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Game Development

VR techdegree

Hello! I'm currently studying under the Game Development with Unity track. It's going great! I halfway through the 3D Art with Maya course. I had received an email awhile ago that a VR Techdegree was going to be offered in January. Very excited for it! Definitely want to pursue this career path. Just had a couple questions. Will there be a lot more courses to learn from than the ones in the current track available? And I have an iMac which I know doesn't support Oculus or Vive but I will be getting a PSVR soon, will I need any of those tools for learning in this Techdegree? Thanks so much, I love what you guys do and offer! Treehouse is great! Looking forward to hearing from you!

Cheers,

  • Sean

10 Answers

Nick Pettit
STAFF
Nick Pettit
Treehouse Teacher

Hi Sean,

Great questions! First, yes, the VR Techdegree will include more courses than the ones currently available at the time of this writing (Oct 2016).

The VR Techdegree will have the following requirements:

  • Windows 10 PC
  • HTC Vive
  • NVidia GTX 970 graphics card (equivalent or better)

Right now there's no high-end VR headset that supports macOS. That may change in the future, but unfortunately we're constrained by the present. There's also no other popular option for room-scale VR beyond the HTC Vive. Oculus recently announced room-scale support for the Rift using 2 or 3 Oculus Sensors in combination with the Rift and Touch controllers, but Touch won't be released until December 2016 and their complete room-scale hardware/software support is still on an unclear timeline. When room-scale is officially supported by Oculus, we can begin integrating their hardware/software into our courses, but that will take time.

We probably won't ever teach PS VR development for many reasons. You need to be a registered PlayStation developer, you need to own a PlayStation DevKit (and a PS VR), and all of their development resources are under strict NDA. In fact, even that's a gross oversimplification of why teaching it is intractable, but those are some of the larger points.

Hi Nick,

Have you ever consider to create a unity tech degree program? In my opinion a VR tech degree program is very interesting but since it requires extra equipment ( HTC Vive etc.. ) I am not sure that it will attract a large amount of students. Creating a unity tech degree with some optional VR lessons will be a better way to go. What do you think? Unity is extremely popular and probably many people would take this program

Calvin Secrest
Calvin Secrest
24,815 Points

What is the status for the VR Tech Degree is this still going to be offer on this platform anytime soon?

Nick Pettit,

Thanks so much for the reply! Looks like I'll have to save up some money to participate. But I am very happy you guys are offering this Techdegree. Looking forward to the future with Treehouse and Game Development! Btw congrats on your new game Neptune Flux coming out soon! I'll definitely be playing that on my PS4!

Thanks again!

Quierra Wells
Quierra Wells
7,705 Points

@ Nick Pettit Why HTC Vive? That's an expensive requirement.

Has the VR techdegree been delayed? I can't wait for it to start!

Nick Pettit
Nick Pettit
Treehouse Teacher

Hi Melissa,

Yes. VR is rapidly evolving so we want to best serve our students by focusing on creating new VR courses. The Techdegree is on hold for now.

Thanks Nick - is there something I can do to prepare for the courses? Is there a general timeline I can make a rough plan by?

Nick Pettit
Nick Pettit
Treehouse Teacher

Hi Melissa,

We'll have more news later in the month, but for now, there's two things you can do.

  1. Make sure you meet the software/hardware requirements. They are:
  • Windows 10 PC
  • HTC Vive
  • NVidia GTX 970 graphics card (equivalent or better)
  1. Follow the existing Game Dev track, which you can find here: https://teamtreehouse.com/tracks/game-development-with-unity

I hope that helps! :)

It does! Thank you Nick! :)

Hey Nick!
Any updates on the rollout date for the VR TechDegree? I noticed that "What's new in VR" only has one entry for October and hasn't been updated since. I'm hoping the path wasn't abandoned or put on hiatus.

Nick Pettit
Nick Pettit
Treehouse Teacher

Hi Robert,

We've decided to put the VR Techdegree on hold for now. However, we have officially launched a new Beginner VR Track which you can find here: https://teamtreehouse.com/tracks/beginner-vr

I'm sad to hear that Nick, I am working through Unity now and about halfway done then I'm on to Beginner VR. Even though the TechDegree is on hold, are more advanced VR courses or tracks on the docket?

Nick Pettit
Nick Pettit
Treehouse Teacher

Hi Robert,

Absolutely. We're committed to VR and I'm teaching it full time now. Expect many more VR courses!