I have seen the YouTube video about the Tobii Eye/Head tracker for use in FS or other sims and games, and it is suggested that it is an alternative to VR? An interesting concept, but it is not an alternative to VR. The view on the screen changes with movement but you are still looking at a flat screen and the room around you., and as you turn your head or eyes left, right, up or down you are not looking at the monitor or TV but in your room. In VR you can look behind you and see the rear of the aircraft. VR gives a fully immersive experience of near reality, Eye/Head tracking does not.
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Yeah, I saw that video too. I have a 43" 4K monitor plus TrackIR, but rarely use them in the sim. What I did find 2D plus head tracking useful for was learning to fly things like the FBW A320Neo, as using the MCDU and other stuff was easier to operate in 2D. Decent haptic feedback VR gloves for VR that allow you to handle dials, switches and the MCDU buttons would be great.
Even without that, you canāt beat VR though. 
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Itās a nice in-between. Personally, I donāt like VR because I canāt use all my external programs, and it makes all my physical hardware more difficult/impossible to operate. VR is great for immersion while bush flying, and Tobii is the perfect middle ground for everything else. Iām not going to stare through VR during a two hour cruise. Thatās too similar to my actual job.
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I tried VR and it was kinda neat, but really impractical ā that inability to see my actual physical environment meant I couldnāt take a drink, pet my cat, alt+tab to another window, check my phone, eat a snack, or just move slightly without hitting something by mistake.
Finally gave in and tried a TrackIR head tracker and itās great. Took a little getting used to the āstretchingā of the rotation/translation amounts (the camera will pan at an exagerrated rate, so you can look directly behind you if you like with a smaller movement of your head) but itās a huge improvement in usability over VR IMHO.
Takes all kinds, of course, many people enjoy VR very much and more power to them. 
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VR is nice, but itās got a long, long, long, way to go. I prefer head tracking and a nice oled screen for the time being. And just to clarify, with head tracking I can see the rear of the aircraft, look under the dash, stick my head out of the window and look down, etc. Adjusting the sensitivity curves properly is essential.
I have to admit that certain cockpits do look fantastic in VR, like the AN-2 and Caribou.
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I used TrackIR for years, and I was very happy with it. It took awhile to get used to VR, but now there is no going back to head tracking. The difference is like flying a plane vs flying a radio controlled model plane. It helps if you have a full HOTAS and rudder setup. I canāt imagine flying VR with a keyboard. There is no substitute for VR with full HOTAS.
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You donāt need Tobii. There are phone apps that let you use your phone/tablet for head tracking. It works great and adds A LOT of ādepthā if you donāt have VR. But comparing it on any level to VR is impossible. Before VR was supported i used to play with head tracking and just a few months ago i was without a headset for a month or two and i figured iād use head tracking until i get a new headsetā¦and oh man, lolā¦i quit playing altogether until i got VR back
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100% agreed. Eye tracking in VR, absolutely, very useful. On its own with pancake thoughā¦ not interested. I used Track-ir for years and years, and it was good, but after experiencing even mediocre VR, let alone great VR, thereās just no going back to pancake at all, tracking or not.
HOTAS is pretty much required though, at least until passthrough cameras ( and displays) become high enough resolution to negate the need for it, though Iād prefer hand tracking natively in the sim. That would probably be the best of both worlds currently, but the only step Iām really interested in next is a Holodeck. 
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sadly thereās only a small subset of headsets that do this. What Iād" rather have is reliable hand tracking. VTOL VR but with your hands.
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Note that eye tracking is something different from head tracking, and Iām not sure why Iād want it in the first place.
Head tracking is great though; VR fans know this because itās a fundamental component of the VR experience. It can also be done without the screen strapped to your face, though, and thatās where people disagree.
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I prefer to feel the real deal with VR 
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i want to give you a thousand likes for this post its absolutely spot on
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I donāt know very many GA aircraft that have a HOTASā¦ And having reasonably accurate physical hardware to interact with is more important to me than a VR image. My cockpit hardware setup allows me to do everything in the GA aircraft that I fly in the sim, without touching the mouse or keyboard. And my TrackIR allows me to look around outside the cockpit at the places I should be looking, just by turning my head.
As others have said here, the head tracker gain curves can be configured to even allow looking behind oneself (e.g. checking that the area behind is clear before starting oneās runup). The human brain is an amazing thing and it quickly adapts to the non-linearity of the head motion, so it soon feels completely natural.
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Yes, being able to look behind you with a slight turn of the head is the one thing I miss in VR. You are correct, sim pit builders and VR users are two separate camps (usually). Bondjpfās rig is quite the setup.
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Itās great for VR because it allows foveated rendering wherever you look without having to move your head.
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I cant disagree more lol.
It is impossible for me to fly pancake after using VR.
Its like someone giving you a glossy PHOTO of a new car vs actually handing you the keys and stepping INTO your car and driving it.
Yes there are drawbacks to VR, but to me it is a thousand times more immersive than pancake.
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Last week I did some VFR flying around Tokyo in VR. The live weather was great with multiple broken cloud layers.
I decided to head toward Mount Fuji and couldnāt see it even though I was getting close. Turned out to be hidden behind clouds rising above the general layers. So I just kept flying toward it via instruments and hoping I wouldnāt slam into it. Cloud segments were whooshing by my cockpit and my head kept anxiously switching between scanning the outside and the instruments.
Suddenly, the clouds parted dramatically and there, right in front of me, rises Mount Fuji in all its glory with its top glistening in the sun. You just donāt get viscereal goose bump moments like that without VR.
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I love flying in VR with multiple cloud layers
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Some comments from long time:
- TrackIR user
- triple monitor setup user
- triple monitor with TrackiIR user
- VR user
- moderate cockpit builder (up to 300 knobs/switches/buttons not exactly representing any actual plane)
- Air manager/Touch screen user.
If your focus is on airliners with complex cockpits and IFR procedures, this is probably best for you:
- triple display, TrackIR (or similar), some kind of cockpit with knobs/switches/buttons.
You are focused on operating the equipment, charts, noting VATSIM clearances. And on the gauges as required for IFR. There is not much outside to look at, especially if you enjoy marginal conditions for shooting difficult approaches.
If your focus is on small GA planes, VFR and warbirds (DCS) the best setup is probably:
- VR
- some kind of panel with knobs/switches/buttons (not so many for a GA planes, especially without glass cockpit) to fly mostly without keyboard and mouse.
Your focus is on the external world, scenery and beautiful stereoscopic immersive rendering of the airplane cockpit. And on the outside world as required for VFR. Not so difficult to operate the physical panel in VR, muscle memory will help, especially if you have wide array of different shapes and sizes of your switches and button and dual encoders with pushbuttons as your knobs).
You can still fly IFR in VR (I did it with Aerosoft CRJ, in VATSIM, copying clearances in VR on Wacom tablet, and controlling external apps on the Windows desktop brought into VR, with physical FMS keyboard operated in the blind). But it was a bit hardcore, only because Iām already VR-addicted.
And you can fly VFR with flat display and TrackIR, but this is probably because you never experienced proper VR with strong enough PC - such investment is not for everyone.
In both cases three things matter a lot to the immersion:
- ability to look around either via head/eyes tracker with big display/triples or VR,
- panel with knobs/switches/buttons (and of course yoke/stick, throttle quadrant and preferably rudder pedals) to get rid of the mouse most of the time,
- VATSIM for voice communication and some challenge coming from following the procedures of the real world with the real people.
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Fixed that for youā¦
Off topic but relevant: Vatsim isnāt great for VFR flying and is overrated. (They often donāt know what to do with you, and their top down sytem of control where you often just talk to a single controller means that one of the biggest challenges of operating VFR in complex airspace - knowing who to talk to where and when - is eliminated.)
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