After its announcement last year, we have all been eager for more news about Microsoft’s next generation console, dubbed Project Scorpio. Microsoft promises their next machine to be able to deliver “true 4K graphics,” and originally also stated its ability to provide “High Fidelity VR.” This claim has been thrown into doubt with the removal of the bullet point surrounding its VR capacity from the Project Scorpio website.
The alarm first rose on a thread on NeoGAF, but an “insider” from Microsoft quickly squashed the rumor by stating that he is “100% confident VR is still moving forward.” Nevertheless, it has led to speculation surrounding the reasons Microsoft would have for deleting the VR capability from Project Scorpio’s website.
Project Scorpio boasts an impressive 6 teraflops of power, 8 cores and 320gb of memory. You would be forgiven to think that will all that processing power at its disposal, the prospect of high fidelity VR wouldn’t be too much of a stretch. Many gamers have voiced their own opinion for why there has been the omission of the VR capacity, ranging from skepticism for the potential future value of virtual reality gaming, right through to Microsoft not being able to charge monthly for the service.
The furore over the change to the Scorpio website grew to the point that a Microsoft spokesperson contacted GameSpot to confirm that high fidelity VR gaming is still part of the package. They declined to comment however on why the line was deleted, leaving gamers open to speculate for the meantime.
Perhaps Microsoft is struggling to make all the pieces come together well enough to claim “high fidelity,” or maybe it is as comments suggest on the NeoGAF feed, that the tech giant is still unsure of the future role that VR will play in this industry. That would mean they are simply not advertising this part of their machine’s functionality as loudly as its other impressive statistics. More will be revealed as we draw nearer Project Scorpio’s speculated release date of Christmas 2017.