VR News: Yes, I managed to show how slip a Paolo Nutini lyric into a VR news story, but it seemed to fit. Anyway, this VR news comes from Surplex VR who can now track full body position in VR via a pair of shoes. This is not the normal tracking style we have seen many times before, this is a free-roaming pair of actual shoes that boast up to nine hours of battery life per charge!
According to the designers, the system is accurate at gauging body position to within 5 cm (2 in), and has a latency rate of about 30 milliseconds. The fancier Pro version of the shoes has a claimed runtime of nine hours per charge, and an update rate of 60 Hertz – the Basic version goes for six hours at 30 Hertz. Its an interesting idea for sure and you can check out more about them over on their Kickstarter page. Thanks goes to newatlas.com for the heads up on the story.
Our Thoughts: We have seen so many of these full-body systems come and go that I have totally lost count! But on paper the Surplex system does sound like a great idea. Sadly without full support for standalone systems like the Meta Quest headsets(I still hate that name) they are doomed to fail before they have even started. The good news is it will still work with Steam VR games played on the Quest headsets, so its not all bad news. We have indeed backed them and can’t wait to see what the final product looks and feels like.