HTC Vive bundle lets you climb Everest, walk the plank for free till end of March

By Jon Martindale February 17, 2017

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If you’ve been umming and ahhing over whether to buy a HTC Vive virtual reality headset, making the leap before the end of March would make a lot of sense. If purchased before then, the bundle will come with two additional games, Richie’s Plank Experience and Everest VR, making for a total of four for new owners.

When it was first released in April 2016, the HTC Vive shipped out with popular launch titles like Google’s TiltBrush, Job Simulator and Fantastic Contraption, but times have changed since then. More recently, new buyers have been given free copies of Zombie Training Simulator and The Gallery: Episode 1: Call of the Starseed. Now though, they get two more as well.

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The new additions offer two similarly vertigo-inducing experiences, but are rather different in execution. Richie’s Plank Experience is designed to induce real fear for those who don’t like heights and introduce people to the capabilities of virtual reality, while Everest VR is more atmospheric and awe-inspiring.

As much as free games are hard to turn down, the addition of these two titles is an interesting choice for HTC. While Richie’s Plank Experience is a reasonably well-reviewed title on Steam, the amount of content it offers is rather spare. It’s perhaps a good way to start out in VR and makes for a fun demo game, but it doesn’t have a lot to offer.

While Everest VR gives about an hour’s worth of playtime, according to reviewers, most report a decidedly negative experience. Some reviewers suggest they had trouble moving beyond the bounds of their physical room, while others claimed that the amount of content on offer was so limited they regretted buying it.

That sort of feeling may be alleviated by those who get it for free, but HTC didn’t exactly put its best foot forward with those choices for the bundle. Fortunately, both Zombie Simulator and The Gallery’s first episode were both very well reviewed and offer new VR users much more to play with.

The $800 HTC Vive bundle with additional games can be bought directly from HTC, or through Amazon, according to RoadtoVR.

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Computing

HTC changed the Vive’s bundled games, check out the new titles

HTC VIVE

HTC is shuffling the software that comes with its virtual reality headset, replacing two games.

The esoteric Job Simulator is gone, and so is Fantastic Contraption, Engadget is reporting. In their place is Call Of The Starseed: The Gallery, an immersive puzzle game inspired by 80's fantasy movies, and Zombie Training Simulator, a shooting gallery with faux-cardboard zombies. Google's Tilt Brush remains bundled with the Vive.

Computing

Climb a towering mountain in virtual reality with ‘Everest VR’ for HTC Vive

everest vr for htc vive simulates mountaineering in virtual reality everestvr

Virtual reality developer Sólfar Studios has launched Everest VR, a simulated first-person trek to the summit of Mount Everest available exclusively for HTC Vive headsets.

Designed in a partnership with Nordic visual effects and animation house RVX and powered by Unreal Engine 4, Everest VR includes five playable scenes that simulate a complete expedition from Base Camp to Everest's summit.

Wearables

Climbing Mt. Everest in VR is so terrifying that my knees wobbled

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I stood on the edge of a precipice, frozen from cold, faced with a terrifying walk across an ice-encrusted rope bridge that was precariously suspended across a crevasse hundreds of feet deep.
My legs turned to jelly, and I almost fell to my knees. I don’t deal with heights well, especially if a single error could result in my untimely death. Grasping the rope to steady myself, I took the first step, my eyes widening as the ice cracked and crumbled off the next foothold. “I’m not sure I want to do this,” I thought to myself. But I didn’t have a choice.
It all began the week before, in the comfort of my home, with the delivery of a wooden crate. Inside was an assortment of mountaineering paraphernalia, including a compass, a thermal vest, and a map of the Himalayas. Digging through, a passport issued by The Virtual Republic of Nvidia doubled as an invitation to an event where I’d experience what it’s like to climb Everest. Not actually climb, because I’m a feeble tech journalist, but climb thanks to the magic of virtual reality.
Base camp
The journey up to London for these shindigs are usually about as arduous as the day gets, but this time, that wasn’t the case at all. Upon arrival at Tobacco Dock — a converted warehouse from the 1800’s that’s all exposed brickwork, iron, and dark passages — I was handed a thick jacket that not only doubled my size, but also tripled my body temperature, plus a pair of trousers so enormous they’d make a clown blush. “It’s cold in there,” I was informed.

I tentatively walked out onto it, slowly edging along the footholds ensuring I didn’t plunge to my doom.