Nintendo Won't Enter VR Market Until It Thinks It is Mainstream - News
by William D'Angelo , posted on 16 June 2016 / 8,953 Views
Nintendo won't enter the virtual reality market until the technology becomes mainstream, according to Nintendo of America president Reggie-Fils-Aime.
This is in contrast with rivals Sony and Microsoft. Sony is releasing its own VR headset, PlayStation VR, later this year, while Microsoft announced earlier this week the Xbox Scorpio will support VR.
"We’ve been looking at the VR space since the days of the Virtual Boy," Fils-Aime told Bloomberg and reported by VG24/7. "With us, we want to make sure our next content is going to be mainstream, mass-market approachable, and when something like VR is at that point, you can expect Nintendo to be there."
"There was a lot of gyroscopic technology out there in the marketplace, but it took the Wii and the Wii Remote to really make it mainstream," he added. "Even going all the way back to the Nintendo DS, that was the first electronic device that really made extensive use of a touchscreen."
Nintendo entered the VR market in 1995 with the Virtual Boy. The device was limited to just two colors, red and black. It ended up as a commercial failure.
A life-long and avid gamer, William D'Angelo was first introduced to VGChartz in 2007. After years of supporting the site, he was brought on in 2010 as a junior analyst, working his way up to lead analyst in 2012. He has expanded his involvement in the gaming community by producing content on his own YouTube channel and Twitch channel dedicated to gaming Let's Plays and tutorials. You can contact the author at wdangelo@vgchartz.com or on Twitter @TrunksWD.
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Nice ! Smart choice by them, it's better to focus on ther features that the Wii U lacked instead of VR...
This are both good and bad news. Its means they are focused on making the NX a gaming console first instead of focusing on peripherals. But if also means that their new console may not be powerful enough to support VR, meaning that it will be outdated as soon as it hits the market.
I don't mind: give me software, not hardware.
You think Nintendo fans are VR Ready? Or there is a demand in the Nintendo market?
I think, financially, they can't really spread their efforts across a lot of ideas atm. Thus, this makes sense. On that note, I feel nostalgic for the days where Nintendo just did what it wanted and didn't worry about that kind of thing.
Today, I think Nintendo has a lot more money than they did 20 years ago. The problem is they're also spending a lot more than they did 20 years ago. Also, they were in a better position back then that allowed them to invest in Virtual Boy without any repercussions from failure. The Game Boy market was still growing and they were getting ready to released the much anticipated N64. Virtual Boy was like that third pillar the DS would become a decade later. If it succeeded, it would be better for them and if not, they could bury it and just focus on the other systems, which is exactly what ended up happening.
I'm hoping NX power hovers around PS4 and XB1. I'm not too crazy about graphics, give me good gameplay with a good art style and I'll be happy.
Good.
If NX is what most are saying, then a VR device can come 2/3 years without effort.
While there's times where I think nintendo games are just perfect for VR, I like the approach. Once the technology becomes cheaper Nintendo would be perfect to enter the market, and if there IS no real market, then they didn't lose money on it.
I'd like to think that those who are going to try to capitalize on this early are going to have the most success in the long run. So by then, it might be a little late for Nintendo. Still, it's a young, new thing and anything could happen.
Lel, I still remember that time when they said that they didnt focus on Online gaming because "people didnt want that" Xp... So maybe we have to wait 2 more generations to see the Big N enter the VR war (if it still produces hardware by then)...
