Oculus Rift CV1: First impressions

tatte · January 16, 2017

I picked up the headset yesterday, I'm writing this review fresh off my mind to share my first impressions. It's noteworthy that progress (or rather change) in software side of things appears rather quick, so this could get outdated quickly. Prior to Rift I had experience with Samsung Galaxy Gear, so I will be making a few comparisons.

I got my Rift second hand, as far as I can tell I'm the third owner. First thing I noticed was the lack of cleanliness, which in most part is of course the fault of the previous owners, but in part also Rift's fabric construct which makes cleaning it out just a little bit more tedious. I am pleased with the end result, thankfully the foam padding comes off and makes things a little easier.

Having to spend time cleaning the headset served me pretty well, since the software installation took its fair time. Had I been proactive, I would have installed the software in advance (it can be found at oculus.com/setup). Setup itself was straightforward and quick.

First thing that I noticed was the lack of space for glasses. Lenses sit fairly close to your eyes, and the headset sits albeit however feathery lightly, with good tight seal. Gear VR risks bleeding light on the sides, but provides ample space for my glasses. I'm lucky, I'm short-sighted and can use VR without my glasses, but this could be a problem with far-sight. I have the lens distance adjustment in the minimum setting, which also luckily suffices.

Second major thing that struck me was the enormity of the accommodation for nose. Rift's stock imagery uses appalling image of someone's nose cavity, and I immediately understood why. He's probably navigating the room. With some careful adjust and getting used to, it stops being an issue while in VR, but I would have hoped Rift had taken the opposite approach and rather than flattening the foam down, used even thicker but softer foam around the nose area. I can smell the headset while it's on, which gets annoying after a while and made me stuff some toilet paper between my nose and the Rift, solving both the gap and the smell.

It took me a while to realize that the headset doesn't have to press heavily against my face, nowhere near as heavily as the Gear VR. Straps do a good job at keeping the headset in place, and unlike Gear VR's straps, they don't interfere with my ears. Mounted headphones (which can be removed with a flathead screwdriver or anything that resembles one), have excellent adjustment and raise the accessibility to a new level. They spring outward to make it easier to put the headset on, but I found I can slide the headset on with headphones in their normal position. This significantly makes removing and putting back on the headset faster and easier, and using the headset in general more pleasant.

Rift remains comfortable while lying down, much more so than the Gear VR, and with the remote controller and virtual desktop, managing whatever media you consume is while not ideal, still relatively easy.

Just like Gear VR, Rift activates automatically when you put the headset on. It uses the same lounge and interface as Gear VR, which works relatively well but is missing some key features like search. While you can browse the available software in VR, it's seems like its intended to be installed via the desktop app. Some software or apps as I'll be calling them from now, require user action in Windows to finish installing, meaning you will need to take off your headset to finalize their installation.

In general Rift's own lounge works well for launching apps, adjusting orientation and helps you keep the VR rolling. It doesn't require any input from a keyboard or a mouse, all you need is the remote (which in Gear VR is substituted with integrated controls that make you feel like cyclops from X-Men).

SteamVR gets a little more complicated, mostly due to the added levels of "a program opens a program which opens a program" cycle, and division between software that has its own built in support, software that supports SteamVR, and software that launches in Theatre mode (big, moderately adjustable virtual screen) can get confusing at first. The fact that a large portion of VR related content seems to be outdated doesn't help when you try to Google something, which I ended up doing a lot. (I'm still not playing Half-Life 2 or Skyrim in VR, and by the looks of things, probably wont be in any time soon.)

Theatre mode is quick and decent, but I prefer third party virtual desktop apps for richer screen adjustments. Games like C&C Tiberium Wars can get moderately immersive without real VR, as when launched from a virtual desktop instead of using Theatre mode, screen can be adjusted to ludicrous levels, while the game stays playable thanks to large GUI style that carries through all C&C strategy titles. SoaSE in comparison suffers from unusable small GUI in similar conditions. All in all, while both the Theatre mode and virtual desktops help play most non-VR titles with some VR flavour, they are no substitute to a decent monitor.

I don't have Oculus Touch controllers yet, leaving my VR experience incomplete. Thanks to tracking Rift still provides a lot more than Gear VR can. In Minecraft your height in game is affected by your height in real life, so if you sit down, your perspective follows. In Euro Truck Simulator 2 you move your upper body around in intersections to try and see past your side mirrors. Tracking has, even while sitting and without touch controls, obvious benefits to plain 360/3D view. This is double-edged sword (compared to static experience like Gear VR), as it also can misalign you while moving around in the room.

Rift appears to lack several basic apps, such as a browser and Youtube/Netflix. Most used workaround seems to be virtual desktops, but considering that even Gear VR has both, Oculus has no excuse to drag their feet with so basic features. Playing the Beta-card has no effect. I paid 14 euros for the best virtual desktop I could find, promising both Netflix and Youtube. It delivers, sort of. Youtube works by pasting the link of a video you want to watch to its interface, which is honestly insufficient execution (controller has no buttons for copy+paste).

This brings us to my main complaint about Rift. I bought Samsung Galaxy S6 for the sole purpose of leaving it in Gear VR for dedicated VR use, but ended up returning it because it kept overheating, especially in Youtube. I'm a media consumer, firmly believing that Youtube will be the best source of VR media content. An old Huawei without any Gear VR's functionality beats both entry level Gear VR and Oculus Rift in this regard. I raise my hands and walk away...

Other shortcomings I discovered are the flooding of light in the lenses in environments with one bright object (when it happens, you can tell the lenses apart and immersion is ruined) and ever present notification in lounge, telling me my PC supposedly doesn't meet the "hardware requirements", the specific requirement in question being an Intel processor opposed to my honestly sufficient AMD.

Initially I would have preferred HTC Vive, but at around 800 euros used, 900 euros from HTC and closer to 1000 euros from retailers, it's was just too expensive. Brand new Rift costs around 740 euros either from retailers or Oculus, with Touch controllers costing extra 200 euros. Used market for neither is particularly big in Finland, but I spotted this Rift for 570 euros (without Xbox One controller) from local seller. After discovering the few current shortcomings I still would buy it at that price. I will be doing proper research for games supporting Oculus Touch before ordering them, but as long as there's even a couple of games I find decent, I'm convinced it will be worth it. Mounted headphones make up a lot for some of the flaws it still has.

I have intentionally completely passed judging the image quality. First of all, I'm not a... visiophile? With less than perfect sight it may work better or worse for me in general. Some things are a little blurry, others appear very sharp. It's not perfect, but I can't see anything without a flaw anyway so what do I know. The experience works, I love it. Watching normal video content feels mostly the same as with just plain FHD phone with a VR box, but judging by other content, that's not the Rift's fault. (Having imperfect sight probably helps with some of the notorious issues of VR.)

In hindsight I wish I had spent more time researching currently supported games. Steam lists pages after pages of titles, but most of it is just small demo like experiences or straight up garbage.

TL;DR: Rift falls short with both multimedia and (without Oculus Touch) gaming, but delivers a worthwhile experience in general. The little you can do, you will be well immersed for.