How practical is it to get into programming for VR for cost sensitive developers? I feel like this space will not blow up until the tools and resources become fairly accessible for the common developer.
If you prefer sit-down VR and don't see the potential in room-scale VR, then I would recommend the Fove.
It has eye-tracking which allows for focusing rendering resources around your gaze as well as some cool interaction and less stress on your neck.
John Carmack was sniped by Oculus while back to figure out things like inside-out roomscale, specifically with the Gear VR, so you might be keen to keep up with those developments.
Gear VR is fairly affordable if you have a compatible phone and will hopefully stay that way once they implement Carmack's reverse tracking.
I don't support Oculus because of the Facebook buyout, but I am a Carmack fanboy and I hope that he is pushing for GearVR / Oculus to make his methods for inside-out tracking publicly available.
Do you have Daydream HMD and if so, what is your experience with it?
Rift is lighter and looks better but that's about it. Vive controllers are better and it has much larger game selection.
"Room scale VR" is not irrelevant. Room scale VR basically is THE VR. Seated experiences are completely useless except for car/plane sims.
Also Vive is pushing the open source mentality and whole VR technology forward, while Facebook is trying to create exclusives, DRM and other shit with the Rift.
Meanwhile, the Touch controllers do have some nice features that the Vive controllers don't--and, realistically, few developers are going to target those features as more than throw-ins because the Vive doesn't have them (to say nothing of PS VR, which seems to be a strong entrant as well but I don't advise it because PS4 development ain't exactly cheap to get into). You are buying into a platform, but developers are going to be targeting all of them; both as a gamer and as a developer I would want the median setup until and unless the Rift becomes the only choice, not one of the choices.
But, sure. I'm "misguided". I'm a technology zealot (not somebody who, like, looks at markets or anything, or somebody who's used all this gear). You sure I just didn't rustle your jimmies because you like the Rift? I mean, don't get me wrong: it's fine, it'll get most if not all of the same games, and while its FOV feels shrunken a bit to me it's even a little more comfy than the Vive is (though PS VR is more comfortable than both). But if you want to develop on it, it would be my third choice, behind "buy a PS VR dev kit" and the Vive, in that order--and I don't know many hobbyists who can score a PS VR dev kit, so the Vive's the only option.
And now I have burned three paragraphs repeating what 'moron4hire said in the Iribe thread to disabuse you of your notions, but I don't take kindly to shots at my credibility from platform warriors. Haveaniceday.
Given that Oculus finances games while HTC/Valve doesn't do it that sounds dubious to me.
edit: Not impossible, just dubious. Most game devs at the moment only do VR if someone pays them as VR doesn't pay for itself, not even with all three platforms.
The high-end systems are significantly different, but there are a lot of UI concerns that you can still address with Google Cardboard.
That said, a Vive plus a good enough PC should run you no more than $1750 today, and it will go down pretty quickly.