Please support Game Informer. Print magazine subscriptions are less than $2 per issue
Acer And Starbreeze Team Up To Develop And Manufacture StarVR Headset
Acer is partnering with Starbreeze, the game studio behind The Darkness, to help bring their virtual reality headset StarVR to life, which was announced last year at E3.
Acer, one of the world's largest computer manufacturers, will aid Starbreeze in its design, manufacturing, and marketing for the StarVR.
“Acer is thrilled to join forces with Starbreeze in bringing the StarVR head-mounted display to the market,” said Jason Chen, Acer Corporate President and CEO. “We are devoting R&D resources across multiple aspects of the VR ecosystem for a coherent and high-quality experience, while just last month Acer announced powerful desktops and notebooks fully-ready for StarVR. Starbreeze and Acer share the same goal of delivering best-in-class VR applications, and we look forward to unlocking new VR possibilities together with this partnership.”
StarVR is a 210 degree, high resolution VR headset that was initially born from the InfinitEye project. We had the chance to try the headset out at E3 2015, where it was coupled with a demo based on The Walking Dead. Since then, Starbreeze unveiled plans for a virtual reality arcade space in Los Angeles called StarCade and premiered a cinematic VR experience during the first week of this year's Cannes Film Festival.
Both Acer and Starbreeze plan to gear the device towards more location-based and enterprise-focused markets, which likely means StarVR won't be competing as much against consumer-based VR experiences such as the Oculus Rift and the HTC Vive.
Our Take
Considering how large a company Acer is, it's bound to help this VR headset gain a bit more leverage in the marketplace. During last year's E3, our editor Mike Futter had a chance to try the StarVR headset himself. While he enjoyed his experience for the most part, he noted issues from pixelation to a bulky design that felt heavy to wear. If StarVR hopes to be successful, problems like these will first have to be ironed out.
I’d like to ask you to support Game Informer’s continued coverage of games with a subscription. For less than two dollars per issue, we mail you a full year of 10 print magazines, each with cover stories and preview features filled with exclusive details about the most exciting upcoming games. We profile and interview game creators. We look back on the rich history of gaming, and we celebrate what’s next.
Here on the website, we offer much of our content for free, including game reviews, daily news, videos, event coverage, and more – all with minimal ads.
We do so with a small editorial team, alongside contributing paid writers from around the world – over 65 individuals from 9 countries around the world, just in the last couple of years.
It’s not possible without support.
In a time when game makers and games coverage have faced hard struggles and layoffs, the future of this 30+ year magazine and community is at risk. Our new standalone magazine subscription is the number one way you can keep us alive – and we believe you’ll get a pretty fantastic gaming magazine in your mailbox every few weeks for your trouble.
Thank you.
