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Sci-fi writer Damon Knight publishes "The Analogues" in The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction. It was about technologically created personalities projected into people's awareness, and is considered one of the first conceptions of virtual reality. "The Analogues" was later expanded into the novel The Analogue Men, aka Hell's Pavement.
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Made throughout the late 1950s and early 1960s, Heilig's Sensorama was the first totally interractive virtual reality device. It simulated 3D images, sound, even smell.
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In 1970 at the Massechusetts Institute of Technology, Sutherland produced a primitive head-mounted display and Engelbart unveiled his crude pointing device for moving text around on a computer screen.
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In the mid-seventies, Myron W. Krueger created what is considered the first artificial reality - Videoplace. Videoplace used projectors, video cameras, sillouhettes, and special purpose hardware to simulate a "real" environment. It was shown on display at the Milwaukee Art Museum in 1975.
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Steven Lisberger's TRON is released, about a programmer (Jeff Bridges) zapped by laser into a computer mainframe, and featuring now-primitive computer graphics that are still pretty awesome. It's considered one of the prime examples of virtual reality in pop culture.
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Before 1995, VRML 1.0 - Virtual Reality Modeling Language, or <i>vermal</i> if pronounced by it's initials - is the standard file format for representing 3D graphics on the web. Its newest edition, VRML 2.0, was introduced in 1997, and is now standard.
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The Matrix, released in the US in 1999, is another example of virtual reality in pop culture. Featuring countless famous scenes, the graphics of this movie still measure up and earned it $750 million worldwide.
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NATAL technology is being researched. NATAL is a 3D interractive technology.
