Microsoft Quietly Developing Low-Cost VR Headset

We know about Microsoft's upcoming augmented reality HoloLens glasses, but now we also know about Microsoft's upcoming VR kit, with a decidedly low cost Google Cardboard-ish vibe:

Spotted on a website to promote a hackathon in Russia, Microsoft is trying to attract developers to an upcoming hackathon that will use the company’s VR-Kits. As you can see in the image at the top of this post, the kit works by inserting your Lumia into a cardboard box and then holding it to your face. The event is being held on October 17th and Microsoft is promoting the event by saying that ideas that are “successful”, according to the translation, the team will be given a VR-Kit so they can keep building their application.

So that also means 3 of the 5 top tech supergiants are confirmed to have a VR product: Google, Microsoft, and Facebook. I'm not surprised Apple has avoided the VR game altogether, but somewhat curious Amazon hasn't jumped in with a VR-powered shopping tool.

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Comments

[Henry Kam]

Microsoft's exiting products is always awesome so we hope so that VR headset will be good quality headset.

[Eddi Haskell]

I would not be surprised if all these mentioned companies were not considering purchasing High Fidelity or Linden Lab right now -- for relatively budget prices (under 2 billion) before the market starts to explode. In fact, I put the probability of a purchase of one or the other by a major player at 40% by the end of 2016. Do not discount Sony's move in this area.

[Flashing Merlin]

I doubt the market for SL will "explode" with the rise of VR headsets. Sure, people might join to see a VR world, but as soon as they realize the user interface requires a lot more than spotting a target and pulling a trigger, most will give up on SL.