In an effort to help PC VR developers bring their content to Quest 2, Meta has ported Showdown, an old UE4 VR graphics showcase, to the headset as a case study in optimization best practices.
VR glove creator Manus has launched pre-orders for its latest device, Quantum Metagloves, an input solution targeted at enterprise users. The Netherlands-based company is looking to offer up more precise finger tracking than not only its past VR gloves, but also optical trackers current used in the industry.
Electronic Arts is bringing VR support to the PC version of F1 22, the upcoming Formula One racing game developed by Codemasters. Although the game isn’t due out until July, the studios have tossed out a few codes to YouTubers to show off just how the game will look in VR.
Researchers from Carnegie Mellon University have demonstrated a practical system for full-body tracking in VR using cameras mounted on the controllers to get a better view of the user’s body.
We now have the opportunity to come face-to-face with the myriad eldritch horrors that lurk within Elden Ring (2022). One of the most well-known names in the VR modding community, Luke Ross, has released his Elden Ring VR mod for the PC version of the game.
Horizon Worlds is Meta’s social VR platform for Quest 2 and Rift which includes ways for users to explore together, create their own rooms, and play mini-games. The company is making good on its vision to mold the social platform into more of a monolithic metaverse app by folding its live event app Horizon Venues entirely into Worlds.
Blade & Sorcery, VR’s favorite melee combat sim, is continuing to see steady updates. The game’s next update, U11 (now available in an early beta), looks to be a doozy with the studio adding an expanded magic system, stealth mechanics, a graphical overhaul on PC, and plenty more.
Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg showed off a prototype of the company’s wrist-worn XR controller this week to EssilorLuxottica, the Italian parent company behind the Ray-Ban Stories camera glasses and a host of other conventional luxury eyewear brands. Although outwardly it appears to be similar to what the company revealed last year, it’s definitely a vote of confidence by Meta in the tech’s potential as the basis of a future XR input device.
A team of researchers from NVIDIA Research and Stanford published a new paper demonstrating a pair of thin holographic VR glasses. The displays can show true holographic content, solving for the vergence-accommodation issue. Though the research prototypes demonstrating the principles were much smaller in field-of-view, the researchers claim it would be straightforward to achieve a 120° diagonal field-of-view.
Popular block-slashing rhythm game Beat Saber just got an unexpected drop of 12 new tracks in its Electronic Mixtape paid DLC, which includes content spanning nearly two decades of electronic music.
Google is adding to its portfolio of XR microdisplay designs and talent, as the company announced it’s acquired microLED (µLED) designer Raxium.
Researchers at Meta Reality Labs have created a prototype VR headset with a custom-built accelerator chip specially designed to handle AI processing to make it possible to render the company’s photorealistic Codec Avatars on a standalone headset.
Flirtual is a dating app designed to match VR users together and to facilitate dates in social VR applications. The creators say it’s a codification of a trend that’s already happening—people meeting in VR and going on to form real-world relationships.
Following a report today which claimed Meta’s upcoming Project Cambria headset would be priced at $800, rather than denying the information as a rumor, the company took the curious step of confirming the headset would be much more expensive.
According to a report by The Information, Meta plans to release four new VR headsets by 2024, and that’s purportedly in addition to its AR devices.
