Rec Room is one of the leading social VR platforms, supporting every major console, mobile device, and VR headset—except PlayStation VR 2, that is. And it’s very likely going to stay that way.

In a Reddit AMA earlier this month, Rec Room co-founder Cameron Brown (aka ‘Gribbly’) answered a few burning questions, including a big one that’s been on the minds of PSVR 2 owners since the headset launched early last year. When will Rec Room come to PSVR 2?

Well, the news isn’t good, as Rec Room has “no current plans” to support Sony’s latest VR headset. Here’s Brown’s full statement:

“No current plans to bring RR to PSVR2. We’ve looked into it, it’s a non-trivial port, and we haven’t found a way to make it make economic sense. In an ideal world we would love to bring RR to PSVR2, but we just can’t justify the cost based on the numbers. Sucks I know, but that’s the truth.”

The free social VR platform has been available on the original PSVR since late 2017, bringing its user-focused maker tools alongside a host of first-party games and activities. Rec Room has rolled out to every major VR headset, including Quest 2/3/Pro, SteamVR headsets, Pico, and is also soon heading to Apple Vision Pro. Notably, PSVR 2 doesn’t support backwards compatibility with games designed for the original PSVR, leaving the onus on developers to port.

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While Brown didn’t specify why the company is porting to Vision Pro and not PSVR 2, the writing on the wall is fairly clear. There simply aren’t enough people using PSVR 2.

In its 11 months of existence, Sony has been strangely gun-shy when it comes to funding new content for PSVR 2. The headset, which is some of the best VR hardware we’ve laid eyes on, only launched with a scant few VR-native exclusives: Horizon Call of the Mountain, C-Smash VRS, The Dark Pictures: Switchback VR, Synapse, and Firewall Ultra—which came alongside VR-optional ports Resident Evil Village and Gran Turismo 7. Since then, we’ve gotten the Resident Evil 4 remake VR mode, which landed in December, and a rash of games that also launched on Quest. That’s about it.

One of the big indicators that PSVR 2 isn’t doing well is sales volumes. Quest 2/3/Pro sales over the holiday season across Amazon outsold PSVR 2 by a large margin, giving Sony a sort of self-fulfilling lack of incentive to invest in future content. And the fact that one of the biggest, most well-funded VR platforms can’t find a way to make it work speaks volumes. We’re curious to see Sony’s next move, as it either picks up the reigns and funds more content à la Meta, or it continues to wane in third-party developer support into an uncertain future.

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Scott Hayden
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.
  • ViRGiN

    PSVR2 just like PCVR, dead.

  • Leisure Suit Barry

    Jim Ryan has single handedly destroyed the Playstation brand, no wonder he is jumping ship.

    Luckily for Sony, there is no real competitor in the console market with Nintendo focused on handhelds and Xbox being even worse than Playstation.

    • Christian Schildwaechter

      I wouldn’t agree that he destroyed the Playstation brand. It is still the most popular gaming console by far, making Sony lots of money. But he did a lot of damage since becoming CEO in 2019, incl. trying to starve PSVR2 to death, after Sony didn’t let him kill it before it was born. And it is hard for any software developer to justify spending resources on a platform, when the platform management is providing as little support as possible. Just enough to be able to claim they tried, but unfortunately it still failed, despite all their efforts.

  • gothicvillas

    Bad times for Playstation brand. Psvr2 flopped and TLOU online cancelled. I might as well pack my ps5

  • ApocalypseShadow

    Oh whoa is Sony as the agenda continues. What does rec room actually bring to the table? AAA games? Nope. Long and engaging single player narratives? Nope. Hybrid games? Nope.

    Even if rec room was to come to PS VR 2, that’s not what gamers actually want. They want bigger and better games than the PSVR era. They want more than indie titles that, although can be fun, is not good enough to where VR should be. Sony has a great list of PS VR 2 games. But more high quality is needed. I’d rather have a list of quality games than a high quantity of shallow experiences that didn’t take that many dollars to make. Which fills a lot of stand alone’s list of games. Games that have a high level of player retention.

    • Andrew Jakobs

      I think you underestimate how many people do like RR. I’ll bet RR on PSVR2 would be a success, maybe Sony should consider funding the port.

  • drd7of14

    Seems like the same strategy and vow of silence that Sony takes now with their whole PlayStation business. Doesn’t seem specific to VR, cause they do the same with flat screen titles.

    We know so little of what is actually coming, with a few teasers not showing gameplay like Concord & Fairgame$. Apart from Helldivers 2 and Rise of the Ronin there is no gameplay of an upcoming PlayStation Studios titles, and those aren’t even 1st party teams.

    Not saying I’m okay with their lack of future transparency, but I think it’s fair to say that we still be getting PS5 titles…VR or otherwise. Just because they’re quiet, doesn’t mean they’re not busy working on games.

    In regards to Rec Room, the devs have given little interest into PSVR2 from the beginning as soon as they required the updated version of Unity. Just seems like they’ve been pouring little resources into it, as it would require some extra work. It’s not like they have PSVR2 sales #s either. Yet they’re planning to launch on the Vision PRO which is very funny.

    • VR5

      Sony (and Microsoft) seem to have changed their MO of announcing games way in advance. In the context of crunch culture such early announcements are seen as a main driver of overtime in the industry.

      This changed MO is disappointing our expectations as an audience. We’re used to getting informed way too early so now that we aren’t, it seems there are less games. This isn’t fatal for PS5’s momentum at large but for PSVR2, which people are mistrusting based on precedent (Vita) it just might be.

      Of course, not getting announcements now does not guarantee we’re getting them later. Maybe PSVR2 is dead and we just don’t know for sure yet. Or maybe they will announce projects long in development once they’re ready.

      State of Play better announce something to keep up hope. Because even if PSVR2 can’t recover, as we’ve seen with Wii U it pays off to keep the customers happy that bought into your failed platform. Because only then they’ll buy the next one and support it with word of mouth that makes it a success (Switch).

  • You ask why Vision Pro yes and PSVR 2. Well, Vision Pro is an investment: there is a lot of hype, so you get visibility by being on the Vision Pro Store. And it’s a new store which potentially can be successful, so you want to be the first to be there. It’s an operation at a loss, but so are many investments. PSVR 2 seems to be a dead rail according to what he says, and there is no media attention towards it, so there is no advantage of doing a porting for it

    • david vincent

      “it’s a new store which potentially can be successful”
      Only a few rich people will buy the Vision Pro and they probably won’t have much time to play games with it

    • ViRGiN

      It doesn’t matter how many times bigger Apple is compared to Sony – it’s in Sony vital interest to provide content and quality on their platforms – but that is seen nowhere. Everything poinst out to Sony leaving VR in the exact same spot as Valve on PCVR.

      Meta is The King, and there has never been any competition, and once again, there never will be.

    • Christian Schildwaechter

      Rec Room being shown in the (background of the) AVP presentation as the only known port of a VR title hints that this is more than just a strategic investment into a future platform. Apple apparently partnered with them, as they have with other well known players in the past. We can be pretty sure that AC Mirage, RE8 and Death Stranding all now releasing for iPhone 15 Pro is not just because Ubisoft, Capcom and Kojima Productions all at the same time decided to get into mobile AAA, but because Apple wanted these titles and made a deal with those companies, probably involving money and/or privileged access.

      So Rec Room will come to AVP because Apple wanted Rec Room on AVP. It is sort of the logical choice as a very popular cross platform social (VR) platform, but a lot more family friendly than the everything-goes VRChat, and already available on iOS.

      Rec Room will win any way: if the visionOS platform doesn’t catch on, Apple will probably compensate them for the development cost. And if it becomes a success, they are in a privileged position. The extra information they could get from Apple regarding their plans alone might be worth the partnership.

  • JB1968

    The main problem here is that RecRoom is written in Unity which is PITA engine in terms of upgrading projects to latest version. There is also many devs pointing out that there is still bug in Unity so they can’t use ETFR almost year after the PSVR2 release! Not to mention the older graphics pipeline is not suppoeting ETFR at all for PSVR2.

    In other words due the Unity mess and crapp PSVR2 support the devs are not willing to deal with all the issues espwcially in such old codebase which is spanning multiple platforms. I can imagine the coding nightmare after all the years.

    So until Sony give them money same as Apple did for the iOS port upgrade to Vision they don’t give F to do it just for couple of whinning kids on PSVR2.

  • Ardra Diva

    I’m super-puzzled why PSVR2 is such a dud. It’s actually pretty good. The combination of game system and visor $ price is about same as the ‘pro’ VR visors, without the PC they need. Being tethered is a problem, I am sure.

    • shadow9d9

      Only ports, a wire, fresnel lenses, no backwards compatibility… You are surprised?

      • Ardra Diva

        Yes because I only care about the experience, and it’s pretty good. Don’t care beans about fresnel vs pancake vs whatever else, nor do most people. All we care about is, is it fun? And it is.

  • Lucidfeuer

    I’m glad they’re falling, and betted on that. They tried their hardest to fail given specs/price, no BC and no functionalities.