Virtual Reality is a technology, an integration of hardware and software that creates virtual environments for sensory experience. Unlike others, VR consoles surround the users in a digital 3D world-VR projects a 3D environment with objects the users can interact with, and integrates audio and tactile stimulations for enhanced life-like experiences. VR stimulates its user’s senses, such as vision and hearing, to achieve absolute immersion to the simulated environment. Because of VR, the way people interact with information becomes more immediate, comfortable, and relatable.

VR caters many needs and contributes to the development of various fields.

Although VR is present in many fields and practices, it is most evident and well- known for gaming. VR machines tailored for gaming, such as Oculus Rift, host numerous video games with genres ranging from harmless simulations to horror survival. These games immerse the players to their environment through projecting proper scenery partnered with spatial sounds, and requiring the gamers to make elaborate movements rather than just clicking buttons. Through VR, gaming is brought up a few levels because of the unique experience it brings to its audience. Horror games, for example, bring the elements necessary to scare without injuring its players; farming simulations let the players experience toiling the soil without the proper tools; VR brings people various experiences without costing damage to people, harming the real environment, and consuming significant amount of resources.

There are many other applications of virtual reality- medicine, military, education, architecture, communication, and many more. In medicine, simulations of surgical procedures can be used for training; simulating a surgery removes the possibility of harming a live patient due to malpractice.

In architecture, VR can be used to view the infrastructure being modelled in its life-like size. VR gives the advantage of simulating real events, without having to experience or cause unnecessary and undesired changes to the real world.

Virtual Reality is a helpful tool and a fun one to use. It never stops to fascinate us. What great strides will VR take? What more can it improve on? As science is tentative, so is VR. What was once a vision has turned into reality— virtual reality.