Whew. This, obviously, is a video game on steroids. The arcade hardware goes by the name Virtuality and it’s the first popular, full-blown application for the intoxicating you-are-there computer technology known as virtual reality. Edison Brothers Stores, the St. Louis company that sells the British-made Virtuality machines for placement in U.S. malls, theaters and restaurants, hopes consumers will find the system compelling enough to garner a big slice of the $7 billion that analyst Steven Eisenberg of Oppenheimer & Co. estimates Americans put into coin-operated amusements each year. Edison has sold about 20 machines since introducing them late last year-at $55,000 for the top models, that means more than $1 million in sales already. “Virtual Reality is the ultimate entertainment adventure,” says Edison chairman Andrew E. Newman. It could also be the ultimate wallet-buster for parents-it costs about $1 a minute to play.
Until now, most of us have only gotten to read articles about virtual reality. It has been the plaything of well-funded researchers and an elite group of companies that can afford the brawny computers required to make the pictures move. Its boosters promise it will eventually revolutionize fields like architecture-letting designers and clients walk through buildings before construction. Education and medicine could benefit from rich simulations, too.
But for now, Virtuality is the layman’s first shot at the fun. For virtual-reality experts, Edison’s baby will probably be disappointing. Its concealed computer engine is a mere PC, Commodore’s video-friendly Amiga. The graphics are very simple: there’s little detail, and the playing field is fairly limited. But it still blows away most video games and turns a mere pastime into a blast. In Dactyl Nightmare, as many as four users can share the field, each in his own machine, blowing each other to the aforementioned smithereens. Three other games now run on Virtuality, and heavy-hitter Spectrum HoloByte is helping to develop more. First up: a jet-fighter simulation, due early next year. Competing virtual-reality systems could begin to appear, too. Of course, even way cool has an upper price limit. Tapped-out parents, who finance their kids’ arcade habits, could throw a monkey wrench into any dreams of a video empire. And that’s a reality the promoters of the new machine may have to deal with very soon.
