The HTC Vive, a headset developed in conjunction with Steam giant Valve, is one of the most promising VR solutions yet, and we were expecting it to come out sometime this year. That's still going to be true for a select few people, but it sounds like a regular commercial launch isn't happening before 2016.

In a press release announcing the company's presence at the PAX Prime expo, Valve says that "HTC will offer the first commercial Vive units via a limited quantity of community and developer systems" later this year, "with larger quantities shipping in calendar Q1 2016." Developer units have been available for free since May.

Q1 2016 is, if you're keeping track, when the first consumer version of the Oculus Rift is set to ship, and Sony's Project Morpheus PS4 headset is also planned for release in the first half of the year. The virtual reality platform wars are now set to take place over a more condensed, crowded, and probably confusing period of time.