With the recent release of Half-Life: Alyx, VR has been thrust into the spotlight of the mainstream gaming audience. While players and critics alike have universally praised the game, pushing it to become one of Steam's best rated games ever, plenty of folks not interested in VR have levied common fallacious arguments about why VR is a dead-end technology. Consider this article your official rebuttal to these tired arguments. This article is actually a throwback to an article I wrote with the same premise back in 2015. I find it interesting that the most common arguments against VR that I identified back then are almost never raised anymore because they have been clearly overcome; today the VR industry is exponentially larger, more mature, and even more clearly poised as a new medium with massive potential. In fact, the common arguments in 2020 that have replaced those older arguments—despite their best efforts—underscore how far VR has come since then; instead of making fallacious comparisons to previously failed technologies, people are now much more often talking about price and other much factors that are much more relevant to everyday consumers than to futurologists. So, what are the arguments against VR commonly seen in 2020? "VR Headsets Cost $1,000" [caption id="attachment_86733" align="aligncenter" width="640"] Image courtesy Oculus[/caption] VR headsets can be expensive. Arguably the best consumer-focused headset out there, Valve Index, does cost $1,000 for new customers who don't already have any VR hardware. But Index is the Ferrari of the VR world, and there's many other headset options that cost less than half as much but play all the same games. The most popular headset used on Steam right now is the Oculus Rift S [Amazon] which costs $400 brand new. It plays all the VR games on Steam and all the games in Oculus' own PC VR library, making it an excellent value, especially with 'inside-out' tracking which makes it a breeze to set up with no external trackers. But hey, $400 isn't a trivial purchase for most people. That's like investing in a new game console! It's perfectly fair for someone to say, "I don't see enough value in a VR headset that I would spend $400 on it." And I won't argue that—everyone has a different perception of value based on their circumstances. [irp posts="93819" name="Cas & Chary Present: Why Working Out in VR is Game-changing"] However, I would argue that as VR hardware has improved, become more affordable, and seen bigger and better games, the number of people who do think it's worth their money is expanding with time; that's why the number of active VR headsets is at a record high and still growing. Maybe today the value proposition isn't there for you personally, but maybe next year or the year after, or the year after that there will be a game that catches your eye and the hardware will be better and cheaper; perhaps then you'll feel it's worth jumping in. If you don't want to wait, there's also budget options available today. Microsoft and partners like HP, Asus, Samsung, Acer, and Dell launched a batch of 'Windows Mixed Reality' headsets [Amazon] a few years ago. These headsets are fully supported on Steam (so yes, they can play Half-Life: Alyx) and can be found used or refurbished around $250 depending on the headset. And if you happen to own a PS4, Sony's PSVR [Amazon] is an aging but still impressive add-on which can be found on sale for $250. Continued on Page 2: "VR Requires a Super High-end Gaming PC" » "VR Requires a Super High-end Gaming PC" This was arguably true when VR headsets first hit the market back in 2016. Most VR headsets demand high resolutions and high framerates, quite a bit higher than the 1080p 60FPS that was a common performance target for PC games of the era. Four years later, the high-end GPUs of the time have become the low-end GPUs of today, and major players in the VR space have improved performance on the software side to actually lower the minimum GPU power compared to when headsets first launched. Yes, you're still going to need a dedicated GPU, but even moderate gaming PCs (and many gaming laptops) have the power to run VR games. There's a common misconception that if you want to get VR headset, you're going to need to buy a new high-end PC to power it. I've heard this from plenty of gaming friends who are getting interested in a VR headset; when I ask them what specs they have in their current PC, they're always surprised to find they already have the hardware they need. This is true for many PC gamers. The most popular NVIDIA and AMD cards on Steam—GeForce GTX 1060 and RX 580—easily have enough horsepower for any consumer VR headset old or new. Even older cards like the GTX 970 are enough. [irp posts="45317" name="How to Tell if Your PC is VR Ready"] And let's say you have an aging gaming PC that in fact doesn't have the requisite horsepower. How much would you need to spend to buy a new one that can handle VR? Surely it must be $1,500? Nope. Most people are surprised to find that they can buy a brand-new VR capable PC for around $800, or even cheaper if they wait for a sale or are willing to build one for themselves. [caption id="attachment_86564" align="aligncenter" width="640"] Image courtesy Oculus[/caption] And we haven't even talked about Oculus Quest [Amazon] yet! If a gaming PC is out of the question, you're in luck. Quest—which we called "the first great standalone VR headset"—is an all-in-one headset that requires no outside hardware. Though it has less graphics horsepower, Quest actually has an impressive and growing game library, including ports of many PC VR titles, including Beat Saber, the best-selling VR game to date. Surely an all-in-on VR headset that can play games like Beat Saber must be expensive. Right? Nope. Quest is a great value at $400, especially because it can optionally tether to a PC to play the full range of PC VR games. That way, if you catch VR fever and want to upgrade to more expansive VR games on PC (like Half-Life: Alyx), you can use the headset you already have. Continued on Page 3: "VR is a Gimmick" » "VR is a Gimmick" [caption id="attachment_92942" align="aligncenter" width="640"] Image courtesy Oculus[/caption] This one is just frustrating, often because it comes from people who have never tried a full-featured VR headset (sorry, Cardboard, Gear VR, and Oculus Go don't count, for so many reasons that I can't get into in this article). Despite their inexperience with the technology, somehow deep down in their heart... they know that VR is a "gimmick." This is generally the same as saying VR is "fad," accusing it of being pure novelty that's just a flash in the pan. What evidence do they cite for these claims? Usually some variation of "VR games are just tech demos" or "VR doesn't add anything." So, Mr. or Ms. "Gimmick," I know your heart is telling you that VR is bad and I'm not going to argue against your opinion with my own opinion because I don't think that would mean anything to you. But I will present the data that shows that you're wrong. Yes, the overall library of VR content in 2020 is not as large in size or scope as mainstream games. The VR market still an order of magnitude smaller, so it's understandable that the games are less ambitious on average (because the return on investment for developers is smaller). And yet, there are VR games out there which rank as highly as some of the best rated non-VR games ever. Half-Life: Alyx is the most recent example. Despite the highest possible stakes—as Valve's first Half-Life game in more than a decade, and its first full-fledged VR title—the game has been universally praised. Users have rated it better than all prior Half-Life games, pushing it to become one of the best rated games ever on Steam. A 98% positive rating on Steam means that 98% of people who played the game—regardless of who they are, what their expectations were, what PC specs they had, or what headset they used—have come out and said "Yes I would recommend this game to others." 98%—that's "instant classic" territory. [irp posts="92224" name="Valve's Gabe Newell: 'We're excited to return to Half-Life, VR has energized the studio'"] Aggregate review scores from critics across the gaming industry have rated Half-Life: Alyx as the best PC game of 2020 (so far) and the 22nd best PC game ever, according to Metacritic, surrounded by PC gaming classics like Divinity: Original Sin II, Unreal Tournament 2004, Starcraft II: Wings of Liberty, and Minecraft. "Ok," I hear you saying, "but that's just one game." Sure, but there's more great VR games you've probably never ever heard of because they don't have the recognition of a Half-Life game. Here's 10 you should check out. [caption id="attachment_90970" align="aligncenter" width="640"] Image courtesy ILMxLab[/caption] And Half-Life: Alyx is far from the only major name you'll find in VR. How about Star Wars: Vader Immortal, a three-part VR narrative adventure that makes you feel like you're the hero in a Star Wars movie. Heard of Skyrim? Of course you have. Guess what—you can play it in VR. And why not get your drift on with DiRT Rally 2 in VR while you're at it. Want to go off-world? Check out No Man's Sky and Elite Dangerous, both with full-fledged VR modes. Or maybe you've rather fight zombie hordes? Step into The Walking Dead: Saints & Sinners. I could go on. Yes, VR has arcade games too. And guess what? People love them. Beat Saber is the best selling VR game to date because of how it masterfully mixes rhythm gaming with the physicality of VR. It's been so successful that Facebook bought the studio that made the game. On console side, Sony has curated an excellent library that includes some of the best titles that you can find on PC VR, and a handful of excellent exclusives. Sony believed in VR enough to not only develop their own headset but to set some of its talented first-party studios on making exclusive content. Astro Bot: Rescue Mission (2018), made by Sony's JAPAN Studio, is one of the best games on any platform, and the 31st best rated game in the entire six year catalogue of PS4 games, according to Metacritic—right up there with the likes of The Witcher 3, Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice, Monster Hunter: World, and Rez Infinite (which also happens to have VR support). Meanwhile, Blood & Truth (2019), created by Sony's London Studio, has some of the most impressive virtual human graphics and performance seen anywhere in VR, all while weaving a story around action-packed shooter gameplay. Considering both the current size of the VR market and how new and different VR is as a medium for game design, the amount of quality content available so far is actually quite surprising. There are many working in the VR industry not because it's the most profitable thing they could be doing right now—Valve was well aware that Alyx would sell only a fraction of what a non-VR game would—but because they genuinely believe in the massive potential of the technology and want to contribute to its development. - - — - - I think the reason why some people tend to be 'hostile' toward VR is actually the result of a misconception. There are people out there who simply don't want VR and may never want VR, and that's fine. But to them, VR might seem like a threat to the non-VR gaming that they know and love. The misconception is this: nobody who is well read in VR believes that VR will replace non-VR gaming. It's a new medium for gaming, not 'the future of gaming as we know it'. This would be like saying "video is going to replace radio," or "smartphones are going to replace computers," neither of which are true, because one is not the future of the other—they're different mediums. I'm confident that in a few more years, these supposed 'reasons why VR won't become a thing' will be clearly understood to be wrong, only to be replaced with some new arguments that will—despite their intent—underscore how far VR has come since 2020. Are there other common arguments out there that you often hear? Do you have a rebuttal? Let's have a (considerate) conversation in the comments below!