Will Virtual Reality Take Over the Tech World Soon?

Don’t we all have some very high hopes from virtual reality on account of it being awesome? Any individual who has been behind those coveted VR headsets can vouch for the fact that virtual reality is here to stay and stay for long. Hands down, it has a booming future in the tech industry as the whole world will slowly but surely be captivated with this technology.

Ergo, it might have taken over the tech world already. The chills that run down your spine post a VR session – that feeling is something which can be simulated; it is an unparalleled experience much like riding a massive roller coaster.

Change the Industry As We Know It

Virtual reality has the potential to completely transform the entertainment industry as we know it. However, its applications are not just limited to entertainment purposes. Right from medical applications to corporate video conferencing or usage in the defence industry – it has a wide variety of applications. This is what has allowed the technology to escalate to the general folk at godspeed. Up until a few years ago, who would’ve known what a VR headset exactly means? And look at what has happened now!

Given the fact that its rise is only going to exponentially increase, multiple industry experts have thrown out positive predictions. The International Data Corporation (IDC) estimates that the international virtual and augmented reality market will growm from $14 billion in the current year to no less than $143 billion in the year 2020. Imagine the change if at all it happens! That’s no less than a tenfold increase for an industry which is already sitting at a very generous number.

What was the trigger behind this technology? Because there’s always a trigger. There’s always that instant where you can sit back and point out – this is what completely changed the ballgame. The answer – POKEMON!

Pokemon – Proof of Concept

Now we’re not talking about the age old cartoon series which bedazzled the world youth over. We’re talking about the launch of Pokemon Go; the app-game back in the year 2016. This augmented reality game was a classic blend of real-time locations with fun digital characters and tasks. The players had to utilize their own smart phones to navigate courses, real-time locations in order to catch as many Pokemons as they could. You heard it right! The game in itself was free; however, Nintendo played it smart by releasing a paid version of PokeBalls which allowed you catch more number of Pokemons quickly.

By every possible metric in the world, this Pokemon Go was a game changer. This was when everyone took notice, of the magic that is virtual reality. It quickly became the most downloaded game to have ever existed as per the opening weekend numbers as registered on the Apple’s AppStore. We’re talking about 50 million downloads for Android in the initial 3 weeks.

Till date, the game has been downloaded nearly 750 million times, which is 10% of the entire population of the earth. Imagine the frenzy!

Even though VR is currently attached with only the gaming and entertainment domains; Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg believes there’s more to it than what meets the eye. He once said that virtual reality is a highly likely candidate to act as the next big computing platform.