HTC Vive reveals price, pre-order date and bundled games
Vive-ting stuff
Valve and HTC confirmed yesterday that their room-scale Vive virtual reality system would cost $799 (£689) when it launches in early April. They also announced they'll be taking orders for the product from 7 a.m pacific time on February 29th.
That's just a few days from now, so you can bet that most of team Pocket Gamer and VR fans around the world are padding eagerly around their living room with a tape measure, moving furniture and making thoughtful noises.
The Vive is $200 pricier than it's direct competitor the Oculus Rift, who got some negative attention for the $599 price tag on their rift, which was double the price of their early developer kits.
The price was the final piece of the puzzle on the HTC Vive, which has solidly impress most of team PG at a series of events around the world for the last year or so.
Why the higher price? HTC and Valve have called the package a "complete system," and the bundle includes the headset, two motion-detecting base stations, earbuds, wireless controllers and the box to connect to your PC.
The wireless controllers are what make the HTC Vive so exciting, with the controllers functioning as virtual hands and giving you a sense of presence in a 3d room.
The Vive will be bundled with two free games: Job Simulator: The 2050 Archives by Owlchemy Labs and Fantastic Contraption by Northway Games and Radial Games.The company will unveil more games coming to the platform at GDC next month.
Side note - Me and editor Mark Brown both guessed $700 for the Vive but we no one aimed for $800. Immense price. I'd say there were no winners on the team for this one.
