It’s raining VR headsets of late, what with HTC, Oculus and Sony all starting to make the final, commercial versions of their respective virtual reality devices available for purchase within just a few months of each other. After Taiwanese electronics company HTC and American tech startup Oculus, it is now the turn of Japanese consumer electronics giant, Sony Electronics, to announce that it will soon start accepting pre-orders for its much talked-about virtual reality headset, the PlayStation VR, which was internally codenamed ‘Project Morpheus’ at Sony during its developmental phase. According to the official announcement from Sony, pre-orders for the PlayStation VR Launch Bundle will open on the 22nd of this month at 7AM PT.
Earlier this week, Sony had announced a price-tag of $399 for the device in the US, whereas Canadian residents will have to pay CA$549 to get their hands on it. That makes it by far the least expensive of the three aforementioned VR headsets. While the Oculus Rift carries a price-tag of $599, the HTC Vive is the most expensive of the lot, with an asking price of $799 straight out the box. Meanwhile, Sony says the device will launch in October, which may be a little disappointing for those waiting patiently for the device over the past several months. Either way, those pre-ordering the PlayStation VR will receive the specially-curated Launch Bundle, which will include some additional goodies alongside the regulation PlayStation VR core bundle.
According to the announcement from Sony, the core bundle will include the headset itself, the VR cables, stereo headphones and a PlayStation VR Demo Disc. Along with all that, the launch bundle will include a PlayStation Camera, 2 PlayStation Move motion controllers and a PlayStation VR Worlds disc. Sony says that over 230 developers are already hard at work developing content for the device, and that it expects to have dozens of games and titles available by October, which should be an interesting proposition for those wanting to put down the cash. The company will also be offering ‘The Playroom VR’ as a free download from the PlayStation Store. It will come with six family-friendly games that will apparently demonstrate that “VR can also be an impactful experience when it’s shared”.