One exciting new field in computing is virtual reality. Right now it is poised to explode as the first round of consumer VR headsets enter the market. What kid wouldn’t be interested in a VR headset? How do you turn that interest into a career in VR or computing. Well there are currently a few apps that let you create virtual worlds. Kind of like minecraft which every kid loves but building actual environments that could be used in game development.
Epic’s Unreal engine is a programming environment for creating virtual reality and video games. They have just released an update that allows you to build the environments within virtual reality. Watch the video above and it looks like minecraft on steroids! What kid wouldn’t want to spend time working with it. The great thing is your child is learning a valuable skill and might someday get a great job developing VR games and apps! It’s a great time to build games with this environment. A few years ago it would have cost many thousands of dollars per month to develop with it. Now you can develop for free and are only charged a 5% royalty once your game is making at least $1000 per month.
If Unreal engine looks a bit complicated, take a look at Voxelus. It’s a simpler platform for creating VR environments.
So get your child interested in creating things for Virtual Reality, you might find out they have more fun creating rather than playing video games!
