News – Page 4

Quest 3 Teardown Shows Just How Slim the Headset Really Is

Meta Quest 3, News, quest 3, quest 3 ifixit, quest 3 repair, quest 3 teardown, Standalone VR Headset / Rejus Almole / October 17, 2023

Less than a week since launch, Quest 3 has already gotten the full iFixit teardown treatment, showing off just how slim (and seemingly difficult to repair) the headset really is.

iFixit’s Shahram Mokhtari pried apart Quest 3, revealing the innards of Meta’s new $500 mixed reality standalone. The short of it: it’s pretty complicated to dismantle and there aren’t any repair parts as such, getting a [4/10] repairability score in Mokhtari’s video (linked below).

Getting past the user-removable bits is simple enough. Take off the headstrap and pop out the facial interface, as anyone would do to install either aftermarket or first-party accessories. Removing the rubberized face plate, which isn’t meant to be user-removable, proved challenging though, as Mokhtari snapped an internal clip with his plastic spudger, and by the looks of it, busted the top structural bridge of the face plate too.

That’s some pretty thin plastic—forgivable enough since Meta likely designed the headset to make weight savings wherever possible. Still, something to watch out for.

While it’s a much thinner package than Quest 2—about 40% thinner when you don’t consider the facial interface—the headset’s new slim design is largely owed to its inclusion of pancake lenses. The inclusion of these new lenses, which use polarization-based reflection to fold the optic path into a small space, doesn’t impede the teardown process any more than larger Fresnel lenses might.

Here’s a 360 look at the headset under X-ray, courtesy Creative Electron, showing off just how tightly everything is sandwiched together:

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Things aren’t glued down thankfully, although the headset does feature a ton of screws—more than 50 by Mokhtari’s reckoning, many of which you’ll need to contend with to get to the battery.

Screws aplenty | Image courtesy iFixit, Creative Electron

Quest 3’s battery is sandwiched between the display and mainboard; while keeping the battery close to the user’s center of gravity puts less strain on the neck, it requires you to dig deep into the headset’s guts. One big benefit: Quest 3’s battery is pretty normal, unlike Quest Pro’s unique curved, back-mounted battery.

Quest Pro battery (left) and Quest 3 battery (right) | Image courtesy iFixit

Replacing the battery is technically possible, although there aren’t any official replacement parts. Getting there is apparently a bit more complicated than replacing a battery on a modern smartphone, although thankfully you won’t need heat guns or a host of dedicated tools to do so. Still, it appears to between the difficulty of replacing the battery of Quest 2 (harder) and Quest Pro (easier).

Mokhtari’s teardown delves into more of Quest 3’s pros and cons, such as the cost saving benefits of not including eye-tracking, and providing a cheaper IR-tracked Touch Plus controller over Quest Pro’s inside-out tracked Touch Pro controller. Another curiosity: Quest 3’s depth sensor fits into the blank spot where it would have otherwise gone in Quest Pro had they not scrapped the sensor right before production.

Catch the full eight-minute video below, which critically isn’t a repair guide as such. We’re hoping to see that posted on iFixit fairly soon, so stay tuned.

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The Best Meta Quest 3 Accessories & Why You’ll Want Them

Meta Quest 3, News, quest 3, quest 3 acessories, quest 3 cables, quest 3 charger, quest 3 dock, quest 3 face pad, VR accessories, VR Deals / Paul Patrick / October 14, 2023

If you can get your hands on a Quest 3, you’ve got everything you need right in the box to start playing some of the best VR games out there. Once you’ve got a few hours under your belt though, you’ll probably notice a few things that definitely need improving, many of which can thankfully be solved with a few key aftermarket accessories.

Upgrade Your Headstrap

Meta has done it again; like Quest 2, they’ve included a cheap, floppy strap that you’ll very likely want to replace soon after popping out of your first long playsession. For many, the stock strap just doesn’t do a good enough job of distributing weight evenly and comfortably on the user’s head. Some users report the stock Quest 3 straps even cut into the base of their ears a bit too, which is bound be bothersome long-term.

It’s difficult to recommend Meta’s Quest 3 straps out of the gate: Elite Strap ($70) and Elite Strap With Battery ($130), the latter of which includes an integrated 2,330mAh battery promising two hours of extra gameplay.

Quest 3 Elite Strap with Battery | Photo by Road to VR

Don’t get us wrong, they’re both comfortable and great out of the box. Meta’s one-year warranty will also likely let you exchange them too if/when they break. Beyond that, you’re at the mercy of Zuckerberg though; Meta doesn’t have a great track record with the build quality of its aftermarket headstraps, and until we put ours through its paces and we’re reasonably convinced it won’t snap in half like the first-party Quest 2 straps were prone to do, well, buyer beware.

Respected third-party accessory makers, such as Bobo VR and Kiwi Design, are slated to have their own versions soon. If you’re looking for something right this second though, a fairly inexpensive solution from MOJOXR ($25) not only has great reviews, but also supports both Quest 3 and Quest 2 thanks to an included adapter.

Provided you can 3D print your own adapter though, you may be able to use any Quest 2 aftermarket strap on the market, which should give you a little more choice in the meantime.

VR Cover or Spare Facepad

The stock facial interface on Quest 3 is actually a big improvement over the Quest 2 version. Out of the gate, its fabric weave feels better than having some sort of clammy high-density foam straight on your undoubtably greasy face, although it isn’t nearly as cleanable as, say, a silicone or removable fabric cover.

Quest 3 Silicon Facial Interface | Image courtesy Meta

Silicone covers are great for workouts since you can easily wipe them down before or after a session. Meta offers its own Quest 3 silicone facial interface ($40), which completely replaces the stock facepad. The benefit here is you can quickly swap out the stock pad when you’re done playing casual games, and swap in the silicone pad for when you’re ready for some Les Mills Body Combat, Supernatural, Beat Saber, Pistol Whip—whatever gets your heart pumping.

Realistically speaking though, you probably don’t need to shell out the better part of 50 bucks to get the job done. There are a number of third-party silicone covers on Amazon which fit right over the stock facepad, ranging from $10 to $15, and offer equal protection from face grime.

As for fabric, the trusted third-party creator VR Cover has its own machine washable fabric cover too ($30) in case you want to keep it a little more cosy than the impenetrable seal of a silicone cover. Alternatively, you can also get full facepad replacements from Meta which comes with matching floppy headstraps in Elemental Blue and Blood Orange ($50).

Make Charging Easier

Quest 3 has charging pins at the bottom of the face plate, meaning we’re sure to see a host of third-party charging docks and accessories come to market soon enough.

Quest 3 Charging Dock | Image courtesy Meta

For now, there’s really only one real solution though: Meta’s official Quest 3 charging dock ($130). While this also charges your Touch Plus controllers, keep in mind this won’t charge up any sort of external battery strap.

Always the old reliable: the second option could be to get magnetic USB-C connector cables, which allow you to attach and detach special charging cables to your headset without having to wear out the charging port. Many on Amazon can even do fast charging, although getting one with data transfer is hit and miss. Even if you could, you wouldn’t want to use Meta Link with a magnetic cable because of how easily it can detach.

Carrying Cases

Meta’s official Quest 3 carrying case ($70) is certainly a good option to keeping your Quest 3 prim and proper—if you don’t mind the hefty price tag, that is.

Quest 3 Carrying Case | Image courtesy Meta

There are definitely more cost-effective ways to spend 70 bucks though, considering Quest 3 is smaller and will most definitely fit in the carrying cases originally designed for Quest 2; there are a ton on Amazon, with many hovering under the $25 mark.

There’s bound to be an explosion of Quest 3-specific cases in the coming months, although it’s still too early to tell. Third-parties have created a ton of different case styles over the years for Quest 2, ranging from standard copycats of Meta’s own to official case to ones that even double as charging docks. More of those, please.

Long USB-C Cables for Wired PC Play

Whether you’re just looking for a way to charge during gameplay, or you want to connect Quest 3 to your computer via Meta Link to use it as a PC VR headset, you’ll need a USB-C cable long enough to get the job done.

Note: to play PC VR games via Link, you’ll need a VR-ready PC.

Official Oculus Link Cable | Image courtesy Oculus

By now, you know the drill: ‘Meta first, then the actual option you’ll actually want to buy’. Meta’s Link Cable ($80) is a thin fiber-optic cable that spans 16 feet (5m). It’s a great cable since it’s very thin and fairly light at 7.9oz (224g).

That said, any 3.0 USB-C cable will work, and there are tons on Amazon that will do the job just as well at a quarter of the price. Pick one, and you’re playing Half-Life: Alyx (2020) in no time.

Wi-Fi Router for Wirelessly PC VR Games

We know who you are. You’re more of a “low contact” sort of person. You exclusively charge all of your devices wirelessly, only talk to friends through Discord, and prefer courteous bows from across the room over shaking hands. Your ‘hover over public toilets’ game is also suitably on-lock. Well, you’ll be happy to know you can play PC VR games cable-free too thanks to Air Link.

You should be able to game easily enough using Air Link on that old 2.4GHz router, although if you’re looking to get the most out of Air Link-ing your headset to a VR-ready PC for a host of PC VR games, it might be time to upgrade to a dual-band router, as Meta recommends connecting to Wi-Fi via 5GHz band (AC or AX).

Note: Virtual Desktop developer Guy Godin has reported an early issue with Quest 3 and how it connects over Wi-Fi. For now, it appears the headset has network performance issues with routers running in Wi-Fi 5 (AC) mode. The issue disappears when switching the router to Wi-Fi 6 (AX) or Wi-Fi 6e (AXE) mode.

You can find dual-band Wi-Fi routers for as low as $40 on Amazon, however the more you pay, generally the better range you get. You can also get them for significantly cheaper if you don’t mind refurbished units.

Then there’s dedicated dongles, such as the D-Link Airplay ($100), which creates a dedicated Wi-Fi network between your Quest headset and your PC, skipping the whole Wi-Fi router tango entirely. Whatever the case, Meta recommends having your PC connected to a router or access point via ethernet cable, and in the same room as the headset or in line of sight. The better the connection, the lower the latency involved.

Other Accessories to Consider

Did we miss any big ones? What are your favorite Quest 3 accessories? Let us know in the comments below!

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Pioneering VR Studio Fast Travel Games Raises $4M

fast travel, fast travel games, Investment, News, VR Investment / Rejus Almole / October 13, 2023

Fast Travel Games, the developer and publisher behind a host of VR games, announced it’s closed a new investment of $4 million, something the company says will help it further develop its own IP for VR platforms as well as support ongoing publishing initiatives.

The latest round was led by Handelsbanken Fonder, with existing owners Industrifonden, Brightly Ventures, Creades and Inbox Capital among others also adding new funds.

The Stockholm-based studio is known for developing VR games Wraith: The Oblivion – Afterlife (2021), Apex Construct (2018), The Curious Tale of the Stolen Pets (2019), and Cities: VR (2022).

Having opened its own publishing wing in 2021, Fast Travel Games signed on as publisher to a slew of indie titles, including Broken Edge (2022), We Are One (2023), EVERSLAUGHT Invasion (2023), and Virtuoso (2022).

“The VR games market continues to grow at a steady pace, and with the introduction of the PS VR2 and the Quest 3 this year, and the Apple Vision Pro around the corner, we’re confident this growth will continue,” said Oskar Burman, CEO and co-founder of Fast Travel Games. “We now have twelve games on the market, and we’re just about to launch our most ambitious game yet – Vampire: The Masquerade – Justice. We also saw our revenues grow 70% last year to 5M+ USD, and our strong growth continues this year. With this new investment we’re in a solid position to capitalize on this new exciting gaming frontier.”

Besides Vampire: The Masquerade – Justice, the studio says it’s currently working on two other VR games in particular: a multiplayer game based on original IP called Mannequin, and an unannounced title.

Fast Travel Games also recently revealed it’s in a partnership with MoonHood, a new studio from the creators of games like Lost in Random, to develop a VR game based on physical models. Next year, the team will also publish Project Demigod, a physics-based superhero sandbox from New York-based indie Omnifarious Studios.

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I Tried to Play VR With Friends on Quest and it was a Nightmare (Again)

Feature, meta quest, multiplayer, News, VR Gaming, vr multiplayer / Mike M. / October 12, 2023

It feels like every time I try to get friends to have some fun in VR with me, the experience is somehow horribly painful. This time I kept a journal of the entire experience to catalogue the struggles seen by real Quest users every day.

The advent of Quest was supposed to streamline the usage of VR. But what was once friction of complicated hardware and requirements has been replaced with a mess of usability issues that make people not want to come back.

As much fun as I know it is to play VR with my friends, there’s a little part in the back of my mind that dreads it. I’m so used to telling my friends about some fun new VR game we can play together, only to have to drag them through a string of frustrating issues to finally reach the fun I had promised. It’s such a problem that I don’t ask my friends to play anything but the very best looking VR games with me, because the amount of struggle has to be offset by a great experience.

This week when I decided that the newly released Dungeons of Eternity looked good enough that I could convince my friends to give it a shot, that feeling of dread crept in again. I decided from the outset to keep journal of the experience because I knew there would be strife. There always is.

These Aren’t Novices

So let’s set the scene. I asked two of my good friends to play the game with me. Both are life-long hardcore gamers who own multiple consoles, have built their own PCs, and regularly seek out and play the latest non-VR games. Friend 1, let’s call him, has owned multiple PC VR headsets before getting Quest 2. On the other hand, Friend 2 got Quest 2 as their first VR headset.

Both have owned their Quest 2 for more than a year, but neither had used the headset in the last six months (after reading this journey you’ll understand why).

Imagine This, But Without Expert Guidance

And let’s be clear here. I’m a highly experience VR user and know the Quest headsets and their software inside and out. I knew there would be struggles for them, so I anticipated and offered to walk them through the process of getting everything set up. With me there, they skipped any amount of googling for solutions to the issues they encountered. No normal VR user gets the benefit of an expert holding their hand through the process. This is to say: the experience that you read here is the absolute best case scenario—and it was still a struggle.

I knew since they hadn’t used their Quests recently that the headsets would need to get plugged in charged, updated, and controller batteries replaced. I told them both from the outset to make sure this happened before our planned play session (had they not realized they needed their headsets updated, it would have meant our planned play session would have begun with at least 15 minutes of updates, restarts, and game installs). In anticipation of stumbles along the way, I got Friend 1 into voice chat to make the process as seamless as possible. Here’s how that went.

Put on his headset to update. Controllers weren’t working and neither was hand tracking.

Fix: I walked him through the process of using the ‘cursor’ and ‘up volume’ button as a mouse click (an input modality most people in my experience don’t know exists on the headset). I had an inkling that hand-tracking might be disabled on his headset, so I told him to go to Settings and enable it.

Didn’t know where to find settings.

Fix: Told him to “click on the clock” then hit Settings at the top right. Mind you, the Settings ‘button’ at the top right does not have any visual indication that it is in fact, a button. It easily could be mistaken for the label of the panel.

Didn’t know where to find hand-tracking option.

Fix: He wandered through multiple sections of the Settings until finding it

With hand-tracking enabled, it was easier to guide him to the Software Update section of the Settings and have him hit the ‘check for update’ button.

Headset updated and restarted, but controllers still weren’t working.

Fix: I guided him through the process of holding two buttons on the controller to make the power LED flash. Had to tell him where to find the LED on the upper ring of the controller (it’s invisible when not active). Concluded that batteries weren’t charged, so he replaced them.

Now he needed to install the game. He had already purchased it online but couldn’t find it in his headset.

Fix: I told him to find the Store search and pull up the game and click the install button.

As we were going through this process, Friend 1 asked me about Dungeons of Eternity: “is the multiplayer pretty seamless?” I told him I didn’t know because I hadn’t tried multiplayer yet. Drawing upon his past experiences of VR he responded, “I’m guessing the answer is no.”

Installed and Ready to Play, Right?

So we got through the process required just to get the game installed and ready to play. But the issues didn’t end there, and not just for Friend 1 but also for me.

I had the foresight to start a party call in the headset with both friends so we could be in constant communication if when things went wrong. If I hadn’t done this we would have ended up separated, communicating by text or phone while in the headset trying to get all of the following solved, and that would have been far worse.

But when I first sent the party call invite to both friends, Friend 2 joined and I could hear him for a few moments, but then I got dropped out of the call. Friend 1 said he never got a notification to join the call in the first place.

Ok, so I hung up the call and tried again. This time Friend 2 got in and we didn’t get dropped out, but Friend 2 still got no notification about the call. So I walked him through how to find the headset’s notification section, from which he was able to join the party call.

Ok so we’re talking. Now how to get my friends into the game with me? I opened the Quest menu and found my way to the party call where I was able to choose to bring the party to the game lobby. When I clicked the button to do so, both friends got a pop-up asking to travel to the game. “Awesome! Something is going to work!” I thought to myself.

Of course not. All three of us loaded into the game, but we weren’t connected together into a lobby. Ok, well at least we’re all in the game now, so let me try inviting them directly into the game instead of using the party travel system.

I opened the Quest menu, found the ‘invite’ button on the game panel, and when I clicked it, nothing appeared. I knew a list of friends should have appeared, but there was simply nothing. I backed out of the menu and tried again. Nothing appeared. This wasn’t even a blank page… just… air.

Attempting to invite my friends to the game. After the normal invite button was broken I searched for invite buttons elsewhere but didn’t find any | Note: While attempting to retrieve this video from my headset, the Gallery section of the Quest smartphone app bugged out and had to be force-quit before the video would appear.

At this point my friends were getting impatient just standing around in their uncomfortable headsets. So I tell them both to run through the tutorial separately, and we’d all meet up when that was done.

In the meantime, I tried going through the party call interface to pull up each friend’s Quest profile to see if I could invite them that way. This is very standard stuff for every other game platform… navigate to a friend’s profile and click an invite button. But I could only call or message them from there. I also went to the ‘People’ tab in the Quest menu to see if I could find them on my friends list and invite them that way. Nada.

Ok so I quit and relaunched the game. Upon trying the regular invite process again, the invite panel actually appeared!

Can We Play Yet?

They had finished their tutorials, so I sent them both an invite. And get this: it actually worked and they loaded into my lobby! Finally. Finally we’re going to play the game together.

If only.

I told them to drop out of our party chat so we could use in-game spatial audio. But they couldn’t hear me.

Eventually I saw an error pop up in the game, “attempt to login to voice chat timed out.”

Luckily I recalled that the first time I launched the game several days prior it had asked for permission to ‘record audio’. Since I had selected Solo Mode to play the game by myself, I didn’t initially understand why the game would want to ‘record audio’, so I reflexively denied the permission.

That meant when we tried to use in-game chat, it couldn’t connect me. Fixing this meant going into the Settings to find App Permissions, then toggle the microphone permission for the specific game.

Now you might think ‘oh that’s just user error you obviously should have accepted the permission in the first place.’

And yet… no. This was a contextless permission request that goes against every modern guideline. I had opened the game to play it solo, not even thinking of its multiplayer component at the time. The permission was requested after I selected ‘Solo Play’. Why would a game want to ‘record audio’ in a single player mode?

Not only was this the wrong time to ask for the permission, the permission itself is unclear. ‘Record audio’ is very different than ‘transmit your voice for multiplayer chat’. Had the permission asked with that added context, I might have better understood what it was asking and why, even though it had asked at the wrong time.

Ok so the permission is sorted out. Then I had to restart the game. Of course that meant I also had to re-invite them to my lobby. I braced myself for disappointment when I clicked the button for the invite menu… alas, it actually appeared.

Found the Fun

After all of that—maybe 20 or 30 minutes of trying to get it all to work—we were finally standing next to each other in VR and also able to hear one another.

Perhaps the most frustrating part of all of this is how much it hides the magic of VR.

Within minutes, maybe even less then one minute, from launching into a mission together we were laughing together and having an absolute blast just screwing around in the very first room of the very first tutorial mission. Multiplayer VR is magical like that, especially with good friends. But it can be so painful to get there.

And here’s the kicker. Even though we had a really fun time together, the repeated pain of finally getting to the fun burns into the subconscious like a scar that doesn’t go away. It had been more than six months since I was able to convince them to play a VR game together. The next time I ask them to play with me again, I won’t be surprised if they say ‘nah let’s play a flat gam’.

– – — – –

And last but not least, it’s important to point out here that I’m not just ripping on Quest. I’m not saying other VR platforms do social better. I’m saying Quest doesn’t do it well enough.

Am I alone in this or have you had your own nightmares trying to play VR with friends? Drop a line in the comments below.

I Tried to Play VR With Friends on Quest and it was a Nightmare (Again) Read More »

Quest 3 Review – A Great Headset Waiting to Reach Its Potential

Feature, hardware review, meat quest 3, Meta Quest 3, News, quest 3, quest 3 review, Standalone VR Headset / Rejus Almole / October 10, 2023

Following Quest 2 almost three years to the day, Quest 3 is finally here. Meta continues its trend of building some of the best VR hardware out there, but it will be some time yet before the headset’s potential is fully revealed. Read on for our full Quest 3 review.

I wanted to start this review saying that Quest 3 feels like a real next-gen headset. And while that’s certainly true when it comes to hardware, it’ll be a little while yet before the software reaches a point that it becomes obvious to everyone. Although it might not feel like it right out of the gate, even with the added price (starting at $500 vs. Quest 2 at $300), I’m certain the benefits will feel worth it in the end.

Quest 3’s hardware is impressive, and a much larger improvement than we saw from Quest 1 to Quest 2. For the most part, you’re getting a better and cheaper Quest Pro, minus eye-tracking and face-tracking. And to put it clearly, even if Quest Pro and Quest 3 were the same price, I’d pick Quest 3.

Before we dive in, here’s a look at Quest 3’s specs for reference:

Resolution	2,064 × 2,208 (4.5MP) per-eye, LCD (2x)
Refresh Rate	90Hz, 120Hz (experimental)
Optics	Pancake non-Fresnel
Field-of-view (claimed)	110ºH × 96ºV
Optical Adjustments	Continuous IPD, stepped eye-relief (built in)
IPD Adjustment Range	53–75mm
Processor	Snapdragon XR2 Gen 2
RAM	8GB
Storage	128GB, 512GB
Connectors	USB-C, contact pads for optional dock charging
Weight	515g
Battery Life	1.5-3 hours
Headset Tracking	Inside-out (no external beacons)
Controller Tracking	Headset-tracked (headset line-of-sight needed)
Expression Tracking	none
Eye Tracking	none
On-board cameras	6x external (18ppd RGB sensors 2x)
Input	Touch Plus (AA battery 1x), hand-tracking, voice
Audio	In-headstrap speakers, 3.5mm aux output
Microphone	Yes
Pass-through view	Yes (color)
MSRP	$500 (128GB), $650 (512GB)

Hardware

Even if the software isn’t fully tapping the headset’s potential yet, Meta has packed a lot of value into the Quest 3 hardware.

Lenses

First, and perhaps most importantly, the lenses on Quest 3 are a generational improvement over Quest 2 and other headsets of the Fresnel-era. They aren’t just more compact and sharper, they also offer a noticeably wider field-of-view and have an unmatched sweet spot that extends nearly across the entire lens. That means even when you aren’t looking directly through the center of the lens, the world is still sharp. While Quest 3’s field-of-view is also objectively larger than Quest 2, the expanded sweet spot helps amplify that improvement because you can look around the scene more naturally with your eyes and less with your head.

Glare is another place that headsets often struggle, and there we also see a huge improvement with the Quest 3 lenses. Gone are the painfully obvious god-rays that you could even see in the headset’s main menu. Now only subtle glare is visible even in scenes with extreme contrast.

Resolution and Clarity

Quest 3 doesn’t have massively higher than Quest 2, but the combination of about 30% more pixels—3.5MP per-eye (1,832 × 1,920) vs. 4.5MP per-eye (2,064 × 2,208)—a much larger sweet spot, and a huge reduction in glare makes for a headset with significantly improved clarity. Other display vitals like persistence blur, chromatic aberration, pupil swim, mura, and ghosting are all top-of-class as well. And despite the increased sharpness of the lenses, there’s still functionally no screen-door effect.

Here’s a look at the resolving power of Quest 3 compared to some other headsets:

Headset	Snellen Acuity Test
Quest 3	20/40
Quest Pro	20/40
Quest 2	20/50
Bigscreen Beyond	20/30
Valve Index	20/50

While Quest 3 and Quest Pro score the same here in terms of resolving power, the Snellen test lacks precision; I can say for sure the Quest 3 looks a bit sharper than Quest Pro, but not enough to get it into the next Snellen tier.

While the optics of Quest 3 are also more compact than most, the form-factor isn’t radically different than Quest 2. The slightly more central center-of-gravity makes the headset feel a little less noticeable during fast head rotations, but on the whole the visual improvements are much more significant than ergonomic.

Ergonomics

Ergonomics feels like one of just a few places where Quest 3 doesn’t see many meaningful improvements. Even though it’s a little more compact, it weighs about the same as Quest 2, and its included soft strap is just as awful. So my recommendation remains: get an aftermarket strap for Quest 3 on day one (and with a battery if you know you’re going to use the headset often). Meta’s official Elite Strap and Elite Strap with Battery are an easy choice but you can find options of equal comfort that are more affordable from third-parties. FYI: the Elite Straps are not forward or backward compatible between Quest 2 and 3.

While the form-factor of the headset haven’t really improved, it’s ability to adapt to each user certainly has. Quest 3 is the most adaptable Meta headset to date, offering both continuous IPD (distance between the eyes) and notched eye-relief (distance from eye to lens) adjustments. This means that more people can dial in a good fit for the headset, giving them the best visual comfort and quality.

I was about to write “to my surprise…”—but actually this doesn’t surprise me at this point given Meta’s MO—the setup of Quest 3 either didn’t walk me through adjusting either of these settings or did so in such a nonchalant way that I didn’t even notice. Most new users will not only not know what IPD or eye-relief really does for them, but also struggle to pick their own best setting. There should definitely be clear guidance and helpful calibration.

The dial on the bottom of Quest 3 makes it easy to adjust the IPD, but the eye-relief mechanism is rather clunky. You have to push both buttons on the inside of the facepad at the same time and kind of also pull it out or push it forward. It works but I found it to be incredibly iffy.

Field-of-View

In any case, I’m happy to report that eye-relief on Quest 3 is more than just a buffer for glasses. Moving to the closest setting gave me a notably wider field-of-view than Quest 2. Here’s a look at the Quest 3 FoV:

Personal Measurements – 64mm IPD

(no glasses, measured with TestHMD 1.2)

	Absolute min eye-relief (facepad removed)	Min designed eye-relief	Comfortable eye-relief	Max eye-relief
HFOV	106°	104°	100°	86°
VFOV	93°	93°	89°	79°

And here’s how it stacks up to some other headsets:

Personal Measurements – 64mm IPD

(minimum-designed eye-relief, no glasses, measured with TestHMD 1.2)

	Quest 3	Quest Pro	Quest 2	Bigscreen Beyond	Valve Index
HFOV	104°	94°	90°	98°	106°
VFOV	93°	87°	92°	90°	106°

Audio

Another meaningful improvement for Quest 3 is improved built-in audio. While on Quest 2 I always felt like I needed to have the headset at full volume (and even then the audio quality felt like a compromise), Quest 3 gets both a volume and quality boost. Now I don’t feel like every app needs to be at 100% volume. And while I’d still love better quality and spatialization from the built-in audio, Quest 3’s audio finally feels sufficient rather than an unfortunate compromise.

Controllers

Quest 3’s new Touch Plus controllers so far feel like they work just as well as Quest 2 controllers, but with better haptics and an improved form-factor thanks to the removal of the ring. Quest 3 is also much faster to switch between hand-tracking and controller input when you set the controllers down or pick them up.

Processor

The last major change is the new Snapdragon XR2 Gen 2 chip that powers Quest 3. While ‘XR2 Gen 1’ vs. ‘XR2 Gen 2’ might not sound like a big change, the difference is significant. The new chip has 2.6x the graphical horsepower of the prior version, according to Meta. That’s a leap-and-a-half compared to the kind of chip-to-chip updates usually seen in smartphones. The CPU boost is more in line with what we’d typically expect; Meta says it’s 33% more powerful than Quest 2 at launch, alongside 30% more RAM.

Quest 3 is still essentially a smartphone in a headset in terms of computing power, so don’t expect it to match the best of what you see on PSVR 2 or PC VR, but there’s a ton of extra headroom for developers to work with.

Continue Reading on Page 2: Softwhere? »

Quest 3 Review – A Great Headset Waiting to Reach Its Potential Read More »

2 Years After Announcing, Meta Has ‘no update’ on ‘GTA: San Andreas VR’

grand theft auto san andreas, grand theft auto vr, gta quest 2, gta quest 3, gta san andreas vr, gta vr, News, qta for quest, san andreas, VR Game / Rejus Almole / October 10, 2023

If you’ve been waiting to hear about a release date for the long-promised Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas on Quest, you’ll just have to sit tight a little longer.

Meta announced at Connect 2021 that it was working with Rockstar Games to bring GTA: San Andreas to Quest 2, giving players a new perspective on the nearly 20 year-old game.

When asked during Connect 2023 in late September, a Meta spokesperson told Road to VR this: “We don’t have any updates to share on GTA: San Andreas.“

If there was a time for such an update, it seemingly would have been right around Connect and the launch of its next-gen standalone, Quest 3. Even without a major hardware announcement, the company’s annual XR developer conference typically provides a good roadmap to its pre-holiday ramp-up ambitions; the company is touting a few major game releases for that time, including Asgard’s Wrath 2 and Assassin’s Creed Nexus VR.

Considering it skipped that big announcement opportunity, it’s a pretty conservative bet that GTA: San Andreas VR won’t launch in 2023. Whatever the case, Meta is staying tight-lipped, so we’ll just have to continue waiting to see just how Rockstar hopes to inject us head-first into Los Santos, San Fierro and Las Venturas.

2 Years After Announcing, Meta Has ‘no update’ on ‘GTA: San Andreas VR’ Read More »

Anticipated VR Adventure ‘Behemoth’ Delayed Until Late 2024

behemoth, News, psvr 2, quest 3, skydance interactive, skydance's behemoth, SteamVR, vr combat, VR Game, vr rpg / Rejus Almole / October 10, 2023

Skydance Interactive, the studio behind The Walking Dead: Saints and Sinners, revealed their next VR game Behemoth is being delayed by a year, now slated to arrive on all major headsets in late 2024.

The studio confirmed the delay with UploadVR, also noting that the game now has a new name: Skydance’s Behemoth.

First revealed at Meta Connect 2022 this time last year, the upcoming VR adventure puts you in what the studio calls a “plague-ravished wasteland of a once glorious empire, where its inhabitants are driven mad and cities have fallen to ruin.” In the story-driven campaign, you combat towering giants called Behemoths.

The studio also released a single work-in-progress image of the game (above), which more clearly shows one of the titular behemoths.

Behemoth is coming to Quest (presumably 2/3/Pro), PSVR 2, and PC VR sometime in late 2024. Meanwhile, we’re curious to see just how gameplay stacks up to the studio’s other skull-splitting adventure, The Walking Dead: Saints & Sinners.

Check out the cinematic trailer below, released in late 2022.

Anticipated VR Adventure ‘Behemoth’ Delayed Until Late 2024 Read More »

Apple’s Approach to Immersive VR on Vision Pro is Smarter Than it Seems—And Likely to Stick

apple vision pro, News, vision pro full screen, vision pro immersive space, vision pro immersive vr, vision pro vr / Mike M. / October 8, 2023

One of the most interesting things about Vision Pro is the way Apple is positioning its fully immersive capabilities. While many have interpreted the company’s actions as relegating VR to an afterthought, the reality is much more considered.

Vision Pro is somewhat ironic. It’s an incredibly powerful and capable VR headset, but Apple has done extensive work to make the default mode feel as little like being in VR as possible. This is of course what’s called ‘passthrough AR’, or sometimes ‘mixed reality’. We’re not quite there yet, but it’s clear that in Apple’s ideal world when you first put on the headset it should feel like nothing around you has even changed.

Apple doesn’t want Vision Pro to take over your reality… at least not all the time. It has gone to extensive lengths to try to seamlessly blend virtual imagery into the room around you. When floating UI panels are created, the are not only subtly transparent (to reveal the real world behind them), but the system even estimates the room’s lighting to cast highlights and shadows on the panels to make them look like they’re really floating there in front of you. It’s impressively convincing.

But none of this negates the fact that Vision Pro is a powerful VR headset. In my hands-on demo earlier this year, Apple clearly showed the headset is not only capable of fully immersive VR experiences, but that VR is a core capability of the platform. It even went so far as to add the ‘digital crown’ dial on the top of the headset to make it easy for people to transition between passthrough AR and a fully immersive view.

Much of the commentary surrounding Vision Pro focused on the fact that Apple never actually said the words “virtual reality,” and how the headset lacks the kind of dedicated controllers that are core to most VR headsets today. It was reasoned that this is because the company doesn’t really want Vision Pro to have anything to do with VR.

As I’ve had more time to process my experience of using the headset and my post-demo discussions with some of the people behind the product, it struck me that Apple doesn’t want to avoid fully immersive VR, it’s actually embracing it—but in a way that’s essentially the opposite of what we seen in most other headsets today. And frankly, I think their way is probably the approach the entire industry will adopt.

To understand that, let’s think about Meta’s Quest headsets. Though things might be changing soon with the release of Quest 3, up to this point the company has essentially used VR as the primary mode on its headsets, while passthrough AR was a sort of optional and occasional bonus mode—something apps only sometimes used, or something the user has to consciously toggle on.

On Vision Pro, Apple is doing the reverse. Passthrough AR is the default mode. But fully immersive VR is not being ignored; to the contrary, the company is treating VR as the most focused presentation of content on the headset.

In short, Apple is treating VR like a ‘full-screen’ mode for Vision Pro; the thing you consciously enable when you want to rid yourself of other distractions and get lost in one specific piece of media.

If you think about it, that’s exactly how we use full-screen on our computers and phones today.

Not every application on my computer launches in full-screen and removes my system UI or hides my other windows. In fact, the majority of apps on my computer don’t work this way. Most of the time I want to see my taskbar and my desktop and the various windows and controls that I use to manipulate data on my screen.

But if I’m going to watch a movie or play a game? Full-screen, every time.

That’s because these things are focused experiences where we don’t want to be distracted by anything else. We want to be engrossed by them so we remove the clutter and even let the application hide the mouse and give us a custom interface to better blend it with the media we’re about to engage with.

In the same way that you wouldn’t want every application on your computer to be in full-screen mode—with its own interface and style—Apple doesn’t think every application on your headset should be that way either.

Most should follow familiar patterns and share common interface language. And most do not need to be full-screen (or immersive). In fact, some things not only don’t benefit from being more immersive, in some cases they are made worse. I don’t need a fully immersive environment to view a PDF or spreadsheet. Nor do I need to get rid of all of my other windows and data if I want to play a game of chess. All of those things can still happen, but they don’t need to be my one and only focus.

Most apps can (and should) work seamlessly alongside each other. It’s only when we want that ‘full-screen’ experience that we should give an app permission to take over completely and block out the rest.

And that’s how Apple is treating fully immersive VR on Vision Pro. It isn’t being ignored; the company is simply baking-in the expectation that people don’t want their apps ‘full-screen’ all the time. When someone does want to go full-screen, it’s always a conscious opt-in action, rather than opt-out.

As for the dial on the top of the headset—while some saw this as evidence that Apple wants to make it quick and easy for people to escape fully immersive VR experiences on the headset, I’d argue the company sees the dial as a two way street: it’s both an ‘enter full-screen’ and ‘exit full-screen’ button—the same we expect to see on most media apps.

Ultimately, I think the company’s approach to this will become the norm across the industry. Apple is right: people don’t want their apps full-screen by all the time. Wanting to be fully immersed in one thing is the exception, not the rule.

Apple’s Approach to Immersive VR on Vision Pro is Smarter Than it Seems—And Likely to Stick Read More »

The Biggest Announcements at Meta Connect and What it All Means for the Future of XR

Connect 2023, Feature, Meta, meta connect 2023, News, VR Industry / Mike M. / October 5, 2023

Meta Connect 2023 has wrapped up, bringing with it a deluge of info from one of the XR industry’s biggest players. Here’s a look at the biggest announcements from Connect 2023, but more importantly, what it all means for the future of XR.

Last week marked the 10th annual Connect conference, and the first Connect conference after the Covid pandemic to have an in-person component. The event originally began as Oculus Connect in 2014. Having been around for every Connect conference, it’s amazing when I look around at just how much has changed and how quickly it all flew by. For those of you who have been reading and following along for just as long—I’m glad you’re still on this journey with us!

So here we are after 10 Connects. What were the big announcements and what does it all mean?

Meta Quest 3

Obviously, the single biggest announcement is the reveal and rapid release of Meta’s latest headset, Quest 3. You can check out the full announcement details and specs here and my hands-on preview with the headset here. The short and skinny is that Quest 3 is a big hardware improvement over Quest 2 (but still being held back by its software) and it will launch on October 10th starting at $500.

Quest 3 marks the complete dissolution of Oculus—the VR startup that Facebook bought back in 2014 to jump-start its entrance into XR. It’s the company’s first headset to launch following Facebook’s big rebrand to Meta, leaving behind no trace of the original and very well-regarded Oculus brand.

Apples and Oranges

On stage at Connect, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg called Quest 3 the “first mainstream mixed reality headset.” By “mainstream” I take it he meant ‘accessible to the mainstream’, given its price point. This was clearly in purposeful contrast to Apple’s upcoming Vision Pro which, to his point, is significantly less accessible given its $3,500 price tag. Though he didn’t mention Apple by name, his comments about accessibility, ‘no battery pack’, and ‘no tether’ were clearly aimed at Vision Pro.

Mixed Marketing

Meta is working hard to market Quest 3’s mixed reality capabilities, but for all the potential the feature has, there is no killer app for the technology. And yes, having the tech out there is critical to creating more opportunity for such a killer app to be created, but Meta is substantially treating its developers and customers as beta testers of this technology. The ‘market it and they will come’ approach that didn’t seem to pan out too well for Quest Pro.

Personally I worry about the newfangled feature being pushed so heavily by Meta that it will distract the body of VR developers who would otherwise better serve an existing customer base that’s largely starving for high-quality VR content.

Regardless of whether or not there’s a killer app for Quest 3’s improved mixed reality capabilities, there’s no doubt that the tech could be a major boon to the headset’s overall UX, which is in substantial need of a radical overhaul. I truly hope the company has mixed reality passthrough turned on as the default mode, so when people put on the headset they don’t feel immediately blind and disconnected from reality—or need to feel around to find their controllers. A gentle transition in and out of fully immersive experiences is a good idea, and one that’s well served with a high quality passthrough view.

Apple, on the other hand, has already established passthrough mixed reality as the default when putting on the headset, and for now even imagines it’s the mode users will spend most of their time in. Apple has baked this in from the ground-up, but Meta still has a long way to go to perfect it in their headsets.

Augments vs. Volumes

Several Connect announcements also showed us how Meta is already responding to the threat of Apple’s XR headset, despite the vast price difference between the offerings.

For one, Meta announced ‘Augments’, which are applets developers will be able to build that users can place in permanently anchored positions in their home in mixed reality. For instance, you could place a virtual clock on your wall and always see it there, or a virtual chessboard on your coffee table.

This is of course very similar to Apple’s concept of ‘Volumes’, and while Apple certainly didn’t invent the idea of having MR applets that live indefinitely in the space around you (nor Meta), it’s clear that the looming Vision Pro is forcing Meta to tighten its focus on this capability.

Meta says developers will be able to begin building ‘Augments’ on the Quest platform sometime next year, but it isn’t clear if that will happen before or after Apple launches Vision Pro.

Microgrestures

Augments aren’t the only way that Meta showed at Connect that it’s responding to Apple. The company also announced that its working on a system for detecting ‘microgestures’ for hand-tracking input—planned for initial release to developers next year—which look awfully similar to the subtle pinching gestures that are primarily used to control Vision Pro:

Again, neither Apple nor Meta can take credit for inventing this ‘microgesture’ input modality. Just like Apple, Meta has been researching this stuff for years, but there’s no doubt the sudden urgency to get the tech into the hands of developers is related to what Apple is soon bringing to market.

A Leg Up for Developers

Meta’s legless avatars have been the butt of many-a-joke. The company had avoided the issue of showing anyone’s legs because they are very difficult to track with an inside-out headset like Quest, and doing a simple estimation can result in stilted and awkward leg movements.

But now the company is finally adding leg estimation to its avatar models, and giving developers access to the same tech to incorporate it into their games and apps.

And it looks like the company isn’t just succumbing to the pressure of the legless avatar memes by spitting out the same kind of third-party leg IK solutions that are being used in many existing VR titles. Meta is calling its solution ‘generative legs’, and says the system leans on tracking of the user’s upper body to estimate plausibly realistic leg movements. A demo at Connect shows things looking pretty good:

It remains to be seen how flexible the system is (for instance, how will it look if a player is bowling or skiing, etc?).

Meta says the system can replicate common leg movements like “standing, walking, jumping, and more,” but also notes that there are limitations. Because the legs aren’t actually being tracked (just estimated) the generative legs model won’t be able to replicate one-off movements, like raising your knee toward your chest or twisting your feet at different angles.

Virtually You

The addition of legs coincides with another coming improvement to Meta’s avatar modeling, which the company is calling inside-out body tracking (IOBT).

While Meta’s headsets have always tracked the player’s head and hands using the headset and controllers, the rest of the torso (arms, shoulders, neck) was entirely estimated using mathematical modeling to figure out what position they should be in.

For the first time on Meta’s headsets, IOBT will actually track parts of the player’s upper body, allowing the company’s avatar model to incorporate more of the player’s real movements, rather than making guesses.

Specifically Meta says its new system can use the headset’s cameras to track wrist, elbows, shoulders, and torso positions, leading to more natural and accurate avatar poses. The IOBT capability can work with both controller tracking and controller-free hand-tracking.

Both capabilities will be rolled into Meta’s ‘Movement SDK’. The company says ‘generative legs’ will be coming to Quest 2, 3, and Pro, but the IOBT capability might end up being exclusive to Quest 3 (and maybe Pro) given the different camera placements that seem aimed toward making IOBT possible.

Calm Before the Storm, or Calmer Waters in General?

At Connect, Meta also shared the latest revenue milestone for the Quest store: more than $2 billion has been spent on games an apps. That means Meta has pocketed some $600 million from its store, while the remaining $1.4 billion has gone to developers.

That’s certainly nothing to sneeze at, and while many developers are finding success on the Quest store, the figure amounts to a slowdown in revenue momentum over the last 12 months, one which many developers have told me they’d been feeling.

The reason for the slowdown is likely a combination of Quest 2’s age (now three years old), the rather early announcement of Quest 3, a library of content that’s not quite meeting user’s expectations, and a still struggling retention rate driven by core UX issues.

Quest 3 is poised for a strong holiday season, but with its higher price point and missing killer app for the heavily marketed mixed reality feature, will it do as well as Quest 2’s breakout performance in 2021?

Continue on Page 2: What Wasn’t Announced »

The Biggest Announcements at Meta Connect and What it All Means for the Future of XR Read More »

A New Category of VR Game is Slowly Emerging Right Before Our Eyes

arm based locomotion, arm based movement, echo arena, echo ve, gorilla tag, lone echo, News, VR Gaming, VR Locomotion / Mike M. / October 5, 2023

The much lauded Echo VR might no longer be with us, but one of its innovations is living on in a new wave of VR games.

Echo VR (and its single-player counterpart, Lone Echo) were among the first major VR games to build a game around a virtual movement system based entirely on the player’s arm movement. While most VR games used (and continue to use) thumbsticks to allow players to glide around on their feet, the Echo games actually gave players no control over their feet, and instead had them floating around exclusively in zero-G environments with only their hands to push and pull themselves around the game space.

While other early VR games definitely contributed to the idea of arm-based movement rather than sliding thumbstick movement (shout-out to Lucid Trips Climbey, Sprint Vector and many more), the Echo games did a lot of heavy lifting to popularize this novel locomotion concept.

And from there, the idea has grown and evolved.

Gorilla Tag (2021), whose creator specifically says he was inspired by Echo VR, has become one of VR’s most popular games, bringing its spin on arm-based locomotion to a much wider audience. With that exposure, more and more players are learning how this particular way of moving in VR can be fun, making them more likely to try games with similar mechanics.

And this goes far beyond the smattering of Gorilla Tag clones you can find on Steam.

Nock (2022) went several steps further with a much faster type of sliding and gliding arm movement, while also weaving in bows and arrows, challenging players to both navigate and shoot with their hands in a continuous flow.

Space Ball (2023) took the Gorilla Tag movement and fused it with a Rocket League style game, letting players bound around the arena and launch themselves to dunk a huge ball into a hoop.

It’s not just multiplayer games either. Arm-based locomotion systems are popping up in single player adventures like Phantom Covert Ops (2020) which had a very literal take on arm-movement in VR—asking players to paddle themselves around in a covert kayak. It sounds silly on the surface, but there’s no doubt the game’s arm-based movement was both unique and successful.

In 2023 alone we’ve seen more arm-based movement games like No More Rainbows, Toss!, and Outta Hand. If you peruse the reviews of these games, you find a common theme of advice from reviewers: ‘if you liked Gorilla Tag, check this out!’. Clearly the players enjoying these games want more like them, with the desired similarity being the use of arms for movement.

And there’s more to come. One of the most intriguing upcoming Quest titles, Underdogs, takes the concept in a different direction, where a player brawls it out in a mech using their arms to pull themselves around the arena.

And in a truly full-circle moment, the creators of Gorilla Tag (which were inspired by Echo VR) are building a spiritual successor to Echo VR. Currently codenamed ‘Project A2’, the game will revisit arm-based movement in zero-G in an effort to revive the very game that popularized arm-based movement to so many in the first place.

It’s apparent that VR developers and players alike are beginning to find that controlling your arms with… your arms, is much more engaging than controlling your legs with… a thumbstick. I have a feeling that this new wave of games built entirely around arm-based movement is here to stay. The question on my mind is if they will remain as their own genre within VR, or perhaps come to define the way movement works in most VR games.

A New Category of VR Game is Slowly Emerging Right Before Our Eyes Read More »

VR’s Favorite Fantasy Fighter Details Huge 1.0 Launch Update Planned for Early 2024

blade & sorcery, blade & sorcery nomads, blade and sorcery, blade and sorcery 1.0, News, Remove term: blade and sorcery blade and sorceryRemove term: blade & sorcery nomads, VR Game / Mike M. / October 5, 2023

Blade & Sorcery, the hit physics-based combat sandbox, is moving towards its 1.0 release, which is coming with a major update slated to arrive early next year.

In development by indie studio WarpFrog for almost five years now, Blade & Sorcery has basically been the go-to fantasy combat simulator for PC VR headset users, letting you live out all of the sword and sorcery dreams with suitably malleable enemies at the ready.

WarpFrog is nearly ready to bring the game out of Early Access too, detailing on Steam the game’s massive 1.0 update, known as “Crystal Hunt”, which will feature a host of new content, including a bona fide storyline, a new dungeon biome, and new game mode. It’s also said to be the game’s final update.

Revolving around an ancient and mysterious race called the Dalgarians, the game’s storyline will be presented through environmental storytelling, written text, and ciphers—something that the studio says will offer players “deep lore” exploration for the first time.

The Crystal Hunt also involves character progression, loot gathering, and a unique skill tree—no small feats. Loot gathered in dungeons can be sold to purchase weapons and armor from a physical shop in the game. Then there are the much sought after Crystals Core themselves.

The titular crystals are “the very rare resource found in the Dalgarian ruins and what you and everyone else is chasing,” the studio explains. “Crystal Cores can be siphoned of their magical power to make a sorcerer more powerful. In game terms, this is the currency you will use to unlock new skills branches, which you can then invest your shards.”

The update also introduces new armors and weapons, including tiered weapons with functional benefits.

The release date for the update is estimated to be in Q1 2024, Warpfrog says, but it’s subject to change due to development challenges, and also the team’s anti-crunch culture—now counting 21 full-time and six part-time members.

Exactly when 1.0 arrives, we aren’t sure. The final release date will be confirmed when the 1.0 trailer drops, so stay tuned to The Baron’s YouTube channel, who is producer and community lead for the game—and of course, check back here for all of the latest news.

VR’s Favorite Fantasy Fighter Details Huge 1.0 Launch Update Planned for Early 2024 Read More »

Valve Hires Creator Behind Popular ‘Half-Life: Alyx’ Mod

half life vr, half-life: alyx, hl:a, nate grove, News, VR Game, VR Mod / Rejus Almole / October 3, 2023

Like many of Valve’s best titles, Half-Life: Alyx (2020) is a lot more moddable than your average game, which for PC VR headset owners means hundreds of new modes, missions, and mini-games. Now one of the HLA’s most talented modders announced they’ve been snapped up by Valve.

Nate Grove was responsible for two of the best HLA campaign-style mods, Incursion and Re-Education—both of which are uncannily Valve-like in pacing, setting… everything.

Grove says in a tweet that “a HUGE contributing factor to my hire was my work on my Workshop items Re-Education and Incursion. It was a dream for me (and many others) to work at Valve and I think this highlights the importance of supporting integration of community work into any game. It only makes the product (and the industry) stronger.”

While clearly a capable modder of one of the best VR games to date, Grove is no gaming industry neophyte. Now a level designer and artist at Valve, Grove comes to the company from Annapurna Interactive, which is known for publishing award-winning titles such as Outer Wilds, Stray, and What Remains of Edith Finch. Grove also created custom assets for both HLA mods, which is probably par for the course for someone who’s already spent nearly a decade as a professional digital artist and environmental designer.

What does this mean for Valve, VR and everything? It’s too early to speculate, since the company is by nature a black box that only occasionally sneaks possible hints about upcoming headsets in SteamVR updates. In fact, Grove says the announcement above was their “last post here” on X, formerly Twitter.

If it makes you feel better though, you can always comment “Half-Life 3 confirmed” in the comments.

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