The XR Week Peek (2025.05.21): Google teases its smartglasses, Valve Deckard gets an unexpected leak, and more!

May 21, 2025May 21, 2025

Hello from Shenzhen, China! This is the last city of my Chinese trip, and together with some very interesting discussions I’m having with people here and some new great friends I’m making, I’m also enjoying a lot of Chinese food, since my B&B is in a part of the city full of small local restaurants. The fruit here in Southern China is also amazing: yesterday I tasted some mango with coconut milk, which was delicious.

Anyway, I’m not here to talk about food (even if I would love to), but about XR, so let me tell you what the most interesting pieces of XR news of the past week have been!

(PS Don’t miss the upcoming AWE Nite Florence that I am preparing together with Cecilia Lascialfari. The title is “PIONEERING THE FUTURE WITH XR AND SPATIAL INTELLIGENCE” and will feature three incredible speakers like Tom Emrich, Gabriele Romagnoli, and Alexandra Gerard! It will be live on
Thursday, May 22nd at 6pm CEST/4pm UTC/9am PDT, for free, at this link. You can find more info on Cecilia’s website)

Top news of the week

Google teases smartglasses made with prominent eyewear brands

A few days ago, Google teased that it would talk about smartglasses at its Google I/O conference, and yesterday it actually happened. What happened during the event was not a full launch, but just a teaser of things that will come in the future (so the first teaser was just a teaser of the teaser in the end).

Google announced that it is working on fashionable smartglasses, which will be, of course,e powered by Android XR and by the artificial intelligence of Gemini. What is cool is that Google understood that the Ray-Ban Meta is selling so well because of the cool style and the distribution network of Luxottica, so it is trying a similar strategy by partnering with the famous eyewear brands Warby Parker and Gentle Monster. Google added that it will also work with Kering Eyewear, one of EssilorLuxottica’s main competitors, in the future. Yes, these brands pale if compared with the huge market power of Luxottica, but they are still brands that are very famous and very fashionable. This makes me very excited because I’m a big believer that if we want people to wear glasses all day, these glasses should be, of course useful, but also very comfortable and fashionable, and so the alliance between tech brands and fashion brands is super important.

Google also stated that it is working with Samsung to create a sort of reference design for Android XR smartglasses. It is not clear if Samsung is also building a pair of glasses, too, though.

Even if Samsung did not announce any glasses, we actually have the second Android XR device that has ever been announced. XREAL has announced Project Aura, a pair of glasses that will support Android XR via a tethered compute puck with a Qualcomm Snapdragon chip. The details on these glasses are thin, we have just a picture where it is possible to see two tracking cameras and one camera to capture images. We also know they have an optical-see-through display. More details will be shared at AWE in Long Beach next month (Chi Xu, if you are reading this post, book me for a demo!)

There have been many video demos of how AI can support people via smartglasses (I will link them to you below). And Google has announced the developer preview 2 of Android XR SDK, so now developers can build even more powerful apps for the future Android devices (e.g. the latest SDK adds support for spatial videos). There are also rumors that Android Quick Share may come to Android XR devices.

Google also gave a new update on Project Starline, the expensive setup to have quasi-realistic 1-on-1 calls with people who are distant from you. The project has been rebranded as Google Beam and will be distributed by Google in partnership with HP, which, I guess, will try to sell this system to the various enterprise customers it serves. I personally think that among all the dead-on-arrival pieces of hardware, this is the most dead-on-arrival of them all: it’s a very expensive and bulky system, whose only purpose is to make your colleagues appear as 3D while you are having a call with them. Considering that what I hope is to have the least calls possible, the last thing I want is an expensive, bulky piece of hardware just to see in 3D the belly of my colleagues with whom I’m forced to have a meeting. I mean, I think it’s an impressive tech gadget and I would really love to try it, but I would never buy it for my company (unless my company sold products for the belly, in that case it would be really useful…)

More info (Google teased its smartglasses before Google I/O)
More info (Google partnered with eyewear brands for smartglasses — Road To VR)
More info (Google partnered with eyewear brands for smartglasses — Upload VR)
More info (XREAL unveiled Project Aura glasses)
More info (Android XR may support Quick Share)
More info (Demo video on Gemini on smartglasses)
More info (Demo video of Project Astra AI running on smartphone)
More info (Sneak Peek of Project Moohan UI)
More info (Android XR SDK developer preview 2 has been launched)
More info (Google Starlight becomes Google Beam)

Other relevant news

Valve Deckard has been confirmed… by Lynx

In an incredible plot twist that no one was expecting, Stan Larroque, the CEO of Lynx (the French company building a standalone headset) has confirmed on X that he got to know about the design of the upcoming Valve headset and that he found it to be amazing.

Stan, who we can refer from now as SadlyItsStanly, has probably learned about Valve’s plan through some supply chain leaks, since his headset has common suppliers with Valve’s headset. He doesn’t want to leak the full design, because as a headset manufacturer himself, he wouldn’t like this to happen to his device, but he still teased that this device and the new Lynx will serve different markets. He also said that he expects the release of Deckard to happen in 2026, notwithstanding previous rumors that talked about a release this year.

I know Stan, and he already gave me in the past a few heads-up on things that would happen and almost all of them became true, so if he says this about Deckard, we should take his revelations in serious consideration. I also hope he makes more reveals in the future. If he said that Valve Deckard exists and it is a great headset, we have to believe it. And this is great news for all our ecosystem…

More info (Stan Larroque’s tweet about Deckard)
More info (More details shared by Stan to Road To VR)

XREAL One becomes 6DOF with add-on camera

In Japan, Chinese manufacturer XREAL announced the launch of an accessory called Xreal Eye, a camera that attaches between the lenses. Preorders have opened in some regions like Japan, and the company plans to launch it in the other countries where Xreal One is sold in late June, priced at $100.

This is very interesting: for just $100, you can get an accessory that,t first of all, allows you to take great photos and videos with your XREAL One headset that you use for productivity. And especially, this camera unlocks 6DOF tracking, allowing these glasses to become truly augmented reality glasses. Since the tracking is performed with only one camera, it can’t work as well as the one made with multiple cameras that is performed on other headsets, but for $100, it is still a great addition to the glasses.

The company also announced improvements to its Unity SDK, which will now support the XR Interaction Toolkit and allow better hand tracking and access to camera images to apply AI algorithms on them.

More info (XREAL Eye camera)
More info (XREAL Eye and SDK improvements)

News worth a mention

Boz addresses some hot topics about Meta

As usual, Boz has been the face and voice of the company related to some interesting topics. First of all, he stated that he and Mark Zuckerberg are very committed to building the metaverse. Then he said that Meta is taking action to solve the issues flagged by developers about Meta Quest causing framerate issues in the latest updates, especially with a weird battery-saving feature that brought all the apps straight to 45FPS. He says that notwithstanding the usual mess with the updates, Meta will keep iterating fast the Quest runtime.

More info (Zuck and Boz being “true believers”)
More info (Bugs related to Quest performances)
More info (Boz answers to the bugs related to Quest performances)

Apple teases accessibility features for Vision Pro

Apple has teased some very interesting accessibility features that are coming to Vision Pro, probably in the upcoming VisionOS 3. First of all, it will be possible to zoom in on the passthrough images and ask the headset to describe what is there. Then Apple is opening up camera access to companies that want to build accessibility applications. Apple Vision Pro will also add support for brain-computer interface (BCI) input devices later this year, starting with Synchron’s. This will allow, for instance, people with ALS to click on buttons just by thinking about clicking on them.

According to Mark Gurman, in Vision OS 3, Apple will also allow users to scroll through text by just using their eyes.

More info (AVP passthrough zoom)
More info (AVP support for BCI)
More info (AVP lets you scroll with your eyes)

Ray-Ban Meta adds detailed descriptions for blind people

Meta is working on accessibility features, too, and this week it has announced that Ray-Ban Meta is adding a feature that allows the glasses to provide a very detailed and verbose description of what they see in front of them so that to help blind people discover what is in the space they are in. Meta is also expanding its partnership with Be My Eyes, which lets blind and low-vision Ray-Ban Meta glasses wearers start a view-sharing video call with one of the service’s 8 million volunteers who help them navigate a situation. It is very good to see Meta works with accessibility.

More info

AR company Rivet comes out of stealth

A new AR glasses manufacturer is on the field now: it is called Rivet and includes some people with long expertise in the industry. The details on their glasses are thin, but the company is making clear that it is focusing now on some sectors where AR glasses already have valuable use cases, like the enterprise and military industries. They seem to focus a lot on quality, so I’m curious to see what they will come up with.

More info

VRChat opens up an avatars marketplace

In the end, VRChat did it: it opened up a marketplace dedicated to avatars within its social VR platform. The company is not going to prevent the existing mechanisms that people are using to sell and buy avatars, but it is adding the marketplace as a centralized and convenient way for people to buy avatars. The Avatar Marketplace is also now hosting branded avatars, such as ‘Quill’ from Polyarc’s VR adventure series Moss.

This is a good thing to allow creators to earn money doing the work they love on VRChat.

More info

Starvault is a new MOBA game for Quest

Starvault is a new interesting MOBA (Multiplayer Online Battle Arena) for Quest. The first-person MOBA offers up large 5v5 battles, letting you choose from nine unique heroes, each with their own weapons, skills, and playstyles. The game has been launched in Early Access, and the team acknowledged there is still a lot to do, but it would like to grow the game together with the community.

I was supposed to mention this news in the “Friends” section since I know Alex, the PR of the team, but actually this game was received so well on Reddit and on all the online magazines (Upload VR just published a positive review about it), that I thought it deserved a mention on its own in the “News” section. It seems that the team has the right attitude to build a great game powered by a big community… let’s hope that it will actually deliver!

More info (Starvault, a new MOBA game for Quest)
More info (UploadVR’s positive review)
More info (Quest page of the game)

Creature hosted a game showcase called Creature Feature

Almost everyone now is making a VR games showcase, probably I’m the only one not hosting it. So this week Creature, the game studio behind Starship Home, hosted its own gaming showcase called Creature Feature. These are the most relevant pieces of news announced:

Adepts Arena is a new first-person fantasy adventure coming to Quest and Steam
Laser Dance, the mixed reality obstacle game from Cubism’s creator, will launch in early access this fall on Quest 3 & 3S
Prison Boss Prohibition, the sequel of Prison Boss VR, is making its debut on Quest and Steam this July
Deadly Delivery is a comedic VR co-op horror game where you deliver parcels across a haunted mine on Quest and Steam. It’s coming in Q4 2025
Maestro finds a new audience on PlayStation VR2, launching alongside a new Star Wars DLC crossover next month
Crossings promises an action-adventure roguelite set in the Norse afterlife, and a Steam demo will be available on June 9 for Steam Next Fest.

More info (Creature Feature)
More info (Adepts Arena)
More info (Laser Dance)
More info (Prison Boss Prohibition)
More info (Deadly Delivery)
More info (Maestro)
More info (Crossings)

Some news about content

Synth Riders goes back to the 90s with its latest music pack, adding Blur, Radiohead, and more
Assetto Corsa EVO released the game’s 0.2 update, which also includes some much-needed VR performance tweaks to make the game work well with PCVR
Verse is a relaxing experience that brings you to wonderful places around the world to experience poetry
The Smurfs — Flower Defense, a VR and mixed reality tower defense game based on the iconic series, is now expected to come out on June 19 for $19.99 on the Meta Quest platform
Wonder, an anthology of mixed reality charming experiences to live in your home, is out now on Quest 3
Beat Saber is celebrating its 7th anniversary with Danger, a free new track
Tier One: Direct Action, a VR tactical shooter that aimed to be an Onward spiritual successor, has hit financial struggles and departures
Space Lander replicates the old classic game Lunar Lander, but in mixed reality
Wordbound is an educational mixed reality word game coming to Quest 3 and Apple Vision. It features an amazing mechanic that lets you transform a 3D model into a word, then you can modify the word and transform it into a new 3D model that represents the new word!
Upload VR has published its usual XR News Roundup, with many minor pieces of XR news

More info (Synth Riders)
More info (Assetto Corsa EVO)
More info (Verse)
More info (The Smurfs)
More info (Wonder)
More info (Beat Saber)
More info (Tier One)
More info (Space Lander)
More info (Wordbound)
More info (XR News Roundup)

Some reviews about content

Bearly Escape is a cute game whose highlight is letting you play with arcade claw machines in a pretty accurate way
Smash Drums on PSVR 2 is a great game exactly like on all the other platforms
Of Lies and Rain is a post-apocalyptic sci-fi VR shooter where you fight to save humanity. From the available free demo, it is possible to see impressive graphical quality, but a slightly lacking story
Tunnels is a scaring game that is able to let you feel quite uncomfortable and claustrophobic while navigating underground tunnels while being chased by an evil creature.

More info (Bearly Escape)
More info (Smash Drums)
More info (Of Lies and Rain)
More info (Tunnels)

Other news

Samsung unveiled new, impressive, high-resolution, high-luminance micro-OLED displays

Learn more

Meta is paying people to scan their bodies to train the AI for codec avatars

Learn more

Karl Guttag has written one of his amazing technical pieces about the potential technology employed by smartglasses from Meta and Google

Learn more

The devs of BoomBox VR accuse the publisher of having “stolen” the game from them

Learn more

Two stories came out this week describing the disaster that is Meta’s organization about Meta Horizon

Learn more (Story 1)
Learn more (Story 2)

Varjo published a documentary to show the enterprise use case of its headsets

Learn more

Infinite Reality rebrands now as Napster Corporation, to make things even more confusing than before

Learn more

News from partners (and friends)

Discover Virtual Dawn SDK!

Virtual Dawn has launched their Unity SDK that enables community driven creation for XR and AI. It is maintained and improved on daily basis by its users from gaming, education, military and businesses. Featuring shared assets and templates and community support! Join up for free by clicking VD Login from the website.
Learn more (Official website)
Learn more (YouTube video)

The age of abundance

Some people are firm believers that Artificial Intelligence has the power to project us into an age of abundance, where humanity can finally not fight anymore for scarce resources and be happier. One passionate proponent of this possibility is Alvin Wang Graylin, who has written a very detailed post about it.
Learn more

Some XR fun

A new way of shooting
Funny link

I thought it was only me!
Funny link

Google I/O bingo card. Actually I would say, the bingo card of all the tech events now.
Funny link

Donate for good

Like last week, also this week in this final paragraph I won’t ask you to donate to my blog, but to the poor people who are facing the consequences of the war. Please donate to the Red Cross to handle the current humanitarian situation in Ukraine. I will leave you the link to do that below.

Let me take a moment before to thank anyway all my Patreon donors for the support they give to me:

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And now here you are the link to donate:

Support The Red Cross in Ukraine

(Header image by XREAL)

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