Sony reveals specifications of PSVR2 at CES 2022

Honestly speaking, I wasn’t expecting interesting news from this CES in AR and VR, while actually we just had one: Sony has revealed almost all the specifications of the upcoming PlayStation VR 2 headset and its controllers! Without further talking, let me report them to you.

Headset specifications

Controllers specifications

Naming

We have also an official name for the controllers and the headset, which until now was just referred to as “Next-gen virtual reality headset”. The headset will be called… PlayStation VR 2!

I imagine the entire days of brainstorming at Sony Interactive Entertainment with people discussing how to call the headset that would have come after the PlayStation VR 1, until someone came with the unexpected genius idea of calling it PlayStation VR 2. How incredible and unexpected. Luckily, I have some magic superpowers and I started calling it PSVR 2 since the first time I have heard about it…

Jokes apart, the fact that we finally have a name, makes it much easier talking about it, and also gives the headset an identity. This holds true also for the new controllers, which are called PlayStation VR2 Sense Controllers.

Content

We have also the first piece of content announced for the new PSVR2: it is “Horizon Call Of The Mountain”, developed by Guerrilla and Firesprite. Horizon is a popular exclusive IP of Sony, and this new game will be built from the ground up for the new PSVR headset. It is most probably one of the launch titles of the device, so we can expect it to be designed so that to exploit the best features of the new HMD and controllers.

Price and release date

There was no mention of a price or a release window. Especially the price would be important to know to understand how this new headset can indirectly compete with the Quest 2. As for the release date, the only thing we know is that it will be most probably released this year.

Commentary

This announcement has been very interesting, but honestly speaking, it doesn’t contain much that we already didn’t know. The name was obvious, and many of the headset specifications had already been revealed by journalists some months ago: for instance, Upload VR had already published them a lot of time ago. Seeing them confirmed is anyway good news.

PSVR 2 will officially be the first consumer-oriented VR headset to implement eye-tracking, foveated rendering, and HDR. This is an important announcement and shows how PSVR will bring with it some innovations. Foveated rendering will be very important to offer games with superb graphical quality: the PS5 is already a powerful machine, and if it must render games only at a partial resolution, it can run games with a very fine level of detail. And this great games will shine on a display featuring OLED bright colors and HDR. I can’t wait to see what big studios will be able to create for this new headset.

The other cool feature will be the vibrational feedback on the headset: inside the headset, there will be a motor that will make the device vibrate at different intensities depending on what is happening inside the game. Having tried the haptic facemask by bHaptics, I can tell you that having haptic feedback on the head may be quite cool if designed properly: being headshot and feeling the head to vibrate adds a good level of immersion to a FPS game.

Apart from these special features, it also spots other very good specifications, like the 2K x 2K per eye, 110° Field Of View (I hope horizontal, but it is not specified anywhere), 120 Hz refresh rate, and the use of an OLED display that can guarantee very bright colors and deep black levels. It has also ergonomic controllers with advanced haptic feedback. And It also solves the previous problems of PSVR with a simple setup requiring just a single USB-C cable and an inside-out tracking with four IR cameras that let you use your headset without having to install anything complicated in your room.

It is clear that PSVR 2 is raising the quality bar for tethered headsets: to my knowledge, no other consumer-oriented headset features all these innovations, especially if paired with the polish typical of Sony products. I really hope that the PCVR manufacturers will accept Sony’s challenge and will try to improve their products, too, because I really hope for PCVR to keep thriving.

The real question is how this PSVR 2 device will be able to compete with the Oculus Quest 2. PSVR 2 has clearly better features and is paired with a very powerful console, while the Quest 2 is just a mobile device. But Quest 2 is easier to use and doesn’t need an external device like a PS5. Quest 2 has a great library of content, and also PlayStation VR already has. It will be interesting to see how the market will react: will people prefer the quality and the PlayStation brand, the usability, and convenience of Quest, or will use them both like every person has a PC and a mobile phone? I guess only the market will tell us after this product will be released.

(Header image by Sony Interactive Entertainment)