Carmack was key for many aspects of modern VR and I'm currently still enjoying the fruits of his labours. Even a partial success is pretty good for someone like him.
Right, saying he couldn’t get anyone to listen to him is super reductionist. No one cared about hobbyist VR until Carmack started working with Luckey and got the software to run a lot faster. It was him taking it seriously that helped get the ball rolling for the VR boom.