cancel
Showing results for 
Search instead for 
Did you mean: 

"Consumer interest in VR is declining according to sales data trends"!?

RuneSR2
Grand Champion
https://media.thinknum.com/articles/sales-data-shows-that-consumer-interest-in-vr-is-waning/

Maybe the suggested trends are true, but I have several problems with that article. 

1. The first graph doesn't show PS4 VR sales strictly - it shows Skyrim Bundle Sales Rank. I don't like Skyrim - I'd never go for that bundle too. 

2. Next is HTC Vive - which seems to go up in May and slightly down in June - but it starts at about 90 in March and finishes at about 97 in June. Not much variation - and we all know that the summer vacation means low VR sales. So I don't see any specific trend here at all - actually VIVE seems to be doing fine or at least seems stable. 

3. Then comes Samsung Gear VR. Note that this chart must be only showing data from 2016 - it ends in "Nov" and the text only mentions the year 2016. So this chart does not belong with the other results, it seems like a far-fetched attempt be the author to support some trend that the author believes exists. 

4. Finally there's Oculus Go -  which are the results that worry me the most. Still new things often ride on an initial wave of curiosity, and will then slowly sink to a more stable level, maybe that's what we're seeing here. 

Also note the chart that has been omitted by the author - the Rift chart! Is the author hiding something that doesn't support the proposed trend?

So I just checked the latest Steam VR hardware survey results - today they are - July 11 2018:

iev0j5pzwegl.jpg

And:

i6a7mmjcla5z.jpg

And here they are April 30 2018 (I mailed the results to some friends back then, so therefore I have these results):

VR Headsets 
Oculus Rift 0.20%
HTC Vive 0.18%
Windows Mixed Reality 0.01%
Oculus Rift DK2 0.01%
Oculus Rift DK1 0.00%
Unknown 0.00%

Thus Rift has gone from 0.20% to 0.32% - that's a massive 60% increase in just 2 months! 
HTC Vive went up from 0.18 to 0.31 - a massive 72% increase in just 2 months!
Windows MR also increased 5 times from 0.01 to 0.05 - that's not bad either, right?

I do believe that Oculus Go and Gear VR may be poisoning the well - but I really don't see any decline in real VR adoption - if current Steam trends are continuing, Rift and Vive may reach 1% in 9 to 12 months, which would make these headsets about as popular as the GeForce GTX 1080 Ti  😉 

Oculus Rift CV1, Valve Index & PSVR2, Asus Strix OC RTX™ 3090, i9-10900K (5.3Ghz), 32GB 3200MHz, 16TB SSD
"Ask not what VR can do for you, but what you can do for VR"

132 REPLIES 132

LZoltowski
Champion
Have a read of this:
https://www.roadtovr.com/valve-monthly-active-vr-users-on-steam-are-up-160-year-over-year/
Core i7-7700k @ 4.9 Ghz | 32 GB DDR4 Corsair Vengeance @ 3000Mhz | 2x 1TB Samsung Evo | 2x 4GB WD Black
ASUS MAXIMUS IX HERO | MSI AERO GTX 1080 OC @ 2000Mhz | Corsair Carbide Series 400C White (RGB FTW!) 

Be kind to one another 🙂

WreckLuse68
Heroic Explorer
To be honest the whole VR scene hasn't turned out to be the groundbreaking home entertainment revolution I was hoping for.
A couple of weeks ago I was considering buying a new CV1 to replace my slightly tattered second-hand one that I bought, but I simply couldn't justify that sort of money outlay at the moment for something I pretty much only use for the occasional drive in PCars 2 or Assetto Corsa now that the novelty has worn off...and I am even considering setting my triple monitors up again for those as I just sweat too much when I drive with the headset on. I am thinking that the money would be more wisely used going towards a nice monitor.
I know I am old and slow witted but the whole VR thing (as far as I can see) seems to have gone a little stagnant...the Oculus Store being a prime example...I haven't bought anything from there for months as I pretty much bought anything of interest to me within the first 2 or 3 weeks of owning a Rift and nothing I would consider spending much (or any) money on has appeared since.
Anyways...just my 2 pennies worth

When Einstein was asked how it felt to be the smartest man on Earth, he replied, “I wouldn’t know. Ask Nikola Tesla”.

Anonymous
Not applicable
The funniest thing about this article and other similar articles discussing the same sort of thing is that apart from the GearVR and PSVR sales WE HAVE NO OFFICIAL SALES DATA AT ALL. These are just guesstimations.

The VR industry is doing fine, nobody with any sense was expecting VR to go anywhere near mainstream this early and sell truckloads. Oculus themselves made a statement ages ago saying it could take 5-10 years for this to happen.

kzintzi
Trustee

snowdog said:



The VR industry is doing fine, nobody with any sense was expecting VR to go anywhere near mainstream this early and sell truckloads. Oculus themselves made a statement ages ago saying it could take 5-10 years for this to happen.


Agree with this 100%. One can only assume that people need to make money and if you're going to write about VR, saying it's tanking is a way to generate clicks..

I love my headset (albeit slightly broken), and still spend 3hrs+ a week in it.. it'd be more but life gets in the way; when I'm on holidays or do have a day free with nothing but free time in it (rare though it is) I spend at least 5 hours in there.

and now that I have an SSD's as my boot drive and Oculus game drive it hammers along (no more 40+ sec load times for Skyrim :smile: )

Though you are more than slightly incoherent, I agree with you Madam,
a plum is a terrible thing to do to a nostril.

Anonymous
Not applicable
To be honest the whole VR scene hasn't turned out to be the groundbreaking home entertainment revolution I was hoping for.
When you said :

I pretty much only use for the occasional drive

You pointed out the problem yourself: you use VR for only one feature (simulation). Of course it will become redundant. You should try out other stuff. Because as far as technology goes, VR does change everything.
Have you tried Beat Saber? Once you played this, you can't play any normal rythm game anymore.
Have you tried any FPS game? Once you do, you'll laugh at this "gamepad vs mouse&keyboard war" , because none of those controls are as effective as VR controls (bigger FOV, easier camera control, more natural use of the weapons).
Have you tried social apps (VRChat, Rec Room, ...)? Communication in VR is much more consistent than communication in normal games (since you can use not only the mic and emotes, but also your hands to interact). Being able to raise our hands in a FPS game to say we surrender, there's no such thing in normal games.

Also... replacing a VR headset with monitors? Seriously? Right, 'cause nothing is more immersive than flat, limited screens. Three monitors have the exact same problems as one monitor : limited sight, no perspective, no immersion whatsoever, and that screen light that always reminds you that you're facing a screen.
That said, sweating is definitely a problem with VR headsets ^^. But sweating while playing a sim game, sitting down? Maybe you should consider using a fan xD.


Anyway. About the sales of the headsets, I would like to point out something important : many people buy several headsets. I don't know any VR Youtuber who doesn't own at least two of those.
The sales are definitely alright, but the number of VR owners is definitely much lower.
That said I do think VR is doing well, given it's been here for two years only.

Zenbane
MVP
MVP

I saw this topic earlier as well. I chalk it up as typical "bad journalism" which has become so commonplace. For example,

In February:
Teens are fleeing Facebook in record numbers
As of the first quarter of 2018, Facebook had 2.19 billion monthly active users.

This is the age of, "well if I said it, then it must be true."

RuneSR2
Grand Champion


To be honest the whole VR scene hasn't turned out to be the groundbreaking home entertainment revolution I was hoping for.


I get that a lot from persons who have not seen the Seeking Dawn trailer  😉

https://youtu.be/3XOryqcdqlA

Lone Echo, Moss, The Vanishing of Ethan Carter VR, Robinson - The Journey, Elite Dangerous are just a few examples of VR games that have moved me far beyond anything else - ok, maybe apart from when I met my wife or got the first-born son...    

Doom, Tomb Raider 3dfx (1996 on Voodoo Graphics), maybe Outcast in 1999 and then Lone Echo in 2017 would be the games that impressed me the most when they launched - and absolutely nothing beats Lone Echo for now (ok, did play using super-sampling (SS) 2.0 on a oc'ed GTX 1080, not sure I'd appreciate many VR games if I had to use lower levels of SS). I'd consider VR one of mankind's most impressive inventions. VR even took me to the moon on Apollo 11 and I've been spacewalking outside the ISS!  B)  

BTW, Seeking Dawn should be released today (July 12, at least on Steam - full Rift support - should be released in Oculus Store too, possible also today, but no date has been announced in the Oculus Store). I've already informed the family that Dad - unfortunately - will need to take parts of his summer vacation off-planet  o:)

Oculus Rift CV1, Valve Index & PSVR2, Asus Strix OC RTX™ 3090, i9-10900K (5.3Ghz), 32GB 3200MHz, 16TB SSD
"Ask not what VR can do for you, but what you can do for VR"

bigmike20vt
Visionary
I would say - like others here  have said also - time of the year is part of it.
it is hot here in Blighty right now, really hot, and the last thing i feel like doing is strapping a vr mask to my noggin.

of course you could argue its always hot somewhere in the world, however i would hazard a guess that between europe and the US we cover a large number of vr sales and it is a general trend that in summer people tend to spend less on technology and more on other things like actually going outside and family time etc.

Combine that with i the fact that we are so close to the end of a gpu generation, i wonder how many people without vr ready gpus are waiting for the next gen to come out before jumping in on a big upgrade and maybe at the same time checking out VR.
Personally i think there is some really good stuff on the horizon software wise for VR.  the new pimax hmd should be out by the end of the year, as should Santa Cruz and hopefully some more news on CV2.

maybe knuckles will finally come out and HTC may smell the coffee and release an affordable Vive Pro bundle including knuckles????  (I know some have been championing knuckles for 18 months or more but they will surely come out eventually???)

all of the stuff above i think will mean any perceived dip in VR right now will be fixed in Q3/Q4.

I know i personally am as happy with VR right now as I have ever been. the price of the rift package as it is now is crazy good value imo.
Fiat Coupe, gone. 350Z gone. Dirty nappies, no sleep & practical transport incoming. Thank goodness for VR 🙂

WreckLuse68
Heroic Explorer


To be honest the whole VR scene hasn't turned out to be the groundbreaking home entertainment revolution I was hoping for.
When you said :

I pretty much only use for the occasional drive

You pointed out the problem yourself: you use VR for only one feature (simulation). Of course it will become redundant. You should try out other stuff. Because as far as technology goes, VR does change everything.
Have you tried Beat Saber? Once you played this, you can't play any normal rythm game anymore.
Have you tried any FPS game? Once you do, you'll laugh at this "gamepad vs mouse&keyboard war" , because none of those controls are as effective as VR controls (bigger FOV, easier camera control, more natural use of the weapons).
Have you tried social apps (VRChat, Rec Room, ...)? Communication in VR is much more consistent than communication in normal games (since you can use not only the mic and emotes, but also your hands to interact). Being able to raise our hands in a FPS game to say we surrender, there's no such thing in normal games.

Also... replacing a VR headset with monitors? Seriously? Right, 'cause nothing is more immersive than flat, limited screens. Three monitors have the exact same problems as one monitor : limited sight, no perspective, no immersion whatsoever, and that screen light that always reminds you that you're facing a screen.
That said, sweating is definitely a problem with VR headsets ^^. But sweating while playing a sim game, sitting down? Maybe you should consider using a fan xD.


Anyway. About the sales of the headsets, I would like to point out something important : many people buy several headsets. I don't know any VR Youtuber who doesn't own at least two of those.
The sales are definitely alright, but the number of VR owners is definitely much lower.
That said I do think VR is doing well, given it's been here for two years only.


Your assumptions...like your logic...are completely way out...try reading what I wrote again.
When Einstein was asked how it felt to be the smartest man on Earth, he replied, “I wouldn’t know. Ask Nikola Tesla”.