Google Cardboard Unboxing & Review

[Almost]

Hey guys!

Today I got Cardboard in the mail!
How I feel right now.

For those of you unfamiliar with cardboard, it’s google’s ultra-cheap VR demo. Some cardboard, a few lenses, velcro and tape if you’re feeling really fancy, and the smartphone you already have is all you need to experience VR at home. There are instructions for how to make your own at home, but the original was a small package containing everything you need with a simple 6-step assembly. Google gave these kits out at I/O 14, and through a friend with close ties to google I managed to get ahold of one so that today I can give you guys and unboxing and a review. Let’s get started!

Outer Packaging

The outer packaging is simple. It’s small, but bigger than I was expecting - about as thick as a DVD case, but an inch or so bigger in both height and width. On the front there’s a nice picture of the asembled device.

The back is equally simple. A few warnings and a pull tab to get started.

Pulling off the tab and peeling the cardboard back leads us inside, but not quite to the actual device. It comes with a “3D Token” but I can’t find anything about what this is for. The only thing the internet can find is this reddit thread where redditor /u/thetickz seems equally baffled. Whatever.

The device

Detach where it says and flip it over and we finally see the actually cardboard device.

Once we remove the outer package from underneath, we see how much smaller the cardboard is that actually makes up the device. It’s got instructions printed on it, and it’s pretty simple to follow, although I did have trouble figuring out exactly how to bend it in step 2. Maybe I’m just an idiot

Fully Assembled

TADA!

Lacking a 3rd arm to take pictures while I assembled, I opted to skip that process. Here it is all put together.

And from the front.

The “button”

As you can probably guess, once your phone is inside the device you can’t exactly interact with it. This is where google has done their second coolest work (besides making a nearly free VR system, of course).

On the inside of the device is a magnet. On the outside is a washer in a oval groove. Pulling down on the washer causes the magnetic field to be all weird (technical terms, bear with me) which tries to pull the washer back up, directly over the magnet. When you pull and release quickly, this causes a disturbance in the magnetic field which your phone’s compass can detect, thus allowing the washer to act like a button.

Check out this gfycat:
https://gfycat.com/JampackedCarelessGermanwirehairedpointer

DISCLAIMER: I think that explanation is correct, but I’m assuming a lot of things. I might be very wrong.

Review

Sorry guys. The pictures end here.

So, What’s Cardboard actually like? When I was first mentioning it in the shoutbox, I got this horrible feeling that I might have to explain that “actually, it’s not that cool” and “eh. It’s ok, I guess” but once I actually tried it out, I was blown away.

The cardboard app is pretty cool. Load it up, it teaches you how to put together your cardboard as well as how to get to the main menu of the cardboard app.

At the main menu, you’re given some options: tour Versailles, look at some African masks, google earth, google streetview, your own photospheres, an animated short, and youtube (not in that order). You navigate this menu by turning in a circle. The option in front of you get’s bigger to let you know you’re selecting it, and a flick of the washer launches you in.

The first 5 things I mentioned are similar in terms of what they do. You stand in the center of a sphere which you can turn 360 degrees and look up and down. It feels as though you’re standing exactly in that spot and you can look at any point around you. The only think you can’t do is move closer/further from the objects around you. If you’re like me and have never experience VR, it’s REALLY cool.

The 6th item, the animated short, is similar to the previous group, but feels slightly different. You watch this couple minute long animation where you’re standing just a few yards from the action (or so it feels). The story moves from your right to your left, and as you follow the action you realize that there are more things in the world than you thought. Of course you can still look in 360 degrees but you can’t really follow the story if you’re not looking at it. I couldn’t help but imaging watching a full movie like this. It is such a surreal feeling to actually be able to control the viewpoint when watching a story, one that I hope we’ll be able to do with all movies in the future.

Lastly is the YouTube app. This one is completely different from the others. When you load it, you’re looking at a screen which gives the feeling of sitting in a movie theater. Some video plays, in my case it was a music video that I didn’t recognize (I’m not sure if it would change for different people/viewings. Might be a random popular video or something). Looking down shows a speech icon, and clicking the washer allows you to voice search youtube. If you do this, the first video it finds immediately plays. Looking around behind you reveals a wall of video tiles, much like that room in The Stanley Parable - you know the one - but with much fewer options. These seem to be related videos, popular videos, etc, although they aren’t labeled, so it’s kind of hard to tell. Once again, a flick of the washer starts them. Overall, it’s a pretty cool way to watch videos.

Beyond the official Cardboard app, Google released a google cardboard api. There are a handful of apps on the play store, but the only real notable one is a 3d spherical asteroids-like game. This is really too bad, because the technology is quite cool. The back of the device even has a slot for your camera, so making AR games/apps is definitely doable.

My overall feeling of Cardboard is that it’s a fantastic cheap demo, but I wish it were more. The demos are really really cool, especially since I’ve never seen VR before (unless you count my 3DS :P ), but you can only look at 5 rooms in Versailles for so long. It’s fun, but I think the novelty will wear out quickly, and since it’s temporary, it’s unlikely to pick up enough dev support to make it great. I guess I shouldn’t be too bummed out, it’s really cheap, even if you make it yourself, and it is really cool. Asking for a piece of cardboard to be much more than that is asking quite a lot. I don’t want to make it sound like I’m disappointed in Cardboard. I’m actually super excited about it! It’s just a little painful to think that it likely won’t progress much further than it’s already at.

Well, thanks for reading this far! I hope I gave you some insight. On one last note, I actually received 3 of these things in the mail. I’m keeping mine, @Scuzz claimed one, but I’m not sure what I’ll do with the third. Maybe I’ll have a giveaway ;). Stay tuned.

srsly wtf is this?

[Scuzz]

Did you try holding it up to the camera?

[Almost]

Of course. The camera isn’t even active anyway…

[Almost]

Apparently Google is now taking Cardboard seriously again.

Google updated their cardboard site, created a list of cardboard apps, and added a Unity SDK. All official as of today.

Maybe I spoke too soon in saying this was not going to progress.