Neat Corporation, the team behind Budget Cuts (2018), originally wanted to bring its VR stealth adventure to PSVR back in May. After a delay due to the global slowdown, which pushed that date to July 10th, the studio is again marking a definitive launch date in stone: September 25th.

Update (July 3rd, 2020): Neat Corp has released a PS blogpost outlining its new September 25th release date. Ostensibly as a form of recompense, the studio has also built a new PSVR-exclusive level called ‘Panopticon’.


Update (May 7th, 2020): Neat Corp has announced in a recent tweet that Budget Cuts for PSVR won’t be launching in May 2020 as previously planned. The delay, which is due to the global slowdown, is pushing the release to July 10th. We’re glad to hear that the team is taking the extra time to nail it down, and continue on with their work in these uncertain times.


Update (March 23rd. 2020): – Neat Corporation, Coatsink, and Perp Games today announced that the original Budget Cuts will be coming to PSVR on May 15th with a simultaneous digital and physical release. There’s still no word on whether a Quest version is still in the mix.

Original article (January 20th, 2019): Budget Cuts puts you in the hum-drum world of an endless office complex. Just as you’re about to die of boredom, a fax comes through that warns you of impending doom. All of the humans in the office have been mysteriously replaced by worker drones, and it’s your job to get past the deadly security bots with only throwing knives and your trusty portal-style teleportation gun to figure out what happened.

While we genuinely liked the game, unfortunately it was plagued with performance issues early on which actually forced the team to reschedule launch well after reviews were already out in a bid to smooth over some of the game-breaking bugs that made their way to some reviewers.

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That said, Neat Corp has plenty to do to get the physics-based stealth game in shape for the decreased graphical and CPU power of the PS4. Another hurdle to jump over will invariably be the PS Camera’s smaller, front-facing tracking volume that will no doubt require users to make heavy use of snap-turning locomotion in addition to the game’s native teleportation scheme.

Whatever the case may be, we’re hoping it does well enough to bring the game to Oculus Quest, because it’s clear a virtually unlimited tracking volume would be an insane addition to a game that gets you dodging, ducking, and cowering under virtual desks for your life.

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Well before the first modern XR products hit the market, Scott recognized the potential of the technology and set out to understand and document its growth. He has been professionally reporting on the space for nearly a decade as Editor at Road to VR, authoring more than 3,500 articles on the topic. Scott brings that seasoned insight to his reporting from major industry events across the globe.
  • MosBen

    This would be an interesting test for the Quest, if they can get it working well. So much of the Quest skepticism that sometimes gets voiced around here is based on the very real graphical limitations of the Snapdragon 835 chip. But the article is right that having a potentially bigger tracking volume might make the game better/more fun regardless of whatever graphical downgrades are required by the hardware. Will people care? Will put up with less than cutting edge graphics in order to have a fun, wireless experience in a larger area, or will they hold off for higher resolutions and faster processors? It’ll certainly be interesting, and the upcoming Facebook conference can’t come soon enough.

    • dk

      what graphics …optimizing it and basically looking the same will be super easy with this one

      • MosBen

        Perhaps. It’s certainly not the most beautiful game in VR, but I’m admittedly out of my depth in determining what level of graphics the Snapdragon 835 is capable of, so maybe I was underestimating it. Anyway, my point is just that one of the things that I find so fascinating about the Quest is that it will serve as a good test of the hypothesis that some around here have suggested that graphics is everything, and that VR won’t achieve mass market appeal until we see significant improvements to what can be rendered and the resolution that it’s rendered in. I have a suspicion that they’re wrong, and that people don’t care nearly as much about graphics as hardcore gamers do, and that they’ll accept cartoony or lower fidelity graphics in exchange for a device that is cheaper, easier to set up and use, and portable. But we’ll see! The Quest and Cosmos can’t come fast enough!

        • dk

          youtube.com/watch?v=JvMQUz0g_Tk have u seen this it’s about porting simple looking games …the 835 is pretty weak if nothing else it’s 2 years old …u might be underestimating how much u can optimizing some stuff and retain similar mechanics also 75hz and fixed foveated rendering helps ….but yes it will be as limited as other headsets with sd835 …and people will be happy with what it can do until it gets updated or there is something better on the market

          • MosBen

            The thing that I’m mostly trying to get at is the tradeoff between price and convenience and raw horsepower is going to land in the VR space. I tried watching a 3D movie in my Rift this last weekend, and it was the first time that I’ve really felt like the screen resolution was limiting my ability to enjoy what I was doing. Lots of people that hang out on these boards are convinced that higher resolution screens and more powerful graphical hardware are what’s really limiting VR, but I have a suspicion that while that stuff is important, it’s the cost and complexity of PC VR that’s holding it back. Things like Daydream or the Go are nice enough for what they are, but they don’t really present what I consider a “real” VR experience. But the Quest probably will, even if the power of its processor is limited. So I’m bullish on its chances to significantly expand the market, but I might be wrong and people will dismiss it as too under powered to present compelling experiences.

          • dk

            the rift/vive res is a joke ….but with games it’s not that noticeable because your brain is filling in the blanks and mostly paying attention to the movement …even the cheap winmr headsets which have great angular resolution and stripe rgb subpixels get annoying pretty quickly when u use it for browsing the internet or for productivity apps
            I agree ….3dof headsets r not real vr …it’s a demo sort of similar to vr from the days of the oculus dk1 …and 3dof will die as soon as mobile 6dof ages a bit
            well u can have a compelling experience with under powered hardware…like with every handheld thing ever …and if u want even more compelling things u upgrade
            for me the quest is not that interesting since it doesn’t have a pc mode with 90hz and without fixed foveated rendering not to mention using 2 years old hardware platform….but it will be great for plenty of people until something newer better comes out

          • MosBen

            The Rift/Vive resolution is certainly surpassed by newer HMDs, but like you said, in games it’s not that noticeable, which speaks to the idea that there is a point for any activity where tech is “good enough” for most people. I’m probably always going to want the latest PC VR platform because I’m an enthusiast enough to want to see what super cool stuff is available. But I’m also interested in VR as a medium achieving mass adoption. Maybe interesting experiences and games in an affordable and convenient package is what will do it, in which case the Quest could be a landmark in VR’s history. Or maybe it will take a really big breakthrough in using VR for productivity for mass adoption to happen, in which case the Quest may end up with too low of a resolution or too short of a battery life to serve people’s needs. But I think that it’s important to try to take a step back from what we as enthusiasts and gamers think is important to try and figure out what is, or will be, important to all the people that could be interested in VR, but haven’t taken the plunge yet.

  • johnny

    We don’t need any native game for the quest honestly, if STREAMING will work well as it works on the oculus go right now. I bet we’ll get ALVR or RiftCat or TPCAST Air [or any other solution]… support day-1 when the oculus quest is out, then everyone can throw their rift’s, vive’s and wmr to the garbage… oculus quest + great streaming feature = the best headset.

    • Rogue Transfer

      It’s all low FOV though, there’s better.

    • dk

      sure it will work somewhat …..75hz and whatever delay u get from wifi streaming and from $300 tpcastair usb connection

  • iThinkMyCatIsAFlea

    Teleportation blows. If I could, I’d ban it.

    KICK TELEPORTATION OUT OF VR IN 2019

    • mirak

      stfu

      • iThinkMyCatIsAFlea

        Nope.

    • G-man

      even if you can more around in room scale, or artificial locomotion, being able to teleport in a game as a special ability is still reall cool. or is portal suddenly not one of the best video games ever made?

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