Blog V Reality: July 2026

Tuesday, 21 July 2026

Reader Feedback Wanted: Thoughts on Our New Article Format

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We at Road to VR have been asking ourselves: how do we offer the most value to our readers? That question led to an experiment over the last few months that changed the way we structured each article, with the goal of making them more useful to you. Now, we’d like to hear your thoughts.

From the very beginning of Road to VR, our goal has always been to give the audience enough context in any given article that they would walk away understanding both the what and the why it matters of each piece of news we cover. Between my colleague Scott and I—who produce the vast majority of content on Road to VR—there’s nearly 26 years of collective expertise in the XR. That’s why, for most of our publication’s existence, our usual news articles generally wove critical context directly inline with each and every paragraph of the news subject of the article. Usually that resulted in several pretty dense paragraphs.

In recent months we decided to experiment with another idea: to more clearly separate the what (ie: the basic facts of the news that you could find from the official source) from the why (ie: why does this news matter… through the lens of authors that deeply understand the subject matter and historical context of the XR industry).

So you may have noticed recent articles organized with two recurring headers: ‘The News’ and ‘My Take’.

In ‘The News’, we aim to give you the facts quickly and without fluff. In ‘My Take’, we aim to zoom out and help readers understand why this particular news item matters in a broader context. This section also allows Scott and I to speak from a personal “I” perspective—and lean into our individual expertise, opinions, and personality—rather than speak with a collective voice, as we have done historically.

Here are two examples of an examples of articles using this new format:

So, we’d really like to hear your thoughts on this format. A couple of questions to think about: did you notice it? Do you like or dislike it? Is there some way it could be better?

Please feel free to leave a comment below, or if you’d like to offer your feedback privately, please reach us at feedback [at] roadtovr [dot] com.

The post Reader Feedback Wanted: Thoughts on Our New Article Format appeared first on Road to VR.

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Gentle Monster Plans Massive North America & Europe Retail Expansion Amid Smart Glasses Rollout

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South Korean eyewear brand Gentle Monster is set to launch its first pair of smart glasses this fall, and it’s hoping to make waves with a rash of new physical retail locations across North America and Europe.

The News

As reported by Maeil Business Newspaper, Gentle Monster is set to dramatically increase its overseas stores within the next five years. While Gentle Monster currently operates a total of 86 stores globally, 36 of which are in Korea, the Seoul-based company aims to open 10 more non-Korean locations by the end of this year, with plans to expand that number to a total of 200 within three to five years.

Gentle Monster’s rapid expansion outside of its Korean home turf comes at a critical moment, as the company hopes to drive global brand growth off the back of its upcoming smart glasses, the result of a partnership between Google and Samsung.

Gentle Monster Smart Glasses | Courtesy Google & Samsung

Much like Meta Ray-Ban, Gentle Monster’s smart glasses include a built-in camera for video and photo capture, audio input and output, and a a big focus on AI integration, although it will be one of the first smart glasses to run Google’s Android XR operating system and its Gemini AI.

“We plan to increase the number of North American stores from the current eight to more than 10 by the end of this year,” a Gentle Monster spokesperson told Maeil Business Newspaper. “We will actively market AI glasses to become a new growth engine in addition to existing eyewear.”

While North America and Europe are undoubtedly set to be a big focus for Gentle Monster, the company also aims to expand retail across Asia, including Korea, Japan, China, and Taiwan.

This follows a $100 million investment by Google in Gentle Monster’s parent company IICOMBINED, giving Google a 4% stake in the company.

My Take

I was wondering how Gentle Monster would appeal to the North American and European market ever since Google announced it was working with it and US-based Warby Parker. I’ve never physically seen a pair of Gentle Monster glasses outside of Asia, so I basically assumed Samsung would take the lead, physically selling both the smart glasses from Gentle Monster and Warby Parker via its comparatively larger retail presence, leaving the two smaller brands to essentially sell primarily online and at its less numerous physical locations.

It seems though the recent Google investment has given the rapidly growing K-brand reason enough to take a lead, which maybe shouldn’t be so surprising given just how well K-anything is doing nowadays.

What’s especially interesting though is that Gentle Monster appears to not only want a leadership position in the global eyewear market in general, but sees to its smart glasses as the impetus. It’s a sort of confidence I didn’t expect from the company with only one pair of smart glasses on the roster thus far, although I imagine we can expect that to change in short order if it wants to take on a growing pack of rivals.

Ray-Ban Meta glasses | Courtesy EssilorLuxottica, Meta

Speaking of rivals: as the result of a long-term partnership with EssilorLuxottica, Meta has released multiple generations of Ray-Ban and now Oakley-branded smart glasses. That tight partnership may be changing though, as Meta even released its own cheaper ‘Meta Glasses’ frames, starting at $300.

Meanwhile, EssilorLuxottica seems to be making inroads to develop its own XR hardware, as the Franco-Italian eyewear giant recently partnered with Applied Materials in a long-term joint development agreement that will accelerate the commercialization of next-gen optical systems for AR and AI-powered smart glasses. EssilorLuxottica also recently acquired mixed reality headset creator Lynx, which was creating a competitor to Meta Quest.

A host of other brands have also seen the obvious growth potential for the audio-only smart glasses segment, which seems fairly logical since it’s very clearly a cheaper-to-produce accessory and not a hardware platform as such at this point; no costly displays, relatively small compute footprint, and no need for any sort of app store at this point, since it’s all about interactions with AI, taking photo/video, and using the few approved integrations, like listening to Spotify.

That said, there are also a growing number of startups eschewing cameras altogether by offering display-only glasses, such as MemoMind and Even Realities, although they admittedly feel like a niche that the biggest brands on planet Earth may skip over, as the training data alone from their camera-first, AI-flavored smart glasses is just too rich to pass up.

The post Gentle Monster Plans Massive North America & Europe Retail Expansion Amid Smart Glasses Rollout appeared first on Road to VR.

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Monday, 20 July 2026

Magic Leap Cuts Nearly 200 Jobs as AR Pioneer Pivots Into Waveguide Supplier

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AR unicorn Magic Leap is again pivoting its core business, this time to serve as a waveguide supplier to other companies making AR glasses, something that we’ve learned comes amid a mass lay off nearly 200 of its core engineering and product development staff.

According to a formal WARN Act notification letter to US government officials last week, the company is set to lay off 193 employees at the company’s Plantation, Florida headquarters.

A wide range of product development and engineering roles are set to be affected come October 1st, the letter reveals, including software, hardware, UX/design, product management, manufacturing engineering, quality, technical program management, and several senior engineering and executive leadership positions.

Although it’s uncertain how many will remain at Magic Leap—estimates point to a few hundred at this point—the mass layoff comes amid a broader shift at Magic Leap, as the company announced earlier this month its was undergoing a “strategic pivot to accelerate the development of AI display glasses.”

The company says it’s now shifting from building first-party AR headsets to taking on the role of “essential AR ecosystems partner, waveguide supplier, and device integration expert for the technology industry.”

“Magic Leap is seizing the moment where our AR innovation and manufacturing expertise create the greatest market impact,” said Scott Carden, SVP of display engineering and manufacturing at Magic Leap. “We’re solving the toughest challenges of scaling waveguide production, from industry-leading waveguide performance to manufacturing and full-device integration. Now, we’re using our unmatched expertise to help partners bring AI display glasses to millions of consumers in the fastest way possible through our waveguide technology.”

Founded in 2010 by Rony Abovitz, Magic Leap is arguably the most well-funded AR startups to date, having massed well over $4 billion in funding from investors including Saudi Arabia’s sovereign wealth fund, a majority holder at over $1 billion invested, as well as Google, Alibaba, and Qualcomm.

Despite an enviable runway, the company’s first AR headset didn’t exactly live up to the hype. Released in 2018, Magic Leap 1 awkwardly straddled the consumer and enterprise segment at the (then unthinkable) price of $2,300, essentially forcing the company to pivot and drop its consumer ambitions a short two years later. That first pivot away from consumer also marked the departure of CEO and co-founder Rony Abovitz, with its follow-up device Magic Leap 2 released in late 2020 solely targeted at enterprise.

And while Magic Leap has only just announced its waveguide optics pivot, in reality the company was making moves away from first-party devices as early as July 2024, according to a Bloomberg report, which characterized the action as a last ditch effort to make use of the company’s AR optics tech.

Meanwhile, we’ve heard substantially nothing about development of first-party devices, as over the past two years the company has only announced a hardware partnership with Google and manufacturing partnership with Taiwan’s Pegatron, both of which center around licensing and manufacturing waveguides.

The post Magic Leap Cuts Nearly 200 Jobs as AR Pioneer Pivots Into Waveguide Supplier appeared first on Road to VR.

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Saturday, 18 July 2026

Valve Drops Big SteamVR Update Ahead of Steam Frame Launch

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Valve has dropped a sizeable update to SteamVR, paving the way for what appears to be imminent launch of its long-awaited standalone VR headset, Steam Frame.

Valve’s latest update brings a good slate of standard Steam features to SteamVR. And with it, the VR runtime is ostensibly shaping up to offer a more VR-native user experience, in part thanks to its new UI for SteamVR’s Dashboard.

According to the update’s patch notes, users who opt-in to the Steam Client Beta will essentially have a more useful Dashboard, as it brings Steam Deck-style Quick Access controls, as well as easier access to things like achievements, guides, and notes.

Valve says the update also improves usability with easier overlay management, better battery information, and brightness controls.

For those of us waiting for years, the latest SteamVR update suggests we really are finally rounding the bend, as Valve has not only obviously imported tons of Steam Frame headsets into the US in preparation for release, but is now tightening SteamVR’s long-neglected UI for something seemingly ready for prime time.

What’s more, Valve recently released a ‘Great on Frame’ page that highlights a growing list of optimized VR and non-VR games that are guaranteed to work on Steam Frame.

Still, the top two bits of information are missing: price and exact release date. Provided Steam Machine is any indication, which launched at a much higher-than-expected $1,050 last month, it’s likely Steam Frame will be similarly inflated—all of it due to the global RAM and storage crisis going on currently.

Looking for more Steam Frame news?

Valve Unveils Steam Frame VR headset to Make Your Entire Steam Library Portable: Valve shows off Steam Frame, the standalone headset that can stream and natively play your entire Steam library—with only a few caveats right now.

Hands-on: Steam Frame Reveals Valve’s Modern Vision for VR and Growing Hardware Ambitions: We go hands-on with Valve’s latest and greatest VR headset yet.

Valve Says No New First-party VR Game is in Development: Valve launched Half-Life: Alyx (2020) a few months after releasing Index, but no such luck for first-party content on Steam Frame.

Valve is Open to Bringing SteamOS to Third-party VR Headsets: Steam Frame is the first VR headset to run SteamOS, but it may not be the last.

Valve Plans to Offer Steam Frame Dev Kits to VR Developers: Steam Frame isn’t here yet; Valve says it needs more time with developers first so they can optimize their PC VR games.

Valve Announces SteamOS Console and New Steam Controller, Designed with Steam Frame Headset in Mind: Find out why Valve’s new SteamOS-running Console and controller will work seamlessly with Steam Frame.

Steam Frame vs. Quest 3 Specs: Better Streaming, Power & Hackability: Quest 3 can do a lot, but can it go toe-to-toe with Steam Frame?

Steam Frame vs. Valve Index Specs: Wireless VR Gameplay That’s Generations Ahead : Valve Index used to be the go-to PC VR headset, but the times have changed.

The post Valve Drops Big SteamVR Update Ahead of Steam Frame Launch appeared first on Road to VR.

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Thursday, 16 July 2026

EssilorLuxottica Acquires French XR Startup Lynx, Putting R2 Headset Release in Doubt

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Lynx, the France-based XR hardware startup, has been acquired by global eyewear conglomerate EssilorLuxottica.

In a public email to backers, Lynx founder and CEO Stan Larroque confirmed the acquisition, which was rumored to have taken place two weeks ago.

This includes “[a]ll the IP, assets and most of the team is now transitioning from a startup to this big company,” Larroque says in the email, adding that “it might take a few months for the operations to be smooth again, pending all legal approvals.”

Larroque isn’t making the move to EssilorLuxottica alongside other staff however, concluding his eight years building the startup, as he reveals he’s moving to Paris-based drone company Parrot to take on “a key leadership role” alongside Parrot founder and CEO Henri Seydoux.

Larroque further confirmed with Road to VR that the deal is “a formal acquisition, meaning they get everything, the name, the domain, the databases, code, 3D files, manufacturing know-how, etc. And most of the team is already employed now at EssilorLuxottica.”

There’s no word on what will actually happen to Lynx-R2 though, the company’s still-unreleased mixed reality standalone announced earlier this year. Given EssilorLuxottica’s close partnership with Meta vis-à-vis Ray-Ban and Oakley Meta smart glasses, the company’s Quest competitor may have little future under its new owner.

While financial details of the acquisition are still under wraps, it seemingly couldn’t have come at a better time. In March, Lynx parent company SL Process entered judicial liquidation proceedings following a ruling by the Economic Activities Court of Nanterre, France, which essentially meant restructuring efforts had failed and survival was no longer viable, as assets and IP are typically sold off to cover debts.

Founded in 2019 after raising an initial $2 million seed round, the Paris-based startup made a splash with a 2021 Kickstarter campaign for its first-gen R1 standalone headset, raising more than $800,000 from backers. In 2022, Lynx garnered a $4 million Series A round led by social VR platform developer Somnium Space.

Still, for a hardware company, a little over $6 million is nothing more than a shoestring budget, something Larroque often lamented about online, calling the fundraising environment in Europe “excruciating.”

The post EssilorLuxottica Acquires French XR Startup Lynx, Putting R2 Headset Release in Doubt appeared first on Road to VR.

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Wednesday, 15 July 2026

EU Moves to Exempt Smart Glasses from Repairability Rules, Privacy Questions Remain

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Although smart phones will soon require user-removable batteries in the EU, the European Commission is moving to exempt wearables, which includes smartwatches, fitness trackers, and smart glasses.

As reported by Politico, a so-called “legislative tweak” has cleared the way for US-based companies like Meta to keep the EU market in sight.

In a statement, a European Commission spokesperson maintained it “has not given in to anyone’s pressure,” as its proposals “follow a broad public consultation with consumer associations, industry stakeholders and the Member States.”

According to the spokesperson, the exemption “is not about regulating one specific product” but “to ensure safer consumer and industrial products in cases where opening a device could create safety risks or where technical limits make consumer access unrealistic.”

That said, the European Parliament and individual governments have a two-month period to object to the tweak before it’s entered into the Official Journal of the EU. Once entered, it’s only a 20 day wait until the bill is in force, putting official legislation in play possibly sometime in late November or early December.

While that’s cleared the way for companies like Meta, Google, Samsung and Apple to release smart glasses in the EU (and likely also AR glasses) materially unchanged, European regulators and lawmakers are increasingly discussing smart glasses’ role in data privacy and surveillance.

Politico notes the European Data Protection Board, which gathers privacy regulators across Europe, has ordered a report into smart glasses, likely to be finalized this summer. From there, EU lawmakers will assess actions.

“Europe should not dilute consumer protections. Smart glasses are already raising important concerns about privacy, security and consumer choice. Exemptions from EU battery removability rules should remain exactly that: genuine exceptions based on clear technical and safety evidence, not industry pressure. Exempting these devices … risks setting a dangerous precedent,” said Cláudio Texeira, head of digital policy at Europe’s largest consumer protection group BEUC.

This follows Meta’s recent class action lawsuit in the US over privacy concerns tied to its Ray-Ban smart glasses, wherein the company is accused of sending private camera footage to a Kenya-based subcontractor for manual review to train its AI models.

Allegations stem from an investigative report from Sweden’s Svenska Dagbladet and Göteborgs-Posten, which is said to have uncovered a subcontractor in Kenya tasked with reviewing and labeling images and videos uploaded from the glasses.

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Monday, 13 July 2026

Anduril Founder Quietly Teases Remarkably Compact AR Glasses

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Palmer Luckey, the founder of military tech startup Anduril (also the founder of Oculus), quietly teased a pair of unannounced AR glasses that are presumably in development at Anduril. Despite their incredibly compact appearance, Luckey says they are not merely smart glasses, but are indeed built for full AR capability.

Just days after Snap Inc revealed its latest Specs standalone AR glasses, a photo shared on X showed Anduril founder Palmer Luckey wearing what appeared to be some kind of clip-on attachment to his sunglasses. The caption of the photo, shared by Lulu Cheng Meservey, included the quote “Other AR glasses getting literally frame mogged.” This ostensibly referred to Snap’s Specs glasses, which drew significant commentary about whether their design was too bulky to be socially acceptable.

Regardless of where one stands on the size of Specs, the glasses shown in the photo of Luckey appear incredibly compact by comparison. This prompted Road to VR founder Ben Lang to question whether it was actually a fair comparison to make; Lang pointed out that surprisingly compact smart glasses—like the Even Realities G2—are already available on the market today, but they remain compact because they lack the full hardware stack required for true AR glasses.

Luckey responded directly to Lang’s scepticism, saying “[…] these are the real deal! No shortcuts, just really good tech in conjunction with deeply invested partners like Qualcomm, Meta Quest, and [Andrew “Boz” Bosworth, CTO at Meta].”

When asked by Lang if the device pictured is capable of true AR, Luckey added, “correct, [the glasses have] wide-FOV full-color stereo.”

Luckey’s confirmation that the device is capable of proper AR is indeed surprising considering the size. Significant questions, however, remain. Chief among them is whether the device is fully standalone or if it relies on a tethered puck (which would serve to offload battery and/or compute), allowing the device to be much smaller than a pair of standalone AR glasses like Specs.

Given the incredibly compact size of the glasses, a tethered architecture seems like the only possible explanation. However, neither the original photo published by Meservey, nor a follow-up photo published by Luckey, show any clear signs of a tether:

Another major question is whether the device is made as a modular add-on to existing off the shelf glasses. The design of the hardware suggests this as a significant possibility (indeed, the glasses pictured look like a regular pair of Ray-Ban Aviators). But making a simple modular add-on to existing glasses introduces significant complexities for the calibration of optics, displays, and tracking hardware.

Far more is unknown about this device than is known at this stage. But there’s reason to believe it’s legitimate, and possibly connected to Anduril’s EagleEye project, which aims to build an augmented reality helmet to bring superhuman perception to soldiers on the battlefield. In 2025, Anduril announced it had partnered with Meta on XR technology for the military, which aligns with Luckey’s statement that the pictured glasses were thanks, in part, to “deeply invested partners [like Meta].”

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Lenovo Reportedly Shutters US-based XR Business Unit Amid Shift to AI Wearables

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Lenovo has reportedly closed its XR business unit in the US, according to a report by Skarred Ghost.

Citing people familiar with the matter, the report maintains Lenovo has shuttered its business-oriented XR unit in the US. As per the report, most of the affected employees were let go, while a minority have been offered other positions within the company.

It’s uncertain how many have been affected. Lenovo has however confirmed, at least in partial, that the company is taking its XR efforts in a new direction:

“As the XR market evolves, we see stronger momentum and broader consumer adoption around AI-enabled wearables. As a result, Lenovo is transitioning from a business-first XR strategy under our ThinkReality brand to a more consumer-focused approach within Motorola,” Lenovo says in a statement obtained by Skarred Ghost.

The company says it’s creating a “more centralized organization” which will focus on AI-powered consumer wearables and delivering what it calls a “unified Personal AI experience across multiple devices — from AI PCs and tablets to smartphones and wearables.”

While not a core XR leader, Lenovo has produced a number of VR and AR headsets over the years, starting with the launch of its Windows Mixed Reality headset in 2016, which was released alongside other top OEMs, such as HP, Samsung, Dell, and Acer.

The company also released the Mirage Solo VR standalone in 2018, manufactured the Rift S for Meta (then Oculus) in 2019, a Lenovo Classroom 2 VR headset built in partnership with Pico in 2020, and its ThinkReality A3 AR glasses for enterprise in 2021.

Lenovo’s most recent XR headset, released in 2023, was its ThinkReality VRX mixed reality device, one of the first enterprise-oriented headsets to adopt pancake-style optics. Additionally, the company released its second-gen Lenovo Legion tethered display glasses in 2025.

The post Lenovo Reportedly Shutters US-based XR Business Unit Amid Shift to AI Wearables appeared first on Road to VR.

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‘Ghosts of Tabor’ Returns to Its Roots in 2024-era ‘Legacy’ Edition This Month

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Combat Waffle announced it’s taking popular extraction shooter Ghosts of Tabor back to its 2024 roots with a separate version of the game, called Ghosts of Tabor: LEGACY.

Ghosts of Tabor: Legacy is essentially set to be the 2024 version of the game, before the studio pushed a number of major content updates, some of which drew community ire.

Combat Waffle says it’s reintroducing the game “preserved for the players who were there for it. The maps you mastered. The feel you remember. This is your raid, the way it used to feel.”

This includes a host of legacy stuff, such as maps in their original form: Old Island, Hex Bunker, Silo, and Matka Miest, as well as UX in its original state, such as backpacks with item collision, the older damage system, and more.

As it is, the studio says it won’t be pushing any content updates to the “time capsule” version, only bug fixes as needed.

After 2024, Ghosts of Tabor received a number of major updates, including a new mission system, PvE mode, maps, weapons, and some quality-of-life improvements.

Complaints have centered some on balance issues, although the biggest offender has been ongoing bugs, including things like clipping through the environment or disappearing, which can cause players to lose valuable gear after a raid (to name a few).

Still, despite vocal community feedback, the game has managed to move up the charts as one of the top 50 best-selling Quest games of all time.

Ghosts of Tabor: Legacy is now available for pre-order on Steam and the Horizon Store for Quest 2 and above, currently priced at $10, or 33% off its $15 launch price.

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Friday, 10 July 2026

Apple Publishes Detailed Technical Specifications for Third-party Vision Pro Motion Controllers

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Following Apple’s announcement that VisionOS 27 will support third-party motion controllers for Vision Pro, the company has published a set of technical specifications and requirements for third-parties building such controllers.

Published in the latest version of Apple’s Accessory Design Guidelines for Apple Devices, a new section called Spatial Accessories offers an in-depth technical explanation of exactly how third-party motion controllers for Vision Pro should be built and how they should interface with the headset.

The 74-page section covers everything from what hardware a tracked accessory must include, to exactly what wavelength and radiance each LED must meet, to an example main logic board layout for a motion controller.

In section 20.9.2, the document further explores a complete example of a third-party motion controller for Vision Pro, which Apple used in the developer session about Spatial Accessories from last month’s WWDC.

Vision Pro launched with what seemed like a very intentional lack of support for motion controllers. But after two years on the market, it seems the company got enough feedback to go from eschewing motion controllers completely to taking a surprisingly open approach to allowing third parties to bring their own controllers to the platform.

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Valve is Getting Awfully Close to Steam Frame Release Following ‘Great on Frame’ Store Page

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Valve hasn’t mentioned the price or release date for its long-awaited Steam Frame standalone headset, although we seem to be getting suspiciously close.

As spotted by hardware analyst Brady Lynch, Valve just published a new store landing page for Steam Frame content, which is rounding up all of the ‘best’ games and demos that are certified to work with the company’s soon-to-launch VR headset.

So far, there are only four titles on the ‘Great on Frame’ site:

Into Black (VR game) – The Binary Mill
Portal 2 (flatscreen game) – Valve
Aperture Hand Lab (VR hand interaction demo) – Valve
The Lab (large format VR demo) – Valve

Of course, there is set to be a much (much) larger subset of games capable of working on Steam Frame, as the standalone headset can not only download, store locally, and play nearly any flatscreen game à la Steam Deck, but many PC VR games that have been optimized to run on its Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 (Gen 3) mobile chipset. That comes in addition to being able to wirelessly stream games directly from a VR-ready PC at higher quality.

While we’ve had the opportunity to go hands-on with Steam Frame following its unveiling last November, two of the biggest missing pieces of info are undoubtedly price and release date.

If it’s going to be anything like Steam Machine though, which launched at a not-so-friendly price starting at $1,050 last month, we’re expecting somewhat of an initial sticker shock too. To Valve’s credit, the company has been transparent about the fact that the RAM and storage crisis has jacked up prices across the board, although that doesn’t make what could be a $1,000+ MSRP any easier to swallow.

Looking for more Steam Frame news?

Valve Unveils Steam Frame VR headset to Make Your Entire Steam Library Portable: Valve shows off Steam Frame, the standalone headset that can stream and natively play your entire Steam library—with only a few caveats right now.

Hands-on: Steam Frame Reveals Valve’s Modern Vision for VR and Growing Hardware Ambitions: We go hands-on with Valve’s latest and greatest VR headset yet.

Valve Says No New First-party VR Game is in Development: Valve launched Half-Life: Alyx (2020) a few months after releasing Index, but no such luck for first-party content on Steam Frame.

Valve is Open to Bringing SteamOS to Third-party VR Headsets: Steam Frame is the first VR headset to run SteamOS, but it may not be the last.

Valve Plans to Offer Steam Frame Dev Kits to VR Developers: Steam Frame isn’t here yet; Valve says it needs more time with developers first so they can optimize their PC VR games.

Valve Announces SteamOS Console and New Steam Controller, Designed with Steam Frame Headset in Mind: Find out why Valve’s new SteamOS-running Console and controller will work seamlessly with Steam Frame.

Steam Frame vs. Quest 3 Specs: Better Streaming, Power & Hackability: Quest 3 can do a lot, but can it go toe-to-toe with Steam Frame?

Steam Frame vs. Valve Index Specs: Wireless VR Gameplay That’s Generations Ahead : Valve Index used to be the go-to PC VR headset, but the times have changed.

The post Valve is Getting Awfully Close to Steam Frame Release Following ‘Great on Frame’ Store Page appeared first on Road to VR.

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XREAL’s First Budget AR Glasses Go on Sale Internationally, Priced at $300

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AR glasses maker XREAL today announced its ‘X by Xreal’ sub-brand (xbx) is officially bringing its first pair of budget XR glasses outside of China.

Xreal today released its xbx a01+ in the US for $300, available across xreal.com, Amazon, Best Buy, B&H, and Micro Center. You’ll also find it direct from Xreal and partner retailers across the EU, UK, Canada, Australia, Japan and South Korea.

First launched in China in May, Xbx a01+ packs in a fairly smart slate of specs for its price, offering 50° field-of-view, HDR10 support, real-time SDR-to-HDR conversion, 120Hz refresh rate, and bird bath-style optics delivering up to 1,600 nits of brightness from its Sony micro-OLED displays.

At 62g, Xbx a01+ is remarkably light too, although it’s important to note it’s not a standalone device. Like all of Xreal’s other glasses, the company’s latest budget pair are basically meant for consuming traditional content while physically tethered to your standard array of mobile devices, suich as phones, tablets, portable game consoles, and laptops.

Notably, as $300, Xbx a01+ sits well below XREAL’s premium lineup, undercutting the $400 Xreal One, $500 Xreal 1S, and $600 Xreal One Pro. Getting them down in price has also been a balancing act; the glasses don’t feature any sort of camera sensors, electrochromic dimming, and don’t include the usual ‘Sound by Bose’ audio seen in other Xreal devices—all of it making for the company’s cheapest glasses to date.

“Where XREAL’s flagship lines push the frontier of spatial computing, X By XREAL was created to make AR glasses feel more accessible, personal, and fun,” said Chi Xu, co-founder and CEO of XREAL. “With a01+, we’re bringing XREAL’s industry leading display technology, comfort, and optical engineering expertise into a lighter, more affordable product built for entertainment, gaming, and everyday use.”

Xu maintains its first budget glasses mark “an important step toward making big-screen AR something anyone can experience,” noting that it’s primarily built for movie-lovers and gamers.

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Former Oculus CTO John Carmack Puts up $1M for Official VR Ports of Id Software Titles

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John Carmack, former Oculus CTO and co-founder of id Software, announced he’s still willing to put up $1 million of his personal money to help make VR versions of Id’s most famous retro titles—especially now that Microsoft has laid off a bulk of the studio’s employees.

Having left id Software in 2013 to join Oculus as CTO and help kickstart the VR consumer revolution, Carmack is still one of the industry’s most vocal advocates. Even after stepping down as CTO in 2019 and leaving Meta in 2022, he’s continued to push for open platforms and wider adoption of XR.

Last February, Carmack announced he would lend support to VR modding group Team Beef, noting he was lobbying for the team to have the ability to sell “full versions of the classic titles officially on the store.”

“I had some hope, but that was still too small potatoes to make anything happen in a Microsoft company,” Carmack said at the time. Notably, Team Beef has released a number of unofficial VR mods, including much of Id Software’s back catalogue, as well as official VR ports WRATH: Aeon of Ruin VR (2025) and soon-to-release Postal 2 VR (2026).

Now that Microsoft has essentially pared down Id Software though, resulting in what laid-off VFX artist Derek Best calls the size of “support studio”, Carmack is again reiterating the offer, hoping to make officially-sanctioned Id Software VR games a possibility.

“BTW, if the XBOX division is scrounging for loose change under the sofa cushions, I’m still willing to put up a $1M guarantee to allow TeamBeefVR to commercialize the legacy open source games on VR,” Carmack says.

By “legacy open source games,” Carmack is referring to classic Id Software titles whose game engines were released under open source licenses, such as the original DOOM (1993), Quake (1996), and Return to Castle Wolfenstein (2001). While the underlying code is freely available, the games’ assets, including levels, textures, audio, and other copyrighted content, are still owned wholly by Microsoft.

Acquired by Microsoft in 2009, Id Software has been relatively insulated from Microsoft’s repeated gaming layoffs, which included Activision Blizzard in 2024, and the closure of several ZeniMax-owned studios like Arkane Austin and Tango Gameworks, making recent cuts at the legendary developer unfortunate, but not all together surprising.

“My ‘Microsoft will probably be a good steward of the brand’ statement isn’t aging well, and this is certainly going to dampen the mood of the founder reunion at QuakeCon next month,” Carmack says. “I’m saddened, but I can’t muster anger or outrage over it. I don’t have access to the books, but I suspect that Id Software was a marginal business from Microsoft’s perspective. I believe the reports that Minecraft revenues have been carrying several other studios. To continue being produced long term, games need to succeed, not just be beloved.”

Whether Microsoft will actually bite remains to be seen. VR games already make less relative to flatscreen games, which makes it less attractive from a revenue perspective. Still, the company could do a lot more right now to sow good will, as its competitor Sony is taking the brunt of gamer frustration right now with its recent decision to end physical disc production before 2028.

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Thursday, 9 July 2026

‘Tomb Raider’ VR Reportedly Cancelled According to Leaked Images & Video

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As reported by MP1st, a sizable leak from Vertigo Games reveals its now-defunct Amsterdam satellite studio was working on an official Tomb Raider VR title before the project was cancelled earlier this year.

Vertigo Games Amsterdam was working on the unannounced Tomb Raider VR game from at least November 2024 until its cancellation in January 2026, MP1st maintains.

At the time, the game (codenamed ‘Project U’) was reportedly being developed over 50 developers, and was slated to target Quest 3, PSVR 2, and PC VR headsets.

Now, it appears an internal source has leaked a veritable treasure trove of concept art and images of the now-cancelled VR game, which seem to put Tomb Raider protagonist Lara Croft in a fully-realized Mesopotamia-inspired desert environment.

The leak also includes a 15-minute long gameplay test video compilation, courtesy MP1st, which shows off a number of environments, enemies, and immersive traversal methods:

In the video, you can see Lara using a mix of gear, including her bow and arrow to solve environmental puzzles, dual pistols, and a submachine gun.

An immersive touch: her equipment seems to include a wristband that indicates health and oxygen level, the latter of which would have likely been used during underwater segments.

As mentioned in the initial report, the leak also includes a brief look at a presumable early boss: a giant guardian statue inspired by Babylonian art.

There’s also an array of concept art too, which shows off a variety of enemies, human and supernatural alike:

Notably, the images seem to show the game was planning a plot centered around some sort of ‘supernatural infection’, as enemies are seen in various states of affliction, which likely would have paved the way for increasingly difficult versions of the same basic enemy type.

This follows the closure of Vertigo Games Amsterdam in June, previously known for developing Metro Awakening VR (2024). The satellite studio’s shutdown has followed a wider trend across the VR industry and games industry at large.

The reported January cancellation coincides with Meta’s shuttering of a number of internal VR studios, as the company has shifted its Reality Labs XR division to focus on AI and smart glasses.

Among the reportedly cancelled games: Batman: Arkham Shadow sequel from Meta’s Sanzaru Games, an unannounced Harry Potter VR game for Quest from Skydance Games, and a major project from Moss developers Polyarc.

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