Chase Reed
Tech 393 Technology in world civilization
May 2, 2019
Project Two
Virtual reality, or VR for short, has become extremely popular in the past few years, though some may not know what that phrase even means. Virtual reality is essentially a computer generated “reality” that a person can experience through a special head mounted viewing device and other parts to interact with the alternate reality. This technology can simulate crazy climates and storms, transport to alternate dimensions, back in time, and even different planets. What we know as virtual reality can include video game and other simulations. However, when I was just a sprout what I knew as virtual reality was the Viewmaster toy, those little red plastic devices you held up to your face (in good lighting of course) like binoculars, and shuffled through a circular disc containing a dozen images that made it seem that you were in a different world.
In about the past 20 years, virtual reality was a farfetched pipe dream of many electrical and computer engineers. In the 90’s, the game consul company Sega came up with several rudimentary VR gaming systems. They included bulky body mounts and headsets, along a bulky price of about $73,000. They were a start however. Afterward a couple decades and in the 21st century brought us huge VR technological and cost-effective improvements. In 2010 a man named Palmer Luckey developed a compact VR device for gamming called Oculus rift. It has a few distortion issues and was further improved and released to the market in 2012. This is the first affordable and assessable VR device in the past decade. Two years later Sony released its own headset to pair with its popular gaming console the PlayStation 4. And today, you can simply buy a headset that mounts y...
