In what's being widely called the "Year of VR", GDC 2016 will be the first major battle in the War For Your Head. VR headset frontrunners Oculus and HTC/Valve are due to begin shipping the Rift and Vive in less than a month, with Sony's PlayStation VR coming not far behind. Three headsets, three platforms, and each of them wanting to win the right to be worn by you. GDC 2016, the world's largest game developer conference, begins tomorrow. By all measures this will be the biggest year for VR at the conference. So big in fact, that the organizers of GDC have spun up VRDC, a sub-conference of sorts (of which Road to VR is the official partner) to contain the mass of VR content, running alongside GDC itself. As the destination of the reveal of the Rift DK2, PlayStation VR (and predecessor Morpheus), and Vive DK1 over the years, GDC has been an important theater for the headset's early skirmishes. With each of due to ship to consumers in just months or less, you can expect these companies to vye for 'top of mind' when it comes to VR headsets that will be 'top of head'. Here's a preview of what we expect to see from Oculus, Sony, and HTC/Valve at GDC 2016. Oculus Rift Oculus planted their flag in the ground last year for a Q1 2016 shipment. The consumer Oculus Rift (often called the CV1), went up for pre-order in January and the first units are expected to ship to customers on March 28th (new orders are currently backlogged to July). With the Rift shipping at the end of the month, what more is there to learn? A lot, actually. Oculus Home for PC There's not much left that's a mystery on the headset itself: we know what it looks like, how it feels, the resolution, and that it'll have built-in (but removable) headphones, along with an IPD adjustment. What we know very little about, is what Oculus' software platform will be like, and we expect to hear much more about it from Oculus at GDC 2016 this week. On Samsung's Gear VR, which is powered by Oculus software, the company calls their VR platform Oculus Home. We expect the same name and style to carry over to the Rift. Oculus Home will be the in-VR hub for your Rift games, the Oculus store, and social features. We've seen glimpses of the Oculus Home launcher in action at prior events, but haven't been able to dig into what the store integration will look like, nor have we seen any of the social functions like friends lists, communication, or multiplayer integration. Rift Launch Preview (How Much Touch?) Oculus is holding an invite-only event today previewing a selection of games coming to the Rift. Info from this event is under embargo until Wednesday, so be sure to check back then to see what we've gleaned. The big question for this game preview is: how much will Oculus emphasize Touch, their VR motion controllers which aren't expected to ship until the second half of 2016? [caption id="attachment_42253" align="alignright" width="325"] See Also: 3 Moves Oculus is Borrowing from Apple’s Marketing Playbook[/caption] Oculus is in a precarious situation with their headset launching, at minimum, several months before their motion controllers, while competitors Sony and HTC/Valve both have their controllers ready to go at launch. Because of these mismatched timelines, all of Oculus' launch titles have to be compatible with the Xbox gamepad that the company is shipping with each headset. And while motion controllers are clearly the way forward for VR input, Oculus can't be too aggressive about the fact that Touch is coming down the line, otherwise they risk putting the spotlight too heavily on titles that players won't be able to play until Touch arrives, while offending the current crop of developers who have committed to gamepad support. For this reason, I'm not expecting Oculus to announce a Touch launch date or price at GDC—that is unless they've managed to move the Touch launch date into early Q3, or have a surprisingly low price to tell us about that will give their complete headset+VR controller package a nice lead over HTC/Valve's $800 Vive. We may, however, get to see the evolved Touch design that Oculus teased back in January. Continue Reading on Page 2 (Sony PlayStation VR) Sony PlayStation VR Pricing Power Play? PlayStation VR (which will almost certainly get colloquially shortened to 'PSVR') is the only console-based virtual reality headset among the big three. And while you could make an argument that it isn't 'technically' a competitor to the PC-based Rift and Vive, Sony could nab a wealth of would-be PC VR customers with a daring play: [caption id="attachment_29954" align="alignright" width="325"] Watch: Video Hands-on - ‘The London Heist – Getaway’ on Sony Morpheus[/caption] If Sony can manage to price a PlayStation 4 + PlayStation VR bundle at the same price of the Vive headset by its lonesome ($800)—or better yet, undercut it—it would have a powerful argument for gamers who want VR but also want to keep an extra $1000 in their pockets by not having to invest in a VR-capable computer. Sony does love bundles (it's hard to even buy the PlayStation 4 by itself); with the PS4 currently priced at $350, that leaves only $450 worth of headroom before bumping into the price of the Vive. I think the optimal play for Sony would be to price PlayStation VR at $450 standalone and then give $50 'savings' through a PS4 + PSVR bundle at $750, thereby providing an entire VR-capable package for less than the cost of the Vive headset alone. Release Date As for the PlayStation VR release date, Sony has only ever been as specific as Q2, which puts a PSVR launch as far out as the end of June, which would be up to nearly three months after the first shipments of the Rift and Vive. We expect to hear a specific PSVR release date at GDC 2016 and don't expect it to deviate from Q2. Final Design & Platform Integration [caption id="attachment_10572" align="aligncenter" width="680"] Sony's Morpheus VR headset being revealed at GDC 2014[/caption] Sony revealed their VR headset prototype (codenamed 'Project Morpheus') back at GDC 2014. At GDC 2015 the company showed a new and improved prototype with better tracking, a better display, and some ergonomic refinements. They would soon rename the headset to PlayStation VR to codify it into an official product. [caption id="attachment_23326" align="alignright" width="325"] See Also: Anyone Who Says ‘You Can’t Do VR on Console’ Hasn’t Tried Sony’s 2015 Morpheus Prototype[/caption] The GDC 2015 prototype is the same one we've seen from the company since that time, but we expect there to be some subtle design changes product which we could see this week for the final shipping product. We hope to also learn more about how the headset will actually interact with the PlayStation 4. Will there be an in-VR menu to launch games (like Rift and Vive), or will players be expected to launch PSVR games through the PS4's main menu, and then put on the headset? (We hope not!). Will there be any way for players to play their existing PS4 games in a virtual home-theater like Vive's SteamVR Desktop Theater Mode? We'll have to wait and see. PlayStation VR Press Event Sony is holding an invite-only PlayStation VR press event Tuesday afternoon/evening where we expect to learn about much of the above. We'll have hands-on time with whatever Sony will be showing there, so be sure to check back. Continue Reading on Page 3 (HTC/Valve Vive) HTC/Valve Vive The HTC Vive became available for pre-order at the end of February for $800. The unit which, unlike the Oculus Rift, currently comes with VR motion controllers included, is due to ship at the beginning of April, just a few days after the Rift. The Vive is currently backordered to May. Emphasis on Room-scale VR Valve has given us a pretty good indication thus far of what we'll see from them and the Vive at GDC 2016. Firstly, the company will be hosting 36 SteamVR games at their booth. Here's the full list: Developer Title Owlchemy Labs Job Simulator: The 2050 Archives Northway Games & Radial Games Fantastic Contraption Google Tilt Brush Epic Unreal Editor Lionsgate & Starbreeze John Wick: The Impossible Task Stress Level Zero Hover Junkers Cloudhead Games The Gallery Neat Corporation Budget Cuts Indimo Labs Vanishing Realms VRUnicorns #SelfieTennis VIRZOOM Virzoom Futuretown.io Cloudlands Minigolf I-Illusions Space Pirate Trainer Vertigo Games Arizona Sunshine Phosphor Games Brookhaven Alientrap Modbox Solfar Everest Aldin Dynamics Waltz of the Wizard Survios Raw Data Dylan Fitterer Audioshield Penrose Studios The Rose and I InnerspaceVR La Peri Triangular Pixels Unseen Diplomacy Schell Games Water Bears Phaserlock Final Approach Innervision VR Thunderbird Other Ocean GiantCop Lightning Rock Marble Mountain WaveVR TheWave Frontier Development Elite: Dangerous Cartoon Network Games & Turbo Button Adventure Time Envelop E.V.E. AltVR Altspace Minority Media Time Machine Giant Army Universe Sandbox ² Cherrypop Games Pool Nation The vast majority are room-scale titles, though HTC and Valve maintain that the Vive works well for seated VR as well (as we've tried on a few occasions). We'll be going hands-on with a number of these Vive titles throughout the week. New VR Content from Valve [caption id="attachment_31064" align="aligncenter" width="680"] Valve's 'Aperture Science Robot Repair' demo gives players a glimpse into the world of 'Portal'[/caption] Valve will also be showing off two new pieces of its own never-before-seen content. The first is The Lab which the company says is a "compilation of new VR experiments," which is set in the Portal universe. We expect this to be linked to the much-loved Aperture Science Robot Repair experience which the company debuted back when the Vive was first revealed during GDC 2015. The second new thing we'll see from Valve at GDC 2016 is the SteamVR Desktop Theater Mode (heretofore: SDTM) which the company today confirmed was in beta. SDTM will allow VR users to play non-VR games inside of a virtual reality home-theater space. Leveraging Steam Look for Valve to leverage the established Steam platform as a major selling point for the HTC Vive. For many non-VR PC gamers, Steam is the platform of choice, and already houses the majority of users' game library and online friends. [caption id="attachment_43832" align="alignright" width="325"] Watch: SteamVR ‘Shell’ is Customizable, Allows Seamless VR Game Switching and Web Browsing[/caption] Valve has taken a first stab at translating the Steam experience into a 'Shell' interface which is an in-VR hub that provides access to SteamVR titles and the usual Steam features like the store, friends, and a web browser. SteamVR's interface is still early and we hope to see big usability improvements as time goes on. Although playing existing games on a virtual screen isn't the most exciting use-case for VR, the new SteamVR Desktop Theater Mode will likely prove a salient bullet-point for Steam gamers who are on the fence about trying the new-fangled technology. Knowing that they can at least do something with their non-VR games means they don't have to feel like they're dropping $800 on a product that is wasted on the investment they've already put into their game library. And after all that... this is only be the tip of the iceberg for VR at GDC 2016. We're on the ground all week to bring you the latest. Stay tuned.