EA will "wait and see" on VR

EA will wait and see on VR

The video game industry has long promised us that virtual reality will change lives, cause a revolution in gaming, and other such hyperbole. But Electronic Arts won't be so quick to bring the likes of Star Wars: Battlefront to the VR faithful.

At the UBS Global Technology Conference, EA CFO Blake Jorgensen outlined a more cautious approach to the headsets like Sony's PlayStation VR, the Oculus Rift, and Valve VR.

The trouble for EA is that VR's early adopters are likely to be very few, making profitable game development difficult.

"There's some challenges still and I think the biggest challenge is just the size of the market," Jorgensen said.

Five years or more

"We don't make games anymore for the Wii or the Wii U because the market is not big enough, the PS Vita – the Sony product – we don't make games for that anymore because the market is too small, so it's all about the size of the market."

Jorgensen admitted that EA had a number of VR development kits, and while we should expect to see VR titles from EA eventually, he didn't see VR taking off for another five years.

"I think the reality is, the next one to three years, it's probably going to take some time to build up a sizeable marketplace and you might see alternative uses for virtual reality first before it becomes gaming," Jorgensen said.

"Longer term, five plus years away, I think there's certainly a market there and it will be another exciting way to enjoy gaming."

Source: gamesindustry.biz