That Valve and HTC have partnered for a virtual reality headset dubbed HTC Vive, which is powered by SteamVR and anticipated to make its way to consumers in 2016 is old news.
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.
One such lucky employee is Valve's Chandler Murch who decided to put the HTC Vive to good use by proposing to girlfriend Kelly Tortorice.
She shared the details on her Facebook page, divulging that Murch invited an unsuspecting Kelly to Valve's office. Kelly was told that she would be helping him test out some features of the VR headset at Valve Software Corporation's headquarters in Bellevue.
"So there I was, typical day... on a sunken ship deck; fixing robots; painting three-dimensional fire; walking through the Alps. Suddenly, a virtual engagement ring started floating my way," wrote Tortorice on Facebook.
Chandler asked a befuddled Kelly to grab the virtual engagement ring. Once she took off her headset, Kelly saw her fiancé bending down on one knee ready to propose, with a real ring and the wand in hand.
A surprised Kelly accepted the proposal and agreed to marry her boyfriend.
The images posted to Kelly's Facebook page reveal that Chandler walked toward her with the HTC Vive wand controller in hand. The trackable wand controller created the illusion of the ring floating in her direction as Kelly watched the events unfold through her VR headset.
Even though the release of the HTC Vive is being promoted as end 2015 - possibly in time for the holiday season, neither HTC nor Steam have been forthcoming with an exact date. 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.
