Italy

Virtual travel to Italy in VR180

La dolce vita comes to life in immersive VR. Glide through Venice’s timeless canals, hike the dramatic peaks of the Dolomites, and wander through centuries of history. Italy’s unmatched combination of natural beauty, art, and culture creates experiences that stir the soul. Bellissimo in 8K VR180.

Italy in our library is two places, and they could hardly be less alike. Most of these titles are in the Dolomites and the rest are in Venice. The Dolomites give VR180 the thing it likes best, a foreground that means something: Cadini Di Missurina and Tre Cime Loop of Legends both work because there is a trail directly under your feet and a wall of pale limestone a long way behind it, and stereo keeps those two facts honestly separated instead of pasting them onto one plane. Venice does the exact opposite. It is close, tight and reflective, and Drifting Through Venice from the seat of a gondola is enclosed in the best possible way, walls within reach on both sides.

The Dolomites material is summer material. Alpine Meadow Wander and Sass de Putia Circuit are full of buttercups, open pasture and traditional huts, which in the eastern Alps means roughly June through September, once the snow is off the passes and the rifugi are open. Lago di Braies shows up twice at two different hours and it is worth watching both: Lago di Braies Adventure at working pace with the wooden rowboats out on the water, and Lago di Braies Dawn held completely still for the mirror reflection that only exists in the few minutes before the wind gets up. Tre Cime Stream is the quiet corner of the same region, clear meltwater winding through meadow beneath the towers.

Seceda Adventure is the single best argument for the region, walking the ridgeline down off the peaks to a chalet where strudel is waiting, and Alpine Twin Lakes threads the path between two emerald tarns. Venice then arrives as the counterweight, and it works better at the end of a session than the start: Gondolas of Venice is two fixed minutes at sunset with the boats bobbing at the shore, and after an hour of high limestone it lands like a held breath.

New to the Italian set? Start with Seceda Adventure, five minutes on the Dolomites’ most recognisable ridgeline and the clearest case for mountains in a headset. Drifting Through Venice is the other Italy, at water level, going nowhere in particular for four minutes.

The two halves of this set lead naturally into Mountains and Cities.