Back in June, we reported that the Kat Walk C VR treadmill had reached its funding goal shortly after the Kickstart launch, and was already at $1.2 million in funding in just a few days’ time. Well, now the campaign is over and the final funding numbers fall at $1.6 million — well above the original goal of $100,000.
To those out of the loop, the Kat Walk C treadmill is a VR peripheral that allows users to walk on the spot and have their movement reflected in VR. It works by getting users to stand on a large dish, wear special shoes and strap into a harness, which then allows them to walk on the spot to provide a new locomotion option for VR players. It supports PC VR and PSVR headsets and, according to Kat VR, will work with games that have a free locomotion setting.
By reaching $1.6 million in funding, the campaign also smashed all five of its stretch goals, which add more hardware and software features to the device. You can read details of all the stretch goals over on the Kickstarter page, but the biggest is the $1.5 million goal, which will see a ‘Haptic Feedback Module’ added into the base of the platform. There’s not too many details on how the module might work in practice, but no doubt it will add some kind of vibration or feedback to the experience while players walk around in VR using the treadmill.
Production of the Kat Walk C is to start in September and the first batch of devices anticipates shipping in October of this year. You can read more here or over on the Kickstarter campaign page.
