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The latest company to jump in the VR bandwagon is Modal VR, with Nolan Bushnell as co-founder who also happens to be the co-founder of Atari.

Unlike most VR gears around built for the consumer market, Modal VR is aimed at enterprises with practical applications ranging from arcades, exhibits to real estate development and education. "If a company has a great idea, we want to work with them," says Nolan Bushnell.

The newcomer in the newly found reality is advertised as fully portable, wireless and can track multiple users in areas up to 900,000 sq. ft. Full-body tracking suits have also been developed for the system.

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Despite aiming for a wider industry and still in the prototype stage, the prospect of bringing VR to a wider audience in unexpected fields and also the possible resurgence in arcade VR reminiscent of the past century - this time with current gen technology - is an interesting track for the technology altogether.

How long before we get a taste of the technology? Over on their website, the Modal VR team is saying that it'll ship developer editions "soon" and are taking applications for devs interested in buying a Modal VR Developer Edition. In the meantime, we can get a glimpse of it all via their introductory videos.

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SOURCE

 

[FAST6191]

Prior to youtube there were a bunch of video websites, several of which were headed by people of some note in the tech world and all of which failed.
Every time I hear of things like this in the VR world I am reminded of those days and wonder if it will play out similarly.

 

[Prans]

Prior to youtube there were a bunch of video websites, several of which were headed by people of some note in the tech world and all of which failed.
Every time I hear of things like this in the VR world I am reminded of those days and wonder if it will play out similarly.

It's still a relatively new technology. Every startup is trying to tap in anything they can from it, promising this and that. Only time will show the survivors, much like with the gaming companies reduced to the 3 bad boys.

 

[BurningDesire]

Holy shit this looks amazing

 

[FAST6191]

I would say this latest spin up of 3d virtual reality fad ( http://www.pcmag.com/slideshow/story/343351/the-wacky-world-of-vr-in-the-80s-and-90s ) is new but oculus goes back to 2012, it was early 2014 when facebook purchased them.

2012 in phones, granted that was still when time actually made a notable difference unlike today where it is all much of a muchness.
http://thenextweb.com/mobile/2012/12/23/the-6-best-smartphones-of-2012/

I am not necessarily inclined to snort derisively a la most times someone says the internet of things but it is not far off. I suppose it is more that I see things surrounded by proprietary bollocks and I am not cool with that.

 

[DKB]

The price for this type of equipment is going to be ludicrous.

Never mind, watching the video again realizing that it's meant to be bought by companies..the price don't really matter.

 

[osaka35]

Prior to youtube there were a bunch of video websites, several of which were headed by people of some note in the tech world and all of which failed.
Every time I hear of things like this in the VR world I am reminded of those days and wonder if it will play out similarly.

It usually comes down to a few things, at least from my research into the topic. Mainly affordability, content, and accessibility. Usually if it's cheap, there's a lot of really good content, it's super intuitive and easy to use/makes a lot of sense, adoption will be high and it'll be a "success". Failures are usually defined in adoption rates (which translates into money), and hinge on the other things.

Content in VR definitely has the "wow", mainly because the tech allows for that. As opposed to 3d tv/movies stuff, where it was sometimes hard to even tell a difference. Affordability is...well...we'll see. 400 for the psvr is expensive, but the cost-per-wow ratio is apparently pretty good, so we'll see. My samsung VR is cheap and brilliant, though I am providing the display and most of the hardware.

Accesibility...that's a big one. Is it comfy? Can you do it with a group of people? Is it worth it doing it solo? How difficult is it to get it running? These were ultimately what put people off from 3d, so who knows if it'll happen with VR. Personally I'm rooting for it, because holodecks are cool.

The newcomer in the newly found reality is advertised as fully portable, wireless and can track multiple users in areas up to 900,000 sq. ft. Full-body tracking suits have also been developed for the system.

Pretty dang cool. I can see corporations loving this stuff. Especially where they need folk to understand some specific visuals. Plus fun things help you learn better than unfun things.

 

[RustInPeace]

E.T. HD VR remake of the Atari 2600 game.

 

[Prans]

E.T. HD VR remake of the Atari 2600 game.

You'll get to dig them up from some far off desert as a pre-order bonus!

 

[CeeDee]

Modal VR is aimed at enterprises with practical applications ranging from arcades

Worth noting that Bushnell also founded Chuck E. Cheese's. There's where I see this going...

 

[Chary]

Worth noting that Bushnell also founded Chuck E. Cheese's. There's where I see this going...

VR pizza parties!!!

 

[Enigma Hall]

Now we will play pac-man as we should. :v

 

[flame1234]

I am not necessarily inclined to snort derisively a la most times someone says the internet of things but it is not far off.

How long before your average refrigerator will cost around $200 more to be IoT-enabled? Or is that not what IoT is? I always think: Washer and dryer texting you to say your clothes are washed/dry, or there's a problem with the temperature. Or maintenance problems or troubleshooting info. And maybe a screen with some functions, like internet TV, for the fridge.

IoT bed? Annoying! Dresser? Annoying! IoT car or home automation system could be nice though.

The future is finally here. They use now virtual/electronic paper (iPads) at my work. To read PDFs. But still. The Future!

 

[FAST6191]

On the PDFs thing I have done things similar to that several times now and turned tablets into single use devices. They are still a tad on the expensive side, compared to my usual alternative of raspberry pis anyway, but like the time I was setting up computer labs and realised laptops have their own inbuilt UPS, screen, fold up small...

It sounds like you suffered "smart" TVs as well. I wonder if I will one day see one of some merit.

Anyway your list is the pie in the sky nicety type list, however what I am seeing filter down is a bunch of nonsense and security problems, especially if we are all supposed to be going to ipv6 some point in the not so distant future. If I had to do anything it would probably be more in retrofitting things to existing devices like I do with XBMC and said raspberry pis for screens.
As you mentioned dryers

 

[DeoNaught]

I hope this does'nt Fail like other things.
I was Awed by that Demo.

 

[Foxi4]

We're seeing more and more of these wildly different VR solutions popping up, and that's not a good thing as they're not all cross-compatible. The market can become oversaturated very quickly, and the tech world has many examples of this. In order to be truly successful, the implementation of VR needs to be standardised as it amounts to a display - nothing more, nothing less. The devices themselves can vary, but one common protocol needs to emerge. There's a reason why today we only really use OpenGL and DirectX while S3 Metal, 3dfx Glide etc. became things of the past. There's a reason why we have a large number of different makes of monitors, but only a handful of protocols, with HDMI and DisplayPort leading the charge. There is only so much software developers can do in order to support VR, and they will most likely go for the most popular solution. One has to necessarily gain the lead, otherwise all will fail. As for Bushnel entering the race, it's not the first time he did something a couple of years late. That was Atari's whole shtick, actually.

 

[Xzi]

Meh I don't expect this to make a huge splash in the VR world if they aren't going to even bother trying to get it to consumers. Vive is winning in that realm, and I love my Vive so much.

 

[DiscostewSM]

I'm feeling some North America video game crash deja vu coming on, but with VR.

 

[hobbledehoy899]

I'm feeling some North America video game crash deja vu coming on, but with VR.

have you lived atari today

 

[RevPokemon]

Plz port this gem to vr

 

[hobbledehoy899]

Plz port this gem to vr