Ahead of the launch of PSVR 2, we’ve got a close-up look at the finished version of the headset and what you can expect to find when you crack open the box.
Shaz from GL: "Where Sony is ramping down support for PSVR2, and Apple are reconsidering their future with the Vision Pro, Meta and the Quest 3 continue to shine."
I'll admit that Facebook is doing more for VR than others. But they also have blown over 50 billion dollars so far and growing in R&D, building the meta verse, buying up exclusives and underpricing their products below build price, to kill competition in the stand alone space. Sony and Valve aren't willing to go into the red at an unheard level to capture the market. We know Sony could build a stand alone device that beats Quest just by the features in PS VR 2 and the new stand alone headset they built. But the new Sony would rather build a device they can profit from day one.
But, Sony so far has profited on hardware and on software. They just don't seem willing to spend the money on marketing, selling under build price or spending millions on making in-house VR exclusives for PS VR 2. Which sucks big time. They're just letting 3rd parties and indies run the show.
Article also doesn't mention that Apple's headset is more a developers product than a mass market item. To say they are looking into making a cheaper one for the next iteration is speaking the obvious. Duh. That was always the case. Build something the public sees as quality not can't afford, then make another that the masses can afford. TVs, cars, cellphones etc all were once expensive. Now, they're cheap to buy with many options to choose from. And Apple isn't even selling VP as a VR headset. I'm well aware that Apple's true intentions is to build a device that pushes AR with VR as an option. Not build a VR device. Because they know eventually that they want to replace the cellphone with AR glasses or an AR headset. If they cared about games, they would have launched as a gaming device.
Lastly, Facebook launched Quest 3 last year. But has not mentioned how many they sold up to this point. Why is that? Besides Quest 2 selling more by being cheap, the market can't move forward until they start selling more Quest 3 headsets than 2. Maybe the new exclusive Batman and Hitman games will help. But we'll see.
Not dead, but definitely on life support from the third party devs and PC crowd who may just purchase the headset.
Although I saw someone say that the module adapter will no allow haptics and adaptive triggers to work, but I don’t know if any of that is true.
Nope. Not yet.
It’s tough to say what its future will bring. There is still decent support. It seems to have sold decently too. Sony seems absent in a direct way though.
The issues Meta have is they are Meta. I'll never buy a Meta product, Every Quest headset they release is always a case of it's not quite there from a hardware perspective and the game content is mostly from indie devs. Selling what should be a AAA experience with C tier games is a non starter.
Meta is also Billions and billions in the hole in regards to VR. If Sony were to do what Meta has done, they'd be bankrupt
Meta is losing billions on a business that theh will probably walk away from like they did the Facebook phone. Temper your expectations of your investments in Meta’s hardware.
I do wish Sony would release more for PSVR. It’s a neat product, but they don’t support it much. It may have the same fate as the Vita.
I know it’s two completely separate products as Vita was stand alone, and PSVR is a companion to PS consoles. More 1st party support would really boost it though.
They are done supporting it. They're relying on pc to do it for them. Sony even paused production because it's not selling
They paused production to get rid of inventory, doesn’t mean the headset isn’t selling, it’s just not selling as fast as Sony thought it would. But with their half assed approach to the headset and lack of first party games, it’s not surprising, saddening, but not surprising.
Meta out here buying up all the exclusives, this is the only part of the gaming market where I feel exclusives should not be a thing since the market is “still in its infancy”.
That's exactly what it means... you think people are buying a headset with min support for the price of the console? It's done man. Sadly because like the vita the tech is good and deserved better
I own PS VR 1, and it is packed with tons of games to pick from in nearly every genre you could think of. While the technology may be rudimentary compared to newer headsets, it still works, and is fun to play, which is what matters most.
Its a shame that PS VR 2 is having such a slow start, because the tech behind it is brilliant. Its currently on sale for $100 USD off, that needs to be a permanent price drop.
We need more first party games on PS VR 2, the fact that Jim Ryan shut down Sony London Studios right before he left was moronic, they should have been upgrading their hit game Blood & Truth for PS VR 2! What a stupid decision.
The VR exclusive hero shooter, X8, has received a new update known as Freeplay Park, bringing a brand new social hub to the game.
Playstation Blog writes: "Players will have access to buy and play Steam’s expansive library of thousands of VR games, including fan favorites like Half-Life: Alyx, Fallout 4 VR, and War Thunder."
Yeah, with none of the headset's standout features. No HDR, no eye tracking, no headset feedback, no adaptive triggers, and no haptics. Don't get me wrong, it's still a quality headset with good lenses and screens, but without those features it is not a no-brainer for PCVR, it falls more into the "it's fine" category and you get better value elsewhere with the PICO 4 and Quest 3.
Still, if you already have a PSVR2 and a gaming PC, this is a huge extra value for not that much extra money. And if you have a PS5 and a PC, this might be worth it for you as well. And hopefully someone can mod the extra features to it in the future, then it will be back at the no-brainer category for PCVR.
Perhaps the Sony PCVR releases will have those features? I mean not every PCVR game has them because the other headsets dont support them. We can assume them making the headset work on PC will also bring along some of their VR titles that will include the things you mentioned.
Their statement doesn't leave room for them supporting those features in the future.
"PS VR2 was designed from the ground up specifically for PS5 – so you’ll notice that some key features, like HDR, headset feedback, eye tracking, adaptive triggers, and haptic feedback (other than rumble), are not available when playing on PC."
Sure, their statement doesn't support that, but the hardware is in there, so it could. I mean they stated that this thing wasn't coming to PC at all not that long ago.
@Vits
You could say the same for DualSense and yet all the PS5 games ported support it fully when wired. I would like to think that PS could or would allow their software (if ported) to more completely utilize the headset and VR2's Sense controllers. That would make sense. Of course I'm not saying PS couldn't screw this up, they definitely could. Right now, there is no mention of PS5 VR2 games making the jump to PC.
Why in the world would anyone think that VR2 would be completely supported in games that don't have Adaptive Triggers and heaset vibration? Software isn't magic it doesn't include features for HW it was never made for.
I think one of the Vive headsets supports eye tracking so I'd think SteamVR has an API for that at least. Hopefully they'll add in support for the other stuff over time
Which they should develop as part of fully supporting the platform. Or, at the very least, work with the currently available OpenXR extensions to fill the gap.
it's possible we could see updates to enable these features down the road. Especially for titles that exist both on PSVR2 and PCVR.
"if you already have a PSVR2 and a gaming PC, this is a huge extra value for not that much extra money." this is my situation, and I think it's great. Even if I won't get all the headset's features for the PC VR games, I'll now have access to 2 of the 3 main VR platforms for just the cost of the adapter.
This is sad to here. One step forward and 2 steps back. If PSVR isn't doing well on playstation, why do they believe they will find more success on the PC with even more competition over there after crippling the headset.
You bring up valid points although I think it's likely PSVR2 would surpass Quest 3 eventually. Some of these features (like haptics and HDR) could be patched in by modders.
I'd get this for my Mac if the emulation scene supports it well enough.
Why would the PSVR2 surpass the Quest3, even if all features were available? The Quest 3 is standalone and can play PC VR, whereas the PSVR2 headset requires a PS5 (or now a PC) to function. The Quest 3 operates wirelessly, while the PSVR2 appears to need multiple ports on the back of the PC. The Quest 3 requires minimal calibration and settings to operate, whereas the PSVR2 likely needs calibration on a PC or just for the controller to be recognized. Most importantly, Quest 3 controllers are available for purchase.
@Pete
I'm comparing only as a device to get PCVR content here as this is what I was directly responding to. As such the PSVR2 has HDR, headset rumble, wider FOV, better haptics plus resistive triggers, and much darker blacks. Quest 3 has wireless (with a significant reduction in quality) and sharper image quality at the peripheral edges of the display.
For immersive gaming PSVR2 is much better. As for eye tracking it might never be a factor for PCVR but if it was; the quality of visuals would boost a lot more yet. IMO the PSVR2 is a better way to play VR games even with only a few of these advantages being ported to PC. If they are all available it's no contest.
Even when comparing devices, the Quest 2/3 combo currently stands as the most popular choice for playing PC VR, accounting for 50% of the devices used on Steam.
https://store.steampowered....
The primary issue with the PSVR2 isn't its specifications; it's the requirement for a wired connection.
To be fair the lenses are often criticised, Fresnel is no longer consider a viable lens option. If I had a gaming PC and was into VR I wouldn't buy a semi proprietary headset that has mostly been designed or the PS5.
I don't like the disadvantages of fresnel lenses, but I like the advantages of it producing a much brighter result, allowing HDR to work without resorting to ultra high cost micro LED like the Vision Pro solution or using LCD to get the image bright enough. If you use LCD screens there are major disadvantages. So all in all the PSVR2 still has its major advantages on PC if the HDR works well.
$59.99 for freaking adapter? I'll wait for a better and cheaper third party adapter. This is why Sony products fail. They charge way too much.
No they don't, but their better value comes from other features that the PSVR2 lacks: being standalone, having their own library of games, using pancake lenses, having a smaller footprint, being usable wirelessly, being cheaper, etc.
Can you give a VR noob an example of what I'd be missing if I played, for example, Alyx on a PSVR2 vs a Quest 3?
Other than wireless, nothing much.
The point is more that if you don't have a VR headset already. Without those cool features, the PSVR2 offers less than a Quest 3 or a PICO 4. Because while those also don't have those features, they do have their own set of advantages like being lighter, using better lenses, costing less and also being usable as standalone devices meaning that you don't need a PC or PS5 to game on them.
Why would headset rumble and adaptive triggers be supported when no PC games support those features? You still get controller rumble, finger tracking, 3D audio and foveated rendering without eye tracking. The only real loss is no HDR which is a real head-scratcher and no eye tracking. How many headsets and VR games support eye tracking? Not many, but to be fair bigger and the most popular VR games, like HL: Alyx and VR Chat respectively, support eye tracking.
This still seems like a win... though I have to hope that the Turing "requirement" isn't, because my laptop GPU is way more powerful than the GTX 1650 and yet I might not be able to use my VR2 on PC because my GPU is Pascal architecture... that would be pretty ridiculous. Not that I have even 1 VR game on my PC yet. I'll have to wait for the reviews to see if it's even worth shelling out $60 for this adapter.
Because that is not how support works on a PC. Having games that use the feature is not what the word means. It's not a console where a feature being available is directly connected to a game using said feature.
On a PC, for a feature to be considered as supported, it must be available at the driver level. That is what "support" means. It's completely disconnected from any sort of external software making use of it. So when a company says that "X" or "Y" is not supported, it means that it is not available at the driver level. Therefore, there isn't a dream scenario where a game will suddenly use the feature.
"You could say the same for DualSense and yet all the PS5 games ported support it fully when wired."
Have you ever wondered why it only works wired? It's because Sony locked those features to a wired connection and never bothered to develop a solution for wireless connectivity with hardware other than their own consoles. Just as no game from Sony has been released on PC and suddenly all the features of the DualSense controller worked wirelessly, no VR game will be released that will suddenly make all the PSVR2 features work.
If it's not supported at the driver level, it essentially doesn't exist.
In order for PCs to support DS there needs to be drivers... guess what? Those exist in the games. If they didn't you wouldn't be able to use DS features even if the comtroller is wired to the PC. In order for games to support things like Adaptive Triggers, the software needs to include reasons to engage the feature as well as a means to actually utilize said feature. If PC had drivers on an OS level instead of per game basis the games themselves would still need to include support for Adaptive Triggers and dual variable response vibration control.
Hopefully you understand this.
lol the nest of wires adapter is back with loads of missing features, The headset is already DOA for PC.
not gonna lie, when I saw the adapter I immediately thought of the horrible processing box from the original PSVR. but it's to be expected, you can't just plug this headset into an open USB-C slot on your computer.
It's disappointing to anticipate PCVR integration with PSVR2, only to realize it's a tough situation for those who don't own the device.
honestly being able to take the headset out and plug in a single wire is so much nicer than the mess I had with the original PSVR. Because the original Processing box didn't allow for HDR passthrough, I ended up having to do a setup involving an HDMI switch so I could bypass the processing box and still get HDR content on my TV. None of that is needed now, which is so much less of a headache. Literally plug and play here.
I'm really looking forward to trying this out with GT7, never tried VR before.
I wouldn't actually say I'm a massive VR convertee....I've literally bought it just for GT7. But I hope to be bowled over by the other offerings too.
God I cant wait anymore.
I'm declaring the PSVR 2 and the PS5 as the best VR platform, because PC VR is basically dead. After HL Alyx, there was nothing. What a f**king let down. VR games on the Quest are very limited to the power of the mobile chip, and lackluster
what a beautiful piece of tech only 2% of gamers will ever get to experience.