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“I was going to wait a few generations to buy a VR system. But after trying the Vive, I’m buying it now.” Said Gary G. after shooting zombies for five minutes. He had the biggest smile and a clear sense of wonder on his face, like he had just witnessed a miracle. In a sense, he did. VR is here.

I know I was all kinds of skeptical about VR. After all, I was promised hoverboards (real hoverboards, not the flaming wheeled planks) and flying cars and VR. I’m jaded. Seriously jaded. Remember when every device was going to be 3D? That didn’t happen. Tech is filled with hype. And, to me, VR was just another hype train.

Not anymore. VR is real. I’m a believer. Not convinced? In the immortal words of Yoda, “You will be.”

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Let’s back up. At CES 2016, I tried the newly premiered HTC Vive Pre at the ZOTAC room (read about my VR adventure here). ZOTAC is a manufacturer of hot graphics cards and mini-PCs, specifically ones that are now VR-ready. After CES, I hit up Kevin at ZOTAC and asked him about getting a private Vive demo for GameCrate and Unlocked at Newegg HQ. He said he’d look into it.

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Turns out, getting a Vive demo is incredibly difficult right now. Everyone wants to try VR. And HTC is still a little hesitant about letting their pre-release hardware into the hands of jaded journalists looking to run benchmarks and declare winners and losers.

But Kevin is a champion. Seriously, most of the guys at hardware companies don’t understand review sites let alone go to the lengths he did to set up a demo for a bunch of nerds. But after talking with Kevin, he’s clearly one these next-gen PC builders that gets it. With Kevin out front, I’m excited to see what new products ZOTAC has to offer in the coming months (I’ve heard some rumors and it’s cool stuff).

On Friday, Kevin and the HTC rep rolled into the office with a box of toys and a ZOTAC 980 Ti VR system. After setting up the HTC Vive system, it was time to have some fun.

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First, a brief discussion of the HTC Vive. The Vive is a VR package, not just fancy goggles. You get a headset, two Wii-like controllers, two black boxes and a ton of cords. The headphones are not included. I chose the awesome Sennheiser HD 630VB that turned out to be a perfect match. More on these headphones -- and VR headphones -- later.

The black boxes are called Vive Base Stations with Lighthouse technology and, once placed on tripods in your room’s corners, are able to map out your movements in a fraction of a second. The Lighthouse tech is the laser system inside the box that tracks your movements or, more accurately, the movement of the various sensors all over the goggles and controllers. Anywhere you turn, crouch or jump, the Base Stations have you covered. More importantly, setup was surprisingly easy.

The Vive controllers are incredibly intuitive. If you’ve used a Wii, think of these as upgraded versions. The big round donut on the top is for motion tracking, the buttons are all along the stalk.

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There’s also a bunch of cords that hook your headset to your computer. Otherwise, the controllers and Lighthouses are all wireless. I asked about a wireless headset but, at this point, the bandwidth needed to wirelessly stream VR doesn’t exist yet. One day.

Right now, there’s a lot of different VR systems out there. Only two are ready for prime time: Vive and Oculus. The Samsung Gear VR, Google Cardboard and others are more tech demos, they don’t have near the tech or power to make the VR experience real. There’s also Sony Playstation VR and Microsoft waiting in the wings. But, for now, it’s going to be Vive and Oculus making all the VR news in the coming months.

As for the demo, the GameCrate team took a turn on the VR system, playing any number of four games -- whales, zombies, paint, and robots. After we were done, HTC opened the VR system up for everyone at Newegg next door to take a turn.

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While I’ll get into my personal feelings about the Vive and the VR movement in detail in another article, here I want to focus on the casuals. How did they react?

Honestly, the responses were surprising, to say the least. Sure, the hard core gamers instantly got VR. The games in the Vive demo are actual games, not just roller coasters. You look in your hands and see guns. You look up and see zombies. You shoot zombies. You have fun. It just works.

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But the Google Tilt Brush demo, where one paints in the open air much like a ribbon dancer, drew people into the virtual world in ways that were both engrossing and emotional. After only a few minutes, many people didn’t want to leave their paintbrush creations behind. When asked, not only did they want to share their 3D personal paintings, but stay in the world and visit it again and again. It was almost like therapy for them.

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In many ways, VR taps into that childlike all-ages fun factor that was last seen on the Wii. Everyone could play the Wii because everyone inherently understood tennis and bowling and physical games.

The same holds true for VR, but to a far greater extent.

With the painting game, the technology is just light years beyond the Wii, from both an accuracy point of view as well as gameplay immersion. Wii bowling was, honestly, hard and annoying. Vive is easy because the hardware and software are so solid that the frustration level is practically zero. Really, I was expecting to write this review and say “yeah, it works, but…” Instead, I'm saying it works, period, full stop. It's VR done right.



And then there’s the zombies. Everyone loved the zombie game, aka Arizona Sunshine. The feeling of grabbing a pistol and blasting a zombie is a universal pleasure. Even for people who would never play a shooting game, they found the satisfaction of zombie destruction an immense joy. Almost everyone said they could play Arizona Sunshine for hours and hours. And these are people who haven't played a game in years. It's just that much fun.

Arizona_Sunshine_vive-zombie-review-2.jpg More importnatly, shooting a zombie in VR makes every other shooting game seem tame and old school. I recently played an embargoed AAA shooter and, honestly, I was bored. Maybe if they port it to VR I will play it but, right now, my excitement is all around VR shooters, not the trusty keyboard and mouse. VR has infected me.

Overall, every single person loved the demo, including people who haven’t gamed in ages. One woman said she hasn’t played a video game since Nintendo. Not Wii, not 64, but NES, the OG. Now? She’s asking how much the Vive costs and what kind of computer she’ll need. She wants it. Heck, even an old maintenance worker who doesn’t speak a lick of English tried out the Vive. After 5 minutes shooting zombies, he was all smiles.

The truth is the Vive is ready for prime time. Even someone as jaded as me recognizes that everyone -- including my 75 year old mother -- will want a VR system. That’s not hyperbole, that’s seeing 100 people play the Vive for 5 minutes each and come away with giant grins and credit cards waving. VR is happening.