Why Look At the Oculus Rift?
The Oculus Rift is the cheapest of the mainstream VR headsets at a ‘mere’ £350/$350. This is after a recent price-drop. Virtual Reality is expensive to get into as it is, so I thought this would be a good headset to discuss as it could be the entry headset for many readers. Personally speaking, it’s my third VR headset and counting.
The Oculus Rift lets you play virtual reality games with motion controllers. See completely different worlds while using controllers to imitate a gun, a sword, or quite a few other things.
What do I need?
Aside from the headset itself of course, you will need a good gaming PC. Minimum requirements will differ per game but a GTX 1050 Ti or better along with an Intel Core i3-6100 or better would be the best place to start. I have tested with lower-end equipment and still played certain less demanding games such as Space Pirate Trainer on low settings.
The basic kit will include two cameras and two controllers unless you’re buying one of the older versions. The cameras are used to track your movement, but I highly recommend buying a third camera separately and some active USB 2.0 extension cables to position them to have a good view of the room from all angles. This allows for better tracking accuracy and tracking when you turn around. It is generally considered to be as good as the Vive with the addition of the third camera.
If using the basic kit only, you can use ‘front-facing mode’ where both cameras are in front of you. This will track you well, but only if you are facing in the right direction. With the addition of a cable, you can run one of the cameras to the opposite corner of the room to get near full coverage, but it may not be as accurate. It will still be better than the PSVR which only has one camera though.
Comfort
One thing the Oculus Rift does very well is comfort. It is very light-weight compared to some other VR headsets. It is not tight around the head like the halo designed PSVR, but does not feel insecure.
The controllers are reminiscent of a traditional controller with analog sticks and buttons. The analog stick looks a bit small on the first inspection but fits the type of thumb movement well. The controllers feel familiar and comfortable in their design, likely due to the traditional design in part. I have had a number of people test them with different sized hands and they are all happy with how they feel, rating them as better than the Vive or PSVR controllers.
Visual
The Oculus Rift is currently one of the better virtual reality headsets in this price range when it comes to visuals. The resolution is relatively high at 1080 x 1200 @ 90Hz per eye and the screen door effect which occurs on all virtual reality headsets to some degree is less noticeable than some others. With that said, the colors aren’t quite as vivid as the Vive headset.
While looking at the same price range, the Samsung Odyssey has the Oculus Rift beat in this category, but in no others. The HTC Vive is at approximately the same level due to having a more noticeable screen door effect.
Audio
Unlike some virtual reality headsets, the Oculus Rift comes with built-in headphones. Unfortunately, they’re not great.
Firstly the audio quality isn’t particularly good. It sounds somewhat tinny and the bass doesn’t come through well.
Secondly, it doesn’t work half the time. There’s a common connection issue with the Oculus Rift headphones where they don’t connect properly. It includes a tool to disconnect and reconnect them which sometimes temporarily fixes it, but I’d instead recommend a good wireless set of headphones.
Audio is incredibly important in virtual reality as an immersion factor, so this was somewhat of a disappointment.
The microphone quality is average. It does well enough for playing multiplayer games online and does not have any issues with background noise, but it is not outstanding.
Issues
As is often the case with Virtual Reality, I recommend that only somewhat technical people buy the PC version at this time. There are often issues to solve. In this case, the setup for the Oculus Rift required repeatedly resets and dealing with USB driver issues. It’s also worth mentioning that all of these cameras and the headset itself use a USB port each.
After setup was complete, I did not have any other technical issues.
Verdict
The Oculus Rift has issues, it’s true. This is also true of it’s closest competitors, the Vive and the Windows Mixed Reality range of headsets.
Despite having issues, I can recommend the Oculus Rift. It’s good in some areas and not so much in others, but it’s a cheap way into ‘true VR’ – which often gets referred to as ‘roomscale’. Being able to wear the headset, be transported into another world, and have your movements accurately reflected in that world is an amazing experience.
OCULUS RIFT IS RECOMMENDED
A gamer since the days of Amstrad and DOS and someone who has dabbled in a variety of professions. He enjoys a wide variety of genres, but has been focusing on visual novels and virtual reality in recent years. Head Editor of NookGaming. Follow him and the website on @NookSite.
