Valve: Steam Saw 1.7 Million New VR Users in 2020, 71% Increase in VR Game Revenue
Valve today shared a handful of new stats revealing the growth of VR on Steam over the course of 2020.
‘Beat Saber’ & ‘Job Simulator’ Top PSVR’s Most Downloaded Games of 2020
PlayStation has released the top 10 list for most-downloaded PS4, PS5 and PSVR games of 2020. It should come as no surprise to anyone that two of the VR industry’s most successful games have nabbed the top two spots: Beat Saber and Job Simulator.
For a Veteran Studio That’s Weathered the Storm, VR Has Become a Lucrative Business
Having started production on its first title even before the original Oculus Rift DK1 development kit was sent to developers, Canada-based Cloudhead Games is one of the world’s most veteran game studios dedicated to virtual reality. The studio has staked its very existence on its ability to build compelling VR games. With three prior games under its belt, Cloudhead poured its hard-won expertise into its latest, Pistol Whip, which has propelled the studio new levels of success.
‘Synth Riders’ Music Pack Featuring Muse Gets Full Tracklist Reveal, DLC Launching Jan. 14th
Virtual reality rhythm game Synth Riders (2018) is getting a new music pack tomorrow called ‘Synthwave Essentials 2′ which is set to feature the heavy-hitting English rock band Muse. Now, developers Kluge Interactive have unveiled the full tracklist for its upcoming DLC in a Road to VR exclusive, and also sat down to talk about some of the finer points of grooving to the infectious electric beat of synthwave in VR.
‘Doom 3’ Rips & Tears onto Oculus Quest with This Unofficial Mod
As you’d imagine, Doom 3 (2004) wasn’t built for VR. But thanks to work by consummate modders Team Beef, the iconic first-person shooter from id Software can finally be played in all its horrific goodness on Oculus Quest, replete with Touch controls. There’s a few hoops to jump through to get it working, but it’s all in the name of doom-slaying.
Panasonic Reveals Improved Specs for Its Impressively Compact VR Glasses
At last year’s CES, Panasonic unveiled a prototype of a pretty sleek pair of VR glasses. Only a few journalists got a chance to try the prototype then, noting that they were more akin to a ‘VR viewer’ since they lacked room-scale tracking and was primarily used for watching immersive video whilst tethered to a PC. At this year’s all-digital CES 2021, Panasonic showed off a new and improved version of the device, which packs in some pretty intriguing specs alongside the new addition of optical 6DOF tracking.
‘Rec Room’ Now Has Over 1 Million Monthly Active VR Users
It was only a month ago when social VR platform Rec Room reported it crossed the two million annual VR user mark, an important milestone worth celebrating along the app’s five-year journey. Its developers tell Road to VR that Rec Room has seen a significant uptick in users recently, as it now reports over one million monthly active VR users on the platform.
Lenovo Reveals ThinkReality A3 Lightweight AR Glasses for Enterprise
During the all-digital version of CES 2021 this year, Lenovo has officially unveiled its ThinkReality A3 augmented reality glasses, which is said to work with PC and select Motorola smartphones via a USB-C cable.
CREAL Reveals Its First Light-field AR & VR Headset Prototypes
‘Tilt Brush’ Co-creator Leaves Google for ‘very special’ VR Project with ‘Space Pirate Trainer’ Studio
Tilt Brush co-creator Patrick Hackett announced today that he’s leaving Google after nearly six years with the company. His next project will be a VR collaboration with I-Illusions, the studio behind the VR classic Space Pirate Trainer.
‘Pavlov VR’ Brings WW2 Tank Warfare & Weapons in Biggest Update Yet
Pavlov VR, the VR shooter in Early Access for PC VR headsets, just got its biggest update yet which not only brings WW2 weapons, character models, and maps to the game, but also multiplayer tanks so you can finally put a little more Blitz in your Krieg.
Facebook Researchers Explore Mechanical Display Shifting to Reduce Screen Door Effect
Researchers from Facebook Reality Labs and the University of Arizona published new work exploring the use of high-speed mechanical display shifting to reduce the so-called screen-door-effect (SDE) of immersive displays. SDE is caused by unlit spaces between pixels leading to the immersion-reducing appearance of a ‘screen door’ between the viewer and the virtual world. The researchers experiment with rapidly and minutely shifting the entire display to cause the display’s pixels to fill in the gaps.
More ‘Hitman 3’ VR Gameplay Revealed in New Trailer
Hitman 3 is slated to release on consoles and PC on January 20th, however the only version getting VR support for now is on the PS4/PS5 platforms. To get the hype train moving, developers IO Interactive just gave us another peek at the upcoming first-person PSVR mode in a new video.
Oculus Quest 2 Surpasses Original Quest in Monthly Active Users
In a look back at 2020, Facebook Reality Lab’s head Andrew Bosworth revealed that Quest 2 quietly celebrated a few new milestones shortly after its October 13th launch.
