Interview: "Bandit" (Sega VR helmet engineer)

[Melf]

Our latest interview (http://www.sega-16.com/2006/07/interview-bandit-sega-vr-helmet-engineer/) is with a former Sega VR helmet engineer (who has chosen to remain anonymous). In it, he details some interesting aspects of just why the fabled technology never made it to market, and he shows just how close they actually were to a viable product. It's a ray of light on this otherwise dark patch in the history of the Genesis, so check it out!

[Benjamin]

I don't understand why the headset would cause eye damage that could not have been adopted from those crummy VR arcade games. The only thing I could think of is that perhaps it is because the home consumer would play the games a lot longer than the few minutes those arcade sets averaged?

I wanted that thing so bad. I'll never forgive EGM for making the device sound like such a sure thing, pasting a picture of Mansion of Hidden Souls and making people think this was the future for Sega. I guess it was at some point. :(

[David J.]

I guess the price has scared more people away?

[RaveFury]

I don't think I can blame Sega for worrying about eye damage if what Bandit says is true.

It's actually kind of creepy to me, becasue I know I'd be one of those kids to destroy his eyes with that thing. I cringed pretty hard when I read it.

[j_factor]

Very interesting piece of history, but I'm glad it never came out.

[djtwok]

There are some vr headsets for pc at about 200€ available @ the www. are they worth the price ?

[Flash1087]

Some of them are, I've heard good things about a few of those headsets.

And does anyone else love how 'barfogenic' is an accepted scientific term?

[Ed Oscuro]

Great article, though one thing has me confused - were all the comments in (parens) from the interviewee?

[StarMist]

Good, thorough interview. Would the attempt to develop this tech be why Sega didn't push 3D glasses for the MD after the SMS?

[JDB]

I approve of this interview

[Melf]

Good, thorough interview. Would the attempt to develop this tech be why Sega didn't push 3D glasses for the MD after the SMS?

I think it was because the peripherals for the MS didn't really sell that well, and didn't sell well in general, on any console. It wasn't considered to be worth the cost.

[djshok]

Uhmmm this interview states that the guy worked at Ono Sendai... you guys realize that's not a real company right, it's a fictional tech developer that appears in the cyberpunk novels by William Gibson. Unless this mysterious company is really good at staying off the internet. Googling this Ono Sendai only produces results that have to do with the Gibson novels... Was this a little inside joke in the article or something?

[Melf]

It was an actual company, named after the one fictional one. It was founded by Marc Pesce.


In 1991, Pesce founded the Ono-Sendai Corporation, named after a fictitious company in the William Gibson (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Gibson) novel Neuromancer (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neuromancer). Ono-Sendai was a first-generation Virtual Reality (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virtual_Reality) (VR) start-up, chartered to create inexpensive, home-based networked VR systems. The company developed a key technology, which earned Pesce his first patent (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patent) for a "Sourceless Orientation Sensor," which is used to track the motion of persons in virtual environments. Sega Corporation of America would use the technology on the design of the Sega Virtua VR (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sega_VR), a consumer head-mounted display (HMD). (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mark_Pesce#cite_note-Vitae-0)

[Lastcallhall]

Nice quote, Melf! For a minute there I thought you were going to Pettus it and just make up your own assumptions.

[djshok]

It was an actual company, named after the one fictional one. It was founded by Marc Pesce.

[/URL]

Ha! That's pretty cool! I thought maybe because the interviewee didn't want to give his real name, perhaps he wanted to conceal the company he worked for as well and filled it in with a Gibson reference, but this is actually cooler.