If you are like me, the first time you used Virtual Reality, you probably ran into one of the more painful problems with VR: you can’t see real life obstacles with a device that blocks your view. While it might seem that mapping an entire room into VR would be incredibly expensive, Occipital has found a way to bring that price down to $500. Occipital’s Structure Sensor can apparently scan the room around you in 3-D, and bring the physical world into your virtual one. So now, instead of being a passive participant basically watching a VR movie unfold, you could possibly roam around in simulations with real movement (instead of moving virtually with a controller pad or awkwardly with an omni-directional treadmill). And while $500 is not cheap, its still less expensive than other options.