I Ruined Virtual Reality…

I've refunded my Bigscreen Beyond.

The Beyond is the sort of "Enthusiast" grade hardware that I find to actually be interesting. Instead of just taking a consumer product, outlining it in Diamonds, and charging 100k, the Beyond is a fundamentally different way of building a VR headset.

Because it's not a standalone headset, it doesn’t need space for a Snapdragon that needs to be kept cool.

Because it's tailored to each individual that purchases one, its lenses don't need space to move.

Because it's so light, it doesn't need a big bulky strap to equalize weight distribution.

It doesn't just target a market, it uses said market to innovate in ways that haven't been done by Valve, HTC, or The Zuck.

I kinda wish more spaces in Tech were like this. The whole "one size fits all even though we're pricing out 90% of you" that's become prevalent, especially in GPU's, isn't just obnoxious…

It's boring.

Question is then, why, as somebody with a Sim-Rig, Softmodded OG Xbox, Vinyl collection, and a bunch of other specialized bullshit, did I refund the Bigscreen Beyond?

Three reasons.

1) I can't run the thing.

Seriously, Beat Saber might be able to hold 90hz on my GTX 3080, but by god does any game with grass like Automobilista 2 or Half Life Alyx struggle.

"Just turn down your graphics settings", some say, and the problem is that the Beyond's micro-OLED displays are so amazing, with absolutely zero screen-door effect or light leak, that to immerse yourself in a PS2 game just feels… pointless.

2) SteamVR is garbage…

Having just come off of hosting Sim Racing Leagues on Assetto Corsa, the last thing I needed in my life was a buggy piece of shit that requires me restarting the computer to get a base-station to wake the fuck up Samurai.

I understand this technology is still extremely new, but SteamVR is several years old, and I'm still unable to do something as inane as switch games, without it flickering between screens, lose track of me while not moving an inch, or just locking up without the decency of restarting itself.

Just because I've had similar issues with Oculus products in the past, it doesn't make the frustration any less… well, frustrating.

3) …It's too good.

Half Life Alyx, a game that blew me away with its fidelity back when I played through it on a Valve Index, feels like playing Half Life 2 twenty years later. The displays are so clear that even the highest quality videos I could find on DeoVR of 4000p, aren't good enough, at least, to avoid pixilation.

Maybe that's an issue of streaming or just the bit-rate that video was shot at, but if the solution is to download a 100gb file locally on my PC, I'm immediately going to see the practically impossibility of using this device.

There's several other nitpicks I have about my experience, the glare from the headset's lenses, its badly placed audio connector and (separate from the headset) how unusable the Knuckles controllers are for my hands.

However, I'm not sure that I'm just going to replace all of the returned equipment with another headset like a Quest 3 either, because having experienced a VR Headset which is this light, this perfectly fitted, this high-quality, and this immersive…

Going back to what's essentially just a TV duct-taped to my forehead doesn't seem appealing.

I do love VR.

Half Life Alyx is still one of my most memorable gaming experiences in years.

Watching the smile on my Dad's face driving around the Nurburgring with my Oculus Rift, it was like he drove it for the first time in his life, but I didn't buy a Bigscreen Beyond to chase that dragon, I knew it was never going to last, and that's okay.

Novelty will evolve into quality.

The thing is… it feels like to me we're at this awkward middle point in VR technology.

We're well beyond the early days of just teleporting around shooting galleries or playing Guitar Hero with Sabers. We've crafted bespoke immersive experiences that at times, get freakishly close to being the sort of things we've only read about in Science Fiction.

Yet, as great as that technology is… I'm just not seeing it become something that I would actually use on a day to day until several roadblocks are cleared.

1. Cable vs. Bulk

One day, I think there will be a Bigscreen Beyond that's wireless. 

Some genius will make a Snapdragon the size of a Tictac and slip it into a pair of goggles you can whip out in any environment. Until then, there's always a sacrifice, either in the bulk of the device, or being tied to a Cable.

Maybe streaming is the solution, but I don't think I'll ever be a part of that market, being that even technology like AI Upscaling, is something I always avoid whenever possible due to noticing its artifacts and pixilation.

2. Usability

For all my whinging on Twitter about software troubles, I have just sat down on a whim and typed up this entire article with no fuss. Generally speaking, when it comes to computers and consoles, I give a command, and the machine responds.

For VR?

Things are going well when it behaves like Adobe Premiere.

Often, whether it's an Oculus Link Cable being disconnected for 0.001 crashing Windows, or SteamVR taking three minutes to have base-stations stop spinning, or bunching up a thousand buttons on a motion controller that picks up every microscopic movement of your hand, the usability of VR is just consistently annoying right now, and not something I'd ever want to put up with on a regular basis.

Even with these roadblocks taken care of, I don't see VR ever being a mainstream part of people's lives until we literally just have braindances from Cyberpunk, and in that scenario…

What would be the point of VR Headsets?