By now, you must have heard virtual reality is all the rage. Between HTC’s Vive, Samsung Gear VR and Oculus Rift, the future is finally upon us (maybe) and soon we’ll all have headsets strapped inches away from our foreheads with bright lights that will take us off to faraway worlds…

Again, we’ll see about that, but the first of the consoles to launch to market is Oculus Rift (now owned by Mark Zuckerberg himself) due to be released on March 28th, 2016.

Oculus Rift has been steadily taking preorders since January 6th, 2016 and it’s first packages ever will be delivered by mid March. If you’re just finding out about this now, you can go ahead and preorder it HERE and expect to get it around March 28th or shortly thereafter.

But, if you’re like me and are wondering why people are stoked to have screens handlessly strapped to their heads, one inch away from their eye sockets, then you’ll probably watch how the first few rounds turns out…It’s not that I’m being a narcissist, I’m just weary of first generation product testing. (Remember the iPhone 1?) 

Don’t get me wrong, I think virtual reality is a fantastic idea, but I’ve turned to the realist side and realized this is only the first step of many, before my expectations will actually be met. And trust me, that day will come sooner than we all think.

The caveat of working at an interactive digital agency is we tend to stay on top of new tech and keep our heads out of the clouds. It doesn’t mean we don’t dream big, cause we most certainly do, but Oculus will have a long road ahead of it, especially considering what I’ve seen from the demos (not to mention it’s starting price point of $599).

The silver lining of the Oculus launch is that it’s launching with quite a number of games and interested third parties looking to create experiences in the future. As of now, I think most people are still trying to best figure out how to use it. We’ve all started to hear the buzzwords of #AugmentedReality and #VirtualReality but has there REALLY been an ‘out of this universe’ experience with it yet? The answer is quite simply, no.

Considering the wide array of possibilities and hype videos (See here for examples) the Oculus has coming out with it’s launch, I’ve just got the hunch that there is MUCH to be done. No doubt the hackers and developers will tweak it to maximize the potential of it, but I still get the feeling it will be a bit jumpy, laggy and could even be nauseating at first. But they said that about every video game console didn’t they?

Will the graphics live up to, or past your Xbox One and PS4 game console? It’s tough to say. With that being said, here are some of the accessories that Oculus Rift is launching with:

It will come with the Rift headset, an Xbox One controller, a motion-tracking sensor, and a previously unannounced Oculus Remote, which is used to more intuitively navigate VR spaces. (You’ll also get all the cables.) Those who pre-order the Rift will also receive CCP’s EVE: Valkyrie, a game centered around dogfights in deep space, and Lucky’s Tale, a platformer in VR.

I’m a little more excited about playing Valkryie than Lucky’s Tale, but we’ll see a slew of other games coming out after Oculus’ launch here in late March.

And in terms of experiential advertising? Well, time will tell. We’ve been lucky to include some VR ideas into several pitches but are definitely looking to develop a bigger interaction. If you’re an interested client in the digital and interactive serves that Inphantry offers, please drop our new biz guy a line at: Cam@inphantry.com or find him on Twitter @CamKing747 

Follow Inphantry on Twitter as well @Inphantry or email us at: Base@inphantry.com

Till next time!