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Budget range VR system VISR looking for budget

Budget range VR system VISR looking for budget

The Pocket Gamer crew got to see the VISR headset up-close-and-personal at the Pocket Gamer Connects London 2015 this January, as the Hull-based design team brought along its answer to affordable virtual reality.

Now entering the final days of a Kickstarter campaign, the project hopes it can bring its smartphone-driven face case into production.

More than Cardboard

Google demonstrated an early example of how VR experiences can be achieved on a showstring with its Cardboard concept, and VISR builds on those novelty foundations with a more solid, yet equally accessible, product.

Rather than being made of stiff paper, the VISR is being put together using a laminate corrugate, and uses what the designer calls a 'magazine' to hold the smartphone in place and allow users to launch a game or app before dropping it into the headset.

This offers a modifiable system that accepts a large number of smartphone hansers, including the iPhone.

VISR being tested at Pocket Gamer Connects

"We have been developing games and apps for the VISR for the last few months and it is surprisingly easy," the team says, as it prepares a catalogue of tech demos intended to demonstrate to developers how they could be putting VISR to use.

The affordability of the platform is aimed every bit as much at the industry, as the end user, and a pre-built Unity package has been prepared to assist game and app creators in getting involved.

The Kickstarter campaign is still running, but still has some distance to cover to meet its £25,000 goal.

The headset only costs £15 in its earlybird pricing tiers.

Yes. Spanner's his real name. And, yes, he's heard that joke before.