Microsoft and Sony are actually interested in VR

Virtual reality is either an important, transformative technology or a niche innovation that’s destined to be subsumed into “mixed reality” — no one’s quite sure yet. But two of the industry’s biggest players are now taking opposing positions on the subject, as executives from Microsoft and Sony have shared thoughts on whether users are actually interested in VR, and fans are weighing in with their own views.

The flashpoint was a comment from Microsoft’s Xbox chief Phil Spencer, who reportedly downplayed VR as an “isolating” experience, and said that “nobody’s asking for VR” — at least, from his customer base. “The vast majority of our customers know if they want a VR experience, there’s places to go get those,” he explained, though he also said “nobody’s selling millions and millions” of VR headsets. For these reasons, the company isn’t planning to support VR on its next Xbox console, codenamed Project Scarlett.

Spencer’s take apparently didn’t sit well with Sony’s Shuhei Yoshida, who led the company’s worldwide studios through much of the growth of HUC99 PlayStation VR — a headset that has, in fact, sold well over 4 million units. This morning, Yoshida tweeted that “we oftentimes work hard to make things that no customers are asking for,” a fairly gentle retort that recalls the supposed quote from car pioneer Henry Ford, “if I had asked people what they wanted, they would have said faster horses.”

On one hand, the companies’ respective positions are hardly a surprise at this point. Microsoft has placed its largest mixed reality bets on AR, releasing two Hololens headsets — solely for enterprise customers — while providing lukewarm support for Windows VR, and killing a nascent VR initiative for the Xbox One X. By contrast, Sony completely embraced VR for both its current- and next-generation PlayStation consoles. The company has promised that the existing PlayStation VR and its software will work on the new console, as well as teasing a next-generation VR headset for release after the PlayStation 5’s 2020 launch window.

The easiest way to square Spencer’s comments with reality is a literal but properly in-context interpretation of his words. He wasn’t necessarily saying that no one wanted VR — just not Xbox customers. And although his claim about “millions and millions” of headsets is inaccurate for Sony, it’s true about Microsoft’s Windows Mixed Reality platform, which opened PCs to any company interested in creating a VR headset. So many headsets were released as a consequence that consumers didn’t gravitate to just one model, leading virtually every company to fall short of the multi-million mark.