Virtual reality is about to get a whole lot more smelly. Feelreal VR this week revealed pricing and plans for its long-in-development smell sensor for current headsets.
The device will retail for $299. However, Feelreal is launching a Kickstarter crowd-funding campaign on April 9th, before which you can ‘pre-order’ the kit for $199 instead. You can reserve a spot in the campaign now or back it on the first day to get the discount. It’s estimated to ship this August pending reaching a $20,000 Kickstarter goal.
You’ll need to pick up a specific version of the device designed for your headset of choice. There aren’t yet any listings for upcoming devices but the company says the Valve Index will likely be added later on.
Feelreal has been working on what it calls a ‘Multisensory VR Mask’ for years now. In fact, the company took its first shot at Kickstarter back in 2015 but raised just under half of its $50,000 goal. The kit is intended to clip onto headsets such as the Oculus Rift, HTC Vive and PSVR and generate scents relevant to the virtual environment. It also emits water mist, wind and vibration in an attempt to make VR more immersive.
It may also make you look like Kylo Ren. The mask fits under your headset, as can be seen in the trailer below.
Each kit comes with ten ‘Aroma Capsules’ to emit smells. Feelreal offers a range of generalized smells like those of a forest environment or smoking gunpowder. Each costs $4.99. You can also pick up sets of capsules tailored to specific VR games. A Skyrim VR set, for example, costs $49.99 and comes with capsules for moss, flowers, mountains and french cookies (for sweet rolls, duh) among others. Feelreal tells me each capsule should last for around three months if a customer were to use them for two hours a day.
There’s also a set designed for indie VR hit Beat Saber. Apparently, Beat Saber smells of green apples, jungles, grapefruits and explosions. Who knew?
It’s been a long time since we last got a or whiff at Feelreal. We’ll be interested to see if it is indeed the real deal (sorry) in the coming months.
