PSVR2 is by far the most advanced virtual reality headset currently on the market, but it’ll receive renewed competition from Meta this year, as the organisation plots the release of the Quest 3. The company’s standalone Quest 2 has shipped more than 20 million units to date, and is the most successful consumer VR product on the market – although the entire medium is so nascent that it’s hard to consider Sony and Meta as rivals in the traditional sense.
Nevertheless, the Quest 3 is coming, according to a roadmap presentation shared by division Reality Labs to its employees. According to The Verge, the firm told its staff that the new headset will be “two times thinner and at least twice as powerful” as the Quest 2, although it will cost more than $399.99 at launch. One of the big selling points, apparently, will be mixed reality experiences, whereby the headset’s built-in cameras are used in augmented reality-style content.
Despite the new features, Meta understands it’ll have its work cut out encouraging people to upgrade to its new headset, despite the promise of 41 new apps and games at launch.
In an interview with Games Industry.biz, Sony’s third-party bigwig Shawne Benson admitted that PSVR2 is not necessarily in competition with Meta. “We definitely are still in this 'rising tide helps all ships' mindset for the VR ecosystem, so it's not the same kind of competitive landscape as it is, say, in the console space, kind of flat gaming experience,” she admitted.
Given the nature of the Quest product portfolio, it’s hard to imagine Meta delivering a product able to power games on the scale of Gran Turismo 7 and Resident Evil Village, so PSVR2 will likely continue to serve a different demographic. And if anything, a new headset entering the market could help cultivate even more interest in the nascent virtual reality sector, which is a net positive for all parties involved.
[source theverge.com, via eurogamer.net]
Comments 22
@Loamy Don't know what you're talking about.
(Thanks!)
Sounds like a slightly different focus from PSVR2, which is probably a good thing for both
Lol, I would hardly call a wireless headset running on a mobile phone processor competition to one powered by the PS5.
For reference, Quest 2 is 1.25tf I believe, so if that doubles to 2.5tf with the Metaquest 3, the PSVR2 would still be 4 times more powerful just on the GPU side, that’s without considering the gulf in CPU, memory and everything else.
What it will mean is that all the quest ports PSVR2 is getting will perhaps be slightly larger in their scope, which is good.
Hopefully it becomes incredibly successful because in the VR space, a rising tide raises all ships. I won’t personally want to have a heavy headset and battery strapped to my face, possibly switching 2 batteries if you want to play for more than 2 hrs at a time, but there is a huge market for this. People who don’t have capable PCs or a PS5 but are still willing to drop 400-500 on a headset are out there in droves surprisingly.
My biggest concern right now is the apparent shift in "VR" from Occulus and the rumored Apple entry, and even some dev interviews, talking the same thing, where the shift is moving to AR across the board. It's almost like VR is now considered unsellable and everything is moving in this AR focused direction. I don't find that terribly interesting or desirable. And I'm afraid the future of games will shift away from cool VR experiences where you're transported elsewhere to more and more gimmicky minigames of doing something with objects right in your living space, which also will make it harder for ports to arrive on PSVR. I'm glad PSVR is focused on VR without the AR angle, but that could starve it of a lot of games. OTOH I'm not interested in those games anyway. Seeing my room in every game gets old in about a day.
@NEStalgia
They go AR because they know the gaming market is likely not as profitable as the enterprise market. BMW aren’t going to complain about the price when their designers want VR to better experience their blueprints. Architects, etc. Then there’s a possible new porn industry…
We sometimes get caught up in gaming because that’s our passion, but AR is so much more than that.
It’s not for me, but it’ll be very profitable. Just look at the billions MS get from the US military for AR devices.
The main problem for Meta is lack of good content. After playing RE4, Beat Saber and a few other titles...what else is there to do? It just doesn't have the kind of titles that will keep people using it for years on end.
I use my mainly for PCVR and the occasional Dr Beef mod, and it's a lovely headset for connecting wirelessly to PCVR. So good I think I will skip the Quest 3 entirely.
Additionally, content on the Meta store also feels very overpriced. I can get great PCVR games on Steam for half the price of some shovelware game on Meta's store. Similarly, PSVR2 games will also likely get nice sales after some time, while you're lucky to get a 30% coupon a couple of times a year on Meta.
@NEStalgia While I'm like you and prefer VR over AR, I think there are more realistic opportunities and applications for AR than VR, especially outside gaming. It's the safer commercial bet.
Not least why would we need to look at our phone when our glasses can show information on request. Which frankly sounds like a terrible idea to me, we already have too many distractions, but I can see that it's easily more applicable and marketable in more scenarios.
@themightyant Yeah, I'll forever call it a Focus, because that's what it is, and I'm not sure that's a good thing. Before you know it we'll all be talking to ourselves, too, lol.
But I don't think that makes sense until it's "Google Glass" and you wear it all the time. The opaque headsets just don't seem to be close to usable for that kind of use. I don't see anyone, anywhere, slapping on opaque goggles to just view the reality around them through a camera. Clear google glass that overlays information, when it's really ready, yes. Opaque VR sets that show you life through a live viewfinder? I don't see any adoption of that other than Quest Pro and the like aimed at corporate customers.
I don't disagree there's a future in that, but the form factor is wrong.
Though frankly I don't think it should exist until cars are 100% automated because it only takes 10 seconds to picture what happens otherwise.
@thefourfoldroot1 Yeah, I get it for the commercial headsets but not the consumer ones. Though you mentioned the porn industry so there's that. Now I'm thinking of Total Recall, lol.
Though after the rejection of "the metaverse" so roundly, everyone going int AR feels like when companies were still going into NFT after it was clear it was sinking.
But it concerns me when I hear game devs talking about VR maybe not really being viable and popular and leaning more into AR as the best direction for games as well. Aka following the money because there's not enough in VR currently. AR to me is less engaging than "pancake games", it forces me to focus on my real space rather than be transported elsewhere. It was fun on 3DS for launch day....and I never used it again, lol.
NEStalgia wrote:
You guys don't already do that? OK just me... myself and I.
I was gifted the Quest 2 at my company's Christmas party when I had already pre-ordered VR2. So now I have a "home console" headset in the VR2 and a "portable" console in the Quest. I think of the Quest as the Nintendo DS of VR. Haha
I'm sticking with the my PSVR2. I'm enjoying it. And don't care about the tethering to the console. It suits my VR needs.
So many new headsets releasing, ranging from Quest 3 to the PSVR2 to these crazy $2000 headsets.
And here I am still with my ol' reliable Index lol.
I hate Facebook with a passion. If Sony can get PSVR2 working with PCVR it'll be an instant buy for me
@themightyant before you know it we'll be giving ourselves hints for every little thing. I just need to type this message and hit the send button
I love my Q2 but never play it wirelessly and don't care about AR too much, so this will be a harder sell for me
Hard not to see them as competitors when the majority of psvr2 launch titles are slightly updated versions of q2 games. I'll pick up both but 'untethered' is a big plus for me
GT7 will be the benchmark for VR sim racing now. Sure it won’t be long until another takes over. But man it’s impressive!. Polyphony just need to implement a 90hz option to help with the slight blur and it’ll be tip top 👌
Quest's cable-less approach means its processing power is basically that of a mobile phone. Don't get me wrong, mobile phone processors, both gpu and cpu, had amazing leaps in the past 10 years - but the gap between that and a console is still there.
VR is a highly demanding processing tech, so while I understand why people find a cable-less VR appealing, I think that at this point of time it's too much of a compromise and Sony chose well by going with a cabled design, delegating most of the processing power to the PS5.
With Carmack leaving it’s pretty clear that Meta is going for a premium experience versus a cheaper more accessible one. That approach will limit who uses it.
VR and AR are interesting but they lack killer apps and the interaction model is too complex.
On AR: think the movie Her is probably the best depiction of an AR future where we converse with an AI using natural language which is close to the ChatGPT + AirPods tech that is already present.
On VR: I think people to-date have preferred just putting more screens everywhere (in cars, in pockets, tablets, on wrists, on fridges) than walking around with one strapped to our faces. I think games are driving some adoption here and there is a dedicated fanbase that is funding the tech year after year so maybe it will grow, but I am still not seeing the necessary tech to do it well which would need 8k microled screens and even more power efficient chipsets. VR needs a Nintendo Wii like moment.
I am most interested to see what Apple is going to bring to the table here but I suspect even if they have amazing hardware there still won’t be a killer app. Apple doesn’t really care about games and I am not going to pay $500-1000 for a personal AppleTV movie theater or an Apple Maps driving directions experience.
And oh Meta, I have no interest in your corporate virtual business meeting dystopia.
More than happy with PSVR 2, the amazing exclusives that it will no doubt have. Make it the better option for me Astrobot will come I'm sure. Which will be incredible!!
@get2sammyb not hating on the article as its definitely worth talking about. But your sums are wrong. Quest 2 did not sell more than 20m. They said more than 20m meta quests. So likely hood that this number includes Quest 1.
It seems like they are struggling to even keep the player base going after they buy. This would seem very likely as both my dad and uncle who are in their 60s bought one to try live their cricket days but 2 weeks of having a go they put it down. Now gathering dust. I imagine the 20m are alot of casuals who jumped on the hype ans then put it down.
I just dont see meta quest 3 doing any good.
The argument of no wire is great but your never going to get the level of graphics and performance unless it tethered to a pc.
All playstation has to do really, is allow their headset to be used on pc and you double yoyr market.
Sony isn't quaking over this at all: Meta has been laying off employees by the tens of thousands and their stock price is down more than $20 per share from this time a year ago. Their Quest 2 pricing strategy has been a total clusterfudge — they raised it by $100 and then lowered it another $50-75 when it didn't sell at the higher market point. The wireless aspect of Quest is valuable only for "gateway" vr gaming, and if you want to use it on PC you're going to shell out a helluva lot more for a gaming PC rig than for your PS5. On top of all of that, Zuck is still convinced that people want to go to work for 8 hours a day in his ugly little "metaverse". He should really stick to what he does best, which is creating social media for boomer-aged political extremists while looking like an incognito space lizard disguised in a skin suit.
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