This week has been like an out-of-season Christmas for us XR enthusiast! Lots of interesting news, some of which have just made my jaw to drop! So let me stop talking and let’s dig into them immediately!
Top news of the week
Apple glasses are coming in 2021–2022 and they are incredibly sleek
Apple glasses are coming. We’re hearing this since many years, but now the sensation is that we’re coming close to the moment when the prophecy will come true: the rumors are intensifying and the software (ARKit) and the hardware (depth cameras, 5G) designed by Apple are all converging to the glasses solution.
This week, the analysts Ming-Chi Kuo has teased that Apple Glasses are coming in 2022 at the earliest (2022–2023 timeline). The glasses are expected to run a new operating system, rOS (or reality OS), and Apple is exploring touch panels, voice activation, and head gestures as a means of control. Ming-Chi Kuo is usually very reliable when it comes to Apple, but honestly, he has already made some wrong predictions on its glasses.
This is nothing new and what is actually exciting is that technologist Jon Prosser has commented on the news saying that he disagrees. He says that Apple AR glasses will come in 2021 and that he has seen them. He has defined them “sleek as hell”, and has also commented positively on their UX. He promised us all to show images and videos on his social media profiles.
This is the first time that I hear someone saying that he has seen Apple glasses, and this demonstrates that at least there is a prototype somewhere. Someone found confirmation on this rumor by the fact that the invitation to WWDC 2020 shows a Memoji with a person wearing glasses. I find this pretty funny.
In all this panorama, Apple has confirmed having bought NextVR, and we have no idea why they have acquired a VR streaming company. Is it for some patents on video streaming? Is it for a future AR/VR headset?
Returning to the glasses rumor, take it with a box full of salt. There are two things you must be aware of:
- Apple is surely making various prototypes, so we don’t know what Jon has actually seen. The rumors also talk about a headset coming in 2022 with AR/VR and another one coming in 2023 as a smartglass. And for sure there are many internal prototypes that will lead to nothing;
- Apple also spreads false information. According to Robert Scoble, sometimes it also spread false rumors, to confuse people about what it is actually doing.
So, Apple Glasses are coming, but we have still a very confused idea of what is going to happen.
Anyway, we should pay attention to what is happening in Cupertino… because we all know that Apple can change completely the XR landscape. If you are skeptical, well, remember that with ARKit it has already changed all the rules of AR and that the Apple brand can give to XR a visibility that no other brand can. Apple is really good at selling stuff. What is the only wearable that people is keeping on their face all day? Yes, Airpods. So, never underestimate Apple.
More info (Kuo’s rumor)
More info (Jon Prosser forecasting Apple Glasses in 2021)
More info (Jon Prosser promising videos on Apple Glasses)
More info (WWDC invitation showing a memoji with glasses)
More info (Apple confirms having bought NextVR)
Other relevant news
Unreal Engine 5 may change the rules of game development
Out of nowhere, Epic Games has teased the next version of Unreal Engine, Unreal Engine 5, due to be released in 2021. 10 minutes of Youtube video have been enough to make all game developers hype. I mean, all UE developers, we Unity developers felt like being in a party where everyone is making out and you’re just there sipping a coke.
The two mesmerizing features announced have been:
- Lumen, a system to have real-time global illumination lighting in your game. So, if you now relied a lot on baked lighting to have better performances, with Lumen you can have real-time lighting in your game with lights that move and illuminate things in a very realistic way. UE lights were already good, now we are at the next level;
- Nanite, a solution that optimizes your 3D assets in real-time. It means that you can take whatever model, even with billions of polygons, and put it in your Unreal Engine project. At runtime, the system will auto-optimize it, so that your game will run smoothly with it.
It is the second feature that in my opinion is a game-changer. If you are not familiar with game development, well, it is mostly made of 3D assets and logic code (that is made by us amazing developers). To make your game run at the desired framerate (90FPS for PC VR), you have to be careful of the number of polygons of the 3D assets. If it is too high, you have to ask the artists to reduce their definition, and also employ tricks like LOD, which is showing assets at different definitions at different distances. If you don’t have an artist, you have to look for 3D models on sites like Turbosquid or Sketchfab, but most probably you will find models that are too heavy to be employed in your game. And when you make a trailer… most probably you have to ask your artist to make a cinematic version of the assets, that is a very high definition copy of them.
With UE5, all these problems vanish away. You just take whatever model, you put it inside, and it just works. Black magic. No more LODs, no more optimizations, no more duplicate assets. Developing games will be much easier for smaller teams because there will be less need to profile and optimize the graphics.
The demo has been showcased on a PS5, but Epic Games has confirmed that it can work the same on a PC powered by an RTX 2070. Regarding VR, Epic has also said that most tech demos of UE5 will work with PC VR as well. Regarding mobile VR, instead, well, no (at least not at the beginning). PC VR games may become much better with UE5, and I think that most big production studios will switch to it.
There is another reason that will make medium-big studios happy: from now on, there won’t be any revenue share with Epic until $1M of revenues of your game, a limit that raises to $5M if your game is published on Oculus Store. This means that Unreal Engine is now free for everyone forever until you really become rich. This is another thing that will help indies.
And it’s not over: Epic Games Services have been improved and now include many new features: multiplayer, matchmaking, lobbies, game analytics, etc… all for free, all compatible with all platforms and all engines (including Unity).
Epic is offering so many facilities that it will be hard for studios not switching to it. Unity has still on its side the facility of use and the better support for mobile platforms, but I think it has to answer very soon to the hype created by UE.
Ah, and last but not least: there is a mega-sale on the Epic Store now, and also GTA V is free to download. You gotta love Epic.
More info (Unreal Engine 5 announcement video)
More info (Comment on UE5 by Road To VR)
More info (UE5 demo can run on RTX2070-powered PCs)
More info (UE5 has optimizations for PC VR as well)
More info (Unreal Engine free until $1M revenue)
More info (Epic Games services)
More info (Epic Store Megasale)
More info (Gran Theft Auto V free)
Oculus Link now works with USB 2.0
Very Silently, Oculus has changed the specifications of Oculus Link, which now doesn’t require anymore a USB 3.0 port anymore, but it is ok with a USB 2.0 port and cable. This update is not yet on the “official” channel, but you can enjoy it by switching to the PTC (the beta channel) of your Oculus runtime.
While this may seem a minor thing, actually it is very important. First of all, this means that more computers will be compatible with Oculus Link. Then it means that more cable will be compatible. And since the charging cable that you find in your Oculus Quest box is actually a USB 2 cable, it means that you can use it with your Quest to attach the Quest to the PC. No more need to buy online cables, unless you’re looking for a premium experience. Reviewers of the Link over USB 2.0 say that there is no difference with 3.0, but probably this will change over time, giving a different experience depending on the speed of your USB port.
In my opinion, this is a clear sign that there won’t be a new Rift, at least a new consumer-oriented Rift. If Oculus can use a standalone headset with all USB ports, the future Quest can work for everyone as a PC headset. And even more, if Oculus has reduced the bandwidth requirements, the times are becoming ripe for a Quest that can connect wirelessly to your PC, via your Wi-fi router or even a dedicated dongle. Will we hear something about it at OC7?
More info (Oculus Link works with Usb 2.0 — Road To VR)
More info (Oculus Link works with Usb 2.0 — Upload VR)
More info (Updated specifications of Oculus Link)
NVIDIA announces CloudXR 1.0 and a new 7nm architecture
It has been an incredible week for NVIDIA, that at the GTC online has announced many interesting news.
The one that interests more us VR enthusiasts is CloudXR development kit 1.0, that will offer a complete solution to try XR cloud rendering via 5G. The development kit is composed of three parts:
- CloudXR Server Driver: Server-side binaries and libraries
- CloudXR Client App: Operating system-specific sample application
- CloudXR Client SDK: OS-specific binaries and libraries
All together will let you stream a very complex virtual reality application from an edge server to a standalone VR headset via 5G. The headset will have just to show the image sent from the rendering server, that should be in the edge, close to you. NVIDIA is a strong partner of Qualcomm and surely this solution is made to be used with the future standalone headsets that will be powered by XR2 Reference Design.
Interested developers and enterprise customers may register on NVIDIA website to get more info on this XR streaming solution and start experimenting with XR cloud rendering.
Apart from this, we had other two key announcements:
- NVIDIA CEO announced Ampere, NVIDIA 7nm GPU architecture, and its first chip based on it, the A100, devoted to professional usage (mostly for data centers). After this announcement, the rumors of RTX30 graphics cards for consumers have intensified, and someone hypothesizes a launch in Q3 this year;
- NVIDIA Omniverse is a collaborative tool for people working with graphics and rendering. Imagine it as the Google Docs for 3D artists, a set of tools that let people involved in CGI work on the same scene collaboratively at the same time, even if they are at the opposite sides of the world. This is very intriguing.
More info (NVIDIA CloudXR SDK 1.0)
More info (NVIDIA announcing the Ampere and the A100 chip)
More info (Rumors on RTX3080)
More info (NVIDIA Omniverse)
Standalone 5G headsets are coming in 2021
Talking about XR cloud streaming, you may wonder when we will have VR standalone headsets that will be connected by 5G. According to Qualcomm, these innovative headsets won’t come this year, but close enough, that is in 2021. The Qualcomm Snapdragon XR2 headset with 5G connectivity should have come a bit before according to the previous announcements (Q3-Q4 2020), but coronavirus has caused some delays.
Next year, we will be able to experiment with 5G streaming in VR! Are you excited? Because I am…
Valve releases Half-Life: Alyx Steam Workshop Tools
After almost 2 months from the release of Half-Life: Alyx, Valve has released some authoring tools to create new maps for the game. This is the exact list of what is available now:
- Hammer — the latest version of the Source 2 level editor.
- Material Editor — the tool for creating and tuning materials in Source 2.
- ModelDoc — a tool for viewing, editing, and compiling models with animation, collision, and other gameplay attributes.
- AnimGraph — our animation tool used to create complicated animation setups with blends and transitions.
- Particle Editor — for making new particle effects.
- Subrect Editor — for creating smart texture sheets known as “hotspots.”
- Source Filmmaker — the Source 2 cinematic renderer and animation tool.
It is not a full SDK to create complete mods yet, but it is anyway a good collection of tools that will let people unleash their creativity and create new levels for the game. Valve is also releasing all the sources of the maps of the game as references for the devs to understand how to create their levels.
People have already started using these tools and an enthusiast has created a StarWars mod for Alyx, that lets you kill enemies using a lightsaber. I can’t wait to see the other creations from the community in the upcoming weeks…
More info (Half-Life: Alyx modding tools)
More info (Half-Life: Alyx lightsaber mod)
News worth a mention
Sketchfab announces Sketchfab for Teams
Sketchfab announces Sketchfab for Teams. Basically, every company can create its own personal “Sketchfab” where to access, collect and distribute 3D assets.
For instance, in a project involving 3D models, the artists could upload all the assets in the Sketchfab Teams account of the company, so that the management can see easily how the work is going on and give feedback. If you outsource your 3D assets, you can ask the other company to upload its work on your company’s Sketchfab account for review, and approval.
There are many use cases, of course, all devoted to enterprise customers. And in fact, this feature is available only for Enterprise accounts of Sketchfab.
These are the available features:
● Manage access rights
● Search and access assets in a central repository: filter by polycount, format, and size
● Inspect models: geometry, topology, materials, and textures
● Convert assets to industry-standard formats
● Publish & distribute everywhere
Oculus Quest & Rift S are back in stock
Also thanks to the supply chain in China that has started again after the coronavirus crisis, the Oculus Quest and Rift S are now available in most countries, excluded the US, South Korea, and Canada. If you need an Oculus device, it is now the time to buy it!
Enjoy a miniature version of Beat Saber!
That genius that answers the name of Daniel Beauchamp has used Quest Hands Tracking to make a miniature version of Beat Saber that you can play using your fingers. It is fantastic, and you MUST see it!
It’s curious that I thought about doing a similar concept using the Vive Cosmos XR for our game HitMotion: Reloaded, but I have never had the time to do it… I’m happy to discover that I had a nice idea…
SideQuest reaches 1M downloads
SideQuest has just published some stats, and they are quite impressive: the store has been downloaded more than 1 million times and the total app downloads are more than 2 million. All of this in less than 1 year. This shows that the Oculus Quest ecosystem is very healthy.
Samsung terminates its XR services
Samsung is terminating all its XR services and in the next months they will all be closed, exactly as all the Samsung XR accounts. The last date will be September, 30th 2020. The GearVR was already dead, but now it has been completely buried.
Facebook showcases two interesting research projects
This week we had two interesting pieces of news from Facebook Reality Labs, the R&D branch of Facebook:
- Facebook has released on GitHub the sources of the sample implementation of DeepFovea. DeepFovea is the algorithm for foveated rendering that lets you render at low resolution the areas in the peripheral vision, with an AI system that reconstruct there an image that is visually equivalent for our eyes to its full-resolution version. Notice that it doesn’t mean that the images are identical, but they are perceived in the same way by our eyes;
- Gripmarks is an experiment about using elements that you have in your hands as inputs for your VR experience. So, in VR you can have a coke can in your left hand and use a calculator that is on its surface with the index finger of your right hand. Or use a spray bottle to select buttons in VR. I mean, it is very weird, but at the same time interesting. Give it a look.
More info (Deepfovea)
More info (Gripmarks)
Spatial releases a new free version for XR meetings
On May, 13th, meeting solution Spatial has released a new version adding new incredible features like a new Web portal with which you can join meetings from whatever device you may have. Spatial will be free for everyone for the next 1–2 months so that to help people stay connected during the coronavirus crisis. Spatial is one of the most surprising meeting solutions and I invite you to discover it in my review!
Some news on storytelling festivals
In-person events are banned because of the COVID, so festivals have to find alternate solutions. This week we had two news about festivals going all-in with VR:
- Cannes XR will be held inside the great VR experience Museum Of Other Realities;
- SXSW will distribute most of its content in partnership with Facebook on Oculus TV.
More info (Cannes XR)
More info (SXSW)
Some news on content
- Iron Man VR will finally release on PSVR on July, 3rd after many delays;
- Tetris Effect has launched on Oculus Quest.
More info (IronMan VR)
More info (Tetris Effect)
News from partners (and friends)
XR journalist Rober Scoble and his business partner, the futurist Irena Cronin, have just published an amazing book all-around AR and VR and all the technologies that can converge with XR to create the next technological revolution: AI and 5G. Its name is “The Infinite Retina” and you can find it in all the best online book shops.
The book is very long and detailed and I think it may be very interesting for everyone wanting to understand the present spatial computing landscape and forecast its future.
Discover (and buy) the book on Amazon
Italian startup InVRsion has just raised $3M for simulating supermarkets and other shops in virtual reality. Not to let people buy online, but to let supermarket owners experiment in VR with different layouts of the shelves, that usually was done physically in big warehouses, with high costs.
As an Italian, I’m very happy of this news. Congrats InVRsion!
Watch the Youtube interview I made with the Indian XR enthusiast Eddie Avil some months ago!
Some XR fun
Beware when someone gets too excited playing VR for the first time!
People created lots of memes about Unreal Engine 5! Have fun with some of them…
Funny link
Funny link
Funny link
Just one more thing…
I write about AR and VR on the web because of my big passion, and also because I like to inform all you my readers about the immersive landscape. This requires me a lot of time, and a lot of effort, and I’m happy of getting tired doing it, but of course I can continue on this road only if my blog becomes profitable enough. So if you can support it by becoming a donor on Patreon, even of a small amount of money, this could help me a lot!
This is the list of the people and companies that already believe in me and support me with their donations:
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(Header image by Epic Games)