When I talk about Virtual Reality technology here on HorrorBuzz, I am usually pushing some of the new video technologies we have been adopting to bring you the most immersive experiences possible.  Horror is great on the screen, but when it is so close, and so seemingly lifelike that it feels like it could invade your space…well many of us believe that is the real direction horror will be moving.

I have been playing with VR since my college days, which I must admit is a really long time to wait for this technology to come home, but to create worlds that convincingly surround you, and have the potential to truly terrify you, it takes a buttload (yes that is the accurate technical description) of processing power, both on your computer motherboard and your graphics card to really create the illusion.  

So while VR has been pushed by Sony for the PlayStation 4, Facebook with it’s Oculus Rift, and HTC with it’s Vive…it’s still be largely beyond the reach of most people to bring it home. 

Until a couple of weeks ago when Oculus put itself on sale for 6 short weeks, dropping the price of entry including the headset, xbox controller, remote controller, and most importantly the virtual hand touch controllers to a competition destroying $399 US.  (Down from $598)

https://www.oculus.com/

It’s a huge world to jump into so let me help a little….

Lets start with the experiences which right now include a vast array of games and simulations that are totally unlike anything you can do on a game console or personal computer alone. (And please keep in mind…no matter what you see in the following trailers…it’s absolutely nothing like how it feels to be put in the middle of these experiences)

For instance have you ever wanted to really test yourself in a zombie apocalypse in the vast Arizona desert where you had to find food, or weapons to combat ever increasing numbers of the undead?  There’s an app for that:

Or perhaps you might wonder what it would be like to wake up in a deserted and increasingly haunted hospital with your heart replaced by some sort of horrific artificial device.  Yep Oculus can accommodate: (and Yep that’s Peter Weller’s voice too)

Or maybe you have wondered what the Robot Holocaust would really be like.  Skynet has nothing on these little beauties:

Or perhaps you have even wondered what it would be like to fall off a cliff while free climbing?

(yodalahehoooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo)

or encounter strange new life and new civilizations:

Yeah you can helm the Enterprise bitches!

And many many more….much of it due to a huge investment in game development by the Oculus and Steam platform teams.

It’s impossible to describe exactly what it’s like but I can tell you first hand, the experience can be trans-formative.

So what do you need to bring it all home?

A pretty beefy laptop or windows PC.  (You can download a small program from the Oculus website to determine if your PC is ready or needs some upgrades.)   Your Oculus (which you should have ordered from the link above already) And perhaps most importantly a large enough empty space to move around in (even if you are doing most of your VR from a desk chair)

Believe me…now is the time to jump in, and you will be amazed.