Virtual Reality

Bigscreen Beyond, the slim and light PC VR headset released late last year, is getting its first ever Black Friday deal. Starting this week, you can nab a free Audio Strap with purchase.

Bigscreen Beyond is small, partly because it relies on the SteamVR tracking ecosystem and doesn’t need inside-out tracking sensors, and partly because it includes dual 2,560 × 2,560 micro-OLED displays, which are paired with space (and weight) saving pancake lenses.

In fact, it’s so light, it weighs in at just a few grams less than the optional Audio Strap itself: 127g Beyond, 160g Audio Strap.

As Soundscape recently announced, the immersive VR concert experience featuring deadmau5 is now available for free on YouTube. The one-hour concert film features the complete audiovisual performance that originally premiered exclusively on Soundscape's VR and PC platform in May 2024.

According to Eric Alexander, creator of Soundscape, the release on YouTube is intended to bring the concert experience to a wider audience. "This release allows anyone with an internet connection to enjoy the groundbreaking combination of music and technology," says Alexander.

The performance uses Unreal Engine 5 and proprietary technologies such as Soundscape's "Sonic AI" transformation system. The concert has already been nominated for five international XR Awards for its technical innovations.

Soundscape has already announced its next major collaboration for 2025: A collaborative project with DJs Chris Lake and Fisher is in the works.

By Grit Alone is simultaneously one of the best experiences I've had in a VR horror game, and one of the most in dire need of a final polish pass. The earnest creativity on display is so endearing that I can't help but fall in love, but I also recognize that some will be frustrated. By Grit Alone lives up to its name, feeling like a Herculean effort by a small team trying their utmost to deliver on a unique sci-fi horror that might one day stand shoulder to shoulder with the likes of iconic classics like its primary inspiration, Dead Space. That is, if they ever get the balancing right.

By Grit Alone puts you in the shoes of a nameless passenger aboard a cryo transport. Waking up early due to a hazardous crash in an anomalous region of space that defies logical explanation, you're thrust into danger from the get-go. You're essentially trapped in a space-equivalent Bermuda Triangle, and you're here with some really twisted neighbors. Before you get a chance to meet them, you're dodging malfunctioning equipment and blowing up debris, only to suddenly be attacked by insectoid aliens deeply keen on removing your brain from your body. It's quite a wake-up call, and that's before we get to the gothic cathedral ship straight out of Warhammer 40k, an alien infested day spa, and a mad AI that may or may not be working in your best interest.

I don't make the positive Dead Space comparison lightly. Besides the obvious bona fides, like Dead Space (2008) scribe Antony Johnston himself co-writing alongside Emma Beeby, there's so much evident inspiration. Every weapon has dual-purposes, whether it's your ammo doubling as grenades, or your blaster serving as a modular shotgun/marksman rifle that changes firing mode based on if it's held in two hands or one. There are sections where you have to think like an engineer, manipulating ship subsystems to survive while hordes of enemies and other hazards encroach around you. Developer Crooks Peaks even translated the stomp attack over, and yes, it works on more than just the enemy.

Augmented World Expo (AWE) isn’t just one of the longest-running conferences focused on immersive tech, it’s also become the most important annual XR conference on our calendar.

In the early days there were many industry conferences that had a significant draw for the pioneers of XR’s modern epoch. There were XR pockets within big tech conferences like CES, GDC, and E3. There were company-specific events like Oculus Connect and Unity’s Vision Summit. And there were early grass-roots events like SVVR, VRLA, and a host of local meetups across the globe that built lasting networks of XR believers.

While many of these events have since faded, the connections they fostered have not. More than any other XR conference that I’ve attended, AWE USA feels like the event that has absorbed the spirit of those early conferences.

Since I started attending AWE USA in 2018, the conference has only grown and offered increasingly more interesting and valuable sessions, exhibitors, and networking. It has steadily evolved into what I consider the must-go event for the XR industry. Despite its scale, it carries the torch of passion that ignited the XR space back when it was little more than kickstarters, meetups, and those crazy enough to believe that immersive tech was not only possible to build, but worth building.

Microsoft Flight Simulator 2024 provides players with a virtual reality recreation of Earth that offers a sense of unmatched realism. Despite initial launch setbacks, the game promises thrilling aviation adventures and limitless exploration.

Beyond the game's familiar focus on aerial navigation, the 2024 release of Flight Simulator allows players to land and explore on foot, enhancing the game's depth. There are still severe mapping imperfections at street level, but the ongoing improvements to this 3D mapping tech conjure up dreams of a future iteration of Flight Simulator where one day we hopefully get to exit our aircraft and walk among much higher detailed streets in any city across the globe. It's going to be a while before we see that level of realism, though, so don’t hold your breath on this type of detail appearing any time soon in games like this one.

With DLSS aiding performance for those players equipped with an RTX series NVIDIA GPU, maintaining the game's level of detail still requires significant computing power. The heft of this game sometimes stresses even high-end systems when flying in densely populated areas, so to experience the game at the highest visual fidelity and frame rates, a powerful PC is essential.

Running the game on a rig with the specs listed above, I still faced performance challenges in busy airspace when the game's VR graphics settings were dialed up to ultra. The sheer complexity and demands of this simulation reveal the need for some serious hardware, so if you don’t have a powerful PC, I wouldn’t recommend going above the low setting. Even though it might make the image quality suffer further, you might want to consider turning off any antialiasing options in the game. Performance will likely improve with updates, as it did with the 2020 version of the game, but until then, those without a top-end gaming rig will need to dial things back a bit.

Ultimately, Microsoft Flight Simulator 2024 is more than just a game, it's an invitation for new generations of virtual pilots to chase their childhood dreams across an ever-expanding virtual world.

Pico 4 Ultra comes with Pico Motion Trackers, three games, and one month of VRChat Plus in ByteDance's Black Friday deal. Those three games are Blade & Sorcery: Nomad, Pistol Whip, and Synth Riders, and the deal ends after December 2. Pico Motion Trackers, normally €90/£80, strap to your ankles to add leg tracking in supported titles, which includes Blade & Sorcery: Nomad and VRChat. They're an accessory Meta says it won't follow unless they turn out to be a massive success. The deal is available everywhere Pico 4 Ultra is sold, which still doesn't include North America.

For those in regions it is sold, ByteDance pitches Pico 4 Ultra as a higher-end alternative to Meta Quest 3, with 4GB more RAM and higher resolution passthrough, as well as faster charging and longer battery life. In our hands-on impressions we found it to be a comfortable headset with passthrough that is better in some ways than Quest 3, but worse in others, that's held back by lenses that are better than Quest 3S but worse than Quest 3. On the content side though, ByteDance is focusing far less on VR gaming now than it did with Pico 4, having canceled a Beat Saber competitor, handed off its would-be exclusive Just Dance VR to Meta, and not announcing any major exclusive titles. You'll find a decent percentage of Quest games on the Pico Store, sure, but what you won't find is just as notable. ByteDance's new focus appears to be making Pico OS a competitive spatial computing platform, and it's reportedly working on an Apple Vision Pro competitor. Still, this Black Friday deal offers great value for those already considering Pico 4 Ultra, and the leg tracking provided by Pico Motion Trackers is something you simply won't find on Meta's standalone platform.

VR manufacturer Pimax unveiled a number of updates and product announcements at its latest keynote. These included the final specifications and design of the new Crystal Super VR headset. According to Pimax, the Crystal Super achieves a retina-level resolution of 57 pixels per degree (PPD) and should therefore offer unsurpassed clarity.

Specs of the Pimax Crystal Super

The key data of the Pimax Crystal Super at a glance:

3840 × 3840 pixels per eye in the QLED version
120° horizontal field of view
Aspherical glass lenses with 99% light transmission and 280 nits brightness
Local Dimming 2.0 with 1000 zones per eye for high contrasts
Integrated eye tracking and inside-out tracking
Controllers are included in the scope of delivery
Pimax Play offers features such as dynamic foveated rendering and upscaling
Interchangeable optical engines, either Micro-OLED or 50 PPD QLED

The Crystal Super has been optimized in size and weight compared to its predecessors, the Crystal, and Crystal Light. The housing volume has been reduced by almost 30% and the ergonomics have been improved for greater comfort.

Thanks to Dynamic Foveated Rendering and upscaling, the VR headset should also run smoothly on mid-range PCs. According to Pimax, the high pixel density makes it possible to reduce anti-aliasing and thus save system resources.

Pimax is also lowering the entry price of the Crystal Super to $1,695. When the Crystal Super was announced in April, the VR manufacturer set the price at $1,799.

A new financing model is designed to make the purchase decision easier: You pay $999 upfront and then either $696 as a one-time payment or 24 monthly instalments of $32.99 each as part of the new Pimax Prime membership.

Kayak and Alyx at the Shiftall HQ with a pre-production MeganeX.

Almost four years after the original PS5 was released, the higher-end PlayStation 5 Pro is here with a mid-generation upgrade. Available now from $700, the PS5 Pro features a 2TB SSD, a 45% more powerful GPU with 2-3x faster ray tracing and PlayStation Spectral Super Resolution (PSSR) - which doesn't support PS VR2 at launch but will in a future update - which is a neural upscaling technology similar to NVIDIA's DLSS.

This should allow developers to run PS VR2 games at a higher framerate or refresh rate. Sony only confirmed two PS VR2 games would have a PS5 Pro patch at launch, and more are continuing to emerge. We've also highlighted any upcoming games with confirmed PS5 Pro support. However, we've excluded games without dedicated enhancements that still have minor performance improvements.

Two additional games with PS VR2 support - Resident Evil 4 Remake and Resident Evil Village - have PS5 Pro patches, though it's currently unclear if these performance benefits are only for the flatscreen editions or if they extend to PlayStation VR2 as well. We've contacted Capcom for clarification but until we know more, we've left them off the list. For now, here's a list of PlayStation VR2 games with PS5 Pro enhancements that we're currently aware of.

Sony has announced Black Friday deals on Playstation products, including Playstation VR 2, on the Playstation Blog.

Offers are valid from November 22 to December 2, 2024 and include hardware discounts via Playstation Direct and at participating retailers. Offers will vary by region and retailer, but an image on the Playstation Blog suggests that Playstation VR 2 could be up to 40 percent off.

We won't know for sure until November 22, when the offers appear on the official Black Friday website and Playstation Direct website.

This year's deals include PSVR 2 as well as other hardware such as PS5 consoles, Dual Sense wireless controllers, Pulse Elite wireless headsets and Pulse Explore wireless earphones. In addition, a wide range of software will be discounted on the Playstation Store.

Microsoft Flight Simulator 2024 is out now, and we've verified that it has VR support at launch. However, like many others, we're unable to get past the loading screen, due to server issues that Microsoft has acknowledged in a public statement: "We are aware of user reports of long initial loading times into Microsoft Flight Simulator 2024.

With so many users initializing the sim concurrently, we have a large number of server requests. We are working to help resolve the issues as soon as possible.

For users whose initial load is past 90% and no longer progressing, we recommend a reboot. Otherwise we advise waiting to allow the loading to proceed as normal."

Two years ago, Valve told The Verge it wanted a successor to its cult classic Steam Controller, whose incredibly customizable buttons and touchpads paved the way for the Steam Deck handheld PC. Now, Valve watcher Brad Lynch claims a Steam Controller 2 — codename “Ibex” — is actually getting made.

His sources tell him the Steam Controller 2 is currently being tooled for mass production, and it’s apparently not the only new Valve gamepad on the way!

Remember the long-swirling rumors about Valve’s standalone “Deckard” VR headset, the one that could be an inexpensive Meta Quest-like wireless alternative to the aging Valve Index? Lynch has discovered references to a new wand-like “Roy” controller in Valve’s SteamVR code, and his sources say that Roy is now aimed at mass production as well.

What’s more, “Roy” may have enough buttons to double as a Steam Controller gamepad when it’s not acting as your hands in VR. Unlike the Index wands, they’ll apparently have a D-pad, bumpers (aka shoulder buttons), and a full set of ABXY buttons for traditional gaming as well.

Currently in closed early access, Orion Drift packages in Gorilla Tag’s immersive movement mechanic with some of the action of the now-defunct sports game Echo VR, promising to serve up an activity-packed social VR space for up to 200 players.

Now, Another Axiom says it’s opening Orion Drift to Quest users for a server scalability test that’s set to last two days: November 20th – 21st. Doors open at 10AM PST on November 20th—check your local time here. […]

In the meantime, you can already grab Orion Drift on the Horizon Store, which supports Quest 2 headsets and above.

Let's first take a look at where virtual reality is today.

Meta has sold well over 20 million Quest units, but the more important question is how many people are using the devices on a regular basis. The VR platform had about 6 million monthly active users in October 2022, according to a Wall Street Journal report, though more recent numbers aren't available.

It is doubtful that the number of active users has reached ten million or more, but even if it has, it shows that virtual reality is still far from being a technology that many people use actively, especially outside its largest market, the United States.

What does mass adoption actually mean?

The question, of course, is how do we define mass adoption? Are we talking about 50, 100, 500 million active users, or even something on the order of smartphones? The answer would be different for each of those numbers.

I don't want to commit to a specific number, so I'll put it this way: VR will be adopted by the masses when it is useful in people's everyday lives and outperforms other technological devices in terms of usefulness, rather than being primarily entertainment.

Meta Quest does not do this yet. Currently, the most popular uses for the headset are gaming, social, and fitness. Games are entertainment. While the latter two applications can be considered useful in a strict sense, there are numerous alternatives to VR headsets. The added value of VR is not great enough for the masses to be social or exercise primarily in VR headsets.

VR headsets need to become full-fledged computers

I believe that VR headsets will not be ready for mass adoption until they mature into lightweight, easy-to-use, general-purpose computers that allow you to do your work more efficiently than other computers.

Meta Quest and Apple Vision Pro are still a long way off. The devices must be significantly lighter and smaller (ideally less than 150 grams), provide a flawless view of the physical world, and establish an entirely new input paradigm that can replace touch input as well as mouse and keyboard.

If we look at where we are today, it is clear that we are only at the beginning of VR's evolution, and I would imagine that true AR glasses could achieve these critical features sooner than VR headsets, but we'll have to see.

Finally, I'd like to say that I don't think it's necessarily a bad thing if VR headsets don't reach mass adoption, at least not to the extent that the majority of people use them on a daily basis. They can be a successful product and enrich the lives of many people without becoming the next big computing platform.

At the moment, the market is not there yet and is too dependent on Meta, but I hope that will slowly change over the next decade.

Most of you know about the MS8K by now. For those who do not: it is a new Lighthouse PCVR headset from a Panasonic spin-off called “shiftall”. The headset sports two 4k microOLED panels, pancake lenses, motorised IPD adjustment, Diopter adjustment and a very sleek overall design that weighs in at only 185g.

I had a whole afternoon with the device at the shiftall headquarters in Tokyo and could check out whatever I wanted on their 4070super PC they had set up for this test session. And yeah, I really wanted to try out Microsoft Flight Simulator, since it has become one of my favourite things to do in VR.

And I am happy to tell you that the experience blew me away. This was the best experience I have ever had in MSFS. Period. What made it so good? The immersion in this headset is just so fantastic, the headset ticks so many boxes:

Visuals - more pixels than the Apple Vision Pro, also microOLED. And the beautiful thing is: really good lenses. Much better pancake lenses than in the Bigscreen Beyond. You get a really good edge to edge clarity here and much less glare. The lenses are very comparable with the Quest 3 lenses. Now since this also has a near perfect binocular overlap and a standard FOV (around 100h), you simply get the best visuals that I have so far seen in VR. Yes, even sharper than AVP and that with DisplayPort. Exactly what we VR enthusasiast crave.

Comfort - the headset is just so incredibly comfortable. It’s a soft strap that is designed in the halo way. So the headset is not pressed against your eyes but hovers in front of them. And the gasket itself is comparable to that of the PSVR2, so it is just there to keep the light out. Nice. Also, there is eye relief, so you can get the lenses as close to your eyes as you want, or leave more room if that is better for you. Real IPD adjustment is built in as well and its realised with motors. You set up your IPD in their software and the lenses move to the correct position. Nice! Also there is even diopter adjustment. All that in a package that only weighs 185g. It was so comfortable I forgot I was wearing it.

Downsides - Yes, there are downsides, too. We do not yet have the perfect headset. In my opinion, it is not a very bright headset. It is very comparable to the brightness of the Bigscreen Beyond. So if that is alright for you, this one will be too. But yeah, there are without a doubt brighter headsets out there. The team tells me that the pre-production unit I was using still did not show me the highest brightness yet. It was configured to be as colour-accurate as possible and that meant it was not optimised for brightness. They say they can give us 10 to 15% more brightness in the production unit. Other than that, there is no audio. So you have to take care of your own audio. I personally prefer audio that is built-into the system, or at least an audio strap like the great one of the Bigscreen Beyond.

Overall, I walked away impressed. I truly believe this is the next go-to headset for PCVR enthusiasts who simply want the best visuals that are possible right now. I personally can’t wait to get it for MSFS 2024 and actually all of my other PCVR games!

We’ve all seen Silent Hill 2 flourish over the years. When Team Silent carefully crafted this incredible survival horror experience, players would end up playing the game endlessly for well over a decade. It’s such a highly cherished game that there was plenty of concern when Konami finally unveiled that a remake was coming. Now that it’s here, fans are able to breathe easy, as it’s quite a stunning game to play.

Bloober Team worked extra hard to ensure that it met fans’ expectations when Silent Hill 2 was released. It’s a very well-done game, and I suggest playing it if you are at all intrigued. However, if you have the game on PC and want to get a little more immersed, this VR mod might do the trick. Thanks to Videogamer, we’re finding out today about a mod that might take you further into this nightmarish hell.

Praydog released a VR mod for the game, and it looks like something you will want to try out cautiously. The gameplay features smooth movement and the ability to use melee weapons accurately. Depending on where you swing, it will allow the melee weapon to pinpoint an area on the enemy’s body carefully. You’ll get a small look at the mod in action from the X post embedded above.

We wish that there was an official VR mode release for this game. But perhaps even the development studio wasn’t keen on bringing this level of horror to players. Regardless, those brave enough to take on the challenge can now do so with the mod. Meanwhile, the rest of us might be waiting to learn more about what the next thrilling Silent Hill installment will offer.

The well-known graphics card manufacturer Nvidia is venturing into new realms. As DigiTimes reports, the company is developing its own ARM-based processors for the PC market. The launch is planned for September 2025 - a strategically clever time, as Qualcomm's exclusive rights for Windows-on-ARM will then expire.

Nvidia definitely has the technical expertise: Years of experience in the areas of graphics processors, AI and ARM architectures form a solid foundation. The company is pursuing two potential approaches for the new chips: A mainstream variant with integrated graphics or a powerful gaming CPU combined with a separate graphics card.

New opportunities for mobile PC VR gaming

The potential impact on mobile PC VR gaming is particularly exciting: powerful and energy-efficient ARM processors could create the basis for a new generation of gaming laptops. These would be ideal for PC VR gaming, for example with your Meta Quest 3 — without having to sacrifice mobility.

The greatest challenge will be software support. Modern games and VR applications must run smoothly on the ARM architecture. This is where Nvidia could benefit from its close relationships with the gaming industry.

Meta has added an important puzzle piece to Horizon Worlds, as the company has quietly rolled out its premium digital currency on the social VR platform in the US, UK, and Canada.

Roblox has Robux, Rec Room has Tokens, and Horizon Worlds now has Meta Credits, letting users buy in-world digital goods from creators, such as avatar outfits and access keys to premium worlds. Unlike Quest Cash, Meta Credits can’t be used to buy hardware or accessories, just stuff in Horizon Worlds.

While it’s a big step, this isn’t the official start of the Horizon Worlds economy. Meta has been experimenting with monetization on Horizon Worlds since 2022, allowing users to buy digital goods directly with their local currency. The difference with Meta Credits (like all premium tokens) however is the all-too familiar obfuscation of the amount of real-world money being spent.

Apple has released a new immersive music video from The Weeknd featuring his latest single ‘Open Hearts’, which is available exclusively on Vision Pro for a limited time.

Captured in Apple’s Immersive Video format, Open Hearts serves up 180-degree immersive views and spatial audio set to eponymous single from the Canadian pop artist’s upcoming album ‘Hurry Up Tomorrow’.

With Metro Awakening, Vertigo Games delivers a gripping post-apocalyptic shooter that tells a successful prequel story over twelve chapters. No prior knowledge of the Metro books or games is required, making it easy to jump in.

The interaction with the world and the gadgets works really well. The handling of the weapons is convincing. Most of the fights are exciting, and the soundtrack is well arranged. Plus: There are plenty of scary moments thanks to the great play of light and shadow and the mutant enemies you'll confront.

Graphically, the Quest version performs quite well, without reaching the quality of Batman: Arhkam Shadow. For a visual comparison between the Quest 3 and PSVR 2 versions, take a look at the linked article.

However, I hesitate to give the game a full recommendation. The level design and the locations are not varied enough for me, especially in the later parts.

Other points of criticism include the sometimes predictable actions of the enemies, the unfair distribution of save points, and the fact that there are far too few creative puzzles. However, if you can overlook these flaws, you will be entertained for seven to nine hours at a good level.

Little Cities: Diorama is the first mixed reality version of the cozy city builder. Its creator Purple Yonder developed the Vision Pro version together with nDreams studio Near Light.

Gears & Goo is a tower defense game developed for Apple Vision Pro by Resolution Games (Demeo, Blaston, Racket Club).

2023 was an excellent year for VR games, and 2024 will even surpass it in terms of quality and especially quantity.

Since October, the number of releases has increased so much that even we are struggling to keep up. Our inboxes are overflowing with announcements of new VR games and updates to existing titles. At times, it feels like developers have been waiting two years or more to release their products at the same time.

The timing is no coincidence: The low-cost Meta Quest 3S was released in mid-October, and VR studios are naturally hoping for a bumper holiday season. Of course, it would be foolish not to take advantage of this unique opportunity.

There are currently rumors that game sales are not as strong as some established VR studios had hoped for with the launch of Quest 3S. Generally, two factors are being cited: the merging of the App Lab and the Quest Store, which has eliminated curation, and Meta's recommendation system, which is said to prioritize Horizon Worlds content over third-party titles that studios have been working on for years. Both of these factors could have led to lower visibility in the Horizon Store and therefore lower sales.

Another possible factor for the alleged decline in sales could be that Meta is currently throwing so many high-quality VR games at new customers for free that they have no reason to buy new VR games, which of course hurts the ecosystem.

Clone Drone in the Danger Zone (2021), the hit arena battler from indie studio Doborog, is bringing the game’s voxel slice-em-up action in a new VR-exclusive sequel next month, coming to Quest and PC VR headsets.

Called Clone Drone in the Hyperdome, the new single-player VR experience includes a thick slice of the series’ unique combat and action-based storyline, where players fight to the death against killer robots—which just so happen to be very frangible.

Doborog says in Clone Drone in the Hyperdome, players take on the role of Blink, a teleporting robot who is the newest ‘looprunner’ gladiator forced to compete in Crashloop, a deadly roguelike combat sport.

bHaptics, the South Korea-based VR haptics creator, announced it’s launching a refreshed lineup of its most popular haptics hardware, which are said to support over 270 titles across Quest, PSVR 2, and PC VR headsets.

The company today announced pre-orders for three new accessories: TactSuit Pro, TactSuit Air and TactSleeve.

Pre-orders for all three are set to launch today, November 12th, and go until November 26th.