The XR Week Peek (2021.07.13): Lynx now aims at the consumer market, App Lab to enable DLCs, and more!

Sorry if this newsletter is one day late. Probably I should tell you that I was busy with VR projects, but the truth is that I have been celebrating a lot lately, especially the recent victory of Italy in the Euro 2020 soccer championship. I have watched the final match with friends and we had a lot of fun, plus I felt that feeling of friendship, union, and happiness, that only sport can convey to people. Honor to all the other countries, some of them probably deserved more than us, but I think Italy won because we were a true team, a group of people that supported each other for a goal they craved to reach. We won with our heart, the big heart of us Italians ❤.
 
Ok, enough with football… let’s get back to AR and VR…

Top news of the week

Lynx now aims at an MR headset costing “a couple hundred dollars”

French startup Lynx announced some months ago a quite interesting headset featuring pass-through augmented reality, hands tracking, eye tracking, and an innovative lens design. It was aimed at the enterprise market, with an expected price point of $1500. The company had some delays (like all startups), but kept improving the design of the device, and published regular updates of its process to keep the community engaged.
 
Then some days ago, suddenly it announced a shift: now Lynx aims to also target the consumer/prosumer market, with a headset that costs less than $1000, or “a couple hundred dollars”. This has been possible thanks to a redesign of its special “four-fold catadioptric freeform prism” lenses that now don’t require an eye-tracking module to solve the small eyebox issue anymore. The company clarified that it still also thinks to aim at the enterprise market, so I expect two different SKUs with two different features and prices.
 
The standalone headset still features passthrough AR/MR, XR2 chipset, dual 1600×1600 LCD panels running at 90Hz, Ultraleap hands tracking. It doesn’t have controllers (you just use your hands), but you can buy external controllers by Finch to use with it.
 
Lynx will start this Kickstarter campaign in September 2021 and expects to ship its consumer device in February 2022 (but remember that delays with Kickstarter are very frequent).
 
Personally, I’m very intrigued by this headset: some people talk about a Quest competitor, but I don’t think so. This looks like a different beast: featuring passthrough MR and only hands tracking out of the box, it seems to me a device that could be interesting more for productivity or social VR experiences. Quest has an enormous catalog of games with which a startup can’t compete, but Lynx could start dominating a particular niche for which this headset may be optimal.
 
It’s interesting that it is different from most of the other headsets in the market, and personally, I’ve also been always a fan of passthrough AR, that offers possibility like diminished reality that is impossible with the other AR glasses. The problem of Lynx is always the same as all other headset manufacturers: foster a healthy ecosystem with many developers and users. Facebook is investing billions for this on the Quest, how can Lynx do something similar? We’ll see!

More info (Lynx R2 on Road To VR)
More info (Lynx R2 on Upload VR)

Other relevant news

Oculus plans to introduce in-app purchases to App Lab experiences

Oculus App Lab has been introduced by Facebook to give a way to indie developers to publish their applications for Quest without the need of passing Facebook’s strong store curation. The problem with App Lab is that it is a limited platform, and to developers, it looks like a second-tier store.
 
But this week we had the announcement that at least one of these limitations is going to lift off: Oculus is going to add downloadable content (DLC) or in-app purchases (IAP) to App Lab experiences “later this year”.
 
This may seem a little thing to you, but actually, it is very important. DLCs and IAPs are two new ways that indie developers that are on App Lab can use to monetize their games. Think about Gorilla Tag, the very successful free tag game: it can’t be monetized at all by its developer notwithstanding its enormous success because the game is available only on App Lab and he can’t add IAP options to earn money from it. With this new option, finally, he will be able to make some money out of his very fun game. Or us of New Technology Walkers, that in our fitness game HitMotion: Reloaded (download it!) could add DLCs with new training levels to earn some money. It’s something that we all App Lab developers need to have to sustain ourselves, and I am thankful that Facebook is finally going to introduce it.
 
 Now my question is: what is Facebook’s plan for the future of App Lab? If it becomes always richer of new content and new features, may it be possible that it will have always more importance in the Oculus ecosystem?

More info

Netflix may be interested in the VR market

Netflix, the most popular streaming service, has had some connection with virtual reality and gaming: series like Kiss Me First, or some Black Mirror episodes have been heavily discussed by us of the XR communities. Bandersnatch has been an interesting experiment to add some interactivity and agency to a series. Plus, the Netflix app has been in VR since the times of Gear VR/Oculus Go.
 
But now, the company seems to have made a more explicit move towards the VR market. This week, it has announced a deal with Shonda Rhimes, a powerhouse television producer, and among the other things, the “partnership includes the opportunity to exclusively produce and distribute potential gaming and VR content.”
 
Netflix has declined to comment further on the news, but it seems obvious that the streaming service would like to expand its horizons past the series, and start exploring also interactive content. The news could be massive because Netflix has an enormous audience and so if it starts exploring VR content, and if it starts promoting VR content, this could increase a lot awareness and the adoption of virtual reality technologies. For now, it is just a possibility, but I want to hope 🙂

More info

Sam & Max: This Time It’s Virtual has been released on the Oculus Quest

Happy Giant has finally released on Oculus Quest “Sam & Max: This Time It’s Virtual”, the much-awaited game that brings to VR the famous duo Sam & Max, who I personally love.
 
From the first reviews (including mine), the game appears to be incredibly fun: Sam & Max have always been fantastic in providing fun sketches, punchlines, jokes, and thanks to the fact that their original creators (Steve Purcell, Mike Stemmle, etc…) have actively worked on the game, this game keeps delivering well on this side. On the other side, the game is a bit slow in some of its parts and could have been polished a bit more. It also brings with it many of the pros and cons of all the old LucasArts point-and-click adventures.
 
It is not a perfect game, but it’s a ton of fun, and I advise you to play it if you want some good laughs.

More info (My detailed review on Sam & Max VR)
More info (Upload VR’s review on Sam & Max VR)

News worth a mention

Facebook launches referral program for Oculus Quest

Facebook is launching again its referral program for its headsets. After having done it for the Oculus Go, now it is experimenting with it for the Quest, trying to boost even more its sales. If you suggest a friend of yours to buy a Quest 2 and he buys it, you both receive $30 in store credit. This is a good way to entice people to suggest friends to buy the headset, and also a good way to make people discover more store content and get used to buying it. I think it’s a very smart way to increase the revenues associated with Quest 2.

More info

Read the Metaverse Primer

VC Matthew Ball has written a de-facto whitepaper on the Metaverse on his website. Dubbed “The Metaverse Primer”, it describes all the various aspects of the metaverse, from hardware to software, not to mention networking and monetization. It is a very useful collection of articles for people that are new to this world and want to understand all the facets of the topic very fast.

More info

Amazon Lumberyard becomes opensource

Amazon has launched some years ago its 3D engine called Lumberyard, derived from Crytek’s Cryengine. Now, in what seems a desperate move to become relevant in a field dominated by Unity and Unreal Engine, it has made this engine opensource with the name Open 3D Engine. The Linux Foundation will oversee the project and form the Open 3D Foundation to accelerate collaboration with game developers to enhance the triple-A game engine.
 
Having a fully open-source engine with the seal of approval of the Linux Foundation sounds interesting, even if the problem of convincing many developers that are used to Unity and Unreal stills seems very big.

More info

AR users to reach 800M by the end of the year

ARtillery Intelligence has made an interesting analysis of the augmented reality market.
 
Some of the most relevant data are about the compatibility of the AR platforms: on top, there is web AR, with 3.06 billion AR-compatible devices at the end of 2021, with the 2nd and 3rd places occupied by Facebook’s Spark AR (1.6 billion) and ARkit (1.25 billion).
 
The number of active AR users on the various platforms is of course inferior, and the company estimates 802 million for the end of this year. This is projected to grow to 1.67 billion by 2025.

More info

Read this analysis of the various tracking systems

On Reddit, I have found an analysis of the accuracy and field of view of the most famous VR tracking systems. Of course, SteamVR is still the gold standard, but it is surprising for instance that Insight tracking of Quest 2 is getting close in terms of accuracy. The worst tracking system is the one of Vive Cosmos, but honestly, we expected it.

More info

Meet and Portal double down on AR effects

Both Facebook and Google have decided to double down on AR effects inside calls.
 
Google has just added a lot of new AR effects and filters inside Google Meet, which is going to replace Duo quite soon.
 
Facebook, instead, has just added Harry Potter-inspired group filters for its Portal device. A member of the call can trigger the “Harry Potter and the Cursed Child” experience, and all members of the calls will see themselves in the environment of the novel, dressed like Wizards. It seems a fun experience, especially for fans.

More info (AR effects in Meet)
More info (AR effects in Portal)

ViewMagic wants to make volumetric videos easy

Thanks to Mathew Olson’s newsletter, I have discovered a startup called ViewMagic that thanks to a special camera (bigger than a standard one, but not very big), is able to record and transmit videos with some volumetric information. When you view these videos, both on a VR headset or on a smartphone, you can move your point of view and see the video reacting accordingly, with the correct parallax for all elements. The moving window is around 0.5m x 0.25m x 0.5m.
 
It seems an interesting project, that can make communication via XR more realistic in the future.

More info (ViewMagic / Video 1)
More info (ViewMagic / Video 2)

Some news on content

• Moss: Book II, the sequel of the fantastic game Moss, has been announced at PlayStation’s State of Play. We have a trailer and nothing more about it
• Fruit Ninja VR 2 is launching in late 2021 for SteamVR, and maybe also for Quest. It features bow and arrow and not only swords this time;
• Sniper Elite has been reviewed by both Road To VR and Upload VR. The sniping mechanic is solid for both magazines, but while Upload has appreciated the game overall, Road To VR is more critical on some things that should be polished more
• ARVORE’s new game Yuki is now set for a July 22nd release date, both for SteamVR and Quest. On Quest, there is a 10% discount for those who preorder it
• VorpX VR driver adds ‘FullVR’ support for ‘GTA V’ and ‘Red Dead Redemption II’
• VR puzzle adventure ‘Obduction’ is going to be offered for free on Epic Store on July 15th
• Paper Birds part I & II has been released on Oculus Quest for $7. It is an acclaimed storytelling adventure that premiered at Tribeca Film Festival 2021 and La Biennale di Venezia in 2020
• There is a new cool gameplay video of Ven on Quest 2
• A VR mod has been developed for the classical adventure Star Wars: TIE Fighter (fan remake). If you like retrogaming, give a look at this
• Totally Baseball, probably the first true baseball game in VR exits early access on Steam and launches on Oculus Quest
• VR drumming game Ragnarock is launching on Steam on July, 15th and will release on App Lab this summer. If you like rock music, this game may be for you
• Noda, a 3D mind mapping experience, is launching on Oculus Quest later this month. It will be free, but with a $5/month subscription price for those who want Pro features
• Rezzil Player 22 hits Oculus Quest this summer for $14.99. It features a number of different minigames aimed at improving your reactions and accuracy and tracks your progress.
• Maestro VR makes you conduct an orchestra in VR

More info (Moss 2)
More info (Fruit Ninja VR 2)
More info (Sniper Elite Review — Road To VR)
More info (Sniper Elite Review — Upload VR)
More info (Yuki)
More info (Vorpx mods)
More info (Obduction)
More info (Paper Birds)
More info (Ven)
More info (Star Wars: TIE Fighter)
More info (Totally Baseball)
More info (Ragnarock)
More info (Noda)
More info (Rezzil Player)
More info (Maestro VR)

News from partners (and friends)

Julien Dorra and his group of indie VR developers did it again: they evolved the already cool Lab Surprise to create VR Collection, a website where you can purchase indie VR games in bundles in a very original way. You want to know what it is? Well, then head there and discover it… 😉
Learn more (VR Collection official website)
Learn more (VR Collection on Protocol)

Will O’Brien (Angel Investor, Blockchain expert) and Greg Edwards (Former Founder of ‘BRCvr’ / “Burning Man VR”) have recently launched ’NFT Oasis’, a collection of virtual reality worlds that have welcomed more than 200 artists and musicians to perform and showcase their work. In just under two months, they were able to raise 4.4 million in financing.
 
Rather than just being one more virtual reality space for events, their objective is to allow every creator the ability to invest their time and energy into custom virtual worlds and experiences, activate their communities, stream their performances and creations, and capitalize on this tectonic shift that is taking place with the global NFT movement.
Learn more

Some XR fun

When you want to buy the last headset.
(Thanks Clemente for the tip!)
Funny link

When serious articles about VR are actually ridiculous
Funny link

When your survey is a bit confusing
Funny link

When you have to return to the real world
Funny link

When you discover that the real metaverse is actually different from the one of Ready Player One…
Funny link

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(Image by Lynx)