Until their last showing at 2am tonight, Bigscreen, Inc. is playing Top Gun in 3D through their VR application for Windows 10. It can be used with the Oculus Rift, SteamVR, and Windows Mixed Reality headsets. Both the movie and the app are free, at least during this promotion, but it is only available in the United States. As such, I have not been able to try it out and give my opinion. They plan to add more content throughout 2018, including TV shows, spread out between free and paid showings.

As for the showings? It makes sense from the standpoint of creating a social experience. You know that everyone is watching the same thing at the same time, which could lead to some interesting features like voice chat (for those who want to opt-in to talking throughout a movie).

The company is planning on bringing the app to Samsung GearVR, Google Daydream, and Oculus Go. This is obviously good, because the barrier to entry will be much lower if you can get away with a cheap-ish accessory to a phone that you already have for other reasons. There’s still a question of whether VR will take off in the consumer space at all, but this is a cute application none-the-less. That said, I regularly use YouTube VR with Google Daydream, mostly for relaxation videos before bed; you can decide for yourself whether I’m an outlier or simply ahead of my time.