A first-hand review of the new Oculus Quest VR headset
– and the perspective in this technology for businesses
By Tim Frank Andersen, Chief Digital Officer — Charlie Tango
Imagine you find yourself in the middle of a Fantasy world, with the ability, not only to move around physically within this imaginary universe, but also with God-like powers to push things around and reconstruct the settings.
This is exactly the experience you get with Moss — a third-person platform game made for all ages, that got me totally immersed in VR within its beautiful settings created.
This was after I had tried my luck with a lightsaber in the virtual Star Wars universe created by ILMxLAB in their title: Vader Immortal: Episode 1 and had built up a sweat, playing with the Quest version of the extremely popular title: Beat Saber. This game sold more than a million copies in less than a year on wired VR platforms, and now it has been transformed for a wireless 6DoF experience on Quest which makes for a much freer experience.
And this is one of the biggest advantages of the newest VR headset from Oculus: It is completely wireless. And extremely easy to use. No phones, no gaming PC, no wires, just you and 3 X 3 feet of space to move around. Put the headset on, and you are good to go.
It may sound like just another expensive toy, and in a way it is: the retail price is $ 399 or 3.600 dkk, but compared to other electronics that we buy, I actually think that there is a good chance, that this will introduce VR to a mainstream audience because of the relatively affordable price point, the ease of use, and the experience you get out of it.
VR has great potential in business
And this leads me to why I think that this technology is so close to a commercial breakthrough, not only in the B2C space but also as a B2B tool.
The possibilities are many. Think of how you could investigate new building projects while they´re still being planned. How you could enter an apartment, walk around, look out the windows, redecorate the rooms and get a pretty lifelike experience of how it would be to live here before you purchase your new home.
I also see great advantages in educational and job training solutions, because with this new set, you can use both hands, and you can actually see them and feel when you interact with something. So, by training skills in a virtual world you avoid the risk of getting hurt, you get a very realistic experience and you can train in a very inexpensive setup — even at home.
This will, without doubt, be a great tool for rehabilitation and exercise purposes, because it really makes you move around, duck and turn to avoid getting hit by stuff.
But for now, it is just a lot of great fun! You shouldn´t cheat yourself for this experience — The Oculus Quest is, in my opinion, the gamechanger we have been waiting for to turn VR into a commercial success, and I promise that you and the rest of your family will be hooked.
