I believe there are some things that need to continue to happen in the Virtual Reality community for this technology to prosper.
Quality content is important for immersion and to impress the consumers. This has shown to be tough as returning developers have simply porting many games to find out that it is not the right feeling while playing the ported game. In the past, there needed to be adjustments to acceleration, jumping and perspective while playing the game to improve the VR experience. MineCraft is said to be a great game for VR and the developers have taken many steps to smooth out the edges for VR users. The game can be played on the Samsung Gear VR and has been adapted for Virtual Reality. They did not port the game, rather added in the code to make it work like their pocket edition. A minor change to the jumping was implemented to reduce the potential for motion sickness.
Virtual Reality also needs early adopters to actively criticize the technology to better develop the hardware and software. Think back to the first Mac or first smartphone – the current versions have improved greatly compared to years ago.
Creativity needs to be shared, not hidden. In past iterations of the past VR pushes, there have been pieces of hardware that were completed then marketed, not tested. Times are different now, and companies are doing a large amount of testing, with Oculus releasing two developer's kits before the consumer edition.
Low cost and convenient technology are other important aspects for this technology to continue to grow. The Gear VR & PlayStation VR are great, convenient, low-cost headsets available, or releasing this year. Many people will pay for high-end smartphones and game systems, so why not expose them to this cutting edge technology? Another example is Google Cardboard. The fidelity is not to par with Oculus or HTC Vive, but this is meant for quick VR interaction and less so the immersion hour long experience. Google Cardboard development has been hot with several apps now available and millions of cardboard headsets are in the hands of smartphone owners.
Finally, the Hype train needs to be reduced, but only in the monetary aspect. This technology will make large amounts of money, but I think this is not the year for the largest growth. It needs to reach more people, companies need to prepare the supply/manufacturing for large numbers in future years and companies/investors will need to continue getting behind VR to develop quality content and means of application.
