In a bid to reenforce the idea that “virtual reality needs to experienced in person to fully be able to appreciate the phenomenon”, Starbreeze Studios have announced plans to build a VR arcade that’ll welcome enthusiasts and newcomers alike to understand what all the fuss is about first-hand. It’ll open between now and the end of summer this year in a “prime location” somewhere in Los Angeles.
If such a VR arcade existed, which of our best PC games would you like to take for a spin?
It’s been a busy week for Payday developers Starbreeze. After announcing a deal worth $40 million with Korean games giant Smilegate – that’ll see the Swedish outfit put their first-person co-op stamp on the free-to-play Eastern mega hit Crossfire – they were then forced to admit Overkill’s slant on The Walking Dead has been delayed to 2017.
Now, they’ve revealed plans to launch a virtual reality arcade in Los Angeles with the aim of making “premium VR experiences accessible for the masses.” It’ll open at some point this year under the banner StarCade, and, as you might expect, the developer’s catalogue of games and StarVR headset will take centre stage. That said, Starbreeze CTO Emmanual Marquez says he’s “open to any content.”
“We will invite developers to join us and give them the opportunity to put their content in our StarCade,” says Marquez in a statement. “We as an industry continuously need to educate ourselves to make VR truly successful, and this is just the first step in our planning to do so.”
Despite being announced the best part of two years ago, we’ve not seen much of Overkill’s interpretation of The Walking Dead. But that didn’t stop Daniel Murray, the president of Skybound Interactive, from weighing in on what the virtual reality arcade might mean for the elusive zombie ’em up.
“When we heard about the StarCade initiative we were immediately excited,” says Murray. “It allows us to further explore The Walking Dead universe in a completely new way. Here at Skybound we pride ourselves in having our finger on the pulse of what fans want, and together with Starbreeze and their Project StarCade, we’re thrilled to create a new way for fans to try out the Overkill’s The Walking Dead VR experience.”