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Comment by iandanforth | Hacker News Reader

I truly do not understand this. Why would you want to dilute presence? Why would you want to create an expensive phone accessory when the hardware changes constantly and the software is extremely fragmented? There are plenty of scenarios where I can see usinga Rift, but very very few where I am 'mobile' and want to experience VR. Of those cases I can't see any where a dedicated and occasionally updated set of hardware isn't a better development experience than trying to deal with VR hassles on top of all the standard android ones. Please someone point out what Carmack gets here that eludes me.

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It's less about the mobile as in using-while-walking-around than the ability to have with you wherever you're at and not tied down to the context of sitting in front of a PC. VR is for everywhere: the couch, the kitchen table, in class, at work, social gathering where you can easily share it, etc. The tether of the current dev kits actually takes away from presence.

While there are hassles of VR with Android that were only solved by making deep changes to Android, the hassles of PC are greater. And this is a phone accessory that is specifically not designed for changing hardware and software: it only works with the Note 4 running a custom optimized version of Android. But they do agree with you that a dedicated unit is what they want to do as well which is why this is not their own consumer unit.

Wireless for starters is just better and required for VR to rock, with the exception of seated experiences (racing, flight sims, mech games, etc) where presence is kept and you can benefit from a PCs far less limited GPU/CPU capabilities.

Also they have a direct line with the phone manufacturer for the display technology and with this strategy of tying in with the mobile world, they can potentially get into a loop of rapidly updating hardware that's subsidized by phone contracts and the like.

The limitations of mobile graphics can and will be solved in hardware and software. It may turn out for instance that something focused on high FPS and resolution can be achieved via low complexity shaders and some novel custom display/GPU hardware.

It is simple. The target Carmack is aiming for is mobile VR. Tethered experience is a necessary middle step. Oculus will release their version in the future and Gear allows him to develop the tech.

You could say mobile VR is a necessary step towards AR (augmented reality).

http://blogs.valvesoftware.com/abrash/why-you-wont-see-hard-...

Think mobile in the same sense that a vacuum is mobile.

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