Is Samsung's Gear VR really worth it?
Samsung's Gear VR is a sleek looking headset with a slim price tag of one hundred US dollars. I received my headset from the amazing deal Samsung had; you buy a new Galaxy S7 or S7 Edge smartphone and receive a headset for free. I was very excited to receive my Gear VR.
When I got the box with my Gear VR on my porch, I immediately took it, opened it up and popped my phone into it. It started up with a voice telling me to take it out and download a few apps and packages. Luckily it was all automated and only required a few button presses and signing up for the Oculus app. After it installed I was finally able to use it.
I stuck my S7 Edge inside and put the headset on and I was instantly amazed at the picture and animations. I navigated to the library of apps it came with to be disappointing that it only came with a 360 Gallery and a Movie theater. It had a few others that required an install, which took about 10-15 minutes. I went into the store and looked for games, I came across Dreadhalls and wanted to play it. A horror VR game - this should be fun. Only to be disappointed when I opened it to realize I needed a controller. I couldn't use my Xbox One controller, or my PlayStation 3 or 4 controller with my phone, using the included OTG adapter.
I went back to the Oculus store and found an Ocean game. It was the best VR App for the device in my personal opinion. You could choose from 8 different under ocean fish, ranging from sharks to snakes to dolphins and even whales. I wasn't able to purchase the full version, but I very much enjoyed the dolphins. It really felt like I was in the Ocean with them. I paired my Razer Krakens up with the headset for a fully immersive experience. I could look around and see fish swimming around my head and I wanted to reach out and touch them, just to find I was swinging at the air like a child.
The Gear VR was very comfortable, and I didn't feel like removing it like I did while using a Google Cardboard headset. The quality is much better than a Cardboard, and that's obviously because it's a much higher quality device. Not only can you use the Oculus Dashboard, you can use Cardboard apps from the Play Store, either by buying the Cardboard Enabler app or just not plugging your phone into the Gear VR. Using the device on Samsung's flagship phones, either the S7 or S7 Edge you will get some warm activity while using the device, I never got the overheating message that people got while using the S6 lineup.
Overall, if you want a nice virtual reality experience and don't want to buy an Oculus Rift or an HTC Vive, I would highly recommend Samsung's Gear VR, but if you aren't comfortable with spending 100$ on it, you can always go for the Google Cardboard for only 15$.
