The XR Week Peek (2020.08.10): Valve Index gains market share, Hitman 3 is coming to PSVR and more!
It’s a sunny Summer day here, and many people are in vacation. But XR never stops, so here below you’ll find the roundup of the most interesting news of the past week.
Before leaving you to it, I want to remind you that in 5 days it will be my blog’s birthday! This year I’m unsure what to do… I’m thinking about a Reddit AMA, but if you have a better idea, please tell me!
Top news of the week
Valve Index and Oculus Quest gain PC VR market shares
The latest Steam Hardware Survey showed some interesting trends happening in the PC VR market (at least the Steam VR market, since we have no info on the Oculus Store market).
The first one is that PC VR usage is not dropping after Half-Life: Alyx. It seems that the new players have found some other interesting games to play (or that are busy modding). Last month’s data show even a slight growth of connected headsets. This is a piece of very good news and shows that there is enough good VR content to keep people engaged.
On the other side, looking at the graph, it is possible to see that in the last 5 months, after a huge spike of sales due to Alyx, we had very little growth of the VR userbase. One reason may be the shortage of devices, and the other one that who was thinking about buying a headset has already bought it before the launch of HLA. I wouldn’t be worried about this datum.
Regarding the type of headsets used, the real winner is the Valve Index. Thanks to its great quality, and the fact that it was bundled with Half-Life: Alyx, the headset has sold very well, and it is now more used than the Rift CV1 on Steam (it now has 14.5% of market shares). The other headset growing a lot has been the Oculus Quest that now, through the Oculus Link, counts as 10% of the market.
The total number of headsets, according to estimates, is between 2 and 3 million. This means that the Oculus Link users are around 200,000 on a total number of Oculus Quest users that is more than 1 million. 80% of Quest users don’t care about playing games on SteamVR and are only interested in playing on a standalone device.
Regarding the last topic, I have written an editorial on how the Quest could disrupt the PC VR market, and it has been good that it has created a healthy debate inside the VR communities. I’ll leave it for you in the links so that you can participate in the discussion as well.
More info (PC VR market analsys by Road To VR)
More info (PC VR market analsys by Upload VR)
More info (My article about PCVR vs Quest)
Other relevant news
The Hitman trilogy is coming to PSVR
The upcoming Hitman III, the last episode of the action stealth saga, will have PSVR support. Not only that, but the whole Hitman trilogy will be playable in VR.
You all know that Hitman is a very famous brand: there have even been shot movies about it. Another great IP is now being bond with virtual reality, and this will be highly beneficial for the technology. And it will also be awesome for its players.
I suspect that it will be a PSVR exclusive title (or at least a timed exclusive) since we have no info about a possible release for PC. We only know that it will be compatible with PS4, PS5, and PSVR. Here Upload VR asks the right question: will you be able to also play it with PS5 and the old PSVR? It is not clear, and we hope that Sony will clarify his.(Theoretically yes, but Sony always talked about the compatibility of old games with PS5 + old PSVR, not also about new games).
The launch date for this marvel is January 2021.
More info (Hitman coming to VR)
More info (Upload VR questioning about its compatibility)
Oculus explains the logic behind its store curation policy
The Oculus Quest Store has a very strict content curation policy, and this makes us developers a bit angry, not only because many of our games get rejected, but also because Oculus never justifies the reasons behind such rejection.
Facebook’s Chris Pruett has made a video inside the Unite Now initiative in which he explains the logic behind such a curation. According to Oculus, a store with too much content is not beneficial to developers and users. If there are only a few great titles, instead, it is good both for users, that can have great content, and for developers, that have more discoverable content: since the store is not cluttered, it is easier for the users to find their titles, that so become more profitable.
Regarding the rejections, Oculus is rejecting all the concepts that according to them can’t produce games that are worth at least 10$ in value. Most of the rejections are because according to Oculus the quality is not enough. But Facebook doesn’t give feedback to the developers sometimes because the details in the doc are not enough to provide valuable feedback, and other times because the submissions are so many that is impossible to provide deep feedback to all.
While I think that the overall logic is correct, my opinion is that Oculus is a bit giving a too positive image of what it does. Rejecting titles is ok if they are shovelware, but the company is rejecting too many games, even ones (like To The Top, Loco Dojo, Crisis VRigade) that already proved to be successful and appreciated by the community. And regarding the feedback, even a preset e-mail template saying a message like “We are looking for a broader game”, “The team seems not suitable for such a production” or “This is an enterprise project, you should apply to Oculus For Business” would be something valuable to understand the reasons of the rejection, and wouldn’t require any kind of effort to produce (Oculus, if you want, I can write the template emails for you myself, if you want).
I would like to see a healthy debate in the communities about this, but strangely the posts about this on Twitter and Reddit haven’t generated much engagement… -_-
More info (Chris Pruett’s talk)
More info (My summary of the key points of the talk)
News worth a mention
The new Oculus SDK doesn’t support Oculus Go
The Oculus Go is being discontinued, and this week Oculus has taken one of the many steps that will be taken towards that goal. The new Oculus SDK has dropped support for Oculus Go, so developers that still want to develop for the Oculus Go have to keep using a legacy old one.
The Go is go-ing away…
The Weeknd has nailed its concert on TikTok
The popular singer The Weeknd has just performed a virtual concert inside the virtual platform Wave, streamed on TikTok. It has been a great performance, with amazing graphical effects, followed by thousands of people.
One interesting idea that the creators had has been interactivity: during the concert, there were moments when everything stopped and people had to perform polls to decide how the concert should have gone on.
(Thanks Chris Madsen for having helped me in finding the full video of the performance!)
More info (The Weeknd performing on TikTok)
More info (An excerpt of the concert shared by Cathy Hackl)
More info (The full video of the concert)
Adobe XD lets you now prototype XR interfaces
Adobe XD is a very powerful tool that UI/UX designers use to produce mockups of applications. It has recently added a new plugin, called “Draft XR”, that lets you prototype AR/VR interfaces easily. If you want to prototype an interface in XR, have a look at this article.
TESTED went hands-on with the HP Reverb G2
I think I’m not the only one that likes the review videos by the popular duo at TESTED, so here you are the latest one, where Jeremy reviews the HP Reverb G2. Summarizing, he thinks it is a great headset.
GAMELODGE aims at being the Roblox of VR
GAMELODGE is an indie title that is not a game, but a platform that lets you build games, and then share and play them with your friends. Imagine something like Roblox, but not aimed at kids and for VR. It is a very interesting concept, and it is now launching a Kickstarter campaign asking $10K (I guess it’s just for marketing, since developing something like that requires at least 20 times that amount of money).
In the GAMELODGE team there is a long time VR enthusiast: Ela Darling. If you know her name, you are here since the early days, and you are also a bit naughty 😉 I’m happy to see her still around trying to innovate the XR space!
(If you are new to VR, Ela Darling is a an adult actress that like in 2014–2015 tried to use Kinects to stream volumetric videos of cam girls in VR. It was a very interesting project, even if she, like me with Immotionroom, was too ahead of times and the technology was not ready yet)
More info (Alice Bonasio talking about GAMELODGE)
More info (Kickstarter page)
Some principles of UX in VR
I have found a very interesting post talking about the basic principles to keep in mind when developing an interface for XR. If you are into UX, give it a read.
Enjoy VR games sales!
If you want to buy some VR games, now it is a good time to do it! There are both the Oculus Summer Sale and a cool VR sale on Humble Bundle running now! You can find great titles like Skyrim VR, Creed, and Pistol Whip at a discounted price.
More info (Oculus Summer Sale) More info (Humble Bundle VR)
A VR experience will surely win an Emmy award
The nominations for the Emmy Awards have been revealed, and luckily there are also some VR titles in. And it is interesting that in the Outstanding Original Interactive Program Category, there are only VR experiences in the nominees, so for sure a VR title will win an Emmy this year!
iStaging creates the virtual 360 expo experience
My friends at iStaging have created a very interesting service: using their expertise in building 360 tours, they have created a special kind of 360 tour that lets you tour a virtual exhibition. You can enjoy 360 shoots of the virtual booths, click on their action points and see photos and videos of the product showcased and also have a live talk with some people of the company that is showcasing there.
In a time where exhibitions are all closed, this kind of virtual solutions can be pretty useful.
A VR maker is building shoes to walk in VR
A VR maker has built a pair of motorized shoes, controlled by an app, that let you walk in real life to walk in VR.
The project is cool, but to be honest, I find it too clunky and unsafe to ever reach the mainstream.
Tarzan VR releases its “interesting” trailer
Tarzan VR is a game that should be released this year, and a good part of the community is waiting for it.
The development studio has just released its mixed reality trailer for the game… and… well, is so cringy that in the end, you may even find it brilliant. A minute and a half of pure WTF that you will want to share with your friends. Save some time and watch it.
Some info on content
- UploadVR has reviewed Dreams on PSVR and found it cool, but also a bit messy;
- The review of FitXR (aka BoxVR) highlights how the game has improved in its latest version;
- VTOL exits Early Access and releases in its 1.0 version;
- Feetsaber mod lets you play BeatSaber with your feet;
- Vader Immortal is going to release on PSVR on August, 25th;
- We have a new video of the VR parkour game Stride that shows new cool locomotion mechanics;
- We have a new trailer of Project Cars 3, that will feature VR support;
- Rocking Hero is like Guitar Hero, but for Quest;
- Great Hoax: The Moon Landing is a fun and crazy animation movie that is going to be presented at Venice XR.
More info (Dreams review)
More info (FitXR review)
More info (VTOL VR)
More info (FeetSaber)
More info (Vader Immortal on PSVR)
More info (Stride)
More info (Project Cars 3)
More info (Rocking Hero)
More info (Great Hoax: The Moon Landing)
News from partners (and friends)
My friend Nicolas Esposito of Enter Reality has just released RIGEL, a professional solution to do motion capture using off-the-shelf hardware. You can track your body with Vive Trackers, your fingers with Vive Knuckles, and your face with a new iPhone. RIGEL will take care of tracking everything coherently.
There is a free demo, and then if you like it, you can pay the whole solution 550€ (+50€/year for the service). If you are an indie studio looking for an affordable mocap solution, I suggest you give it a look.
Learn more (Launch blog post)
Learn more (Sample video)
Someone has just organized the world’s first VR Charity Golf Tournament to help Médecins Sans Frontières / Doctors without Borders.
The tournament will be held on Sept 15–17th (~ 80 min actual play time) and it will be a good occasion to have fun and at the same time help people that are less fortunate than us.
My team is looking for freelancers for developing an XR experience: we’re looking for 2D artists, 3D artists, Unity developers, sound designers, and UX designers. These people must preferably stay in Italy, but we are also open to remote collaborations. If you think you may be the right figure, feel free to shoot me an email!
Some XR fun
This is a good representation of how every programming tutorial is
Some onions make us cry more than others
Always has been
Check out my new Patreon page!
Thanks to the feedback given by all of you, I have finally improved my Patreon page, adding a new donation tier, new descriptions and new fancy icons! Would you mind checking it out?
But before, please read the names of all the great people that are supporting this blog:
- DeoVR
- Jonn Fredericks
- Ilias Kapouranis
- Michael Bruce
- Paolo Leoncini
- Immersive.international
- Bob Fine
- Nikk Mitchell and the great FXG team
- Jennifer Granger
- Jason Moore
- Steve Biggs
- Niels Bogerd
- Julio Cesar Bolivar
- Jan Schroeder
- Kai Curtis
- Francesco Strada
- Sb
- Vooiage Technologies
- Caroline
- Liam James O’Malley
- Paul Reynolds
- Sikaar Keita
- Matias Nassi
Now go my Patreon page and then tell me what you think about it!
Check out SkarredGhost’s Patreon Page
(Header image by Valve)
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