gut feeling to be honest) but I wouldn't take the Second Son implementation as an indication that it doesn't cost much because all it did was gaze tracking (no stereo rendering at 90Hz either). With PSVR, the gaze tracking process would run on top of controllers tracking, headset tracking. All of which also involve depth tracking via triangulation based on image analysis. The PS4 already processes the stereo video feed from the PS Camera at 60Hz, so that's 60 frames analysed every second. For eye-tracking you'd need to analyse 120 if not 240 stereo frames in the same amount of time on *top* of that. I dunno, it seems a bit too much to me.

Adding gaze-tracking would also involve a serious redesign of the whole optics module which is why I think it's too late for Sony to add it. Unless of course Sony has been hiding it all along since GDC 2014. You can't just put a wide FOV camera in that hole in the middle. SMI solution uses two cameras behind the lenses for a reason I guess.

Also, I think that hole is just too high for proper gaze-tracking. It probably needs to be at eyes-level or even lower than that because when you look down, your eyelids slide down as well, possibly occluding the pupil.
 
Sony adding official PSVR forums to their sites: http://community.eu.playstation.com/t5/PlayStation-VR/bd-p/bEN_PlayStationVR

With the included VR warning in firmware 3.50, PSVR-making-of-articles and the big event next week and Sony not backing up on Q2 release... I feel first week of June will happen.

Yeah, the way everything is starting to ramp up this has to be coming out this half. June seems likely.

Despite the fact that I have an Oculus preorder I still find myself more excited for the PSVR.
 
Sony adding official PSVR forums to their sites: http://community.eu.playstation.com/t5/PlayStation-VR/bd-p/bEN_PlayStationVR

With the included VR warning in firmware 3.50, PSVR-making-of-articles and the big event next week and Sony not backing up on Q2 release... I feel first week of June will happen.


Sony showed off retail units around November last year. Theyve been in production since around then. Just a case of picking a month and ramping up to accommodate. Any time from May onwards is possible.
 
Only three meter cord is disappointing, I'm not sure that reaches all the way to my couch and around the back of my head, and I have a pretty small house.
 
One massive thing about it and all of the other headsets except for PSVR that it confirmed for me is that the ski mask style of fit is really not all that great. Tricky to get on and off, really claustrophobic over your face, gets hot and sweaty inevitably, and it constantly moves when you smile or make any kind of facial expression... which usually takes it out of the sweet spot and moves the screen around when you really wish it didn't.

I simply don't understand why no one has copied the PSVR design where the panel actually floats in front of your face, not touching your face at all, with the weight resting on the top of your head (and balanced too between front and back).
I reckon it has to do with light leakage. Only a little bit of peripheral light seeping into your headset already greatly diminishes quality (of immersion). So it needs to stick close to your face, especially through movement.
Wonder what field of view and clarity of image is like. My Gear VR is very blurry towards the edges of the screen, distractingly so. I hope PSVR does manage to improve the optics over Gear VR.
I don't think by much. Though Sony obviously should have better lenses than Samsung, the barrel distortion will always give you less information in the periphery, meaning blurry edges, especially with the lower resolution of the PSVR. VR requires you to move your head more than your eyes. With your problem of one blurry lens I do wonder whether you cleaned your phone and your lenses well enough before using it, don't forget your phone screen usually has finger smears on it, mostly on the bottom side of the screen. Also try to download a hq video and sideload it in MilkVR, the streaming quality is also crap.
 
Any Information on the headset input?

Is it in the black box?

I don´t hope so...because then you need a really long headphone cord.
 
But how long is the proc unit cord and where does it sit? 3 meters is cool Oculus is about the same.

Well I would say average use case for a PS4 is it's sitting in a TV cabinet some four meters distance from a person sitting on a couch, with a coffee table in between.

Average use case of a PC is under a desk a person is sitting at. (or standing at when Touch is introduced.) So three meters is more than enough for Oculus, but for PS4 it should really be 4 meters + 3 meters.
 
Only three meter cord is disappointing, I'm not sure that reaches all the way to my couch and around the back of my head, and I have a pretty small house.
I could be wrong but I think that's only the cord from headset to the processing unit (breakout box). So the cord(s) from the PU to the PS4 will add extra distance.
 
Well I would say average use case for a PS4 is it's sitting in a TV cabinet some four meters distance from a person sitting on a couch, with a coffee table in between.

Average use case of a PC is under a desk a person is sitting at. (or standing at when Touch is introduced.) So three meters is more than enough for Oculus, but for PS4 it should really be 4 meters + 3 meters.

You and others will adapt, or you just will not get a PSVR.
 
I can't wait to be disappointed by the
a) price
b) release date
c) availability in my region
d) all of the above

there's no way it's going to release before summer, at a decent price ($/€399/499), and have global availability. One of those three is bound to disappoint somehow :(

Hope I'm wrong.
 
Average use case of a PC is under a desk a person is sitting at. (or standing

Average doesn't help. Room scale (walking) is and will be a real thing for both Vive and Rift (don't know how Sony look at PSVR in that regard, did they say anything?).

Vive cord length is 5 meters
Rift cord length is 4 meters, but can be longer with optional extension

AFAIK
 
I'm almost certianly getting one fo the PC VR's over the PSVR, though probably not until next year some time.

However, man, that harness for the PSVR looks so much more comfortable than the PC VR ones. I don't know how it is in practice, but the PSVR looks like it would cradle your head in padded foam.

If they ever announce PC compatibility I'll pick up two.
 
Are you being serious right now? You're going to have a headset on covering most of your vision, so why would it matter?

Yes I am being serious, PS4 is a living room consumer device, most living rooms are shared. Why is this so hard to fathom? They specifically have the breakout box in order to make it a shared experience.
 
Yes I am being serious, PS4 is a living room consumer device, most living rooms are shared. Why is this so hard to fathom? They specifically have the breakout box in order to make it a shared experience.
OK so if the breakout box is sitting on the floor between the headset and the PS4, how does that impact your experience exactly?

If you want a wireless option there's always Gear VR.
 
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