Valve employee proposes to his girlfriend using virtual reality

Kelly Tortorice was trying out the HTC Vive headset, developed in partnership with Valve, when a virtual diamond ring appeared in vision.

It seemed just a typical day for her. Inside the virtual reality world, she was on decks of sunken ships – repairing robots and painting three-dimensional fire.

She shared the details on her Facebook page, divulging that Murch invited an unsuspecting Kelly to Valve’s office.

Chandler Murch, an employee at the gaming company Valve, proposed to his girlfriend last week using virtual reality – talk about creative!

When it comes to virtual reality, nothing seems out of the question anymore.

However, even though the VR headset has not hit the shelves, it is still available to a select few developers and Valve employees who are testing out the pre-release kits as they explore the HTC Vive’s innumerable possibilities. The “staged virtual reality demo that turned into a real proposal” was a success.

As Tortorice’s Facebook photos reveal, Murch had walked toward her while holding a trackable HTC Vive wand controller, which she saw through her headset as a ring floating toward her in mid-air-meaning, this was perhaps a bit higher-tech than a Google Cardboard proposal that was publicized in April. He had a real ring for Kelly too, though I’m not sure if the rock on it was as big as the one on the virtual ring. She was delightfully happy to accept the proposal.

So, in a way, she got not one, but two engagement rings. Whether the “room-scale VR” will fend off competition from the likes of the Oculus Rift and become popular with consumers remains to be seen.