Small screens inches away from your eyes. Light beamed directly at your retinas. At this rate, the next war for cutting-edge display supremacy will be happening on your face. Sometime in the near future, the headgear showdown is going to be the Oculus Rift vs. the just-funded-twice-over Avengant Glyph. Ophthalmologists of the world, prepare!
We last saw this tech back in October, when it was dubbed as the Virtual Retinal Display. A new, sleeker prototype was shown off when a Kickstarter campaign launched two days ago and, faster than you can Double Fine Adventure, the hybrid headphone/display device blew past its funding goal. They asked for $US250,000 and are currently at $US552,207.
Avegant’s promising that the Glyph will have built-in head tracking, which atches a feature added to the newest Crystal Cove iteration of the Oculus Rift that Valve’s getting behind in a big way. The built-in audio solution, though, makes the Glyph more of an all-in-one device than the Rift.
Of course, consumer versions of both of these devices are still a ways off and who knows if they’ll deliver on all of their promises. Still, it’s my prediction that the coming Glyph vs. Rift Wars — which sounds like something Kilgore Trout would write — will leave a small but fervent subset of early adopters with bruised wallets and dangerously exhausted eyeballs. Then, decades later, people will stop talking to each other entirely.
Where do I sign up?
Comments
2 responses to “People Really Want That Other Scary-Cool Virtual Reality Headset, Huh?”
Love the Vonnegut reference.
Is there a chance that light coming from above or below would affect the image you see? That’s what I like about the Rift, it blocks out everything else.