While the idea of virtual reality technology has been around for decades, it has yet to make any substantial progress. The roots for virtual reality reach back to the late 1950s when the idea emerged to use computers as tools for digital display rather than just fancy calculators. By the early 1960s, communications technology was intersecting with computing and graphics technology, and this laid the groundwork for computer graphics and eventually, virtual reality.
Over the past three decades, virtual reality hasn’t made any particularly significant advances. It has always needed more computational power than was available on standard home computers, mobile phones, and gaming consoles. Because of this, it was not able to grow. The technology itself has also been slow at developing a high resolution, real life experience. However, in the last few years, technologists have been taking steps to find solutions to these issues, spurring discussions on virtual reality technology once again.
Recently, Mark Zuckerberg, Facebook CEO, announced Facebook’s acquisition of Oculus VR for $2 billion, bringing virtual reality to the forefront of the news. Even with the strides being made in the technology, however, no one is ready to commit to a release date for a virtual reality platform. Jeremy Bailenson, director of Stanford University’s Virtual Human Interaction Lab, says the trade-off between performance and price may be partly to blame.
Facebook is not the only major company anticipating a breakthrough in virtual reality technology. Sony made its own commitment to the technology with Project Morpheus at the Game Developer’s Conference (GDC) 2014. Richard Marks, head of the Magic Lab inside Sony PlayStation R&D, said the difference in virtual technology this time around is that technology has finally caught up with everyone’s long-awaited dreams of virtual reality. If things continue as expected, we are likely to see a drastic change in gaming, education, medicine, and nearly every other realm very soon.