In the Season 5 Finale of Between Realties, Alex and Skeeva invited members of the live show audience to join the conversation for a special extended broadcast.
SadlyItsBradley and Rhys Da King make appearances along many others for quick discussions about the latest in VR or their prospective projects. Topics include the Quest 2 price increase and controversy surrounding VRChat’s latest update.
The latest update for the VR FPS Zero Caliber: Reloaded is now available, adding a full multiplayer PvP mode to the game on Oculus Quest and Meta Quest 2.
The PvP mode is only on Quest for now, but PC VR support is coming later this year. A big PC VR-specific update will launch in the Fall, bringing “most of the improvements and new features of the standalone version [Reloaded] to the PC one – PvP included.”
As previously announced, Zero Caliber’s PvP offering includes four modes: Deathmatch (up to 8 players), Team Deathmatch (up to 4v4), Siege (up to 4v4) and Gungame (up to 8 players). These modes will be played on six brand new maps.
There’s dedicated servers across three regions – NA, EU and SEA – so hopefully most players will be able to play with low ping. There’s also a new ‘Vote to Kick’ option for all multiplayer modes, so you can get rid of pesky players who are disrupting sessions online.
The PvP mode adds to a large array of options for Zero Caliber: Reloaded players on Quest, which also features a single player campaign with co-op support and a survival mode.
Developer XREAL Games says there’s plans for more PvP maps to come, along with support for mods and user-generated content later this year. The studio is also working on cross-play support for PvP modes between Quest and PC VR, which it says will arrive towards the end of the year “if everything goes as planned.”
You can enter for a chance to win a BRAND NEW standalone Quest 2 VR headset right here sponsored by Green Hell VR developer Incuvo. Read on for more details.
Incuvo is the studio behind open world survival game Green Hell VR set in the heart of the jungle, with animals and disease to compete with alongside the need to eat and drink. The developers just released the challenge update on Steam which offers time-limited tasks to complete, like finding the special campfire and lighting it up or finding and building the raft.
You can check out Green Hell VR on Quest 2 and Steam and our thanks for their sponsorship this week allowing us to bring you this giveaway! You can enter for a chance to win in the form below:
The creators describe Incursion as “hour-long campaign with non-linear objectives” that offers more challenging combat than the base game. You’ll be able to choose your own weapon upgrades and forge your own path through Incursion, which is set in an open environment with random enemy and ammo spawn locations. Not only will that keep you on your feet, but it should vary the experience on subsequent playthroughs.
You can check out the trailer in the tweet above, but here’s a short description, from the Steam Workshop listing:
When Alyx Vance is caught on the wrong side of the Quarantine Zone, she has only her wits, guns, and Russell to help her get back to City 17. But it won’t be easy: the Combine have her trapped at one of their checkpoints, and she’ll need to manage her resources and use clever tactics to escape…or stick around for some target practice.
The mod is a collaborative effort between a small group responsible for the voice overs, level design, artwork, scripting and more.
Despite launching more than two years ago, Half-Life: Alyx still stands tall as one of the most impressive VR experiences available. Since launch, the community has boosted the game’s longevity even further by providing Alyx players with a steady stream of mods, maps and extra content through the Steam Workshop.
A new update is available for Myst which adds hand tracking support and other requested features.
Players can now use hand tracking for the entire Myst experience from start to finish on Quest with gestures for smooth locomotion and other interactions. You can also seamlessly switch back to controllers whenever needed, so you can easily swap between the two input methods depending on your situation.
“Implementing hand tracking inMystseemed like an exciting technical challenge and a cool new feature to bring to players,” said Cyan Development Director Hannah Gamiel, speaking to the Oculus Blog. “Additionally, it’s one of those things which makes sense forMyst—we already have a ton of options to make the game accessible to folks, and this is just one more way that people who otherwise couldn’t experienceMystcan now play the game.”
There’s also a new “Classic Videos Mode” which adds in the original Myst videos (with sound) for most of the character interactions. Plus, there’s a new in-game journaling system, allowing you to take in-game screenshots for reference later with an in-game photo album. The developers say this should help you mark important information for reference, without having to take your headset off to write anything down.
Back on release, we thought Myst on Quest was a good translation of a classic into a new medium:
If you’re looking to explore Myst for the first time — or perhaps play “co-op” with family like I did — Myst VR is a definitely faithful, upgraded, and solid port of a landmark game that’s hard not to recommend everyone play at least once. It might be a little straining and lonely after a time, but that’s always been true of Myst.
Microsoft’s big defense contract that looks to supply the US Army with modified HoloLens AR headsets isn’t going so well. As first reported by Bloomberg, the Senate panel that oversees defense spending announced significant cuts to the Army’s fiscal 2023 procurement request for the device.
Microsoft announced last year it had won a US Army defense contact worth up to $22 billion to develop an Integrated Visual Augmentation System (IVAS), a tactical AR headset for soldiers based on HoloLens 2 technology.
Now the Appropriations Defense Subcommittee announced it’s cut $350 million from the Army’s procurement plans for IVAS, leaving around $50 million for the device. The subcommittee cites concerns based around the program’s overall effectiveness.
Concept testing in 2019, Image courtesy CNBC
“The Committee remains concerned that IVAS continues to face software, hardware, and user-acceptance challenges that the Army has not sufficiently addressed,” an official statement reads, which was obtained by Breaking Defense. “While the Committee was encouraged by the Department of the Army’s 2021 decision to extend testing and evaluation for an additional 10 months, it notes that significant development challenges with IVAS 1.1 remain.”
Earlier this year the US Congress froze $394 million from the Army’s IVAS budget, which Business Insidernoted at the time would only leave around $400 million. Even then, that was allegedly $200 million short of what Microsoft needed to recuperate development costs.
Instead the US government appears to be reallocating the 2023 funds to support procurement of the Army’s Enhanced Night Vision Goggle-Binocular, increasing that program’s budget by $300 million.
The subcommittee also increased spending on a number of other Army programs, including ground vehicle procurement, Abrams tank upgrades, Stryker upgrades, new Armored Multi-Purpose Vehicles, and approved budgets for both AH-64 Apache and UH-60 Black Hawk helicopters.
Business Insiderreported earlier this year that Microsoft had internally expressed low expectations for its latest version of IVAS, which was set to begin real-world operational tests in May.
This follows reports that cast doubt on a prospective HoloLens 3 amid an internal division that may have hobbled the company’s efforts to release its next AR headset as planned.
The Venice International Film Festival unveiled this year’s selection for Venice Immersive (the newly-renamed XR division of the festival) this week, which includes the upcoming Peaky Blinders VR experience, alongside Space Explorers, The Soloist VR and more.
The festival returns to an in-person format this year, following online offerings in its last two outings. The immersive selection will be open for press previews and public screenings between late August and early September, with technical support from HTC and Meta.
The scope of the immersive selection is also expanding this year to “acknowledge the growth of immersive media beyond the technologies of Virtual Reality and to include all means of creative expression in XR.” Alongside VR experience, the immersive selection will now also include 360 degree videos, XR installations, live performances and virtual worlds, each in their own sub categories.
There are 43 projects and 32 worlds available this year. Of those projects, 30 are officially competing in three categories, to be judged by the immersive jury panel – Venice Immersive Best Experience, Venice Immersive Grand Jury Prize, and Venice Immersive Special Jury Prize.
There will also be a ‘Venice Immersive World’ in VRChat, designed “with the technical support of VRrOOm” to present a virtual version of the in-person ‘immersive island’ available to visit in Venice.
It’s a bit surprising to see King’s Ransom among the selection – we knew that Doctor Who: Edge of Time developers Maze Theory were working on it, but solid gameplay and progress updates have been slim post-initial announcement. Having seen so little, we expected King’s Ransom to still be a while off. There’s a chance the festival offering is also just a taster of a bigger experience to come, but either way, it’s nice to see it make the festival selection.
Walkabout Mini Golf now offers paid downloadable content that adds an 18 hole course and full size maze inspired by the 1986 movie Labyrinth.
Each hole adapts a different scene of the film into a mini golf hole with the studio’s experience in traditional animation coming in handy with the development of characters from the film you can find throughout the course in Walkabout’s low-poly style. Once you finish the main 18 holes there’s also the fox hunt, hidden balls, the labyrinth itself and hard mode to explore. For the hard mode, the Labyrinth course is reimagined as taking place during Jareth’s masquerade ball in the film.
“Low poly doesn’t mean easy,” studio head Lucas Martell told UploadVR. “It means that you really have to have a good eye for what you’re doing…the fact that we can go on top of the castle and actually see all the way down to hole one and even see the golfers down there. That is something that is really only possible if you are making some artistic concessions, but it’s that balance between the art and the tech that really has to be spot on for something like this to work.”
Martell gave us a tour of the course which you can see in the video above or check out the trailer for the DLC embedded below:
Walkabout Mini Golf is available on Steam and Oculus Quest and the Labyrinth DLC course is priced at $2.99.
Meta’s Reality Labs revenue grew 48% year-over-year in Q2 2022, while costs grew 19%.
Reality Labs is the division of Meta responsible for Quest VR hardware & software, Portal video calling appliances, and the Ray-Ban Stories camera glasses – as well as researching and developing AR glassesand other future AR and VR devices.
This is the first quarter since the company began breaking out Reality Labs revenue where quarterly revenue grew more than costs year-over-year. For comparison, in Q1 2022 revenue grew 35% year-over-year but costs grew 55%.
The division brought in $452 million revenue in Q2 2022, up from $305 million in Q2 2021. But the cost of this division was a whopping $3.3 billion, up from $2.7 billion in Q1 2021. The result is a loss of $2.8 billion, up from a loss of $2.4 billion in Q1 2021.
In other words, cost still far outstrips revenue for Meta’s VR and AR division – but critically, revenue has turned a corner and started to grow faster than costs.
Mark Zuckerberg warned investors in Octoberthat investments in AR & VR would reduce Meta’s overall 2021 profit by $10 billion, and said “I expect this investment to grow even further for each of the next several years”. Despite recent cost cutting across Meta, CFO David Wehner confirmed today Meta still plans to increase its investment in AR & VR.
Earlier this week Meta announced the price of Quest 2 is rising by $100 as “the costs to make and ship our products have been on the rise”. Wehner told investors he expects Q3 Reality Labs revenue to be lower than Q2 – that seems to suggest he believes Quest 2 sales will drop by more than 33% at the new price.
The Federal Trade Commission is seeking an injunction in U.S. District Court to stop Mark Zuckerberg and Meta Platforms from buying fitness service Supernatural.
A partially redacted complaint alleges the acquisition announced last year was poised to close at the end of this month, but that it would “substantially lessen competition, or tend to create a monopoly, in the relevant market for VR dedicated fitness apps.”
“Letting Meta acquire Supernatural would combine the makers of two of the most significant VR fitness apps, thereby eliminating beneficial rivalry between Meta’s Beat Saber app and Within’s Supernatural app,” the complaint reads. “It is reasonably probable that Meta would have entered the VR dedicated fitness app market through alternative means absent this acquisition.”
The complaint recounts the significant list of other VR-related acquisitions by Meta after purchasing Beat Saber’s developer — including one we missed late last year of Wilson’s Heart developer Twisted Pixel.
“In January 2020, Meta acquired Sanzaru games, maker of the fantasy Viking combat game Asgard’s Wrath.”
“In May 2020, Meta acquired Ready at Dawn Studios, maker of Lone Echo II, a zero-gravity adventure game, and EchoVR, an online team-based sports game.”
“In April 2021, Meta acquired Downpour Interactive, maker of Onward, a team-based first-person shooter.”
“In May 2021, Meta acquired BigBox VR, maker of Population One, a multiplayer first-person arena shooter.”
“In June 2021, Meta acquired Unit2 Games, the maker of Crayta, a collaborative platform that allows users to create and play their own games.”
“In November 2021, Meta acquired Twisted Pixel, a studio that makes various games, including Path of the Warrior (a fighting game ), B-Team (a first person shooter), and Wilson’s Heart (a mystery noir thriller game).”
Meta “could build instead of buy within a reasonable period of time if it could not proceed with this acquisition,” the complaint reads. If the acquisition is allowed, “Meta would be one step closer to its ultimate goal of owning the entire ‘Metaverse.'”
Meta put up a blog post about the situation and, in a prepared statement, a Meta spokesperson shared the following with UploadVR:
“The FTC’s case is based on ideology and speculation, not evidence. The idea that this acquisition would lead to anticompetitive outcomes in a dynamic space with as much entry and growth as online and connected fitness is simply not credible. By attacking this deal in a 3-2 vote, the FTC is sending a chilling message to anyone who wishes to innovate in VR. We are confident that our acquisition of Within will be good for people, developers and the VR space.”
Article updated after publication with additional context.
In this week’s episode of Backseat VR Developer, Alex and Skeeva play Moss: Book II joined by developer Chris Alderson from Polyarc.
Tune in every Wednesday at 10 am Pacific on the UploadVR YouTube channel for a new episode of Backseat VR Developer as UploadVR Correspondents Alex & Skeeva play VR games joined by the people who make them!
You can catch up on earlier episodes embedded below as well as the most recent episode from Alex & Skeeva’s Between Realities podcast.
Even though the original PSVR headset is still getting some new game releases, it’s decidedly a last-gen headset… or maybe even a last-last-gen headset depending upon how you look at it. Luckily the forthcoming PSVR 2 is ready to match the latest and greatest headsets with modern features like passthrough view and a system-wide playspace boundary.
For those who have been waiting six years to upgrade from their original PSVR, the forthcoming PlayStation VR 2 is going to be a huge breath of fresh air. Not only is the headset a big step up in specs, but today Sony shared new features coming to the headset that will finally bring it up to par with the latest headsets.
Passthrough View
Image courtesy PlayStation
One of the biggest differences between most first-gen VR headsets and modern headsets is a passthrough view function which uses the headset’s cameras to let the user ‘look through’ the headset to the outside world. This seemingly simple feature adds a lot of convenience for doing things like finding your controllers or phone, quickly chatting with someone in the room, or checking on the location of a pet, all without taking off your headset.
While many other headsets now offer a passthrough view, most don’t actually do anything other than allowing you to look outside of your headset. PSVR 2 will go one step further to add one of Quest’s best features: passthrough playspace setup.
System-wide Playspace Boundary
Image courtesy PlayStation
Every other VR headset in the same class has long offered a ‘playspace boundary’ which shows players a virtual border outlining their safe area so they don’t bump into furniture or smack their TV. The original PSVR didn’t visualize any kind of custom boundary for the player.
For seated games this isn’t too big of a deal, but for more active games it is—so much so that some PSVR developers had to add their own boundary visualization system for their specific game.
Image courtesy PlayStation
Now with PSVR 2 players will be able to define a custom playspace boundary, and they’ll be able to do so conveniently from within the headset using the passthrough view.
Sony says PSVR 2 will be capable of automatically scanning the player’s space to automatically create a boundary, and players will be able to further customize the area with their controllers.
Stream Yourself While Playing
Image courtesy PlayStation
It’s always been possible to stream and capture VR gameplay with the original PSVR, but with PSVR 2 players with the PS5 HD Camera will be able to include a picture-in-picture view of themselves at the bottom right corner of the screen while they play. It’s not mixed reality, but it appears that players will be cut out from their background automatically, giving more context for those watching.
Beyond being able to put a view of yourself in the corner of your PSVR 2 gameplay, we’re also expecting the headset to finally be able to deliver significantly better streaming and capture quality than the original PSVR, though Sony hasn’t given detail on that just yet.
‘Cinematic Mode’ Returns
Sony also confirmed that PSVR 2 will retain the ‘Cinematic Mode’ of the first headset which allows players to play any non-VR PS5 content on a big screen inside of the headset. This includes regular PS5 games and movies, including support for HDR content at 24, 60, or 120Hz. That’s a nice little bonus because it means anyone buying a PSVR 2 is also getting an HDR display as well. There’s no word yet however on whether PSVR 2 will support stereoscopic video content like 3D Blu-ray movies.
The price for a new Quest 2 is jumping to $399 as Meta says “the costs to make and ship our products have been on the rise.”
Oculus Quest 2 debuted at $299 in 2020, $100 cheaper than Oculus Quest from 2019. In 2021, Facebook bumped the base Quest 2 headset’s storage from 64GB to 128GB while holding the suggested entry price firm at $299. Earlier this year, Meta changed the headset’s branding on the physical device to its new corporate identity — officially becoming Meta Quest 2.
The price change will kick in officially on August 1, with the 128GB model increasing to $399 and the 256GB model increasing to $499.
Now With Free Beat Saber
To offset the price difference, Meta says it’s now bundling Beat Saber free with the purchase of Meta Quest 2 between August 1 and December 31 of 2022. Beat Saber is one of VR’s most popular and comfortable titles and since Facebook acquired developer Beat Games in late 2019 it has seen major new features launch as well as a slew of content packs from big name musicians.
Refurbished Quest 2 Price Increasing Too
Meta confirmed to UploadVR that refurbished Quest 2 prices will increase to $349 and $429 for 128GB and 256GB models respectively. The Beat Saber promotion does not apply to refurbished headsets. In the past, some retailers have discounted Quest headsets around Black Friday, but demand around the holidays has also outstripped supply such that Quest has been backordered for months.
Previously, refurbished Quest systems have been as low as $249 or even $199, depending on the model.
Next Moves
Quest 2 doesn’t support expandable storage, so what you buy is what you get, and titles for the headset like Resident Evil 4, Medal Of Honor, and Myst have started to take up dozens of gigabytes each. Upcoming games like Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas promise to continue to eat up more of the internal storage on Quest 2 headsets.
“Meta has invested billions of dollars to help foster and grow a thriving VR ecosystem. We’re adjusting the price of our Meta Quest 2 headsets to enable us to continue investing in ways that will keep driving this increasingly competitive industry forward for consumers and developers alike,” a Meta spokesperson wrote in a prepared statement.
Even as Meta prepares a high-end professional-grade standalone headset to complement Quest 2 – currently known as Project Cambria – competitors like Pico may be preparing new competition. Standalone VR headsets Pico 4 and Pico 4 Pro, for example, were just spotted in FCC filings.
Nonetheless, Meta remains confident its pricing will be hard to match.
“Even with these pricing changes, Meta Quest 2 continues to be the most affordable VR headset with a comparable feature set on the market,” Meta claimed in its blog post announcing the new price structure.
Quest 2 buyers get Beat Saber free if they purchase the standalone headset new between August 1 and December 31 of 2022.
According to Meta, “People who purchase a new Meta Quest 2 from August 1, 2022 through December 31, 2022 and activate the device before January 31, 2023 using an account that does not already have Beat Saber enabled will be able to download Beat Saber at no additional cost for 14 days following activation.” The promotion does not apply to refurbished models.
The offer comes as Meta changes the base suggested retail price for Quest 2 from $299 to $399 because “the costs to make and ship our products have been on the rise.”
Meta boughtBeat Games in late 2019and the studio’s only VR title, Beat Saber, remains one of the medium’s most popular games across all major platforms. There’s multiplayer now and a growing array of musicians teaming up to release music packs in the game, likeBillie Eilish,Lady Gaga,Imagine Dragons, andGreen Day.
So you’ve got your greasy mitts on a Quest 2, and you’re wondering what to buy after you’ve exhausted all of the best free games and experiences available on the standalone headset. Whether you’re into active games, puzzles, or just want to slice or shoot the ever-living crap out of something, we’re here to help you settle into your new headset with a few games that should keep you playing for hundreds of hours yet to come.
Note: This list includes only native Quest games. Don’t forget that you can also play PC games with either Link or Air Link and a VR-ready PC. Find out if your PC is ready for Link.
This list below is a great starting point if you’re looking to burn pretty close to a single Benjamin, although you should definitely check out our list of the best and most rated Meta Quest games now available, which also includes prices to help you whittle away your hard-earned cash.
Each genre section breaks down pretty close to $100 bucks, which includes games to get your heart pumping, shooter fans, puzzle nerds, fantasy swordplay geeks, and much more. You can click through each category, or pick and mix using the legend below:
After the Fall is basically Valve’s Left 4 Dead in VR. This four-player co-op shooter pits you against hordes of zombies across a handful of linear levels, all of which are characteristically dotted with safehouses. Zombies aren’t very intimidating as individuals, but when the masses start streaming in from every corner, you’ll be glad you have a good team to back you up and the gun you grinded for with the points you picked up from—you guessed it—shooting zombies.
Population One is VR’s very own battle royale, letting you team up in 24-player matches so you can climb, glide, run, and scrounge your way to victory. You’ll be battling against teams of hardcore players in this heavily populated, cross-platform shooter, so make sure to pick your squad wisely.
The Quest version of Onward was widely maligned for bringing down the PC VR experience when it went cross-platform, but it’s still one of the best mil-sims on Quest. This online mil-sim shooter is filled with hardcore users thanks to its realism, which means you’ll need to use all of the sort of military tactics to win against the other team. Communicate clearly, make sure you’re not running ahead of the pack Leroy Jenkins-style, and get good at shooting.
In a tweet this week, Laatsch said that the game “is playable from logos to credits” and it “has been for a while.” The focus of development is now “polish, bugs, feature creep, polish!”
Bonelab is the much-anticipated sequel to Stress Level Zero’s 2019 title Boneworks, a physics-based action adventure game that set a new standard for physical interaction in VR. Spanning across an Aperture-inspired collection of test chambers, Boneworks gave every object in the world a sense of weight and tactile handling.
While Boneworks released exclusively for PC VR, the follow-up Bonelab is set to release on PC VR and Quest 2 this year, and potentially even PSVR 2 later down the line. Bonelab was officially unveiled in April at the Meta Quest Gaming Showcase, described as an action-adventure physics game with a brand new story and “two years of innovation and interaction engine progress,” building on Boneworks’ foundation.
With the bulk of Bonelab complete and the focus now on finalizing features and squashing bugs, it looks increasingly likely Bonelab will make its 2022 release window as planned. There’s still no word on a more specific date, but we could hear more at Meta’s annual Connect conference, which usually takes place late in the year.
In a seemingly unprompted tweet this week, Ultrawings 2 developer Bit Planet Games said that despite building its latest game with a focus on the PC VR platform, the studio has seen significantly more sales volume on Quest 2.
The tweet, which not responding to a specific thread, concluded that “stand-alone VR is far more successful than PCVR.”
PCVR players, we aren’t haters. We made Ultrawings 2 thinking of you FIRST! It’s true! But the reality is the Q2 version has made close to 10x what the PCVR has made. That’s just the truth. Players have spoken. Stand-alone VR Is far more successful than PCVR.
As the Quest platform has proliferated and pulled a growing VR audience into the fold, there’s been plenty of accusations levied at developers by PC VR players who claim that a game has been ‘watered down’ due to the need to run on Quest, compared to what it could have been if targeting the high performance of PC VR from the outset.
For some titles that may indeed be true, though in this case Bit Planet Games claims Ultrawings 2 was designed first and foremost for the PC VR platform. Despite that, the studio has clearly seen most of its success from the Quest audience.
The motivation for the studio’s declaration isn’t entirely clear. It may be to fend off a common criticism of the game itself, an effort to shed light on a truth that other VR developers should know, throwing shade at Valve (which runs the leading PC VR platform, Steam), or any number of other potential reasons.
Pico Interactive, the VR hardware subsidiary to Chinese tech giant ByteDance, is apparently getting ready to release a new series of standalone VR headsets.
As first reported by Protocol, Pico filed the devices with the FCC late last week, saying in the filing that it intends to launch both a Pico 4 Pro and Pico 4 standalone headsets.
Both headsets are identical in specs “except additional eye tracking & face tracking function for Pico 4 Pro,” the company says in the filing.
Image courtesy FCC, Pico Interactive
As noted by Protocol, Pico appears to have called the new hardware ‘Phoenix’ in the FCC filing, and it’s reported to run on Android Q via a Qualcomm processor. FCC filings are typically vague as to not give away too much information pre-launch, so we’ll just have to wait to see how much of an upgrade it is over its latest.
It’s uncertain whether ‘Pico 4’ is the final naming scheme, or whether it’s a shorthand for Pico Neo 4, although it’s clear the company is looking to bring competition to basically the only real name in consumer VR standalones: Meta. Since its founding in 2015, Pico pretty much only targeted consumers in China and enterprise users in the West. That was before it released it Neo 3 Link in Europe back in May, a device that features near spec parity with Quest 2.
At the time, we surmised Pico was quickly eyeballing North America with its Neo 3 Link in an attempt to earnestly compete with Meta there, although now it’s possible the company is looking to one-up the competition with the new hardware before it makes landfall on Meta’s home turf.
The filing doesn’t reveal to what extent Pico 4 will be able to match Meta’s upcoming Project Cambria, which is a VR headset capable of doing augmented reality tasks thanks to its mixed reality passthrough camera sensors. The price of Cambria is set to be “significantly higher than $800” though, so there may be some wiggle room from a name that’s so far unknown to consumers in the US.
Cambria is said to include both eye and face-tracking, so it will be interesting to see how Pico intends on competing (likely with Pico 4 Pro), whether it be by pushing specs slightly beyond Quest 2 or going for full spec parity with Cambria.
The Twilight Zone is an anthology franchise that’s spawned multiple TV shows throughout the decades following the iconic 1959 series. While the VR game stays mostly true to its roots, tossing out sci-fi horror themes and narrative twists aplenty, its inclusion of a finicky shooter-based combat system pitted against paper-thin enemies is a sore spot that unfortunately cheapens the overall experience.
The Twilight Zone Details:
Available On: Quest 2, PSVR coming soon Release Date: July 14th, 2022 Price: $20 Developer: Pocket Money Games Publisher: Fun Train Reviewed On: Quest 2
Gameplay
Like the series from the ’60s, the game’s anthology setup feels appropriately pulpy, and provides a buffet of narrative twists you’d expect from the franchise. The storytelling aspect of the game is definitely its strong suit, as it weaves three different tales that feel like they were ripped from show’s glory days, with a serviceable Rod Serling impression included.
Each story takes around 45 minutes to complete, but for the sake of spoilers I’m not going much further than that. There’s suitably weird themes that touch on technology, gaming culture, the survival of the species in a hot and arid hellscape—all of it really on point for 2022.
Image courtesy Fun Train, Pocket Money Games
While the stories are definitely on brand with its psychological horror and patented sci-fi bend, the game includes an action shooter theme that would feel out of place in any episode of The Twilight Zone I’ve ever seen. A large portion of the game is focused on combat, and in two of the episodes you’re given some sort of gun and expected to kill a ton of enemies.
And despite some truly intriguing twists, combat weighs down everything, as the shooting experience left a lot to desire. Aiming is difficult with iron sights on one gun from the third episode, and all other guns in the second episode didn’t include sights at all, which all leads to inconsistent results across the board. Enemy reactions to shots are also equally ineffectual, which always leaves you guessing if you hit the target or not.
Image courtesy Fun Train, Pocket Money Games
Enemies also spawn out of nowhere and poof away when they’re dead. If you’re attacked, you restart at your last automatic save. There are a few high notes, such as some cartoony one-time use guns that can be fun, and some environmental puzzles that may take a minute or two to figure out, but the relative size of the game makes these moments feel more like a sampler than honest-to-goodness skill-building moments where you can put things you’ve learned to a satisfying conclusion.
There’s a few notable easter eggs throughout the game that were nice touches, and should appeal to fans of the franchise. If you look around, you may find Mr. Bemis’ reading glasses from Time Enough at Last (1959) and the Talky Tina doll from Living Doll (1963). There’s also a few tableaus that are definitely from episodes past, like The Odyssey of Flight 33 (1961), which originally starred William Shatner.
Finding easter eggs, or completing a few specific tasks unlocks different modes, all of which essentially function as visual filters that let you play the game in different colors reflecting each of the franchise’s series: black and white for the 1959 series, a more color saturated mode for the 1994 series, etc.
Image captured by Road to VR
It’s a fun gimmick, but it didn’t really extend gameplay after the final credits roll since the game is essentially a one-shot experience with what appears to be set outcomes. Still, you may get a kick out of playing the game completely in black and white, and immerse yourself more in the original series.
Immersion
Visuals feel a bit hit and miss with The Twilight Zone. The game’s atmosphere, thanks to a rich color palette and high variability of objects and environments, is excellent. Some of the modeling and textures however could be more detailed, which is a bit of a downer. You can tell the game on Quest 2 is desperately trying to wring out every ounce of performance though, as video capture incurs significant stuttering.
Image courtesy Fun Train, Pocket Money Games
Object interaction is middling, as the few objects you’re allowed to touch are snapped to specific angles in your hand, while others are entirely unreactive, leading you to question what’s important and what isn’t in any given area.
Voice acting is excellent throughout, which includes a Rod Serling-style narrator. It’s more of an homage than a dead-on impression of Serling, but it’s such a classic touch to bookend each of the episodes. The game’s soundtrack also does a great job at setting the mood and adding to narrative reveals.
Comfort
There’s a ton of map traversal in The Twilight Zone, and many mazes that can make your a head a little dizzy with how much fast and sharp turning you need to do. Thankfully the game includes plenty of comfort modes to get you from A-to-B, but if you feel like you’re running around too much you may need to slow down a bit. There are moments when the world gets turned upside down, which can feel strange, although those are very few.
‘The Twilight Zone VR’ Comfort Settings – July 25th, 2022
As you might expect from the title, this sequel brings the Warplanes series forward to World War II. You will lead the US to victory over Japan in the main campaign, or participate in co-op missions and competitive multiplayer. It will feature 10 specific planes, two of which were revealed in the latest update: F8F Bearcat and J2M Raiden.
In the same update, developers Home Net Games also made some changes to multiplayer and ranked play, adding in 60 decals to unlock and customize your planes with as you rank up. Warplanes currently remains in early access on Steam and it’s likely (but unconfirmed) that this August 18 release will mark the game’s transition into full release there as well.
This isn’t the only upcoming Home Net Games title on our radar either. At our Upload VR Showcase last month, the studio also announced a VR helicopter game, titled HeliSquad: Covert Operations. It will release for PC VR, Quest 2 and the Pico Neo Link 3, but other details are slim for now.
Nearly four years after its early access debut, indie VR gem COMPOUND has launched version 1.0 on PC VR, including an updated demo for anyone to try. The game is expected to come to Quest as well later this year.
Created by one-man indie developer Bevan “NotDead” McKechnie, Compound was originally released in early access on Steam in 2018 and has seen slow but steady development ever since. The game is a roguelite with a unique pixel-art style and an arsenal of fun weaponry with which to experiment.
“I am immensely proud of what Compound has become and I invite you to try the demo so see what it’s like!” says McKechnie.
'Compound' Screenshots
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Image courtesy NotDead Games
Image courtesy NotDead Games
Image courtesy NotDead Games
Image courtesy NotDead Games
Image courtesy NotDead Games
In the last year of development the game has been considerably upgraded.
The 1.0 launch update brings three “comic-book style story endings,” an overpowered minigun for those who complete the game, 21 achievements, and heaps of polish details and fixes. Prior to that, the game was updated with an overhauled progression system to “introduce the game’s mechanics to new players in a much more controlled way,” including 146 trophies to collect based on various progression metrics. Similarly, another update overhauled the game’s ‘HQ’ starting area—which includes a shooting range and upgraded tutorial—to improve the experience for new players.
The game’s release on PC this week appears to show that things are going smoothly along the expected timeline. That bodes well for the game coming to Quest 2 by the end of the year, which the developer confirmed to Road to VR last month.
The game’s public roadmap shows that Compound may also see some updates beyond the 1.0 release; though unclear if before or after the Quest launch, those could include the possibility of custom level support, more weapons & ‘mutator’ gameplay modifiers, and a non-VR version of the game on PC. And just so you know we asked about it—McKechnie says there’s no plans for co-op support in Compound.
Naturally, we had to capture some video from both versions of Moss: Book II and see how they stack up against each other. The short answer? Pretty well!
The footage above is taken from the opening 10 minutes of the game, captured on Quest 2 and PSVR connected to a PS5 console. The differences between the two are, in the grand scheme of things, pretty negligible — the game’s diorama environments are quite beautiful to behold on both headsets.
However, there are a few differences to look out for, if you’ve got a keen eye. While the Quest 2 version generally appears sharper, PSVR does have some more dynamic lighting effects which seem to be missing on Quest 2 — you can see an example of the difference in the thumbnail for the YouTube video comparison embedded above. Still, we’d say the differences are fairly minor and both version look pretty fantastic inside the headset.
