The final retail version of the PlayStation VR headset — codenamed Project Morpheus — will plug into a sizable black box before plugging into the PlayStation 4.
While PlayStation officials have discussed the need for the VR headset's processing box, it wasn't clear what form it would finally take.
I got a chance to check out the retail version of the headset during a demo of the VirZoom bike earlier this month. I wasn't allowed to take any pictures or ask the VirZoom developers any questions about it, other then to confirm it was the final retail version, not a dev kit. But I was allowed to examine it closely and try it on.
As we learned earlier this year, the PlayStation VR headset doesn't plug directly into the PlayStation 4. Instead, it plugs into a processing box, which in turn plugs into the PlayStation 4. This allows people to use the TV and PS4 to interact with, or just watch, the person playing their VR game.
The black box looked a bit smaller than a Wii and is used to process the VR graphics and sort out the second-screen social experience on the television.
While I wasn't allowed to take any pictures, the kit looked a lot like the image seen in the tweet below.
#PlayStationVR cable features power, volume, mic controls, first images revealed: https://t.co/bMT3PCykef pic.twitter.com/7wzvQxAlzB
— VRFocus (@VRFocus) December 5, 2015
The headset itself felt refined in a way that only a company like Sony can deliver. Everything felt comfortable, futuristic, neatly designed, from the way the headset slipped onto your head and tightened with a dial built into the back of the headband, to the ability to pull the 5.7-inch OLED display away from or against your face while playing.
It is, to date, the most comfortable VR headset I've tried on, a list which includes both Oculus and Vive. It feels like a device designed to be treated like a game controller or a remote; something that you can pick up and put on with out much fuss.
Project Morpheus was announced at the 2014 Game Developers Conference and made appearances at a number of other conferences as development on the device continued. This September, Sony changed the name of the device to PlayStation VR and confirmed that it would be coming out in the first half of 2016.
A number of games were announced for the device during the PlayStation Experience earlier this month.
Read up more on the philosophy behind the VR kit here and about one of its better games here.
