PSVR 
 
 
 After years of impatiently waiting, the latest generation of virtual reality headsets are nearly here. Facebook alone has dumped over two billion dollars into the VR market, and countless developers are dedicating thousands of man-hours to make brand new titles for these shiny new platforms. This isn’t just a fun novelty anymore — it’s big business.

The stakes are huge, so everyone involved is scrambling to ensure that we don’t see a repeat of the 90s-era VR flops. Solid hardware and impressive games are vital, but those already seem to be in place for the launch window. To ensure widespread success, what these VR companies need are evangelists: People that can pound the pavement, and make sure the public is getting exposed to the highlights of modern virtual reality.

In preparation for next year’s big VR extravaganza, I grabbed a Google Cardboard viewer to experiment with. I spent a couple hours fiddling with it, pushing it to its limits, and making myself a little nauseous in the process. And while it’s fairly limited, it still delivers the immersive experience I was craving. For about 20 bucks or so, it offers a nice taste of what the full-fledged VR helmets of 2016 will bring us.

However, it’s worth noting that my own experience was somewhat tainted by foreknowledge. I’ve been keeping a close watch on the VR industry since Oculus came on the scene back in 2012, so I was well aware of the strengths and weaknesses before I touched it. To get an accurate idea of what the experience is like for VR virgins, I had my family use it over the Christmas break.

Across the board, it was a major hit. Simply running Google Street View in VR wowed them, and showing off a photo sphere of my kitchen made their jaws drop. After they went through a handful of demos, they were sold — all of them were VR converts. This lines up perfectly with everything I’ve heard before: Seeing is believing for virtual reality. The moment people experience modern VR in person, their interest spikes.
No amount of traditional advertising is going to make VR a financial success. Sony, Valve/HTC, and Facebook need to invest in demo stations in every big box store. Trailers filled with VR headsets need to be parked at every state fair in the country. Go out into the community, let the public try out the hardware, and you’ll have a hit on your hands.

With that said, the PC-focused headsets probably won’t get that kind of attention just yet — they’re going to be out of the reach of most people. Since you’re going to need to drop somewhere around $1,500 to get up and running from scratch, those helmets are only going to sell to serious gaming enthusiasts for the time being — not average consumers. But if Sony can sell a PlayStation VR to just one fifth of the current PS4 install base at roughly $350 a pop, that’s over $2 billion in gross revenue. That’d certainly make quite a splash, and encourage even more companies to enter the fray.