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Josh Miller/CNET
Samsung could be the first company to go all “Lawnmower Man” on us with reports of a virtual reality headset that could pip Project Morpheus and Oculus Rift to our eyeballs.
The rumoured virtual reality headset, which would strap on your head with screens in front of your eyes that make it feel like you’ve stepped into a game, is reported to work with Samsung’s Galaxy phones and tablets like the S5 and Note 3 .
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According to Engadget, the VR headset could be with us this year, and could even beat Sony’s Project Morpheus headset and the Oculus Rift VR rig into shops.
However, Samsung declined to comment.
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By pairing with Galaxy devices the rumoured headset could make for immersive Android gaming. That doesn’t make a huge amount of sense to me, however: the processor and graphics limits of mobile devices mean mobile games tend to be reduced in scope, and nobody wants virtual reality that looks blocky and unrealistic. We had that in the 1990s and nobody bought it then.
By contrast, Oculus Rift works with PCs — although there will be an Android version — and therefore has the graphical and processing power that entails, while Project Morpheus works with the PlayStation. Both systems therefore have a lot more grunt at their disposal to make the VR experience more realistic.
Oculus was recently snapped up by Facebook for $2 billion, suggesting that big companies see virtual reality as an actual thing that could make some money.
