I'm sure after a hard day's wrestling with sabre-tooth tigers and tracking woolly mammoths, not to mention all that gathering, even the earliest cavemen felt the need to turn off for a while. That'd certainly explain all those paintings on their walls.
Now you can really escape, while sitting in your favourite chair. Over the last year or two, Oculus has been making a lot of noise about the future of Virtual Reality. Now they've teamed up with Samsung and the future has come a whole lot closer.
I first encountered Samsung's Gear VR late last year, when it was released in conjunction with the Galaxy Note 4. At that point, the Note 4 was the only handset the VR headset would work with. I was intrigued with the concept, but not particularly impressed with the limited content available. I flew my own virtual jet-pack around a bit, fun - but the graphics were somewhat rudimentary and the experience seemed far from real.
What a difference 6 months can make.
The latest version of the Samsung Gear VR has been designed for both the Galaxy S6 and S6 Edge - surely the 2 coolest phones on the market right now.
This makes the 360 degree possibilities presented by Oculus more accessible than ever before, so I accessed them and almost didn't come back.
This is so much more than 3D, it's the visual equivalent of surround sound. Using the gyroscopic properties of the GS6 handset, the Gear VR tracks exactly where you're looking; up, down, side-to-side - even behind you. I rafted a river, I went on stage with Cirque du Soleil, I even explored some of the most picturesque tourist locations in the world, all from my couch.
Wearing this thing makes you look like a total idiot, but make no mistake, it's really cool. I persuaded several people who have absolutely no interest in this kind of stuff whatsoever, to don the Gear VR and without exception, they all admitted they were impressed by how real the reality was.
Then there were the people who needed no persuasion whatsoever... kids go absolutely nuts over this thing. Monster Number 2 took one look at it and said, "Oh my god! Oh my god! Oh my god! Oh my god! Oh my god!" (Yes, that is a direct quote) Cue an endless stream of friends, cousins and random children off the street to give it a go.
I mean, come on - there are shooting games in which you aim just by looking at the thing you want to destroy. Double cool.
It's actually a very well designed piece of kit to boot. Your S6 or S6 Edge simply clips into place at the front of the headset and you're good to go. The adjustable straps are comfortable enough, and while wearing a whole cyber-world on your face takes a bit of getting used to, only a bit.
Just a warning though, you're on a strictly a solo expedition. Without a doubt, this is the most anti-social piece of technology you'll ever own. In fact, pair a set of bluetooth headphones with the S6 and your house could burn down around you without you noticing a thing.
For gaming, there are also bluetooth controllers available, but there's plenty to see and do without shooting things. You can watch a movie in your choice of cinema... or on the moon. (I'm not even kidding) What's more, download a 3D file, and you'll experience it in a much more authentic environment than squashing your movie onto a boring old 3D TV.
But a 2 hour feature movie is probably the very limit of how long you would want to spend inside the Gear VR. 3 reasons for that; the comfort factor, battery life and after 120 minutes, your brain will basically be reduced to cottage cheese.
As comfortable as the Gear VR is to wear, having anything on your face that long can drive you a little crazy. Turns out, projecting 360 degree insanity sucks up a phone's juice pretty fast. But above all else, the effect of being inside this world is so convincing, you need to step out once in a while to remind yourself you're still a human being.
You may have heard about the "screen door effect" you experience when viewing your phone's screen this close up. I found this to be one of those things you notice at first, but soon ignore without even thinking about it. Apart from the battery drain, 360 degree video content also takes up a lot of memory space. You'll need to allow for that and balance it out with any other music, video or pictures you want to keep on your phone.
If you think you're going to be a real Gear VR addict, you may even want to consider the 64gb version of the S6 over the 32gb. Remember, these new Samsungs no longer have slots for extra microSD cards so storage space could become an issue.
This is a fledgling technology, and the supply of content available is admittedly still somewhat limited, but I can't believe how far it's come since that first jet-pack ride over Pixel Town. Whether the novelty would wear off over time is hard to tell (that would take time) but it's certainly one of the craziest pieces of tech I've ever encountered. Is it $300 worth of fun? You know what? It probably is. Whether I'd go out and by a whole new phone just to run it, well that's another story. However, if you're already sporting an S6, S6 Edge or Note 4, surely you must be a little bit curious...
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