Despite running\u00a0Road to VR for 14 years, I\u2019ve rarely had the opportunity to talk behind-the-scenes about the publication and my philosophy for covering this fascinating industry. Luckily I recently sat down with industry fellow\u00a0Tony Vitillo to do just that.<\/p>\n
Through his blog\u00a0The Ghost Howls<\/a>, Vitillo has been sharing news and observations from inside the industry as a developer and enthusiast. He\u2019s also the creator of one of the most important VR apps ever made<\/a>.<\/p>\n After crossing paths at industry events over many years, Vitillo recently invited me to sit down for the inside scoop on\u00a0Road to VR and my take on this moment in the industry.<\/p>\n You can watch, listen, or reach the full interview below.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n Introduction<\/p>\n Tony:<\/strong> Hello everyone from Tony the Skarred Ghost. Today I\u2019m super excited to hear some a person of the XR space team a lot which is Benjamin Lang from Road to VR and we\u2019re going to spend some time together talking about a lot of cool things. Hey Ben, thanks for joining me.<\/p>\n Ben:<\/strong> Thanks for having me Tony. It\u2019s nice to finally have a kind of formal conversation here after we\u2019ve interacted for so many years in the industry.<\/p>\n Tony:<\/strong> Yeah, I mean it\u2019s been a long time for both of us, even much longer for you. So, but we\u2019ll talk about this, but let\u2019s start by, I guess maybe there are still a couple of people, I guess maybe just a couple that still don\u2019t know you. So, can you introduce yourself?<\/p>\n The Origins of Road to VR<\/p>\n Ben:<\/strong> Sure. So I\u2019m Ben Lang. I am the co-founder and executive editor of Roadtovr.com. I started this back in 2011, so we\u2019re coming up on 15 years, next month I think. Yeah, I just I was really curious about virtual reality and augmented reality technology kind of in the early days actually before Oculus was founded. Oculus was founded like late 2011, maybe early 2012 or at least the the Kickstarter was 2012 for the original Oculus Rift. So I was a little bit before that and nothing was really happening in the space at the time.<\/p>\n My curiosity was really: where did virtual reality go? A lot of people are familiar with the fact that in the late 80s, early 90s, there was VR kind of had a moment in the spotlight there. There were things happening, but it kind of just completely petered out. And by the time that I had started Road to VR in 2011, there was no real such thing as like a consumer VR product on the market that you could just go buy. It was all like the the stuff that did still exist was all medical, high-end military. it just it wasn\u2019t it never happened for consumers. So I was like what happened to that? So I got really curious about where the technology was then and where might it go 15 years later and hence hence \u201cRoad to\u201d VR. So I wanted to sort of chart where we were and where things might go in the future. And now here we are.<\/p>\n We went from when I was writing about kind of just scraps of information to a couple years later we had the Oculus Rift Kickstarter and what we started to call the VR community starting to come along. Now everybody says the VR industry or the XR industry. This is a whole multi-billion dollar industry that\u2019s happened that\u2019s grown up and I\u2019ve watched it from the beginning to today. So, I have luckily a lot of context for what\u2019s going on and I\u2019ve been reporting on all of that as we\u2019ve gone along and hoping to try to help people understand where where we\u2019re at and again, where we\u2019re where it\u2019s all heading.<\/p>\n What Led You to Start Road to VR Before Oculus was on the Scene?<\/p>\n Tony:<\/strong> Yeah, that\u2019s that\u2019s pretty fascinating story because you started before the Kickstarter campaign and I always wondered if you had like the feeling that something was happening or it was just luck. I mean, you just had this passion and then the after something happened.\u00a0Did you start Road To VR because you felt Oculus was coming?<\/p>\n Ben:<\/strong>\u00a0Yeah, I mean I\u2019d love to say I just, it was total prophecy, but let\u2019s be honest, it was some luck. But I will say there was a the thesis behind it was at the time in 2010-2011 I was actually doing tech journalism prior to Road to VR. I was writing about smartphones and tablets and pocket computers and all these things. So I was immersed sort of in the tech space and I was seeing that we were having things like touchscreens, like Siri, like Kinect, and Wii and what I was seeing in those things was that computing was moving away from a keyboard and a mouse or a controller and it was starting to become more human-centric. The way that we were interacting with our devices was starting to become more natural.<\/p>\n And so I started to think about from that like where does this go as it becomes more and more natural? It sort of it feels like that ultimate destination is not only are you like touching the digital content, you\u2019re actually looking at it it\u2019s actually surrounding you or it lives in your environment, hence the \u2018I wonder what happened to VR and where might it go in the future\u2019; so yeah that was it was a bit of a hunch and it was a bit of right time right place.<\/p>\n I started road to VR when I was in college really as a total side hobby project. Just to learn for myself what was going on. And by the time I graduated college, it was like, okay, people are actually interested and things are starting to happen. Should I go full-time with this? And 15 years later or so, apparently I made a career out of it.<\/p>\n Philosophy on Writing VR Product Reviews<\/p>\n Tony:<\/strong> Well, I think you deserve the success you have. I mean, I always mention you and my blog as my \u201creview hero\u201d. I think you\u2019re a great journalist. I want to steal something of your knowledge. Before getting back to talking about VR, I want to talk about the intersection of VR and journalism and ask you for instance, how do you approach writing a good review? What are the criteria to write a good review? Maybe about a game or about a hardware.<\/p>\n Ben:\u00a0<\/strong>I try my hardest to not get wrapped up in the hype of stuff. And this isn\u2019t even purely a professional thing. I\u2019m a pretty avid gamer. I like movies. We see trailers for games and movies and, they all look awesome. I just, for whatever reason, I\u2019m pretty good at not letting my hype levels build something up. And I\u2019m also not particularly forgiving about the circumstance of the thing\u2019s creation. And that\u2019s not to say I don\u2019t appreciate all the hard work and the struggle that goes into making things, even if they don\u2019t turn out amazing.<\/p>\n But the way that I tend to approach reviews is a pretty pragmatic thing as someone who does this as a job. My thought is my audience is the audience of readers. My job is to help them understand if the thing that I\u2019m reviewing is worth their time and their money. If I\u2019m serving any other purpose other than that, I don\u2019t think I\u2019m doing them justice. I don\u2019t think I am giving my audience what I hope they get out of the site. So I do my best to really ask myself (for a game review), am I having fun? You can talk about the graphics and you talk about all this and all that, but like if I\u2019m not compelled to be going through this game, if I\u2019m just not enjoying it, then I\u2019m not going to get distracted by those other factors \u2014like, oh, it took five years to make and it was a miracle that it got off the ground or whatever. Again, appreciate all that, but when it comes to answering the question for my audience, is this worth your time and money? That\u2019s really where my focus is.<\/p>\n I don\u2019t want it to like come off sounding like I don\u2019t care about developers. That\u2019s actually completely not the truth at all. That\u2019s just my kind of take on reviews. When it comes to developers, I mean, ask around the industry. Like, I\u2019ve been hands-on with a lot of projects before they were ever announced, giving people advice on marketing and design and comfort. There\u2019s a lot of stuff that I do because I want to see great content. I want to see developers succeed. That\u2019s all really important for keeping VR growing.<\/p>\n But I do occasionally get comments on like a review where I\u2019m like \u201cI didn\u2019t think this game really pulled it off.\u201d We didn\u2019t give it the best score in the world. And I\u2019ll get a comment that\u2019s like, \u201cyou\u2019re you\u2019re destroying the VR industry. You are ruining this by giving this game a bad score.\u201d<\/p>\n And I understand that reaction, but it kind of blows my mind because I think if you take, more than 10 seconds to come up with that knee-jerk reaction, you realize that if I\u2019m artificially inflating a score of a of a game that I didn\u2019t really think I liked, but I thought, \u201cOh, this is going to hurt the the industry.\u201d All I would be doing is setting an incorrect expectation for people.<\/p>\n If I say \u201cthis is a great game\u201d and really it was down here, but I was sort of fluffing it for the sake of the industry or the developer or something, all I\u2019m doing is having people think, \u201cokay, the VR people are saying this game is great, but I don\u2019t think it\u2019s very good. So, if this is what they\u2019re calling a great VR game, then there must not be very many good great VR games.\u201d<\/p>\n So, I really think that honesty is actually in the industry\u2019s long-term interest. I think it is the healthiest thing you can do. For me it\u2019s not about cheerleading. It is about trying to give constructive honest feedback and help people understand is this product or game for them? And hopefully that honest feedback means that developers can change and see what needs to be tweaked instead of just saying like \u201cthis game is amazing\u201d when it\u2019s just not. So yeah that is my approach to reviews. But again, it\u2019s not that I don\u2019t care about the industry. It\u2019s that I genuinely think that this approach to honest, objective, and trying to keep everybody like on the same page and not being super promotional; I think that is in the industry\u2019s interest in the long term.<\/p>\n Principles of Good VR Journalism<\/p>\n Tony:<\/strong>\u00a0I think that\u2019s that\u2019s very wise. I totally agree with you also because anyway, people then play the game if this is not good, they immediately comment saying that it\u2019s bad. So it\u2019s makes no sense to to lie about stuff and this is a very good way of working. Do you think there are also some rules that a good VR journalist should follow more in general not only about reviews about sources about rumors we have a lot of them? Do you have some let\u2019s say lessons to share about how to be a good VR journalist?<\/p>\n Ben:<\/strong> I don\u2019t think it\u2019s even unique to VR, I mean there\u2019s a lot of basic stuff. As any journalist, you should be you should be confident in the information. If you\u2019re not confident in the information, you should say, \u201cThis is a rumor. We haven\u2019t verified it.\u201d<\/p>\n I would say are fairly unique in this sort of day and age of media in general, which has become very influencer heavy. I wouldn\u2019t call myself an influencer. Not in the way that most marketing or PR people use the term. We kind of live in this world where influencers are sort of an outgrowth of marketing and so they\u2019re many of them\u2014not all of them\u2014are kind of the hype people for some of these products and services and whatever. They form a close relationship with some company or many companies to get products and they know in the back of their head \u201cif I\u2019m not saying good things about this about this product then I\u2019m not going to be on this company\u2019s good terms anymore. I\u2019m not going to get the cool freebies blah blah blah.\u201d<\/p>\n So we really try to from the very beginning to have steered Road to VR toward more journalism and reporting versus influencer marketing. People approach us all the time with the same kinds of deals and perks and things that they offer to influencer type people and we just have a pretty hard line and set of rules to guide how we\u2019re going to handle that stuff.<\/p>\n So, for instance, many games will send influencers like a \u2018swag kit\u2019 with all kinds of cool stuff, statues or memorabilia from the game. And they expect influencers to, post coverage on this and say, \u201cThis is so cool. I got this figurine from the game. I can\u2019t wait to play it. It\u2019s awesome. Look how cool it is.\u201d And our stance is when people come to us asking if we want that swag kit, we just say, \u201cWe appreciate the offer, but if it\u2019s not directly related or necessary to our coverage of the thing, then we would politely decline.\u201d And it\u2019s just it\u2019s a lot of little details like that we really try our best to keep in place and stay truthful to make our reporting good.<\/p>\n I will say, for a lot of people, this doesn\u2019t matter one bit. We have passed up tons of money over the years in deals and offers to do this stuff, because I personally think it\u2019s important and it is the kind of reporting and information that I would like to read from sources that do these kinds of things. Most people don\u2019t really care. So it is an unfortunate reality of the media landscape that we live in that by doing these things you actually make it harder for yourself in terms of running a sustainable business. We\u2019ve managed to get by because we\u2019re a scrappy team and we know what we\u2019re doing. But it is the harder path for sure. But I wouldn\u2019t I wouldn\u2019t do it any other way. It\u2019s just so important to me. And I hope that maybe one day people will be a little more willing to support people who operate in this way in their interest, not in the interest of advertisers or marketers or these other kind of parties that are behind them.<\/p>\n Getting Featured on Road to VR<\/p>\n Tony:<\/strong> Well, that\u2019s very interesting. By the way, if I can tell you an opinion from outside actually you are at very high reputation because people can feel that you are very serious and not appreciate that both by gifts or other stuff like that. So it will pay in the long run. I\u2019m pretty sure about that but in the short run it\u2019s it\u2019s problem for the money. I mean we all we all know that we are not in the best moment for the ecosystem.<\/p>\n But compliments of what you\u2019re doing and since we all love your magazine actually many people me included in the past for some things I did try to get coverage on your magazine but you\u2019re mostly two people, you and Scott, that write most of the articles and of course you cannot write 50 articles per day so you have to be very selective. How can people let\u2019s say be chosen as the as the topic of some articles you\u2019re writing on your blog, your magazine?<\/p>\n Ben:<\/strong>\u00a0It\u2019s a good question. And yes, I\u2019ve definitely fielded incoming, things from you and cool stuff that you\u2019ve done and we\u2019ve also reported on some news that you\u2019ve broken and stuff like that. So, we do source you. But, to be to go back to what I was talking about, we try to be kind of objective with our coverage.<\/p>\n We love you and the stuff that you do. But when you came out and have asked us in the past to maybe cover something that you were working on, it\u2019s not a guaranteed thing just because we have some kind of relationship. And that\u2019s important to us. So, it comes down to two things. I mean, the primary one is a bandwidth. As you said, we can\u2019t write 50 articles a day. I would love to. There are a lot of things that I have to pass on that I think are really interesting, but we simply don\u2019t have the time for it, unfortunately. That is the that is kind of the number one thing that stops us from covering stuff. If I could cover everything that I found interesting, we\u2019d have a lot more stuff going out the door. But you\u2019re right, we have to be selective about it. And what that ends up coming down to is usually just kind of a priority list.<\/p>\n So something like what you were working on may have started at the top of the list. And I\u2019m just using as an example. This wouldn\u2019t be exactly how it happened, but it might; I might be going through my inbox and through my feeds and looking for what I\u2019m going to cover in a given period. And that thing might have been at the top of my list and then maybe I get through and there\u2019s some other thing up here and another thing and I start on that list and I just don\u2019t always make it to the bottom of that list unfortunately.<\/p>\n We really do our best but we\u2019re trying to we\u2019re trying to balance solid reporting and giving a lot of context and analysis in our articles compared to just repeating what a company has said that you could just go read what they already said. So, we spend a lot of time trying to make sure that our reporting is adding some value as opposed to just sort of rehashing the facts out there. And unfortunately, that takes quite a bit more time.<\/p>\n So, I would say, in terms of like, okay, \u201cwe want to pitch road to VR, how do we do it the best way?\u201d Please email us or reach out. Like, I read all of it. I can\u2019t always respond to all of it, but I read all of it. I appreciate it. I appreciate seeing what people are working on and what they\u2019re doing. And I would say I\u2019ve covered some really small projects that maybe somebody thought \u201cit\u2019s not worth the pitch\u201d but I just thought was really unique and interesting and for whatever reason I wanted to highlight this thing. For me it comes down to a lot of like interesting design and interaction and development stuff I find particularly intriguing. But of course we have to cover the major news stuff anyway.<\/p>\n So I would say comes down sometimes to individual sort of reporter interest. So we have me and Scott who are doing the vast majority of the content on Road of VR and as two different people we have different interests and things that are going to pique our interest and that we\u2019re going to want to write about. I think if you want to pitch us or really any other publication rather than just throwing something at the publication as a whole, go to some authors that have written about similar things that you\u2019re working on and get an idea of, okay, this person tends to cover, let\u2019s say new launch trailers for games. If there\u2019s one person that really focuses on that, try to reach out to them specifically and say, \u201cHey, I\u2019ve read your reporting. I see what you do. I love that you keep me up to date.\u201d Make make an effort to understand who you\u2019re actually talking to in the first place. I think that goes quite a long way. Compared to just sending a generic pitch out the door.<\/p>\n And yes, that\u2019s more work. Of course, but in the day and age of AI, you can get a real leg up on that by getting some information and maybe using it to write more custom prompts faster than you would have been able to do it by hand. So there\u2019s a lot of different things out there, but for us in particular, definitely reach out. You never know what really might pique our interest. And keep us up to date. There have been some projects where somebody has written and we read it and we just didn\u2019t have the time to do it. And then on the third time that they sent us information and they reach a certain milestone, we said, \u201cOh, this has reached a point where we think we\u2019d like to cover it now.\u201d So, it\u2019s not like, \u201cOh, we just want one and done, get out of there.\u201d It\u2019s really sort of a combination of our bandwidth, our interest, and again, we love to stay up to date even if we\u2019re not necessarily able to write about everything people send us. Like, please keep it coming. We like to be in the loop and seeing what\u2019s happening.<\/p>\n Marketing Advice for Indie VR Studios<\/p>\n Tony:<\/strong> Well, that\u2019s a very good suggestion to all the people outside there and especially some category of people I\u2019m interested into is the VR indie game studios because there are many people with the small studios that try to succeed in this space where it\u2019s very hard to be noticed by magazines to be featured on the stores because that\u2019s a huge problem since you work anyway between you are an expert of the of our ecosystem, you have knowledge about marketing, about journalism, etc.<\/p>\n In general, what suggestion do you want to give maybe to these people to try to be noticed and be successful in general? So, not only talking about feature being featured on your magazine.<\/p>\n Ben:<\/strong> So, similar thing it is definitely making sure that you understand your audience. And that\u2019s both who you\u2019re developing for and then who you are sort of pitching to try to find coverage. So let\u2019s just say there\u2019s other outlets out there. You should really spend, do your 30 minutes of basic research to understand what are like my top five targets that I would love to be able to be covered in and go understand a little bit or learn a little bit, research a little bit about what is it that they do. Understand their mission.<\/p>\n The closer you get to understanding who you\u2019re actually pitching to, the easier it\u2019s going to be. And again, like I say, I find it, tends to be very valuable to go find a specific person rather than just the name of the organization and send it to some generic, inbox. If you can find a specific person and reach out to that specific person and they\u2019ve covered stuff that you\u2019ve done before or I\u2019m sorry, covered things that are similar to what you\u2019re working on, they\u2019re probably interested in what you\u2019re working on, too. And you can you know make that pitch to them.<\/p>\n I think also there is a I would say a minimum bar of polish that is somewhat important. Ideally when you\u2019re sort of pitching your game or app or whatever it is, you should think about how do I make this how do I make this as easy as possible for the person to cover me? In many cases, one of the biggest things to do for that is help them approach them with a thesis. Don\u2019t just say, \u201cI\u2019m making a game.\u201d Look at it. It\u2019s fun. Approach them with a thesis.<\/p>\n It\u2019s, \u201cI\u2019m making a game. It has this particularly unique feature that I\u2019ve spent a lot of time on that does X, Y, and Z better than, any other game in its genre. Help them have an angle. They don\u2019t necessarily have to take your angle, but if you approach them with an angle for what makes your thing unique, that is going to get you so much farther than just coming and saying, \u201cI\u2019m working on a thing. Please look at it and figure out what\u2019s interesting about it and write and do that work for me to figure out what\u2019s interesting to tell your audience about.\u201d<\/p>\n Much more much more effective if you have inside your own head an idea of what makes your game unique and stand out, what you\u2019re especially proud of with this thing. And I think that\u2019s not even just for marketing. Like, if you\u2019re building something, you can\u2019t just build like a similarly good version of another thing that\u2019s very similar. Otherwise, why would people who are already using that go to another thing? There\u2019s got to be a standout feature. There\u2019s got to be a hook that really makes people want to try your experience.<\/p>\n So, you should know that from the beginning how and be building actively building your app to foster this hook that you\u2019re creating. And then that all ends up, that doing that basic groundwork of knowing what is my hook, what is what am I trying to do to make this game stand out? Like a very specific thing, not just like I\u2019m making a great shooter. It\u2019s like a very it should be a very specific thing. I\u2019m making a shooter which has the best weapon handling or the best weapon customization ever seen in VR. You got to you got to believe that you\u2019re building that and deliver it. Otherwise, you\u2019re just making a shooter. And there\u2019s lots of them out there.<\/p>\n So, yeah. It\u2019s be specific about sort of your vision. And once you do that work to know what you\u2019re building in the first place, it\u2019s going to be so much easier to pitch your thing. Because if you started with that thesis and building the product, you\u2019re not inventing a story out of out of thin air from what you made, you are sort of, staying true to what you\u2019re what you\u2019re actually working on in the first place. And that\u2019ll make everything else easier. It\u2019ll make trailers easier. It\u2019ll make pitching easier. It\u2019ll make selling easier.<\/p>\n Design Tips for VR Experiences<\/p>\n Tony:<\/strong> So yeah, that\u2019s a very it\u2019s a great advice. I think it\u2019s a very good advice for all the indie developers out there. And I want to ask you another advice about another topic because one of the columns I like the most from you delving into VR design. So interaction design of VR experiences etc. And I know you wrote quite a good number of articles about that so you cannot summarize them in five minutes now, but if you can choose maybe a couple of suggestions you want to give people in general about how to design their experience. So, it\u2019s good to use and maybe also manageable.<\/p>\n Ben:<\/strong> Yeah, that\u2019s definitely a tough one. Because it is a huge area. And so, yeah, I try my best in my coverage to help sort of raise up and highlight the design side of VR development. I think there and AR, XR, all of it really. I think there are there is a huge emphasis on the sort of coding or programming side of development and I don\u2019t see nearly as many resources on the design side which I think for VR is extremely important because on the one hand it\u2019s more challenging because it\u2019s 3D and on the other hand it well it\u2019s multi-dimensional. It\u2019s not your mouse and keyboard input. But on the other hand it\u2019s newer.<\/p>\n We can\u2019t carry over so many of the paradigms that have, come up over the last 25 years of gaming of flat screen gaming design. They just don\u2019t translate. I see I see this mistake happen a lot. Like you\u2019ll have someone who says, \u201cOkay, I want to make an RPG.\u201d So, they take what a flat screen RPG looks like and kind of bring it into VR, but they don\u2019t do the the heavy design work. So, you\u2019ll have like a VR RPG with a with like a laser pointer inventory management. And there\u2019s like a lot of inventory management and like pointing with a laser pointer and dragging and dropping and put equipping my stuff by dragging a square picture onto a picture of my guy. It does not necessarily fun in VR.<\/p>\n And so if you don\u2019t do the it\u2019s the difference between taking a concept and taking a feature. So, if UI management with a big grid and a bunch of icons is a feature, you don\u2019t want the feature, you want the concept. In RPGs, it is fun to get equipment. It is fun to equip new stuff. It is fun to get those upgrades. But the fun part is not using the laser pointer, using your mouse, and dragging it around, at least not in VR. So you need to think about how do I bring how do I bring inventory management to VR in a way that is native and enjoyable to VR instead of just bringing the feature as it was built on flat screen.<\/p>\n And you can say this about so many things and it\u2019s hard to completely like the way that flat screen inventory management works. There\u2019s a there\u2019s a common set of ideas now that most people understand and when a new game comes up they pretty much bring those ideas over maybe little tweaks here and there but for VR you\u2019re in fairly uncharted territory. And so I think the best way to approach this, is actually not invent it from scratch if you don\u2019t have to. Because there are a lot of VR games out there and there is a lot of really smart design out there that if you have a wide enough knowledge of having played enough VR content, you will see some really smart little things that people have done.<\/p>\n Inventory management, weapon management, how a door works, like all this stuff is out there, and it pains me to see VR developers spend a ton of time reinventing them when another developer has already showed a pretty darn good shot at it, like a good starting point that could be brought over and adopted, save you a bunch of time, and let you work on your actual unique thing that no one else has done yet.<\/p>\n So that\u2019s the whole reason why you mentioned I have this video series and article series called Inside XR Design. I\u2019m sure you can find, if anyone\u2019s interested, find the, just search it on YouTube. It\u2019s all there. In those videos, I\u2019m trying my hardest to find games that are doing things uniquely well that have not been recognized or re, we haven\u2019t seen that their what they their contribution to the design repeated anywhere. It hasn\u2019t made its way into the design language of VR for a million reasons. Sometimes the game is not popular enough or it\u2019s hard to people don\u2019t want to put on the headset and look at it and say, \u201cOkay, I\u2019m going to recreate it and I\u2019m going to take off the headset and jump into my game.\u201d It\u2019s difficult.<\/p>\n So, I\u2019m trying to get those ideas out of the headset for people so they don\u2019t have to go in themselves and look at it. Put them in a video, make it accessible. I want everybody to learn from this stuff. Maybe even learn what people have done wrong, that\u2019s important, too. And I want people to be able to build on this. Why I would hate to see developer waste time, trying to rethink about again, how exactly should a door open when there\u2019s great examples of the best way to do that out there already. Or how do we how do we spawn people? How do we move people comfortably? Like there\u2019s all these what I think of in my head as lessons out here where I\u2019ve played these games and said, \u201cWow, that is look at that. They did an awesome job with that.\u201d<\/p>\n For instance, the cover system in Synapse comes to mind. You can like grab any wall with your hand and you can move your body around with it and it makes this really natural peaking, cover system that I haven\u2019t seen replicated in a lot of places. And then you\u2019ll have games where it\u2019s a functionally a cover shooter, but they don\u2019t give you that tool. They just expect you to be crouching down and it\u2019s a sort of a worse experience for it. Why not attach that feature? Like there\u2019s so many of these little lessons.<\/p>\n So, inside XR design is there to try to highlight some of these interesting design contributions. Less development, more on the design, the why behind how it works as opposed to the how it works like coding and programming. And yeah, it\u2019s there\u2019s a thousand things and it\u2019s tough for VR developers. I absolutely understand that. And that\u2019s sort of why I think trying to build upon the base foundation of what\u2019s been done already gets you so much further than going in and saying I have to make every single system and feature from scratch as if I as if no one else has done it before.<\/p>\n So yeah, it\u2019s sometimes people are trying to carry over features from the flat screen stuff which is not good and other times people are trying to recreate VR native features from scratch which is also it\u2019s not the worst thing but it\u2019s going to take you a lot more time and effort. So finding the VR version of the flat screen feature and going from there I think is tends to elevate VR games to be more immersive and more interesting. And frankly, a VR game needs to be more fun to play in a headset than it would be on a flat screen. That\u2019s like a critical bar. Otherwise, why would I put on the headset in the first place?<\/p>\n The Evolution of XR Over the Last 15 Years<\/p>\n Tony:<\/strong> Oh, that\u2019s amazing. So, now I want to get back, let\u2019s say, to the origins. You said you started in 2011 and now it\u2019s almost 15 years, etc. So, how have you seen the evolution of the XR ecosystem? I mean what has remained the same? What has changed? What has gone in a different ways from the original plan? I mean what\u2019s your perception of the evolution of the space in the last 15 years?<\/p>\n Ben:<\/strong> I think the thing that stands out to me probably is that I think hardware like headsets, let\u2019s talk about VR in particular, has evolved more slowly than I would have expected. I mean yes let\u2019s go back 14 years to the Rift DK1 we have come a long way since then but since let\u2019s say the Oculus Rift CV1 the first Oculus headset it had six degrees of tracking and not too long after launch it had full motion controllers\u2014things are not fundamentally different today, the headsets are functionally in the same class of size and weight we have the same tracking features for six DoF on head and hands.<\/p>\n There\u2019s definitely improvements to the experience generally. Standalone is a big help. Wireless is a big help. Inside out tracking is huge. But like the box that we were in our head, I still would have forecasted or at least hoped would change faster, become smaller, more comfortable, but we\u2019re still kind of in the same place.<\/p>\n My hope is that once we sort of reach all the good enough levels of things like field of view and resolution, then the size will start coming down. Cuz we exist in this space where at the beginning resolution had to be like the most important thing. It was just screen door effect and all of that was really rough. It was distracting. It reduced immersion. So, we had to get that up. So, in order to increase the resolution, it\u2019d be very difficult to both increase the number of pixels on the screen while also shrinking the size of the screen. That\u2019s like doing, double the work all at once.<\/p>\n So, the headsets have, I think, stayed the same largely because we\u2019ve wanted to get like the baseline like the tracking and the resolution and the various features up to where it\u2019s like we\u2019re good enough and we don\u2019t have to go any further. I\u2019m in a Vision Pro right now and the resolution on this thing I would be fine if it stayed this way forever. It there\u2019s diminishing returns. It could get a little bit better. But it\u2019s really quite good. And if I was given a choice between double the resolution on the next version of this headset or half the size of the headset, I would 100% go half the size on the headset.<\/p>\n So, I think we are just hitting this peak hopefully where we\u2019re where we\u2019re kind of maxing out on the features that we even want in the form factor. And then hopefully from there the emphasis becomes smaller, more comfortable, etc.<\/p>\n On the software side of things, I still sort of I\u2019m still waiting patiently for something like Vision Pro to become closer in cost to Quest because that competition is extremely healthy and it\u2019s been missing in the VR industry for a long long time. So Facebook at Meta has been here for since the beginning essentially and their approach from the very start has been let\u2019s aggressively subsidize these devices to make them affordable and get them in the hands of people and that\u2019s nice for consumers in the short term no doubt but it\u2019s made it extremely difficult for real competition.<\/p>\n So, you had companies like HTC and Valve and even, Microsoft and some of their partners making headsets, but it was extremely hard for any company to make a headset that was even if it was comparable in quality to what Facebook was making, it was extremely hard for them to make it cost the same. It would just inevitably be more expensive. And that sort of makes the that makes the competitive landscape extremely difficult to break into which means the kind of leading player which has been meta for the longest time kind of just doesn\u2019t need to respond too much to what other headsets are doing well because they know like yeah you might have a cool new feature or better resolution or wider field of view or whatever but our headset is half the price of what you\u2019re charging that just makes it really hard for anyone out there doing something better to really influence and push meta to be more aggressive or more innovative.<\/p>\n And this is just the nature this isn\u2019t unique to the VR situation. This is the nature of competition in general. So now that Vision Pro is on the market and it has been for almost 2 years now. We are starting to see some real competition, which is weird because this headset is way more expensive, but Apple has done whether it\u2019s their brand or just the work that they\u2019re doing. Whatever it is, Meta has been a lot more responsive to what Apple has done. I think because Meta understands that Apple is a true competitor at their scale.<\/p>\n Even though this headset is so much more expensive than the Quest headsets today, Meta has made a lot of changes that are improvements or features that have been added, from Vision Pro. It\u2019s not to say that they\u2019re not doing other cool stuff on their own and have other features that Vision Pro doesn\u2019t have. But it is the first time that we\u2019re really seeing them respond. And that\u2019s making headsets and VR better for everybody. If one company comes up with a really cool idea that just works really well, the others hopefully should adopt it and give that to their users, too.<\/p>\n So, I\u2019m really looking forward to this headset or future versions of this headset to come down much closer in price to where Quest is at cuz it\u2019s going to amplify that competition. It\u2019s going to make Meta respond faster and be more innovative to retain customers who might otherwise say, \u201chm, yes, the Vision Pro 3 is twice as expensive, but it\u2019s got a lot of great stuff.\u201d As opposed to just being just as good, but still twice as expensive.<\/p>\n So I\u2019m really looking forward to that and I think that\u2019s going to ex if we look at if I look back over the last 15 years and then ahead to the next 15 years I think the next 15 years are going to show a much faster pace of improvement compared to what we\u2019ve seen over the previous 15. Again we you form factor look back at DK1 I\u2019m in a vision pro functionally we\u2019re still in the same class size class and even weight class so yeah I\u2019m really looking forward to that competition really finally coming online I hoped years ago Apple would have jumped in to make this happen sooner but things take a little longer than they than they seem but I think once that happens it\u2019s going to be a really good thing all around and going to lead to better products more adoption lower costs.<\/p>\n The Current State of XR<\/p>\n Tony:<\/strong> Well that\u2019s been great summary about the past 15 years and maybe accuse some cues about what is going to happen in the future. But what about the present? Because we are in a bit of a transition phase like where mixed reality didn\u2019t really take off. Meta is changing its priorities. I mean connect most of the talks were about smart glasses and horizon worlds. I mean there was some mention of the Quest but it seems not to be the top priority. The Apple and Google are coming but are still in another category. So how do you see the current situation? How would you describe it?<\/p>\n Ben:<\/strong> It is a really interesting time. I think Meta I don\u2019t think it\u2019s their official slogan anymore but move fast break things was for a long time their ethos and it I think it kind of continues to be. And for web development and app development, maybe that worked really well. I don\u2019t think it works great, or at least we haven\u2019t seen it work particularly great when it comes to like a brand new medium like VR.<\/p>\n I think when you\u2019re if you\u2019re just building and iterating on apps, that\u2019s good and great. Go for it. Go to town. But when you\u2019re like making fundamentally new like interfaces and paradigms for how people are going to interact with this stuff, I think it really benefits from having a strong foundation and a strong vision for how it should work and how it should feel as opposed to saying let\u2019s just keep keep making stuff and then see if people like it and then try to make it more. It\u2019s like they\u2019ve meandered a lot.<\/p>\n I see this particularly in their in the software. I think Meta\u2019s hardware is really great. Their hardware team has always been good. They\u2019ve delivered some of the best, consistently some of the best headsets on the market from a hardware standpoint. But on the software, it just feels like there\u2019s not a whole lot of just feels very scattered. It feels like there\u2019s a lot of people who want the headset to do a lot of different things and it ends up not being particularly cohesive.<\/p>\n And now I think we\u2019re seeing that sort of scatteredness of just kind of wanting to chase after what looks like it is doing well. As it as it happens. We\u2019re seeing that sort of now with the headsets too. So I think Meta saw that their smart glasses did well and so of course they want to pursue that.<\/p>\n My my hope is that what looks in the near term right now like in the next one to two years what looks like a distraction for Meta is actually part of a longer plan that actually plays out in the long run. And I don\u2019t think that\u2019s impossible. I think Zuck actually does have a very long-term outlook as he claims to. I mean, he was the one, starting this stuff up back when they acquired when they acquired Oculus. I think it was 2014 if I recall correctly. He did it thinking 10 years later, we want to have something. And we need to start that project now in order to in order to be there before other people are.<\/p>\n So, I do think he has a genuinely long-term view. And so I\u2019m hoping that this, distraction from VR or immersive immersive XR is actually just two things happening from two different sides. So right now, of course, they need to deliver on a product that they see as working. It\u2019s just they\u2019re not not going to work on that, which is trying to expand the glasses. But I do think that while the glasses are like starting small and with the minimum features and then trying to add more as you go and then you\u2019ve got the, VR headsets or AR headsets, XR headsets, whatever you want to call them, mixed reality, whatever meta is calling them now. Is like starting with the maximal feature set and then trying to make it smaller.<\/p>\n And I don\u2019t think those things can\u2019t happen and exist simultaneously and eventually hopefully meet in the middle. Ideally, we\u2019re we\u2019re trying to make the headsets smaller and more comfortable. And Ideally, we\u2019re trying to load the what is today smart glasses with just an AI chat assistant or a tiny static display. Hopefully, we\u2019re trying to get more wider fields of view, more tracking, more immersive features in there.<\/p>\n So, I empathize with the feeling of it being like, \u201cOh, no. It feels like they\u2019re like forgetting about VR because in this last connect, we didn\u2019t hear a lot about it because, I\u2019m a I\u2019m a I\u2019m a player. I\u2019m a user of the headset. Obviously, I\u2019m very immersed in the in the technology.\u201d But looking at this longer term, I don\u2019t think I hope it\u2019s not going to turn out to actually be a distraction, but it\u2019s actually sort of two parallel tracks that are hopefully going to converge at some point.<\/p>\n And again, I think this will all the pace of this will all be dictated based on what the competition looks like. So, Apple is probably doing something very similar. They\u2019re probably in the, in their labs working on something that again is more like focuses heavily on form factor at the cost of some features, whereas Vision Pro is like heavily features and it costs some form factor. I think they\u2019re going to do the same thing. And depending upon who hits the market at at what time and what the response is, that\u2019s going to drive the pace of which one gets pushed faster at any given moment.<\/p>\n But in the end, I think they do all sort of converge. We want to be able to wear something that is comfortable that can be immersive, but can also be like get out of the way and not annoy us. It would be great to be able to walk out the door and see nothing on my display except for floating turn by turn directions when I want them. And then when I walk back in my door, have a whole room full of, virtual apps pinned to my walls, the weather, my mail, my calendar, and then hit another button on the same headset that takes me to a fully immersive social space to hang out with some friends or play games.<\/p>\n We want that all-in-one headset. What we\u2019re seeing right now is the very beginning of, the head the little glasses headset on this side and we\u2019re seeing the larger headsets on this side. We we want them we want all that to be in one. All the features, tiny tiny package. I think that\u2019s where Meta is heading. So what might seem like a distraction I think is actually burning the candle from both ends.<\/p>\n Recent XR Excitement: Neural Band Input<\/p>\n Tony:<\/strong> Well, I agree with you. And by the way, since there is one thing that we have in common that as you said in the beginning, we both you and me are not easy to get excited about something. We don\u2019t fall much for the hype. And I want to ask you is there something that you have tried maybe in the last 12 months or whatever that instead you said oh this is really cool I mean whatever can be software can be hardware one thing that you really said okay this can be can have interesting ripple effects for the future.<\/p>\n Ben:<\/strong> I would say actually most recently it would be the neural band that is shipping with the the Ray-Ban Display. So from the perspective of an XR person who a 20\u00b0 static HUD display in glasses doesn\u2019t excite me too much. The neural band that comes with the glasses which is used for the input. It\u2019s basically like pinching, looking and pinching with with Vision Pro, which works really well, but without needing to have your hands within the frame of view, field of view of the camera, which is a big benefit because if you\u2019re going to be walking around outside and you want to interact with your headset, like start a music track, you don\u2019t want to talk to your headset in public. It\u2019s just it\u2019s just weird and it\u2019s probably not ever going to seem normal if you\u2019re in a crowded space and you start talking to your device.<\/p>\n But being able to have a wristband that can be down at your side and you can make really subtle pinch and swipe gestures to be navigating what\u2019s on the screen. I think that is a I think that\u2019s the future of input for sort of all day devices for a long time. For for immersive games, we\u2019re going to want the full hand tracking, the full controller tracking. But if you just need to be able to navigate a menu and, hit thumbs up a message or start a song or what have you, being able to do it in a very tiny, like with really little motions, I think for AR glasses and stuff where you want to be outside, that\u2019s going to be the way to go for a long time.<\/p>\n I think it\u2019s very smart because it\u2019s already functionally a device people wear. They could easily make it a watch. They could easily make it a smartwatch, health tracker kind of thing. And so it\u2019s not like something brand new. It\u2019s not like telling people, hey, wear like a special backpack or wear like a like a heavy necklace that has this technology in it. It\u2019s just something people are many people are already wearing. And would make sense like even if you only used it to control your glasses 5% of the time, if you\u2019re still getting watch and alarms and health tracking out of it, it\u2019s already a good product.<\/p>\n I\u2019m wearing a smartwatch right now. You can\u2019t see it cuz this isn\u2019t my real hand. But I\u2019m already getting all that value out of it. So, if you can take all that value that people already know in a smartwatch and then add the technology that you need to be able to do these like really subtle inputs, I think that\u2019s just like an obvious it\u2019s like a pure win. There\u2019s really minimal downside to it. And so why it\u2019s exciting is not just because it\u2019s a good idea, but what they showed works really well. At least in, the 15 to 30 minutes that I had to test it myself. Zero calibration. Just it, swipe, tap, pinch, pinch different fingers, it\u2019s all working.<\/p>\n So, that\u2019s the thing that\u2019s exciting me going forward. I would actually So, I\u2019m in Vision Pro. Great headset for a lot of reasons. The pinching works great. The one problem with it is when your hand is out of the field of view of the camera and it can\u2019t see it, which is rare because they have the downward facing cameras, but it does happen. If Apple said, \u201cHey, we could instead of watching your hands with the cameras, we could just do the sensing with the watch and do exactly the same look and pinch for the interface, but we\u2019re going to sense it with the watch.\u201d I would say yes, please do it. I think it would make it more consistent.<\/p>\n And I think it\u2019s it\u2019s better for that particular for the basic need of pointing and clicking on a thing or making selections. I think that is the better approach. Again, obviously you want full hand tracking for different reasons, controller tracking, all that stuff. But yeah, so that is what I think is sort of the wow like ripple effect in the next couple years. I think this is going to become the way for a lot of outdoor devices. Whereas I think just like on this headset, we\u2019ll see an Android XR and probably future Quest headsets that the camera-based look to pinch with eye-tracking will probably be the way for for devices like this in the near future and then again hopefully we have some convergence eventually.<\/p>\n A Fun Story from the Early Days of XR<\/p>\n Tony:<\/strong> I hope so. So luckily we are getting towards the end of this interview and I want to ask you as let\u2019s say the final question since you have been in the space for a lot of time do you have a fun story maybe from the early days that you want to share with us?<\/p>\n Ben:<\/strong> I have a few but I will share one for now maybe maybe more another time. One that comes to mind is I think it was one of the early Connect conferences back when it was still Oculus Connect back when Palmer [Luckey] was still with the company. So I was there attending the event to cover it for press at some point. I can\u2019t remember the exact circumstances, but I think I was invited back to the house where Palmer and like some of the early like Oculus people I think they were living there at the time. It was in the Bay Area. I think they had like 10 people living in one house in the Bay Area cuz they were like, they they were pretty young at the time and they were just like, let\u2019s all crash and jam and they were having fun and hacking, stuff together and they\u2019re hardware and, software nerds together basically hanging out.<\/p>\n So, somebody invited me to come back and be like hang out after the conference for a little bit. People are from the industry are coming back and hanging out. So, I went and was chatting with Palmer there and some of his friends and people he was working with and at some point they were like I was like, \u201cWhat is that thing? What is that big metal thing right there? Why is it in your kitchen or wherever?\u201d It wasn\u2019t it wasn\u2019t like in a workshop, I don\u2019t think. It was just like on their kitchen table or something crazy. I was like, \u201cWhat is that?\u201d And Palmer\u2019s like, \u201cOh, it\u2019s a ramjet.\u201d And I was like, \u201cWhat is what is a ramjet?\u201d<\/p>\n And he explained that this was some, novel type of engine that has particular pros for I don\u2019t I can\u2019t remember the exact explanation, but it was this like it was a funny moment for me to realize that like Palmer\u2019s friends were such nerds that they were like working on this completely other technology other than like other than VR after having just been acquired by this company. They\u2019re still nerding out and working on like other crazy projects.<\/p>\n And why this is funny to me is not just that, but this interest in like ramjets, which I think they\u2019re reasoning for like launching, like basically launching miniature rockets and just figuring out how to do that better and better. It was the earliest glimpse that I have looking back that foretold where Palmer ended up where he is now, which is after getting kicked out of Facebook or Meta, he founded a military contracting company and basically started building this kind of technology as a full full-time thing.<\/p>\n So it was like that was like a little hint that he had this other interest in him that so many years later I saw translate into him getting super serious about it and saying we can build this stuff like I can build a headset I can build this stuff and obviously the company Anduril has become really successful raised a ton of money big valuation so pretty funny like so on the one hand you have a guy who had a huge as far as startups go, huge acquisition on a thing that he built and then had this middle time where he eventually got kicked out and then over here founded another company and had another not an acquisition but huge valuation.<\/p>\n And but at the same time it\u2019s like it\u2019s this guy who was like had a ramjet in his kitchen and was like, \u201cYo, come hang out and like have some beers or whatever after the conference back at like our our tech frat house essentially.\u201d So, it\u2019s just funny. It\u2019s just funny to see the the through line there after so many years. And Palmer remains a really interesting character. He always kind of has been. He hasn\u2019t not exactly been the typical typical tech guy. So it\u2019s been cool to see.<\/p>\n Closing Remarks and Promotion<\/p>\n Tony:<\/strong> Well, that\u2019s amazing. The final final question is always the same. Is there anything else you want to say? The mic is yours.<\/p>\n Ben:<\/strong> Please check out Inside XR Design. I really put my my heart into the episodes that I\u2019m making. And then again, the goal is really to share with people what I think is design that is worth knowing about. There are some hidden gems in there. There\u2019s some details from from bigger games. I really hope that I can save people time and give you the lesson without having to put on a headset and play through the full game.<\/p>\n This is just, this is stuff that this is stuff that I\u2019ve seen from playing games over the last decade in VR and finding where stuff works so well that is memorable, really memorable to me. I\u2019ve gone back to some older games that are still doing things better than, than we ever see in new content today. And for the most part, I think the reason we\u2019re not seeing that is simply because these are sort of hidden things. It\u2019s not obvious to know where to go to find these little smart designs when it comes to, VR interaction and such.<\/p>\n So, if you\u2019re interested in development design, check that out. I hope you learned something maybe that you hadn\u2019t seen before or inspired by something. And again, hopefully I would love to see people see something that inspires them, build upon it, and show everybody how to do that thing even better. It\u2019s sort of the on the shoulders of giants kind of situation and we need that to be happening more in VR I think than it is. So yeah hopefully there\u2019s some value there to be had for people. I think we\u2019re up to like almost 2 hours of content on that series and more to come.<\/p>\n Tony:<\/strong> That\u2019s amazing. So thanks man for being part of this interview. Thanks for sharing your knowledge. You know I have to say you\u2019re public you\u2019re amazing. One of the best journalists we have in our space. Thank you. And thank you also for everyone who watching or reading this interview. Have everyone a good day next. Thank you.<\/p>\n Ben:<\/strong> Thank you Tony. I appreciate it.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Despite running\u00a0Road to VR for 14 years, I\u2019ve rarely had the opportunity to talk behind-the-scenes about the publication…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":341562,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[20],"tags":[158,67,132,68,729,730],"class_list":{"0":"post-341561","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-virtual-reality","8":"tag-technology","9":"tag-united-states","10":"tag-unitedstates","11":"tag-us","12":"tag-virtual-reality","13":"tag-vr"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115459428374051268","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/341561","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=341561"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/341561\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/341562"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=341561"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=341561"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=341561"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}