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[Maiden Voyage]

Link to article.

Fascinating read. Tim really drives home his opinion that VR and the eventual Metaverse needs to be open. He weighs in on his vision of the future of gaming as well, though this interview is primarily about VR.

"It would be really tragic if we let the future metaverse, that binds all humanity together into shared online environments, were a closed platform controlled by a giant corporation," Sweeney said. "As always, they'd use it to spam you with advertising, they'd use it to gather information about your private life and sell it to the highest bidder, and they'd act as the universal intermediary between all users, content creators, and transactions, ensuring that everything has to be approved by them."

And now, the exciting part, is that over the next 12 years we're going to see VR scale down from a huge helmet to something the size of your glasses, which has a display for each eye that's higher quality than any display you can buy now, and cheaper, because it uses very little material. And that's going to revolutionize all forms of entertainment. Instead of having televisions and monitors and smartphone screens, you're going to have this VR device to project imagery wherever you want. It's going to occupy 140 degrees of your field of view--far, far higher quality and more immersive than the best PC entertainment experience you can get today.

When you install the Oculus drivers, by default you can only use the Oculus store. You have to rummage through the menu and turn that off if you want to run Steam. Which everybody does. It's just alienating and sends the wrong message to developers. It's telling developers: "You're on notice here. We're going to dominate this thing. And your freedom is going to expire at some point." It's a terrible precedent to set. I argued passionately against it.
But ultimately, the open platforms will win. They're going to have a much better selection of software. HTC Vive is a completely open platform. And other headsets are coming that will be completely open. HTC Vive is outselling Oculus 2-to-1 worldwide. I think that trend will continue.

Oculus would do best if they tried to bring users into their store by supporting HTC Vive and Oculus Rift and any other PC hardware that comes out. I think if they don't do that, they're going to pretty quickly fail, because you're not going to want to buy a multiplayer game that you can't play with half of your VR friends.

I think the mainstream version of this product does have to be like sunglasses. The helmet version is for serious people. The entirety of the console market – all console gamers are potential VR buyers – that's 100 million people, maybe, in the U.S. and Europe. And then there's 100 million, maybe, in Asia who are not console gamers but do play hardcore PC games like League of Legends. So there's 200 million helmet-wearing VR users worldwide. I think that's where that market tops out.

I bet in 20 years, we're going to live a very large fraction of our lives in the metaverse. Right now we're just typing stuff to each other in social media. Just imagine, if you telecommute, all of your work will be conducted through VR and AR. If there is one corporation that controls and accesses everybody's data stream, then they have complete insight into every aspect of everybody's lives.
That's really dangerous. That company, and any intelligence agencies and governments that it feeds into, will have the power to blackmail anybody. Because everybody has something to hide. Pervasive information collection is a really dangerous factor for a democracy.
That just makes it all the more important to ensure that this new medium is built in a decentralized way, where people can communicate with each other without surveillance, using technologies like end-to-end encryption. And that it's open to basically any company that would want to participate, just like the web is today. Any company can run a website. Any company should be able to host their part of the metaverse, so they can control that exclusively and nobody else can dictate terms to them. That decentralization is going to be the key to keeping it robust and secure and preserving everybody's rights.

 

[Pie and Beans]

I agree with a lot of what Tim is saying, but then Epic has by a large margin been supporting Oculus/Facebook with exclusive software and demos so... y'know? Money where your mouth is?

 

[Maiden Voyage]

I agree with a lot of what Tim is saying, but then Epic has by a large margin been supporting Oculus/Facebook with exclusive software and demos so... y'know? Money where your mouth is?

But right now, Epic is making a closed-platform game, Robo Recall, for Oculus.

Yes. It's funded by Oculus. It was a budget that could never be funded just on the basis of sales. So that enabled us to do some cool things. My view is that the Oculus store, which is an awesome store, should run on all PC and VR devices.
Oculus would do best if they tried to bring users into their store by supporting HTC Vive and Oculus Rift and any other PC hardware that comes out. I think if they don't do that, they're going to pretty quickly fail, because you're not going to want to buy a multiplayer game that you can't play with half of your VR friends.

I think his point is that he likes Oculus enough to work with them but wishes they would adopt an open ecosystem. The weight of what he is saying can be paired with how he is behaving while still taking into account that the Oculus userbase tiny and unable to allow developers to recoup their costs for development without Oculus' help. Oculus is the underdog in terms of sales/userbase and it helps no one to see these early companies flop or for the userbase to be burnt by lack of meaningful software. I think if we were talking about 5 years in the future and Oculus was still a closed ecosystem, he may be less willing to work with them.

More to the point, we don't know when Oculus and Epic signed their contract(s). This all could have been agreed upon before Luckey had to backpeddle on his previous promises of an open platform. The demo for Bullet Train came out around that time so they were obviously working together before the kerfuffle began.

 

[SomTervo]

Really like this article. Great to see the big visions of big thinkers, warts and all (a tethered screenless object in your pocket? Really?).

I'd like to think 'ultimately open platforms will win' against the 'corporates', but can only see it happening if platforms like Steam get more prohibitive.

 

[Maligna]

So basically the Ready Player One reality? That's exactly what I want.

 

[ashecitism]

Fortnite coming soon?

Yeah right.

 

[Maiden Voyage]

Really like this article. Great to see the big visions of big thinkers, warts and all (a tethered screenless object in your pocket? Really?).

I'd like to think 'ultimately open platforms will win' against the 'corporates', but can only see it happening if platforms like Steam get more prohibitive.

I think his point about Snow Crash is a very spot-on comparison. Snow Crash has pay phones being a primary method of communication. The mental limitations toward technologies like smartphones may ultimately be the wrong way to view things. We simply don't know what the technological playfield will look like in 15 years. The future of the Metaverse is wide-open. Truly an exciting time to watch this technology grow.

 

[GuitarAtomik]

Pretty interesting stuff. I think 12 years is HIGHLY optimistic for high fidelity VR consolidated in a pair of glasses though. I'd love to be wrong about that.

 

[Renekton]

HTC Vive is outselling Oculus 2-to-1 worldwide. I think that trend will continue.

The quote that Reddit jumped on

 

[Durante]

Almost every time I read an interview with Tim Sweeney lately I just find myself nodding in agreement.
Actually, it's not really just "lately" any more. Basically at least since they opened up the UE4 source.

Some quotes on VR sales, revenue and expectations:

Have you been disappointed by the sales of VR so far?
It's pretty much what we expected – a little more than half a million PC units; I don't know the PSVR numbers; several million smartphone VR units. That's a good number to start with.

The very first year of the personal computer revolution, when the Apple II shipped, there were 23,000 computers sold. I think VR is going to build up similarly slowly, starting with this early adopter, hardcore gamer base. It's going to be nurtured there for years before it goes really mainstream.

I think the mainstream version of this product does have to be like sunglasses. The helmet version is for serious people. The entirety of the console market – all console gamers are potential VR buyers – that's 100 million people, maybe, in the U.S. and Europe. And then there's 100 million, maybe, in Asia who are not console gamers but do play hardcore PC games like League of Legends. So there's 200 million helmet-wearing VR users worldwide. I think that's where that market tops out.

I think the market will grow by a factor of two or three or four, every year, until it goes from this current 500,000 to 200 million.

And then it really starts to go on a larger exponential growth curve, and reach everybody, including mainstream consumers, when it's in the AR form factor.

At Oculus, John Carmack is focused on mobile VR. But you think PC is going win in the short-term?
Carmack and I, we almost always agree on these core premises about the industry. But he has a very different view than I do. I think his view is that the convenience of mobile will more than make up for its shortcomings in graphics fidelity. My view is that creating a convincing sense of realism is so important that mobile VR won't be able to take off until mobile hardware has really improved considerably.

So far, the market share numbers would suggest that mobile VR is winning by a landslide. You have several times more Samsung Gear VR units out in the market than Oculus Rifts. But if you look at software sales, they tell the opposite story. Software revenue per user is at least 10 times higher on the PC platforms than on the smartphone platforms. It's so much higher that even though the mobile user base is so much larger, there's still more money be made in the PC and console business.

 

[Hari Seldon]

Pretty interesting stuff. I think 12 years is HIGHLY optimistic for high fidelity VR consolidated in a pair of glasses though. I'd love to be wrong about that.

Yeah the problem with these predictions is that Moore's law only talks about the amount of transistors on a chip. It says nothing about battery tech. Now a metric shit ton of R&D money is spent on batteries, but fundamentally you need a ton of energy packed into a small space and it has to not blow up lol. It is entirely conceivable that the gains made in battery tech will one day stop.

 

[Durante]

Yeah the problem with these predictions is that Moore's law only talks about the amount of transistors on a chip. It says nothing about battery tech. Now a metric shit ton of R&D money is spent on batteries, but fundamentally you need a ton of energy packed into a small space and it has to not blow up lol. It is entirely conceivable that the gains made in battery tech will one day stop.

Well, Tim does talk about glasses connected to a chunky box you wear on your belt.

 

[TharpDaddy]

Almost every time I read an interview with Tim Sweeney lately I just find myself nodding in agreement.
Actually, it's not really just "lately" any more. Basically at least since they opened up the UE4 source.

Some quotes on VR sales, revenue and expectations:

I definitely agree with him on his vision vs Carmack's, pc vs mobile. Mobile seems like a soft dead end atm unless hardware or battery life improves quite a bit. I wouldn't be surprised if headsets eventually move towards a Nintendo Switch style system when it can hook up to either PC or mobile. When hooked up to a pc it will have access to higher power specs and the games and software will reflect that. When unattached it hooks up to one's phone and it's better for less intensive experiences.

 

[Durante]

One thing about the 12 year prediction and the compute power necessary for it:
If we assume that we have sufficiently fast and accurate eye tracking by then to only ever need to render the exact part of the scene we are looking at in detail, and rendering pipelines built around making full use of that, then it becomes quite a bit more viable IMHO.

 

[Zalusithix]

Yeah the problem with these predictions is that Moore's law only talks about the amount of transistors on a chip. It says nothing about battery tech. Now a metric shit ton of R&D money is spent on batteries, but fundamentally you need a ton of energy packed into a small space and it has to not blow up lol. It is entirely conceivable that the gains made in battery tech will one day stop.

Considering the worst case basis outlined was a current PC's power in a mobile form factor, I don't think it's that outrageous even with today's battery tech. Take Intel for instance; while their CPUs haven't increased much in performance from generation to generation lately, the power required to achieve the same performance envelope has continued to drop. Beyond that, he was mentioning the form factor, but without the screen. Strip out the display and related hardware from a phone and you can increase the amount of space dedicated to battery, and you can also make the entire thing metal to improve heat dissipation.

 

[Peltz]

Wow, it's been a long time since I've read a good Tim Sweeny interview. Who knows if his vision of the future will come true?

But it certainly is a vision in the visionary sense.

 

[Tain]

Both of these are true:

He's right, and I'm excited for Robo Recall.

 

[Maiden Voyage]

The quote that Reddit jumped on

I saw this as well and chose to ignore it because it's the least interesting part of the article. Platform warz are stupid, especially for a technology still in it's early stages.

 

[HStallion]

So basically the Ready Player One reality? That's exactly what I want.

With better writing hopefully.

 

[Saty]

Part of a larger interview at Glixel:
http://www.glixel.com/interviews/epics-tim-sweeney-on-vr-and-the-future-of-civilization-w459561

But ultimately, the open platforms will win. They're going to have a much better selection of software. HTC Vive is a completely open platform. And other headsets are coming that will be completely open. HTC Vive is outselling Oculus 2-to-1 worldwide. I think that trend will continue.

Also PC VR LTDs:

Have you been disappointed by the sales of VR so far?

It's pretty much what we expected – a little more than half a million PC units; I don't know the PSVR numbers; several million smartphone VR units. That's a good number to start with.

More quotes:

But Oculus, right now, is following the iOS model.

Yes. I think it's the wrong model. When you install the Oculus drivers, by default you can only use the Oculus store. You have to rummage through the menu and turn that off if you want to run Steam. Which everybody does. It's just alienating and sends the wrong message to developers. It's telling developers: "You're on notice here. We're going to dominate this thing. And your freedom is going to expire at some point." It's a terrible precedent to set. I argued passionately against it.

But right now, Epic is making a closed-platform game, Robo Recall, for Oculus.

Yes. It's funded by Oculus. It was a budget that could never be funded just on the basis of sales. So that enabled us to do some cool things. My view is that the Oculus store, which is an awesome store, should run on all PC and VR devices.
Oculus would do best if they tried to bring users into their store by supporting HTC Vive and Oculus Rift and any other PC hardware that comes out. I think if they don't do that, they're going to pretty quickly fail, because you're not going to want to buy a multiplayer game that you can't play with half of your VR friends.

 

[bluexy]

I've only ever read the "HTC Vive Outselling Oculus 2-1" on shitty blogs that have no source. Does anyone have any reliable source for the information, or an idea as to where Sweeney might have heard this info?

 

[jdmonmou]

I was so close to buying an Oculus Rift last year. I had one pre-ordered and was eagerly waiting for it to come until it got delayed. I canceled my pre-order and got the Vive. One was shipped to me in a few short weeks.

 

[cleveridea]

Its important all VR platforms sell well, if we want to see games and content that match the capability of the platform.

It amazes me that the most impressive VR-only implementation of an RPG is Vanishing Realms which is made by 1 person.

 

[Dr.Acula]

Can't believe Oculus fumbled on the goal-line here. Closing their software, their app-store, allowing themselves to be acquired by Facebook, Luckey's bizarre public behavior.

 

[jon bones]

Great news, Oculus can get fucked.

Have Sony & Valve hold down the 2 price groups and hopefully VR takes off.

 

[msdstc]

Vive is the future! Seriously fuck oculus and fuck Palmer.

 

[n0razi]

I like the Oculus hardware but the company can get fucked... I wont support any of their practices

 

[Zerin]

Can't believe Oculus fumbled on the goal-line here. Closing their software, their app-store, allowing themselves to be acquired by Facebook, Luckey's bizarre public behavior.

Yeah, it really seemed like they were steaming towards being first to market and then bam. All these self-inflicted issues. All the delays, shipping relatively incomplete (no VR controllers) and the stuff you mentioned.

Very happy w/ my Vive. Also like that their marketplace they're trying to incent people into using, rather than forcing you to use it (which I've yet to do tbh).

 

[Alec]

I pre-ordered an Oculus about two minutes into them opening pre-orders. Two weeks after launch and I still didn't have one because of their horrible shipping\manufacturing\whatever fuckups. I canceled.

Meanwhile, my pre-ordered Vive came in on launch day.

Now with Revive, I'm glad I didn't buy both.

 

[killroy87]

Despite the fact that the Oculus Touch is almost certainly a better controller, they done fucked by not launching with them. Really poor move.

 

[mckmas8808]

Pretty interesting stuff. I think 12 years is HIGHLY optimistic for high fidelity VR consolidated in a pair of glasses though. I'd love to be wrong about that.

Not from what tech heads have been saying. Even 12 years in console terms is alot and that's more established. in 2005 the Xbox 360 was released and people were questioning if it was really different from the PS2 in the graphics department.

Now 12 years later we literally have a console strong enough to run VR games well. Big jump!

 

[vermadas]

I've only ever read the "HTC Vive Outselling Oculus 2-1" on shitty blogs that have no source. Does anyone have any reliable source for the information, or an idea as to where Sweeney might have heard this info?

Sweeney is probably using the numbers from the Steam hardware survey as a basis, which aren't really accurate.

Also, we already have a thread on this, without the clickbaity thread title:
http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showthread.php?t=1332063

 

[shira]

Anyword on 3D tv's sold in their first year.

For comparison

 

[civilstrife]

Also, Oculus needs to get on board with Valve's open source Lighthouse tracking solution.

Their current optical tracking is more limited, CPU intensive and cumbersome by a large margin.
You need three sensors for "experimental" roomscale, and they each need a USB port.

 

[LOLCats]

Current Oculus store implementation imo is a big mistake. I really want a vive, but im holding out till Gen 2. Well trying to...

 

[Tagyhag]

Great news, Oculus can get fucked.

Have Sony & Valve hold down the 2 price groups and hopefully VR takes off.

This. More options is always good but not when one of the options is as shit as Oculus and its business model.

PC is open, has been open, will ALWAYS be open!

 

[Ferrio]

Also, Oculus needs to get on board with Valve's open source Lighthouse tracking solution.

Their current optical tracking is more limited, CPU intensive and cumbersome by a large margin.
You need three sensors for "experimental" roomscale, and they each need a USB port.

They really kinda designed themselves into a corner didn't they? Vive's roomscale must of really taken them by surprise, because their solution is pretty ass.

Glad I jumped the Oculus ship for Vive, I was sure that they'd get it right and HTC would crash and burn. Man I was wrong on all fronts.

 

[FinaruDensetsu]

Warms my heart to see the Vive outselling the Rift despite the higher price point. Better product, better company behind the product.

 

[Veritigo_X]

Oculus really messed up by not launching with motion controllers. All the VR hype this last year was pretty much exclusively from motion controller/room scale games and none of them could be done on the Oculus Rift. Not too surprising Vive is outselling it by this much.

 

[Tankard]

Thank you, Sweeney.

 

[forrest]

Carmack needs to pack up his usb drive and get the fuck outta there!

 

[Mindlog]

This is likely to happen to all the existing players when the market matures.

 

[justsomeguy]

Oculus are throwing big money around at the moment. They want content.

 

[GuitarAtomik]

I was so close to buying an Oculus Rift last year. I had one pre-ordered and was eagerly waiting for it to come until it got delayed. I canceled my pre-order and got the Vive. One was shipped to me in a few short weeks.

Lol same. I had a minute 5 pre-order down and ready to go. Then when the delays started hitting and people started talking about how preorders made during second 1 and 10 would get them one week, then seconds 11 through 20 the next, so on and so forth, I started getting REAL impatient. Then I found out my preorder didn't actually go through for like 20 minutes, I saw an early mixed reality video of Audioshield and decided to jump ship.

 

[Laevateinn]

If I were in the market for VR, Oculus wouldn't be an option because of the toxic environment in charge of things. It's nice that there's good alternatives out there.

 

[Arulan]

It's good to hear that the open platform for VR is doing well.

I expect the gap to continue to widen, but more importantly, I expect SteamVR/OpenVR (or the soon-to-be the Khronos group OpenVR derivative) support will vastly outnumber other standards. As other third-party HMDs begin entering the market, it's in their best interest to support the open standard which already has the most games, support, and is part of the most popular digital distribution platform.

 

[Melon Husk]

HTC Vive is outselling Oculus 2-to-1 worldwide. I think that trend will continue.

Interesting to hear that he doesn't think Touch will affect the trend. Many waited for Touch to decide.

TBF Vive holiday sales kinda sapped Touch's entry to market and Vive is proving to be much more modular, so he's probably right.

 

[Compsiox]

Interesting to hear that he doesn't think Touch will affect the trend. Many waited for Touch to decide.

The Vive's tracking technology is objectively better so I wouldn't be surprised.

 

[Aztechnology]

Also, Oculus needs to get on board with Valve's open source Lighthouse tracking solution.

Their current optical tracking is more limited, CPU intensive and cumbersome by a large margin.
You need three sensors for "experimental" roomscale, and they each need a USB port.

I didn't realize Lighthouse was Open Source? Wtf are all their competitors doing? The fools.

 

[Masterspeed]

I think people just trust Valve.

I mean, granted there's a TON of shitty games on Steam, but there's probably 10x more games on there than the Oculus store will ever have.