The gap between real life and video games has been steadily closing for decades. However, the prospect of a fully immersive experience remains just that. A promise. Even virtual reality is slow to fulfill it.
As Polygon's Ben Kuchera put it: "VR has been five minutes away from some kind of breakthrough for about eight years."
VR is still a niche category when compared to the rest of the gaming industry (it accounted for less than half a percent of all gaming sales in 2020). Despite its buzzy status, the technology continues to make consumers wait for its next big development.
"Right now, we're sort of in this trough of disillusionment about VR," Kevin Mack, a VR game developer, told Built In a year ago. "There was a lot of hype around it in 2015 and 2016, and then the whole world sort of got butt-hurt that their first-generation VR headset didn't instantly morph into the Holodeck."
But even though VR hasn't yet lived up to the hype surrounding it, tech companies like Facebook, Valve, and Sony keep trying to advance the industry, investing considerable resources to develop both hardware and software.
Mitu Khandaker, a professor at New York University's Game Center, remains hopeful about VR's role in gaming. She doesn't think it's going to look like people alone in their homes playing through a headset, so much as a co-located experience that multiple people share.
"I think that the future of VR is more through social VR," she explained.
Indeed, several popular VR games — such as Rec Room and VRChat — offer social experiences where users can interact and hang out with each other in real time.
We might not be able to fight these real-life bosses, but who knows, maybe we'll get a chance to battle some virtually real ones pretty soon.
