The XR Week Peek (2021.04.19): Quest 2 adds Air Link and Resident Evil 4, Pico and HTC are ready to launch, and more!

It’s a crazy busy period for me and I really need a good sleep. BTW, I’ve managed to found some time here and there to write this newsletter, because I’m happy to inform you of the community, especially my Patrons that always cheer for me (have you considered supporting me on Patreon as well?). I’m trying to do my best… I hope you’ll appreciate that 🙂
 
Before leaving you to the news… I’m hosting a giveaway of Gang V keys… it is a cool VR battle royal game with strong GTA V vibes that has just been released in Early Access on Steam! If you want a key, subscribe to my newsletter (if you haven’t done it yet) and shoot me an e-mail… I’ll extract someone randomly and send him/her the key!

Top news of the week

Facebook announces Wi-Fi streaming and Resident Evil 4 for Quest

This has been an amazing week for all Quest owners. Facebook has just announced some incredible news that will please the people already owning the device and will attract even more people to VR.
 
Let’s start from the tech bomb: Facebook is adding native Wi-Fi streaming from PC to the Quest 2. It was ages that the community was asking for it and was using Virtual Desktop because Facebook wasn’t offering it. Now Facebook has finally listened to its customers and has implemented the feature, that is coming out with the runtime update v28. This new update is also bringing another very welcome feature: a 120Hz refresh rate for applications that will be able to support it. The Quest 2 has just become more fluid as a standalone, and more usable as a PC VR headset. Runtime v28 is being rolled out these days, and you can update your headset following these instructions. Someone has already received it and has already shared on the social media videos of the Air Link in action. As a developer, I feel the pain for the dev behind Virtual Desktop, but I’m sure he knew this moment was coming… and I hope he will keep being successful in VR.
 
The Quest 2 is quite powerful and so Facebook has confirmed that in 2021 there won’t be the need for a Quest 2 Pro as some people were supposing.
 
Facebook has also brought another innovation to the Quest Store, that is subscriptions. Content creators will be able to officially integrate subscription payments in their applications. Some companies are already supporting this feature at launch, and one of them is FitXR. The fitness application goes from costing $30 upfront to be free to download and costing $10/month after a trial. This news has upsides and downsides in my opinion. The good thing about subscriptions is that they can offer a stable revenue stream to developers that can so produce continuous updates of high-quality content to provide to its users, as FitXR and SuperNatural are doing. Also, it proves that the VR market is getting ripe: 3 years ago, the only way to make money in VR was by selling a game, while now we have also subscriptions and In-App Purchases that are starting to get popular. On the other side, I’m afraid that for consumers this means also paying more for the VR content they like: if before training a year with FitXR was costing $30, now it will cost $120. Sum it for all the VR apps that you like, and you obtain a big expense.
 
The other bombshell news is that Resident Evil 4 is coming to the Oculus Quest 2. On April, 21st, Oculus will host its first Gaming Showcase, with news on ‘Lone Echo II’, ‘Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge’, and many other titles. As part of this showcase, it has been declared that there will be the announcement of RE4 for Quest 2. As a fan of the Resident Evil saga, I can not even say how much I am happy because of this piece of news. I will insta-buy it if it doesn’t cost too much. This game will attract many fans of the saga to the Quest, increasing its sales even more.
 
Notice that Resident Evil is coming only to Quest 2 because it was difficult to port it also to the limited Quest 1. Also Air Link is coming only to Quest 2 at the moment. All these hints make me think that the Quest 1 is becoming an obsolete device. It’s so ironic, the device that made the Rift S obsolete in some months, now has been made obsolete by another headset in just more than one year. I hope that the Quest 2 will be supported for a long time, it’s too expensive to change the headset so frequently…

More info (Air Link and 120Hz mode on Road To VR)
More info (Air Link on UploadVR)
More info (Every game that is going to support 120Hz mode)
More info (Video of a user employing Air Link)
More info (No Quest Pro upcoming)
More info (Oculus Store Subscriptions)
More info (FitXR switches to subscription payment model)
More info (VZFit switches to subscription payment model)
More info (Oculus Gaming Showcase)
More info (What to expect from the Oculus Gaming Showcase)
More info (Resident Evil 4 coming to Oculus Quest 2)
More info (Resident Evil 4 will be an Oculus Quest 2 exclusive title)

Other relevant news

NVIDIA doubles down on Cloud Rendering and Omniverse at GTC 2021

NVIDIA has had its annual GTC event, and while there it hasn’t announced new graphics cards, it has anyway provided some interesting pieces of news.

• CloudXR SDK, NVIDIA’s service to offer cloud rendering, will update to v2.1. On the client side, the system will become compatible with iOS devices, and a Magic Leap client has also been developed. On the server-side, it is being integrated with Microsoft Azure, and it is also coming in the future for Google Cloud and Tencent Cloud. This means that cloud rendering could become a reality for always more headsets, and using always more cloud services. On the technological side, it seems all is set to start using cloud rendering, but the big problem of the latency from the nearest server remains;
• VRSS (Variable Rate SuperSampling) v2 has been announced. VRSS is the technology that makes the graphics card draw in higher resolution the region of the image you are looking at. It is one of the solutions through which it will be possible to offer foveated rendering. In v1 it was only possible to enhance the central part of the frame, while in this new version, VRSS integrates dynamic gaze tracking, and will be able to move its high-quality region so that to make it stay where the user is looking. This means that foveated rendering for VR applications will be possible using eye-tracking devices embedded into the headset.
• NVIDIA Omniverse Enterprise edition has been announced. Omniverse was already available as a beta for individuals, but now it can officially be licensed to companies. Omniverse is a very interesting solution that lets distributed teams in the same company work together at the same on a visual task, with everyone using his application. Omniverse doesn’t only care about the synchronization (a bit like if it were a visual Git), but it also provides services like AI and physical simulations. A company like BMW is using it to create a digital twin of one of its factories to understand how to properly build it to increase its efficiency. Omniverse is an interesting project, and I’m sure many companies will start using it.
• NVIDIA DLSS (Deep Learning Super Sampling) will be natively supported for HDRP in Unity 2021.2. NVIDIA DLSS uses advanced AI rendering to produce image quality that’s comparable to native resolution but by rendering just a fraction of the pixels. This means being able to render high quality resolution frames in VR even on a not-so-powerful PC for instance.
• NVIDIA A10 and A16 GPUs, for professional usage, have been revealed.
• Jarvis, NVIDIA’s interactive conversational AI framework has been made available.

On a separate note, NVIDIA has declared that the supply shortage for its graphics cards is lasting for sure for a big part of this year. This is no good if you are trying to upgrade your PC for VR.

More info (NVIDIA CloudXR upgrade)
More info (NVIDIA CloudXR on Tencent Cloud)
More info (NVIDIA VRSS v2)
More info (DLSS integrated inside Unity)
More info (Jarvis)
More info (NVIDIA RTX cards shortage)

HTC is going to launch its headset on May, 11th

HTC is keeping rising the hype for its new upcoming headset. It has confirmed that it is actually going to launch a new headset showing a picture of it veiled on a desk with the caption “VR Headset — Confirmed”. From the picture, we can’t understand anything because it is covered, but the absence of cables makes us understand that it is indeed a new standalone headset. Will it be the famous Vive Focus XR2 leaked on GeekBench some months ago?
 
We have also a date for the launch: May, 11th. The launch will happen at a new online event dubbed Vivecon, which is going to start on May, 11th at 5 PM BST (British Summer Time, that is, present-time London time). In the invite of the event, it is possible to see the silhouette of a headset and the sentence “Are you ready for what’s next?”. I think it is pretty explicit.
 
I expect a new prosumer-oriented standalone VR headset, most probably a new generation of the Vive Focus. I also expect it to be consumer-oriented in China. So don’t hold your breath for the “Quest Killer” here in the West. The launch date is also pretty interesting, considering that the Pico Neo 3 is going to be announced exactly the day before (May, 10th). This looks like a move to ruin Pico’s party, because before buying a Pico Neo 3, people will want to have a look to the Vive Focus launched the day after…

More info (Veiled picture of the Vive Focus)
More info (ViveCon announcement)

We have almost all info on the Pico Neo 3

We already knew that Pico was going to launch its new Neo 3 standalone on May, 10th. This week, we gathered new information on the device: part of them has been distributed by the company, and part of them has been found by me on a Chinese e-commerce website. So, apart from the FOV, we have almost all the specifications the headset, plus many photos.
 
 These are its known specs:

• Qualcomm XR2 chipset
• 4K low-persistence 90 Hz Curved Display
• Wi-Fi 6 connectivity
• 3 Physical IPD adjustments
• Optical Positional tracking, with 4 tracking cameras
• Maximum 10m x 10m tracking area and mm-precision accuracy
• Optical Tracked Controllers, with 32 tracking points
• All-PU materials fabrication, for easier sanitization
• 5300 mAh battery, for around 2.5h of usage
• Integrated audio, with 3.5mm jack to connect external headphones
• Wi-fi streaming to SteamVR integrated in the runtime

From the above data and the pictures, it is clear it is a headset very similar to the Oculus Quest 2. The IPD mechanism, the camera positions, the overall shape of the controllers, are heavily inspired by the latest headset by Facebook. Some features will most probably be worse (e.g. the content catalog), others will be better (the Guardian area, which is 10m x 10m, while the Quest 2 one is around 7m x 7m). It will be interesting to discover the price and read the first reviews to understand if this headset can be a hit or not.

More info (Pico Neo 3 Specifications and photos)

Epic Games is paving the road towards the Metaverse

Epic Games has just got a new funding round of $1 billion at a $28.7 billion valuation. This new money, that has been given by Sony and other investors, has been explicitly gathered to build the blocks of the future Metaverse. Epic is in a great position to build the software part of the metaverse since it controls one of the most used game engines (so it has the tools), and one of the most used games of the world (so it has the users). And it is continuously expanding its offering: its famous MetaHuman package for realistic avatars is now finally available in beta and people can start implementing it in their applications.
 
I’m linking here below a great editorial on the metaverse by VentureBeat’s Dean Takashi, that highlights how both the NVIDIA Omniverse and the Epic Games efforts are huge investments towards an upcoming metaverse. Omniverse lets many people work together on the same project, with real-time simulations, also within VR: it is the perfect tool to build and test experiences together, exactly how we expect it to happen in the future. People that build together like in Omniverse, and people that enjoy an experience together like in Fortnite concerts are both parts of the same interconnected virtual future we want to live in. The building blocks of the Metaverse are being built.

More info (MetaHuman creator now available)
More info (Dean Takashi’s editorial on the metaverse)

News worth a mention

Vicarious Surgical is a new VR Unicorn

We can rejoice: Virtual Reality has a new unicorn company that proves its success. This time it is Vicarious Surgical, a company that lets surgeons operate robots with which to perform high-precision surgeries that leave tiny scars on the patients. For sure virtual reality is just a part of the business of this healthcare company, but it is an important part because it lets the surgeons operate better. And it’s good to see that a company employing VR in a sector that is different from entertainment has reached a valuation of more than $1B. I hope to see many more in the future!

More info

Google is hiring waveguide developers for AR

Protocol’s journalist Janko Roettgers has spotted that now Google is hiring many figures in the waveguide field. For instance, one of the job postings is for a “waveguide design developer, augmented reality.” aimed at “delivering validated waveguide building blocks with the ultimate goal of moving blocks to mass production.”. In case you don’t know, waveguides are one of the technologies to produce Augmented Reality optics.
 
This confirms what we said last week: Google is silently building the blocks for a new AR headset. It is working without too much fanfare because it still feels the burn for the debacle of Google Glasses, but the Mountain View giant is ready to jump on the AR train too. That “Ultimate goal of mass production” is a clear hint of what the plan is.

More info

IKEA releases IKEA Studio

IKEA Place is one of the videos that I usually show to potential customers to make them understand the power of mobile AR. Place is IKEA’s application to let you try furniture at home before buying it, and it is one of the success stories of mobile AR.
 
This week, IKEA has announced a complete overhaul of the app, which will be called IKEA Studio. It will still be compatible only with iOS devices and will let you not only try furniture, but also make measurements, scan your room and see the position of your pieces of furniture on a floor plan, and other cool things. Exploiting the functionalities of LIDAR-powered phones, the app becomes an invaluable tool if you have to design the interior of your home. But weirdly, after you have found your favorite configuration, you can’t buy it, because the app is not connected to IKEA’s e-commerce yet.

More info

Shariiing VR helps you in providing demos in VR

How many times have you offered a demo in VR to a customer or a friend, and you had difficulties in making him/her understand what he/she had to do? To me, it happened millions of times.
 
Shaaring VR aims at solving this communication problem: it is a plugin for SteamVR that lets you sit down in front of the PC when you’re offering a VR demo, and use your mouse and keyboard to offer some guidance to the person in VR. For instance, you can show arrows to make the person see where he/she has to go. It is a simple but great idea, and I think that as soon as exhibitions will reopen, this can be an important tool for everyone making VR demos.

More info

Two cool news from Oculus App Lab

You know how I like to support indie developers, so let me put some spotlight on two good news from Oculus App Lab.
 
The first one is the release of Lab Surprise, an innovative way of offering a bundle made by 18 indie developers. It’s a surprise bundle, and the more you discover the titles inside, the less it is the discount…
 
The second one is that thanks to the success of App Lab, Puzzling Places has been accepted on the official Oculus Quest Store! I asked the developers if the “promotion” from one store to the other was automatic, and they answered that no, they had to re-present the application to the Quest Store by specifying the numbers they obtained on App Lab, and only after this, they have been accepted on the official store! This is very precious info for all you indies that want to arrive at the Oculus Store.
 
PS Talking about App Lab, don’t forget to download The Unity Cube and give it five stars writing a funny review!

More info (Lab Surprise)
More info (Puzzling Places on Quest)
More info (How Puzzling Places was accepted on Quest Store)

Some news on content

• Carly and The ReaperMan has launched on the Oculus Quest for $20. According to Upload, it is one of the best asymmetric games out there;
• ‘Puzzle Bobble VR’, developed by Survios and published by TAITO, is releasing on Quest on May 20th;
• ‘Wanderer’ is a Time-traveling VR adventure coming later this year that looks very interesting from the trailer;
• FrostPoint VR is already closing down;
• Upload has gone hands-on with Alvo, a military team multiplayer shooter, and found it fast and arcade-y.

More info (Carly and the Reaperman release price)
More info (Carly and the Reaperman review)
More info (Puzzle Bobble VR)
More info (Wanderer)
More info (Frostpoint VR shutting down)
More info (Alvo)

News from partners (and friends)

I’ve received the tip about an initiative that may interest you if you work in the museums and heritage sector:
 
“We are running a free digital training programme for European museums. Successful museum applicants will receive free training and support in integrating new technologies into their organizations. Three of the selected institutions will also be given funding to produce VR/AR work for their sites, for free. The project is funded by the European commission under the Creative Europe Programme”
 
If you are interesting, the deadline to participate is May, 31st.
Learn more and participate

Holo-Light’s XR Code Jam is being hosted on May 6–12, 2021 and there you can create your own powerful XR app with remote rendering. All you need is an Android device (API level 26+) or a HoloLens 2 and Unity. I will be on board as a jury member… I can’t wait to see what you will be able to come up with!
Learn more and sign up

Varjo headsets are now OpenXR-compliant. Another vendor is implementing the standard, I’m so happy to see this happening, it means that the standard is working, and soon we will have easy compatibility with all headsets for VR applications.
Learn more

Some XR fun

We are all waiting for just one thing…
Funny link

Mark Zuckerber announcing that Resident Evil 4 will be compatible only with the Quest 2 and not also the Quest 1
Funny link

How the Air Link has been developed.
Funny link

The most epic videomeme about VR! You must watch it!
Funny link

Join my Patreon!

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