It turns out our imaginations were onto something, as that's where today's VR is indeed the most magical. It's also where the stellar HTC Vive leaps past its competitors.

Mobile, gamepad-based and third-person VR can work better than you might expect. But in VR games where you're sitting down with a gamepad in your hand, there's a disconnect between physical and virtual. You're controlling the action with sticks and buttons; it's more video game that happens to be in VR than it is virtual reality in the most literal sense.

Moving to standing/motion controller VR kicks it up to another level of immersion, but after a while that starts to feel a little confined; you'll eventually want to stretch those boundaries and walk around a larger space.