Some of you may have noticed a sort of 3D renaissance taking place recently in the entertainment industry. Such high-profile, quality releases as Beowulf and My Bloody Valentine 3D haven't been doing the movement a whole lot of favors, but James Cameron's next magnum opus—and first feature film since Titanic—is being filmed in 3D. All kinds of wacky stuff is being produced to play in 3D in IMAX theatres, as well. If you didn't know any better, you'd think this was some crazy new technology threatening to revolutionize entertainment. Especially if you're one of our younger readers, you may not be aware that this stuff already had its time, and guess what? It failed miserably.

This point is relevant because plenty of other firms are trying to get stereoscopic 3D going on your computer, too, including Nvidia with its GeForce 3D Vision. A kiosk I continually pass by at Fry's Electronics has a monitor tweaked for stereoscopic vision, too. All you have to do is put on these crazy 3D glasses and you, too, can enjoy Hellgate: London (yes, this really is one of the games they demo it with) in stereoscopic, questionable-quality 3D! Given how well it worked, I wouldn't pay five bucks for it, much less three figures.

I'm not inclined to point fingers at this company or that company when I say 3D is frankly still an awful idea. Consider what's arguably one of the best stereoscopic 3D implementations on the market right now: Nvidia's GeForce 3D Vision. I'm told it produces excellent image quality, but there are some real barriers of entry here. The technology requires a 120Hz monitor, and it incurs a fairly precipitous performance drop. Most damningly, while it's pretty much offering the pinnacle of 3D glasses, the fact that 3D glasses are even present is a problem in itself. If I take a head count of my close friends, at least 50% of them wear glasses, and while that's anecdotal (I also associate with an abnormally large number of southpaws, for what it's worth), it's still indicative of a large number of people for whom 3D frankly isn't going to work that well. Ever put 3D glasses on over your regular glasses?

The problem is that stereoscopic 3D is still, in my opinion, more or less asinine. When I have to put on these kooky glasses (or fit them over my regular glasses, which is uncomfortable at best), I feel like it just screams "gimmick." In fact, the whole concept has always felt like a gimmick to me. All I have to do is pop out my Freddy's Dead: The Final Nightmare DVD for proof of that. The 3D finale of the movie isn't just a failure because the movie sucks (and it does, but I love it anyway), but because 3D just isn't all that exciting. It had a very brief run of popularity in the 70s and 80s before dying a well-deserved death. I love Captain EO as much as the next guy, but 3D had to go.

You can read the entire article at The Tech Report.