I will admit upfront that this is going to be a layman’s review. My knowledge of the technical workings of the HTC Vive has been cobbled together through magazines and the internet, rather than any deeper understanding. ‘Fresnel’ sounds more like a brand of coffee than a type of lens to me. In a way, that’s for the best. In order to truly work, VR needs to draw in people like me. Consumers who are there for the show. If VR cannot break away from the magpie-like tech crowd, and into the casual consumer’s hands, then it’s going to fade away. I’d hate to see that happen because the potential is impressive.

I’d also like to note that this is strictly a hardware review, aside from SteamVR. Other software, and the future potential of the software, will be discussed at a later date. I also have not tried the Oculus Rift (in fact I cancelled my order to get the Vive), so I can’t give a solid comparison. It might be in your best interest to compare this review alongside one of the Rift, so you can make the choice best suited to you. But without further ado…

Setup

It’s an odd thing to begin with but I’d like to praise the box that the Vive comes in. It was bigger and heavier than I expected. I was sure no one was going to be in to sign for it so I was planning to have it sent to a pick up location. I’m grateful I didn’t. My back wouldn’t have survived the walk home. The box itself is smartly designed. Each component of the Vive fits neatly into a separate box of shaped foam. Underneath the foam are smaller containers, which have the wires and extras needed for the components above. It helped keep everything from being cluttered, which I appreciated.

The most important bit is the instruction sheet, which leads you to download SteamVR. From there, it moves on to setting up the lighthouses; small black boxes that are responsible for the room scale and movement tracking elements. You’re supposed to screw them into the wall but I couldn’t do that. Instead, I comprised, sitting one on the top shelf of a bookcase with the other resting on my bed frame. I’m pleased to report that it works well like this, even with the two boxes at different heights. It would of course be preferable to have them screwed in and pointed downwards, as the controllers tend to lose tracking when close to the ground, but for most purposes it’s fine.

Once they’re set up, there’s a simple set of procedures you need to go through. The controllers need to be turned on and calibrated, along with some basic positioning (such as making sure you’re looking at your monitor). To set up room scale, you need to walk around the edges of your room while holding the controllers. I found it judged my room to be too small when using the basic tracking (which traces a line based on your controller position) and instead opted for one that simply meant clicking the trigger in each corner. After that, everything went fine. The whole setup probably took about twenty minutes which is far faster than I was expecting.

Sorting out the wires didn’t take long either, thanks again to the box design. It was easy to see which charger was meant to go with what. There are are only three wires that need to be plugged into the control box (on both sides), with the one from the headset itself being a handy 3-in-1 cable that makes it harder to trip over. Hard but not impossible. It does require a fair few empty plug sockets - best to have an extension lead handy - as the lighthouses and the control box all need a plug, along with each controller. All-in-all, the setup was remarkably painless. It’s only a small hurdle between opening the box and getting into a game.

Comfort

The Vive weighs 555 grams in total and it is noticeable when you first put it on. There’s an adjustment period where you get used to the added weight on your bonce but I did stop noticing it after a while. It’s worth noting that the Rift is lighter at 470 grams, so if you’re concerned then it might be worth trying that on if you can. In truth, the weight itself wasn’t hugely uncomfortable for me in most aspects. It didn’t feel like it was impeding my ability to move my head or that it was putting strain on anything it shouldn’t. It may prevent people from wearing it for long periods, due to possible neck pain further down the line, but after wearing the headset for a solid hour it didn’t feel like it was dragging my head down.

It also has a decent foam pad to stop it rubbing against your eyes. It was a little firmer than I was expecting but it does its job and I didn’t end up with a sore ring around my eyes from prolonged use. Less comfortable is the nose guard, which is made out of very rigid material. While the weight of the headset isn’t distracting just by itself, it does press down on the nose somewhat. After about forty-five minutes the padding around the nose becomes very noticeable and lead to a few moments of lifting the headset up to rub it. That is exactly what you don’t want people to do when playing VR games. Honestly though, the most uncomfortable thing in the Vive is the sweat. You essentially have a computer strapped to your face, so it’s going to get hot.

Otherwise, the Vive does a good job of making sure you’re comfortable. One smart feature is the ability to change the distance between your eyes and the headset, by popping out the ‘Vive’ symbols on either side. I’m not a glasses wearer but I feel this feature alone will make things a lot more comfortable compared to the Rift. To adjust the headset itself there are velcro straps on the side and the top. They’re a bit fiddly to use at first when the headset is in place but once you get used to it then it’s very quick work to get it in a comfortable position.

But that’s physical comfort and I know a lot of people are going to be worried about something else: motion sickness. I’ve suffered from motion sickness all my life, most notably in cars, but I rarely feel so much as a twinge in the Vive. That’s across a wide range of games, some of whom seem like they’d make me very sick on paper. Part it is down to having your body feel free and loose, rather than trapped, which helps keep you calm. The 90hz refresh rate and the FPS are also factors. For me though, it’s likely a locomotion issue. The only twinges I got were in HordeZ because it uses arcade-style movement; you continuously move without your input. That’s a bit sketchy for me. But games like Windlands, that have free movement controlled by the player, were fine. I don’t drive but I imagine it’s similar to the difference between driver and passenger. You’re rarely sick as the driver.

Gaming & Controllers

The biggest boon that the headset offers, in my mind, is the head tracking. Some small part of me still expects to see my bedroom window when I turn around. The fact that I don’t still delights. It’s awkward to write down like this, but it really does feel like you’re in the game world. Small things, like physically bending down to see an object on the ground, make it feel a whole lot more real. Games often use the position of the headset to good effect too, such as ducking in and out of cover in Vanishing Realms or dodging shots in Space Pirate Trainer. That said, the lack of inbuilt headphones means that you’ll likely have to deal with a headphone wire as well as the Vive’s. While you can plug your headphones straight into the headset, the feeling of wires against your skin, and constantly tripping over them on the floor, does bring you out it sometimes.

Room scale is likely what’s going to sell it though. My room is quite small but even so it affords me some space to walk around. And because everything is tracked, when you walk in real life, you walk in the game. That’s an incredible step forward. Just being able to see an object across the room, physically walk over to it and pick it up: that’s worlds ahead of keyboard and mouse. Even something as innocuous as picking up a coffee cup in Job Simulator feels remarkable simply because it feels like we’re physically doing it. Well, okay, we’re just squeezing a trigger on a controller but our eyes are telling us that we’re holding it; drinking from it. There’s a certain amount of willing suspension of disbelief needed here but if you can roll with it then it can make even the simplest things immersive.

Games in virtual reality just feel naturally convincing to me. Even those without great graphics feel a lot better in VR than they would on a normal screen. Not to say there aren’t issues. The ‘screen door’ effect is present, making everything look just a little blurrier than it does in real life, despite the impressive resolution. Everything just looks a bit hazy. It’s a little jarring upon first loading up a game but you quickly stop noticing it and it’s certainly nothing to worry about. One game specific limitation is that there’s going to be some lack of feedback due simply to everything being visual and audio only. So hitting someone with a sword isn’t going to feel exactly right because your arm will keep on moving after you’ve struck. That’s simply a tech limitation though, present with all motion controls, and until we can plug into the Matrix, it’s just another hurdle that developers need to design around.

I’m also in two minds about the controllers. The actual tracking of them is brilliant and put to great effect in games like Pool Nation VR. Being able to hold and physically use a pool cue, almost exactly like in real life, is great. I almost fell over trying to lean on the table at first. Then I juggled beer bottles. Picking stuff up and just being able to point anywhere in the world you want is a huge step forward and, now that I’ve used the controllers, it seems almost integral to the VR experience. My hesitation comes from the touchpad, which is similar to the one found on the Steam Controllers. It simply felt imprecise to me, especially when trying to use SteamVR’s virtual keyboard, and I found myself wishing for something akin to a D-Pad. There are also grip buttons along the side, designed to be pressed when you squeeze, but these too felt awkward. Aside from those niggles, the controllers are the perfect link between flesh and tech.

SteamVR

For the most part, SteamVR tries to act like the normal steam overlay. For better and for worse. Actually starting up games in SteamVR is refreshingly easy. One of the controllers acts like a laser pointer, so you can sift through your library relatively easily. The homescreen will also indicate games were you recently playing as well as putting your full VR library just one click away. The shortest amount of time between putting the headset on and being in a game is crucial here, I think, so SteamVR wins definite points on that front. It boots up quickly on my machine too, so there’s very little delay all round.

It’s when it tries to do the other parts of steam that it wobbles. For one thing there’s a button that lets you bring up your desktop. It’s nice if you want to check something very quickly but text is still very difficult to read in the Vive and navigating the virtual desktop with the controllers is a pain. In the end it becomes easier just to remove the headset for a moment. That also applies when trying to talk to friends. If they message you in-game, it pops up in front of you, which I found quite irritating after a while. When replying you have to use a fiddly virtual keyboard and seeing as you’re out of the game anyway, I found little reason to keep the headset on.

Still, SteamVR as it is feels like a nice little safe ground where you can hang out before going into a game. Remember the construct in the Matrix? It’s a bit like that. A loading program before you step into the real game. In fact you can even customise it to look like the construct, which is a neat touch. There’s quite a bit of customisation to it though it relies on the steam workshop, which is refusing to work for me at the moment. One day I’ll stand in the Illusive Man’s room…

Extras

There are two features that were touted when the Vive was being released that I’d like to mention: the chaperone system and the front facing camera. The chaperone system is definitely a welcome touch. Once you’ve set the boundaries of your room, it throws up a green border when you get close. That stops you accidentally lashing out and putting your hand through the window. If you pay attention to it that is. I tend to forget which direction I’m facing when I have the Vive on, so in a fit of stupidity I ignored the chaperone, thinking I was looking at my bed, and accidentally smacked into my computer. Oops. My personal stupidity aside, the system is a great way to keep everything intact without being too distracting in-game. You can even alter how noticeable it is if it’s really bothering you.

Less useful, to me personally, is the front facing camera. It has yet to be utilised in games, which may change my mind on it, but at the moment it’s role is to change your view into what it can see in real life. The idea being that if you need to see something, like a controller or a drink, you don’t have to take the headset off. My problem is… why? Seeing everything through a green-tinged, wobbly camera isn’t going to magically maintain my immersion in the VR world. It’s a lot quicker and easier just to slide it up my head for a moment. Not to mention drinking anything with it on feels near impossible without a straw.

Conclusion

In the end, the experience with the Vive is always going to come back to price. That hefty £700 price tag is going to turn away the vast majority of those casual consumers I mentioned in the introduction. So the real question throughout all of this is: is it worth it? The answer remains, rather frustratingly, it depends. Go demo a headset at a shop and read all the experiences of it you can. It boils down to two sides in my mind. If you want the Vive for the same reason you want a console, to experience a wide range of interesting games say, then no, it’s not. It’s a lot of money to pay for something if you’re not one hundred percent sure that you’ll love virtual reality. If this is you, then wait. Wait and see if it catches on because if it does then it’ll drop in price.

If, however, you want in because of the very concept, the same reason I got excited, then yes I’d say it is worth it. The Vive blew away all my expectations and I spent most of the first hour on it in shock. The Lab had me gasping at every turn. It’s still a huge price point to pay for something that’s still working in concepts but what it offers on a basic level is extraordinary. New games and experiences are always coming out and I’m personally very excited about what’s going to happen next. At its heart, the decision to buy one is a huge risk. It could flop. But I’m happy with my purchase as I’m happy to fund VR. My hope is that, one day, everyone who wants to wear an exciting piece of plastic on their head will have the funds and means to do so.



Pros

-Room scale is amazing

-Chaperone system is handy

-Comfortable and easy to adjust

-Quick and painless to set up

-The VR experience is very refined and worked without a hitch for me

-SteamVR does a good job of making it easy to boot up your games

-Comes bundled with motion controllers, which are comfortable and a good way of connecting to the world

-Very low motion sickness for me personally



Cons

-Very expensive!

-Heavier than the Rift, which shows in the nose guard

-A slight ‘screen door’ effect is present

-Sweat gets everywhere

-Don’t really see the benefit of the front facing camera yet

-Text is still hard to read, making elements of SteamVR tricky

-The touchpad on the controllers felt imprecise



HTC Vive

Manufactured by: HTC, in co-operation with Valve Corporation

Release date: April 5th 2016

Full specifications here.



