2016 has just begun and the entire gaming industry is already excited by the thought of Virtual Reality or VR headsets that can surely mark their entry before the year ends. These are those headsets that have been in testing phase from almost a year and manufacturers like HTC, Sony, Facebook and many others would like to cash in for these headsets in this year. Though, investing in VR content for the current year is a debatable topic altogether, so one can expect a slow start.
Virtual Reality headsets like HTC Vive, Sony’s PlayStation VR, Facebook’s Oculus “Rift” and Samsung’s “Rink” will soon be available for sale delivering an immersive entertainment experience to all the gaming enthusiasts and since Consumer Electronics Show (CES) 2016 is about to begin, users can expect to get plenty of updates from the show. The show would take place this week in Las Vegas and as per the reports, more than 40 exhibitors will be demonstrating VR products, which is a 77 percent increase from 2015.
However, despite all the hubbub one problem that one shouldn't ignore is that only 13 million PCs have the power to fuel up Virtual Reality (VR) experience and even Nvidia, who is the largest maker of computer graphics chips agrees to the same. Another startling fact is that out of 13 million, the high-end PC’s that are required to run a VR experience form just 1 percent of the 1.43 billion PCs expected to be in use globally in 2016.
The users that possess Sony Playstation 4 video game console can definitely enjoy the VR experience using Sony Playstation VR, but there are confirmed reports that headset will connect into a unit about the size of a Wii before being plugged into the main console unit. So, even if PS4 has the ability to run the game, it requires additional hardware to interact with the VR headset.
All the above points do not mar the hype VR headsets have and as per ISH Research, before 2016 ends there would be approximately 7 million VR headsets in use. Even Facebook CEO, Mark Zuckerberg in the latest earnings call highlighted that producing content for the small VR audience is not less than a challenge. He further added that There already is some very good content,” he said. “But until there are millions of units out in the market, I don’t expect that to be a big industry for folks to be investing a huge amount in 2016.