VR still needs a "killer app" in order for folks like me to buy into it. I'm a gamer and that's probably the strongest area of mass-market appeal for VR right now, but so far there hasn't been enough programs produced that would justify me dropping about a grand on new equipment, never mind spending whatever additional funds would be required to upgrade my rig.
Doesn't help that Oculus got bought out by Facebook/Meta, I completely lost interest in that particular line of hardware once it became owned by Zuckerberg's genocide enabling and creepy tracking/data harvesting operation. Facebook account required? Fuck off Mark, and when you get there keep fucking off until you drown in the sea, you nasty grasping dystopian lump of human shit.
Now along comes Apple who completely fail to read the room and say they're gonna release a redonkulously expensive VR headset that costs almost twice as much as my entire desktop rig, never mind that using it (to its full potential? at all?) would require me to get mired in Apple's closed ecosystem, which isn't geared towards gamers in the first place. So I would have to put aside my burning hatred for Apple's blobby, sexless aesthetics and irritating California attitude, spend way too much money getting invested in their platforms, and then have no games to play at the end of all that anyway. No, just no.
Valve is a company for which I at least have some measure of respect, and their Index is priced somewhere in between the two aforementioned non-options, about a grand for the complete kit. OK great, that's a reasonable goal in terms of saving up the required money, and it would be compatible with the hardware and software I already have.
Unfortunately, unless I shell out even more money on third-party prescription lenses, I would then have to choose whether I want to be uncomfortable while wearing both the headset and my glasses that I need to see anything clearly, or whether I want to be comfortable without my glasses and with just the headset on, but be unable to see anything clearly in the virtual world. It's utterly astounding to me that seemingly every VR hardware manufacturer has apparently dropped the ball on this aspect and failed to provide their own off-the-shelf solutions, it's not like it's uncommon for people to need glasses.
So yeah, in my estimation VR has yet to move past the stage of being a clunky and gimmicky expense, is rather lacking in anything heavily desirable to run on it that would justify said shortcomings, and also has some significant physical accessibility problems to boot.
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