The XR Week Peek (2021.08.16): Facebook releases Passthrough APIs, Quest on the road to 10M units, and more!

Hello everyone! This summer week has been amazing for me and I want to share my happiness with you. It has all been because of these three pieces of news:

• My blog is now 5 years old! I still can’t believe that I did it for so long… and this is also been possible thanks to your support
• Our game HitMotion: Reloaded has been approved on App Lab and even Upload VR reported the news! It is the first time that a VR app I’ve done has been featured on Upload in my 7 years in VR, so this is a big event for me (and for all people at New Technology Walkers)!
• My silly app The Unity Cube is now in 20th place among the best-rated applications on App Lab! Absolutely not bad for an app… that is just a cube 😛

With a lot of enthusiasm because of these three things, let me tell you about the best AR/VR news of the week!

Top news of the week

Facebook releases Passthrough APIs for Quest 2

AR/VR developers, rejoice! Finally, Facebook has released passthrough APIs for Quest 2, so you can create AR/MR apps for the Oculus standalone headset. The Quest is now officially an AR/VR hybrid headset.
 
Passthrough APIs have still limited features: for instance, you have no access to the camera frames for further analysis, you have no understanding of the environment (not even planes detection). You can just put the camera stream as background or foreground of your app, maybe with some preset filters applied to it. It’s not much, but it is enough for the community to start experimenting with it. I can’t wait to see what the community will be able to create with it.
 
This mode is still experimental, and this means that no app of this kind can be published on the official store… but of course, there is place for them on SideQuest. The first app of this kind has been Cactus Cowboy AR Passthrough Tech Demo from DeadPressed, but others have been released in the meanwhile. At the moment I have seen nice things, but still not mindblowing experiences… but let’s just give the creators time to work on it.
 
I have to warn you that it may still not work on your Quest 2. To have passthrough working, you must have the latest firmware: I still can’t work on it, because the minor build version of my FW is not the latest one. Chris Pruett told me they are slowly rolling out the update so that to catch errors if they see them in the first users that receive it. I can understand this for users-oriented features, but we developers should be able to force the latest firmware: this gives some devs a competitive advantage over others and it is not fair. Facebook, please do something about it.
 
Btw, I’m pretty excited about this piece of news and I can’t wait to work on it as soon as I can!

More info (Passthrough APIs released)
More info (The first AR game for Quest)
More info (Gravity Lab dev experimenting with Passthrough APIs)
More info (My problems with the firmware)
More info (Chris Pruett answering to my problems with the firmware)
More info (Passthrough APIs documentation)

Other relevant news

Facebook is on the right path to reach 10M VR headsets

In his latest Instagram AMA, Andrew “Boz” Bosworth has said that the Quest is on track to reach 10M devices and that this number is going to be surpassed sooner than initially planned by Facebook. It’s funny that when Boz speaks, it is always to say that something “is coming sooner than expected” (someone should make a meme about this), but frankly speaking, I think he’s right: I guess Facebook will reach the magic number between Q4 2021 and Q1 2022. 10M is the magic number after which the VR ecosystem can become self-sustainable and start attracting AAA studios. After that, a virtuous circle should start, with always more people and content coming: that’s why Facebook plans to sell around 20M headsets in 2022.
 
In the meanwhile, the company keeps speaking about the “metaverse” it is building. In an article I missed two weeks ago, Mark Zuckerberg states that he plans to make money on the metaverse selling ads, but especially with an internal market of virtual goods. This seems to be the main revenue driver for the company, and the hardware sales and all the other investments are just a way to arrive to have the biggest number of people inside Facebook’s virtual world so that the company can take a cut on all its internal transactions.

More info (Bosworth and the 10M users)
More info (Facebook’s metaverse and its business model)

Watch this Pico Neo 3 review

Pico Neo 3 is the first Chinese consumer-oriented headset. It is not sold in the West because here Pico still aims at the enterprise market (because it can’t compete with Facebook… for now), but it is only available in China. For a price around $400, it gives Chinese people a good product, very similar to the Quest 2, and a catalog with some hit games like Red Matter.
 
The famous VR Youtube ThrillSeeker has been able to review the Pico Neo 3 (consumer edition) and he came out pretty impressed by it, saying that it is very close to the Quest 2 for what concerns performances. I suggest you watch his review… even if you can’t buy the product, it shows you how the headset is a good one. Maybe can we hope in a Quest competitor for the future?

More info

News worth a mention

DigiLens found a way to double the resolution of its waveguides

DigiLens, one of the most important manufacturers of optical systems for AR and VR, has just found a way to double the resolution of its waveguide displays for AR glasses. This is possible thanks to a new product dubbed “Transparent Resolution Expander” (T-REx for short), which uses a trick to increase the perceived resolution of the display.
 
The idea is this one (I’ll oversimplify it to explain the concept): let’s imagine an image with double the resolution of what is possible to do with current waveguide displays, and let’s divide it into vertical pixels stripes. A standard waveguide display can only render half of the resolution, so we make it render just the even stripes. After a fraction of seconds, we make it render the odd stripes, and thanks to some optical magic, we render them in the correct position (so between the even ones). Then we switch back to the even ones, and so on, in loop. If the transition is very fast, our eyes won’t perceive that the system is showing two different images alternatively, and will just see a single image with double the resolution of the actual waveguide emitter. This technique, called wobulation, is not new, but DigiLens looks like the first one that is able to put it into a commercial product.

More info

Everyone is talking about the metaverse and Facebook

All journalists, all XR enthusiasts, basically everyone, are talking about the “metaverse” and what Facebook is going to create in the upcoming years. All the fluff that I’m reading is making my eyes bleed, and I really can’t stand this word anymore.
 
Luckily, there are still some articles worth reading, and a very objective analysis by Doug Thompson is the only article worth reading about Facebook’s metaverse that I’ve found this week, so I’m leaving it to you here below.

More info

NVIDIA makes Omniverse compatible with Blender

NVIDIA is keeping working on Omniverse, its solution that is a bit a collaboration tool, a bit a simulator, a bit an engine. At SIGGRAPH, the company has just announced that Omniverse is now compatible with Blender, and that compatibility with Adobe Substance 3D is in the works.
 
Omniverse seems to be an amazing solution for big and medium studios, and I’ve finally been able to find its price. A license for Omniverse Enterprise, with 5 seats included, is worth $14,000 a year.
 
At SIGGRAPH, the company has showed also its most recent advancements in making 3D CGI the most realistic possible.

More info (Omniverse compatible with Blender)
More info (Omniverse pricing)
More info (NVIDIA’s advancements in 3D rendering)

Visit Virtual Market 6 on VRChat

Virtual Market 6 is an incredible virtual event happening in VRChat these days. It is like an exhibition of real and virtual products, but all made inside VRChat, with a level of detail that is impressive. Everyone that I know that has been there has come out delighted (I’ll give it a look soon), and I think it sets the bar for creating successful virtual expos in the virtual world.
 
There are products by HP, booths by Disney, and even a full recreation of Tokyo’s Akihabara station! And then there is MegaDodo Simulation that is trolling us all showing a virtual model of the Decagear when we can’t see the real version of it…
 
If you are interested in virtual events or virtual commerce, you must give it a look!

More info (Virtual Market 6)
More info (DecaGear at Virtual Market 6)

Space Pirate Arena to come soon to Oculus Quest

Space Pirate Arena, the follow-on to 2016’s Space Pirate Trainer, is going to launch soon on Quest. It will be a local multiplayer game (with single-player still possible), and you will need a 10m x 10m space to play it. This means that provided that you have a big enough space, you and your VR friends can meet in the same place, and have fun as if you went to a laser tag game.
 
I see it being a successful game in VR arcades, but considering that it is hard to find an indoor 10m x 10m space where to play it with your friends, I don’t think it will take off in the consumer market. Happy to be proved wrong, though.

More info

Pistol Whip releases “Smoke And Thunder” campaign

Cloudhead Games has just released the second big campaign for the game Pistol Whip, dubbed “Smoke And Thunder”. The campaign adds new western-themed levels, new weapons, and a new modifier system. The reviews on this update have been very positive everywhere.
 
This update is not coming as a paid DLC, but as a free update to all the game owners. The price of the game is so increasing by $5 to adapt to the new value of the product. In an interview with Upload, the team explains that they found this the best approach to reward the early adopters with a free update while increasing the revenues for the studio with the price increase. A smart decision, I think.

More info (Pistol Whip Update)
More info (Cloudhead Games explains its design decisions)

Some news on content

• ILMxLAB has teased the second episode of Star Wars: Tales From the Galaxy’s Edge. It is called “Last Call”, and from the trailer, it seems an interesting adventure for all Star Wars fans
• Lone Echo 2 won’t launch on August, 24th, but it has been delayed again. I know, it’s a joke at this point. But remember that even Duke Nukem Forever launched in the end… so there is hope
• VR stealth game Arashi Castle has launched on PSVR, and it got good reviews
• Synth Riders is now available for PSVR, and there is a launch discount for PS+ subscribers
• Happy Giant has announced a free demo of Sam & Max: This Time It’s Virtual on Steam!
• Upload has positively reviewed VR RPG game Vengeful rites
• Upload has positively reviewed VR shmup game Vengeful Yuki
• Golf 5 eClub aims at bringing real golf tournaments to Oculus Quest for $19.99

More info (Star Wars part 2)
More info (Lone Echo 2 delayed again)
More info (Arashi released)
More info (Arashi review)
More info (Synth Riders on PSVR)
More info (Sam & Max on Steam)
More info (Vengeful Rites review)
More info (Yuki review)
More info (Golf 5 eClub review)

News from partners (and friends)

My friends at FXG have just launched an amazing camera for your VR productions! It is called FM DUO, a professional camera that is able to record videos at 12K @30fps, and 8K @60fps. It features a double 6000×6000 CMOS sensor, to let you shoot your stereoscopic videos with unprecedented clarity. And it also supports live streaming…
Learn more

I have been the host of a new podcast about AR and VR offered by LCIXR AGENCY. We talked about immersive technologies, the present, and the future. Many other episodes with great speakers are coming soon!
Learn more

Some XR fun

I’ve made this meme about VR that has been the most rated post of the week in the /r/oculus subreddit! Another great news for me…
Funny link

VCs just want to hear a word from us…
Funny link

When you want a Valve Index but you are on a budget.
Funny link

Another victory for computer vision
Funny link

An alternate use for the Oculus Touch controllers
Funny link

This commercial about a VR accessory is so believable I wanna cry
Funny link

Make me a birthday gift!

Yesterday was the 5th birthday of my blog! If you want to make me a little gift to celebrate it, you can join my Patreon community, so that to support my hard work in informing the community. You would make me so happy… and at the same time help me in doing something good for all the other XR people 🙂
 
This is the list of the amazing companies, professionals, and enthusiasts that already support me on Patreon (a special shoutout for Marguerite that just joined the gang):

• DeoVR
• Raghu Bathina
• Jonn Fredericks
• Jean-Marc Duyckaerts
• Reynaldo T Zabala
• Ilias Kapouranis
• Michael Bruce
• Paolo Leoncini
• Immersive.international
• Bob Fine
• Nikk Mitchell and the great FXG team
• Jake Rubin
• Alexis Huille
• Jennifer Granger
• Jason Moore
• Steve Biggs
• Niels Bogerd
• Julio Cesar Bolivar
• Jan Schroeder
• Kai Curtis
• Francesco Strada
• Sikaar Keita
• Ramin Assadollahi
• Jeff Dawson
• Juan Sotelo
• Andrew Sheldon
• Chris Madsen
• Tracey Wong
• Matthew Allen Fisher
• Horacio Torrendell
• Andrew Deutsch
• Fabien Benetou
• Tatiana Kartashova
• Marco “BeyondTheCastle” Arena
• Eloi Gerard
• Adam Boyd
• Jeremy Dalton
• Siciliana Trevino
• Joel Ward
• Alex P
• Marguerite Espin de la Vega
• Sb
• Vooiage Technologies
• Caroline
• Liam James O’Malley
• Paul Reynolds
• Hillary Charnas
• Wil Stevens
• Matias Nassi

To join them, you have just make a little click on the link here below. Thank you!

Support The Ghost Howls for its birthday!

(Header image by Facebook)