Initial Impressions on the Sony VR

Hands on with a demo Sony VR left our reviewer less than impressed.

2016 is Turning out to be a good year for video games but most importantly virtual reality systems. We currently have oculus on shelves, Vive’s shipping and now in October the PlayStation VR. Now, as a huge Sony fan girl who owns everything they’ve produced for gaming, I was really excited about the announcement of a VR headset to work with my PS4. As soon as E3 was over I was determined to find a way and demo the system, and lo and behold, Sony wants exactly that. For the next six months Sony representatives will be traveling everywhere they can to set up demos for the PlayStation VR. I got to try one of these demos recently and I gotta say… I wasn’t impressed.

Shocker right? Extreme Sony fan not excited about VR for Sony. Let me explain.

The Price

First thing that bugs me about the Sony VR is the price. The headset alone retails at a whopping $399 and $499 for a starter kit that includes the Move controllers and the camera. Mind you, these are the same Move controllers from the PS3…so why am I paying another $100 for items I can buy for less than $60. Also, we haven’t even factored in the cost of the system. Yes, the VR will work with the current model of ps4 but as graphics improve, and they will, I’m going to need to shell out another $450 for a compatible system. This puts the total price tag at a little under $1000. This is the lowest price point for a VR system and that kind of makes it worth it for someone who has nothing to start with.

Quality

The quality of the display remind me too much of Samsung’s cheap Gear VR that they give away with their flagship phones. The PlayStation VR headset itself is top quality material and comfortable, but the display lacks in that area. When using it I felt almost as if I were staring at my phone display, which I’m sure looks better. A lot of the simulation I played was blurry, and there seemed to be no adapter to adjust for various vision types, that, or the rep had no idea how to do it. If PlayStation improved on that, I would seriously consider buying it at the high price point, it’d be worth it.

Content

You guys knew this was coming right, there isn’t enough content. I love indie games, don’t get me wrong, but I want big game developers to be behind this. So far only Capcom has announced a full VR capable game and that’s it. I need more than that to invest another $600+ in this. Who wants to buy a setup when you can only use maybe one to two games, not to mention VR will be available on October and Resident Evil 7 won’t be available until 2017.

I know this sounds like a total piss fest on how I don’t want to spend more money on stuff I will more than likely spend it on anyway, but who is ever willing to admit that? If in the next few weeks Sony announces more titles at the time of release and a lower price point I would regain all excitement but if not, I’ll be waiting around to see if it goes on sale, because I do want VR, just not at that price.