Miyamoto, Gun-Shy Over VR, Doesn't Understand the Hype - The UpStream

Miyamoto, Gun-Shy Over VR, Doesn't Understand the Hype

posted Sunday Jul 5, 2015 by Scott Ertz

Miyamoto, Gun-Shy Over VR, Doesn't Understand the Hype

Augmented and Virtual Reality technology is all the rage right now. Both technologies have a lot of potential in the gaming space, I cannot see VR having a lot of success outside of gaming; certainly not in the same way as AR. As Microsoft readies their HoloLens AR headset, Sony readies their Project Morpheus and Valve readies their SteamVR platform with partner HTC, the only major player not involved is Nintendo.

This could be because Nintendo, way ahead of the technology, released their own VR headset, the Virtual Boy, in 1995. The headset was really great at making people sick to their stomach, but not very good at anything else. This could definitely have poisoned Nintendo towards VR or AR technology. It could also be because Nintendo has twice consecutively launched consoles based on novel peripherals and not had huge sales successes. No matter the cause, Shigeru Miyamoto had some harsh words for the technology and its announcements.

I got the general impression that they were showcasing not only the products for this year but also many products for next year or the year after and, because of that, introductions for many of their software titles were done visually, not with playable demos. Also, many demonstrations for virtual-reality devices have been conducted at recent trade shows, and at this year's E3, I noticed a number of dream-like demonstrations for which the schedule and format for commercialization are unknown.

The current software for these virtual reality devices cannot be played simultaneously by a number of people. And since it is generally expected that the development for the applicable software for a high-performance device will take two to three years, there were a number of visual demonstrations for virtual reality devices.

Nintendo took a very difference approach to their E3 presentation from its competition - rather than showcases for stuff coming in 2017 or 2018, Nintendo had a lot of playable games that will be released in the near future. Whether Miyamoto understands VR and AR in today's world, Microsoft, Sony, Valve and Oculus believe they have the next exciting gaming technology on their hands and are putting a lot of their resources behind it. Let's see if Nintendo's cautious approach to the future or everyone else's approach will work better.

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