So far my only experience with VR has been two minutes of holding a Samsung Gear up to my face at Best Buy. I was in a movie theater in which no movie was playing, but it nearly sold me.

So far, Im more interested in things like that than the games. What are the 2D capabilities of these headsets like? Are they good a enough to buy an Oculus? I mean a decent monitor would be around the same price. I think I might like blocking out all outside light and noise and watching a movie or Netflix or maybe playing a 2D game like Stardew Valley. Is anyone else interested in this? Have you tried it?

Edit: Also, are things like playing movie files and 2D games even possible? I don't need the rendered movie theater, just a screen in front of me.

2D stuff can be fairly easily converted to appear 3D, but it will not immerse you at all like VR does. It would be like having a regular 3D screen right in front of your face. If you try to look around, the screen will just follow your head. You'd probably get better results with a 3D monitor.

@sinusoidal: Ugh, so between the lack of games and lack of other useful functionality, it's not looking too great for my purposes. It's a shame because I'm pretty good at wasting money.

I imagine 2D will be fine but it wouldn't rendered as if it were 3d.That's all you wanted to know right? There is an app on the steam and PS VR headsets that'll let you play a game as of it were on a massive screen however oculist currently only allows it on video.

The above response seems to think you're asking if you can view 2d source as 3d

@yesiamaduck: Oh, I see. No, I don't mean play COD in full 3D. I really just mean additional features and functionality that is not native 3D gameplay such as Elite. So videos, straight up 2D gaming, also 3D videos and what not. I just really don't think I wanna play that many full VR games.

@doenut Don't listen to these fools, this thing totally does what you need and so much more. I don't know about the GearVR, it definitely does some cool movie stuff but not to the extent i enjoy it. if i can, I watch all of my movies in my Oculus DK2. There's a plethora of "Movie theater" apps, but I also enjoy Virtual Desktop, which can throw your desktop on screen in a virtual theater. So I can watch youtube videos, netflix, giant bomb content, anything. not just in a theater, but as you saw on the livestream yesterday, On the Moon, in a lush miniature forest, or just floating in a nebula, with the virtual 'screen' 30 feet tall and wrapping around me like minority report. It's actually what I get most of the daily use out of, rather than any given VR game. So yeah, "2D" content is definitely awesome, even a system seller, as you described.

Edit: also, you CAN view many 2D sources as 3D: if there's a stereoscopic, equirectangular, analglyph, or really *any* source of 3D video, many programs can convert it into a 3D image like you'd see in the theater. Only way better than any given plastic glasses! a lot of people talked about enjoying the ability to "look into" the frame when watching Avatar or other 3D movies damn near a decade ago. All of that content is massively improved by the oculus, as the 3D effect is far more pronounced and crisp. It really feels as if you're staring into a window in the wall of the theater, in which a bunch of shit is going down.

Second edit: as for playing traditionally 2D games, it's ALSO rad, as again, you can be playing StarDew Valley on a giant 300 foot curved screen floating in motherfucking SPACE, *while* your favorite podcast or youtube stream or giant bomb content or what have you is ALSO playing on a seperate screen to the right of you. Virtual desktop is awesome!'

THIRD edit: ALSO also, with a program like VORPX or Vireiro, you can totally 'convert' 2D to 3D by utilizing a directX hook. It *injects* Vr support into games like skyrim, gta iv and v, metro 2033, mass effect, fucking *anything*. It works with some games better than others, Mirrors edge looks and feels great until you get sick from all the running, and head tracking "replaces" the right stick in these cases and that can be a bit disorienting. But, Vorpx comes with a setting that allows you to be sitting in a virtual 'lounge' watching the game play out in 3D on a massive 2D screen in front of you. So you could conceivably inject 3D into any given game. I've even seen someone playing Bastion in VR using vorpx.

That all sounds super awesome! Even if there were 0 vr games out Id still want it for stuff like that.

@lestephan: Totally! and, as my third gosh darn edit described, there's actually *every* game out for VR if you try hard enough. That's not even counting all the games that came out with 'hidden' vr support like Alien Isolation or Dying Light, OR the games with full on VR support (until yesterday, when the CV1 broke everything) like Trackmania, Elite Dangerous, DCS, Asetto Corsa and Project Cars, Kerbal Space Program, fucking so many -real- games work in VR that it was painful to watch the livestream yesterday where they were showing off countless phone ports (from the gearVR) just because that was all Oculus home had to show off.

@carpe_dmt: Thanks for all the info! I've only seen the first few hours of the stream. Definitely hyped to see more. Specifically the non gaming portion. Sounds like I'll have to take a look at the Vive too.

Oculus is definitely the coolest name though. Morpheus was pretty good too now just PSVR...

I'm really interested in this too, the "In a movie theater" VR experience could be really neat, although i wonder how sharp the virtual screen will look

Honestly I'm super interested in "cinema" mode like what they're doing with PSVR. For playing 2D games on a virtual TV.

Yesterday I watched Hardcore Henry on the Vive in the BigScreen app in "Grand Theater" mode. The screen door effect is visible even for me (-11,5 on both eyes + astigmatism) and the resolution mismatch blurrines is there, BUT overall it's a great experience. Awesome arm-chair, cold coke in my reach, and invisible jack russell terrier on my lap - what more can a guy need?

Although, I imagine it could get uncomfortably warm in GearVR or the Google's thingamajig.

I use my GearVR mostly for Netflix at this point. The biggest problem I have with this setup is that most movies & TV shows aren't worth my total undivided attention.

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