A game studio with zero hardware experience is building a VR-ready console

Enlarge / Slightly Mad Studios likes to promote the VR modes of its Project Cars games. Now its CEO wants to build a living-room gaming box built for high-end VR gaming. (credit: Slightly Mad Studios)

Are you ready for another video game console, complete with promises of high-speed performance for 4K TVs and wireless VR headsets? Are you ready to believe that such a system can be delivered by a game-development studio with zero hardware launches in its history?

Wednesday's announcement of a new console, dubbed the Mad Box, comes courtesy of Ian Bell, CEO and founder of Slightly Mad Studios. And Bell clarified to Ars Technica that he expects the console to launch in "three-plus years" at a "standard plus next-gen price."

The London-based studio is best known for the Project Cars racing-game series on PCs and consoles, which includes its own impressive VR implementation on PCs. But Slightly Mad has no history with hardware production.

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