Oculus founder has created a new headset that can actually kill you if you die in-game

Oculus VR was founded by Palmer Luckey while simultaneously designing the Oculus Rift in 2012. That said, Luckey didn’t stop there. Well, until 2014, when Facebook acquired Oculus and Luckey went on to work in quite a different area of ​​the tech industry.

That said, Luckey clearly hasn’t let his passion for virtual reality go by the wayside, as the creator has created an entirely new VR headset that’s capable of killing you.

The monstrous headset is inspired by the popular Japanese light novel and anime series Sword Art Online. If you haven’t seen the show, the story follows Kirito, who takes part in an MMO RPG using a virtual reality headset, in this case called NerveGear.

Now the problem is that a dozen players are trapped inside the game and therefore trapped inside the NerveGear. You can probably figure out where this is going, but the MMO Kirito finds himself in soon becomes too real, and those who die in the game… well, die in real life too.

So it makes perfect sense why Luckey was inspired by the story of Sword Art Online, and if you’re a fan of the anime who hasn’t seen it, I totally recommend it. That said, it sucks a bit after the first season.

Luckey’s new headset, called the OQPNVG, was revealed in a blog post on November 6. This date aptly lines up with the day the events of Sword Art Online began. A real commitment to Luckey’s cause, that’s for sure.

In his blog post, Luckey explains in depth how the creation of the Oculus Rift and Sword Art Online coincided with each other. He shares how the headset itself made the series seem more grounded in reality, and in turn, the show actively helped with sales. Ultimately, says Lucky, “this synergy had a significant impact on the sales and adoption of our development kit: literally thousands of people contacted me asking for variations of ‘Have you seen Sword Art Online? When are you going to make the NerveGear real?!’”

Luckey then goes on to discuss what everyone’s really interested in, and that’s the killer headset that could very well be an all-too-real NerveGear for years to come. “The good news is that we are halfway to making a real NerveGear. The bad news is that so far, I’ve only discovered the half that kills you,” shares Luckey.

So how do headsets intend to kill gamers? Well, in the series, NerveGear contains a microwave emitter that can reach lethal levels. It appears that Luckey tried to do something similar, and the end result was three payload modules, which he notes that he would normally use for a different project (probably referring to his work with military defense technology…).

Now the OQPNVG has not yet been tested, not even used. There are simply too many risks involved that could cause the headset to inadvertently kill someone, so it’s certainly safer to sit at Luckey’s desk (in a room as far away as possible, I hope), rather than the head of a test doll.

Last but not least, Luckey concludes by sharing that, to his knowledge, this is “the first nonfiction example of a virtual reality device that can actually kill the user. It won’t be the last.