Valve’s rumored standalone XR headset, codenamed ‘Deckard’, has been the subject of speculation since mention was first discovered back in 2021. Now, information obtained by tech analyst and VR pundit Brad Lynch (aka ‘SadlyItsBradley‘) points to Valve gearing up production for the long-awaited device.

Deckard is still largely a mystery, although rumors suggest Valve’s next headset will be a standalone device that can also wirelessly stream PC VR games, ostensibly putting it competition with Meta Quest and Apple Vision Pro.

Lynch, who is often involved in XR industry leaks, maintains Valve has been recently importing “equipment to manufacture VR headset facial interfaces inside the USA.”

“The equipment is being provided by Teleray Group who also manufactured the gaskets for the Valve Index and HP G2 Omnicept,” Lynch says in an X post.

Valve Index is nearly six years old now, so it’s unlikely the company is looking to prototype facial interfaces for the aging PC VR headset, which really only leaves its long-awaited next entry into the XR segment.

It’s uncertain whether Valve’s move to manufacture key parts in the US is an effort to sidestep increased tariffs on China, which US President Donald Trump levied in recent days.

Lynch however reports that Valve is using the same US-based facility previously dedicated to manufacturing the company’s Lighthouse 2.0 base stations, which Valve cleared out nearly two years ago.

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“Maybe […] they wanted to use that facility for manufacturing some new components in the years they have Deckard on the market, dodging some tariff pressures(?), [or maybe] prototyping future HMDs gasket designs near/at Valve. This option I doubt since I’d wager they already have small scale R&D equipment already for many years,” Lynch speculates.

Having been the subject of rumor for nearly four years now, there’s been a mountain of reports and leaks concerning Deckard. The most recent reports however point to Valve actually gearing up production, which would suggest we’re not very far from its unveiling.

Valve ‘Roy’ Model Leak | Image courtesy Brad Lynch

In November 2024, leaked 3D models hidden in a SteamVR update appeared to show off a new VR motion controller, codenamed ‘Roy’, which departs from standard VR motion controller layouts by offering a more traditional gamepad-style button layout instead of the now widely-adopted Touch layout. Provided Valve is set on that design, it could mean Deckard will offer a 1:1 input experience with Steam Deck.

Then, in February, a report from serial leaker and data miner ‘Gabe Follower’ suggested Valve is releasing Deckard by the end of 2025, priced at $1,200. Gabe Follower maintains that Deckard’s rumored $1,200 price point “will be sold at a loss,” who further posits Deckard will use the same SteamOS as seen in Steam Deck, Valve’s handheld, albeit adapted for VR.

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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 4,000 articles on the topic. Scott brings that seasoned insight to his reporting from major industry events across the globe.
  • xyzs

    Brad spoke for years about Valve’s involvement into liquid crystal lenses similar to Meta’s holographic lenses tech demo. Also about their involvement with true color 4k oled screens manufacturers.
    I truely hope that if Valve releases a VR headset after all these years, it’s not going to be a “Quest 3.5 Made by Valve”. It better be almost a revolution, I am not expecting less.
    Especially since Bigscreen beyond 2, the excuse that ultra light and good fov is not possible is not possible anymore.

    • simon cox

      Bigscreen Beyond 2 isn't standalone though….

    • Andrew Jakobs

      Bigscreen beyond doesn't really have any electronics on board, no camera's, no microphones, no speakers, no SOC, no battery..

      • Christian Schildwaechter

        The Bigscreen Beyond 2e now includes eye tracking, though it is not clear whether this implemented via IR cameras as all current implementations on other headsets or in a different way. It adds only 1.05g (per sensor?) plus a little bit for extra electronics. Cameras and microphones in general don't add a lot of weight, the eye facing lenses, displays, fast SoCs with required cooling and battery are what really make a HMD heavy, esp. if everything is placed in front.

        In the (symbolic) 2022 Valve patent image at the top of the article, cables can be seen leading from the HMD to the back on both sides, indicating that rather large block at the back of the head will be a counterbalancing battery. So while a standalone Deckard could never be as light as a Bigscreen Beyond, it might be similarly comfortable to wear if it is well balanced.

        The rumored USD 1200 would be more expensive than the USD 1019 Beyond 2 (but cheaper than Beyond 2e at USD 1219), and seem rather hard to believe with all the extra components needed in a standalone. This price may still be possible due to the Beyond being even more niche/low volume, and Bigscreen needing to make money from sales, while Valve has Steam money. They offered the base model of the Steam Deck basically at cost, with Gabe Newell saying the USD 399 price point was "painful". So they may do the same with Deckard, benefiting from their Steam Deck experience and connections to AMD to further drive down the build cost.

      • xyzs

        Advanced smartphones with top of the line chip are around 150/170 grams.
        If you only keep the motherboard and SoC chip, it weighs like only 40 grams, maybe less.
        So, adding a standalone system to a Beyond would make it weigh around 150g (adding cameras would not be necessarily much heavier because they only weigh 4~5 grams each, and the reflectors for the base stations to replace are not 0 grams neither). It would need a few extra grams for a heat dissipation system.

        In the end, it's completely doable with today's technology to achieve an advanced standalone HMD that is well under 200 grams.

        • Christian Schildwaechter

          You are ignoring the battery (and audio, frame, a large amount of sensors, for example 14 cameras in AVP, etc.).

          The ~ 19Wh battery in Quest 3 weighs 69g (incl. carrier), the 40Wh one in the Steam Deck (just the naked cells) 160g, the ~36Wh one in AVP (in an external case with connectors and surplus capacity, as it never fully charges to increase battery life) 362g.

          The Beyond 2 has 2.5K displays, ~44% more pixels than the Quest 3, so it would require more compute power to drive the display. If Deckard comes with a 3840*3552 display like most of the newly announced XR2+ HMDs, it has to render 200% more pixels than Quest 3. This will require driving the SoC with much higher, constant load, requiring a large battery and active cooling, both adding significant weight.

          Phones usually idling between interactions don't use active cooling, instead they rely on faster cores to quickly handle performance requirement bursts to then fall back to low power cores, allowing the phone to cool down. If you run a phone under constant high load like a VR HMD, it quickly starts throttling to lower the temperature, and quickly burn through its battery. Which is why the XR2 based on SD8 Gen 2 dropped the high performance and low power cores and instead added another efficiency core to match the permanent load typical for VR without having to throttle. And why both the Quest 2 and 3 massively underclocked the CPU part of their SoC, while the Pico 4 with better cooling allowed it to run faster.

          So there is no way you can turn the Beyond 2 into a standalone with mere 40g. If you also want onboard audio, we are looking at at least 200g extra for Quest 3 class performance, which would be way too weak for a hires microOLED display or running PCVR games on Deckard. If they add a large enough battery to run a successor of the Steam Deck APU and place it at the back of the head to balance the weight, we are now talking about something like 400g+ with the required halo strap.

          The Bigscreen is only so light because it is basically lenses, displays and a silicon foam pad with a soft strap, and nothing else, which is only possible as a tethered PCVR HMD. A Deckard will be in the weight class of the AVP, but hopefully well balanced instead of putting everything in front, or Samsung's Project Moohan, simply because VR is a high performance application that comes with significant hardware requirements with currently unavoidable weight.

          • XRC

            Thermal throttling was a big problem with Google Daydream, placing the smartphone in a thermal sandwich (Daydream headset). With my pixel XL this quickly caused thermal throttling.

            i modified an aftermarket phone case with large finned aluminum alloy heatsink (on outside) connected by a thermal coupler to a copper cold plate which was compressed against the metal body of phone when installed.

            known as "Daydream cool" the modified case also featured a custom built facial interface cut to fit my face, and a vertical strap for comfort and stability. Most importantly the phone never experienced thermal throttling again which made for a very long session with no interruption.

          • Christian Schildwaechter

            The burst use on phones vs constant use on HMDs causing throttling is probably why the Qualcomm XR2 line even exist. The Quest 1 still used a regular Snapdragon 835, the Quest 2 then got the XR2 Gen 1 based on SD 865, with Qualcomm saying it was configured for XR without specifying how. The Quest 3 got the XR2 Gen 2 based on SD 8 Gen 2, featuring a very different core configuration.

            While the SD8 Gen 2 has (AFAIK) 1/2/2/3 high performance/performance/economy/low power cores at 3.2/2.8/2.8/2.0 GHz, the XR2 drops high performance and low power for a 0/2/3/0 core configuration. The performance and efficiency cores that run at 2.8GHz on phones run on Quest 3 at only 2.05GHz in CPU heavy and 1.6GHz in GPU heavy games.

            In an interview either the CEO or XR product manager at Qualcomm pointed out that despite the lower total number and missing high performance cores, the XR2 Gen 2 still beats the SD 8 Gen 2 in XR applications because it has five instead of four (very similar) performance and economy cores that can run continuously at full load, partly due to being clocked lower so even full load temperatures won't cause throttling.

            I don't know enough about SoC design to understand why an SD8 Gen 2 couldn't simply be set by the OS to only use performance/efficiency cores and not exceed a certain speed, removing the need for an extra XR2 line that gets updated only every three years. Maybe its mostly about money, as adding never used (large) high performance cores and low performance cores only useful for idling that never happens in VR, takes up precious die space. The XR2 Gen 2 is produced on a cheaper/slightly slower Samsung process node, so not waisting precious TSMC capacity on an SoC with lower peak performance requirements may be another reason.

          • Jose Ferrer

            "If Deckard comes with a 3840*3552 display like most of the newly announced XR2+ HMDs, it has to render 200% more pixels than Quest 3",

            Quest3 has 9.3Million pixels, and a 3840*3552 is 27.3Million pixels, so it is 300% more.

          • Christian Schildwaechter

            Percentages vs factors.

            Deckard's display has 300% of the pixel count of Quest, so it has 200% more pixels in addition to the 100% Quest already has. 100% of Quest pixels plus 200% of Quest pixels is 300% of Quest pixels.

            1 Deckard = 3 Quest ⇔ 1 Deckard = 1 Quest + 2 Quest.

            Similarly Quest 3 has 2.5 times/250% the GPU performance of Quest 2, so it offers 150% GPU performance more/on top of Quest 2's 100% GPU performance.

          • Jose Ferrer

            Yes, absolute or relative terms. Clear then.

            But if you use those number to estimate the require GPU performance (for PCVR), then you should not use the physical panel pixels but the real rendered pixels at default resolution. For example, Quest 3 is very good in that terms, with 9.11 Million pixels in the physical panel, only require to render 9.24 Million pixels which is basically the same than the physical panel. In other headsets, like for example Pimax Crystal, the physical panel has 16.59 Million pixels but the default resolution need to render 44 Million pixels, which is 2.65 times the physical panel. This 2.65 absolute ratio is what it matters for the GPU requirement. At this is one of the most important parameter for VR devices, and it is not reported in any VR database. I have been calculating it along the years:
            https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/e8d70951584a54db96fcf43383479c5182123973432609c036062d4f7c44a581.jpg

          • Christian Schildwaechter

            TL;DR: Pixel count is indeed a poor comparison and only useful as a rough indicator, as the actual rendered pixels depend on factors like available power, lens distortion, actual visible part of the display, upscaling etc. No mobile HMD will be able to render VR games at native 4K, so optimizations like ETFR will massively distort the GPU power/pixel requirements.

            I agree that the raw pixel count doesn't predict the required GPU performance, as there are numerous other factors involved. Obviously there is the picked render resolution, which is usually higher than native on PCVR to increase the sharpness of the image, and lower on mobile, relying on the GPU upscaler to bring the rendered image up to native resolution. This is largely due to the different performance available on desktop and mobile, with PCs defaulting to something like 150% render resolution, while for example the first Gear VR had to render at only 720p, 50% of the actual 1440p display resolution and then rely on (very good) hardware upscalers to still deliver a decent image.

            In addition all VR HMDs use lenses that introduce so called pincushion distortion, with the outer parts of the image seemingly bent outwards. What enabled cheap VR hardware since the DK1 is the GPU's capability to apply a shader that pre-distorts the image with an opposing barrel distortion, so that it again looks perspectively correct when looked at through a lens. But as this compresses some areas, to in the end keep the full native resolution, you have to render at about 140% of that just to not lose image details at the center during that distortion compensation process. The required percentage depends on the lens curvature, with higher FoV creating more distortions and thus requiring a higher render resolution just to even match native resolution everywhere.

            AFAIK SteamVR defaults to 140% native resolution for exactly that reason. I'd have to look closer into it to make a more informed argument why the values in your table differ so much, but this is clearly a (reasonable) software choice, not a property of the display itself. Besides the general magnification of the lens, the actual shape will have an impact too. For example the Varjo XR-4 uses aspheric lenses with a higher PPD at the center than the edge, which would (without extra rendering tricks) require a much higher overall render resolution to preserve the native resolution at the center.

            The vignette is important too, as a smaller vignette will hide the corners of a square display where the distortion would by highest, so by making sure the user looks at the screen through a "round hole", you can effectively hide some of it and get by with a lower render resolution. Which is what the Quest 3 does, which has a very round mechanical vignette. If you move the headset to see the edges of the display, you see something like an octagon with the edges cut of, so the parts most prone to distortion are simply blacked out, even if sort of wastes some of the display area.

            Given that Quest is a mobile platform with performance and power limits and usually renders below native, this is actually a clever choice. And yes, it means that the Quest 3 with a "Ratio rendered/panel" factor of 1.01x has much lower "per pixel" GPU requirement than the Pimax Crystal at 2.65x. But of course Deckard (or Pimax) could simply decide to have the users through a similar vignette limiting the view on the outer edges and thereby get away with less extra pixels needed for barrel/pin cushion distortion. There are no non-distorting lenses though, so anything rendering at 100% native resolution will lose detail at the center of the image. In SteamVR setting the slider to 100% therefore doesn't really set it to 100% native, but to about 140%.

            I still agree that there is way more to the question of GPU demand than the pixel count. It gets even more complicated with FFR, ETFR and high FoV that impact each other. All foveated rendering requires the GPU to support rendering different areas at different densities, something mobile GPUs offered for a long time, while Nvidia only added the required variable rate shading on RTX cards, and it still is problematic with many AMD GPUs, which again impacts the number of pixels to be rendered. In theory a fine grained model could render at different densities for different lens distortion levels too, though I don't think anybody does that, and the granularity isn't high enough for this yet.

            Different vendors also make different choices depending on their hardware. For example Meta says FFR will save 26%-36% of the frame render time on Quest, while according to Sony FFR (as a fallback to ETFR) saves 60% on PSVR2, which might be possible due to the higher FoV plus the Fresnel lenses covering up artifacts in the periphery. Making comparisons based on some raw specs very apples to oranges. As these factors largely depend on what the platform owner prioritizes, I think it still makes sense to use pixels counts as a rough indicator for GPU requirements, even though practically no mobile SoC/APU available in the near future will be even able to render 3.5K native resolution in a typical game. They will all have to rely on ETFR/upscaling/frame generation in some way, which will have a bigger impact on performance than the actual relative increase in pixels.

          • Arno van Wingerde

            I have seen these numbers and stuff like super sampling – but I do not understand it: you have got a number of pixels on your screen and need to give each pixel a RGB value, anything that is non-native (e.g. 150%) will produce blurriness. Does this have to do with an uneven pixel distribution, with more pixels in the centre, causing that local, maximum resolution to be the resolution needed to be rendered?
            Ah, our usual suspect explains it below…

          • Christian Schildwaechter

            [I wrote this before I noticed the last sentence, but hopefully the less excessive length plus visualization is still helpful.]

            This "sharp scaling to native" pixels only works on flat screens, where you want factors of (0.5x, )1x, 2x, 3x, because this way pixels will keep their original RGB value, at least if you use tools like the (cheap and powerful) Lossless Scaling that prevent pixels from being smoothed/mushed up during upscaling.

            It doesn't work on VR due to lens distortion and shaders applied to compensate it. Basically none of the rendered pixels end up exactly on pixels on the display, they are all moved slightly, and usually by fractions of the pixel size. So it makes no difference whether you pick 100%, 150% or 123.78954%, while this would make a huge difference in flat games shown of a flat screen. The workaround is supersampling that generates a much larger resolution, so that pixel shift "errors" mostly vanish when the images is scaled down back to native display resolution during the final application of the distortion compensating shader.
            https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/7d852bf7482314bef92d25642926529ef489ba76e6e6b530e9753c2940c795e7.jpg

          • Gonzax

            I expect Deckard to be smaller than Index was but nowhere near the size of the BSB2, not even remotely; it's just not realistic to expect something like that.
            I'm fine with that as long as it is comfortable and well balanced without removing features like eye-relief, big fov and audio.

        • Andrew Jakobs

          Uh, battery should be included into the headset or strap, a puck us just awful, knowing from my experience with the battery from the vive pro wireless battery. To me it it DUMB not to include it in a well designed headstrap like the Pico 4.
          unless you really are a weak sick person, a headset like the Pico 4 is no strain on your neck or face.

          • xyzs

            Sorry but I completely disagree.
            The batterry in a puck with a small cable reaching the waist is the best way to offload the weight.
            Apple did the best choice regarding that.
            Pico design is awful (and I had one..) because I do a lot of vr in the bed and with their hard stap, you can never lay against something, it hits the wall or bed head all the time. And it doesn’t balance the weight as great as some expect, you still feel it lots.
            And as a other downside, it’s huge and because cannot fold it since it’s rigid, adios the nomad option…

          • Christian Schildwaechter

            That's another case of "one size doesn't fit all". For media consumption a soft strap allowing to lay down is hard to beat, one reason why the light Oculus Go with a soft strap saw 90% of its use for watching movies, or why Apple insists on its very over-engineered, but very soft Solo Knit Band strap as the main solution. Media consumption or productivity work are also use cases where an external battery pack works just fine or even better than integrated batteries.

            On the other hand anything requiring either lots of fast turning like many games, or moving around like AR usage, usually works a lot better without some cable dangling down or an external battery that needs to be carried around, so a battery placed on the HMD works better. Placing it at the front allows for cheaper, easily replaceable soft straps that work great for example in fitness apps, but not so well in games with fast head turns, as the soft straps doesn't provide enough rigidity and the weight concentrated at the front pulls a lot more during turns than with a HMD where the battery functions as a counterweight.

            So it all boils down to "it depends" and the intended use case, and the best we can hope for are headsets with user adjustable configurations. Allowing you to run from a small integrated battery with short lifetime combined with a soft strap for travel, or instead placing a large battery at the back in a replacement halo strap for long play sessions, or dangling on the side/belt as a battery pack, or simply plugged into a USB port (with magnetic detach) while using it seated for productivity tasks or watching movies.

          • Gonzax

            That last paragraph pretty much sums it all up very well.

          • Andrew Jakobs

            Nope, from my own experience with the vive pro wirelessmodule I highly disagree, any cable down your body is just awful compared to the battery in the headstrap like the Pico 4. And with a decent case it is still a perfect nomad option, a simple strap like the default of the Quests are just awful. It's even more convienient as when you use the 'nomad' option you're not having to deal with the cables entanglements, just open the case, get the headset out of the case, put it on, take the controllers out and start playing, no time lost untangling any cables, having to connect the battery, clip the cable to your body and then you're finally ready to play, same when stopping, and the same with storing it after playing. Nope I'll never buy a headset which needs any cable during playing. Using my Pico 4 is so SOOO much more convienient as using my HTC Vive Pro with wireless module.

          • Gonzax

            Agreed! Same case for me even though personally I could play with the default Quest 3 strap just fine, the only reason I got a 3rdparty strap was because I needed the extra battery life but in general I want everything to be included in the headset just like you said, I don't want to waste time with more cables, clips, etc.
            I'm a lazy ass, I know.

          • Gonzax

            I used to put a battery on my waist for my Q3 before buying a third party headstrap and while it was fine it was far from convenient. Personally I don't have any problems wearing almost any headset for very long periods of time so I'd take a battery inside the HMD or attached to the strap any day compared to something on my waist.

            The time it takes to attach it to my waist, even if it is only a minute is enough reason for me not to like it.
            Then of course, everybody is different, it's all very personal and subjective.

          • Christian Schildwaechter

            TL;DR: Discomfort is not about absolute weight or how strong or sick a person is, instead it largely depends on weight and esp. pressure distribution, and a setup that works great for one person can be horrible for another and vice versa.

            The strain on the neck or face is extremely subjective, as it not only depends on weight, but also on fit. You may be lucky that the Pico 4 matches your face/bone structure very well, so the pressure is spread very evenly over the padding, making it comfortable to wear for you. I know that I am rather unlucky, because almost every HMD I tried put very uncomfortable pressure on my check bones and above the center of the brows, while other parts sit very loose.

            The curved length of the facepad on Quest 3 is about 20cm with on average 2cm width, the Pico 4 should be similar, so with a decent fit, the weight sitting on the face is spread over 40cm², with smaller differences covered by the soft padding. But in my case the bone apparently protrudes too far under the skin, putting most of the pressure on just four points of about 1cm² each.

            Without the surrounding padding taking at least some of the pressure away, this would mean pressure that was supposed to be spread over a large surface gets concentrated on an area 1/10th the size, applying 10 times the pressure there, which is what makes it so uncomfortable. A 500g metal cube sitting on the palm of you hand won't hurt, one standing on one edge will be very noticeable, and one standing on one of its sharp corners, pocking into you hand, will be painful.

            Unfortunately people still largely ignore fit and balance when discussing comfort, even though it is way more important than total weight. Some people absolutely love halo straps, and for me the PSVR1 is pretty much the most comfortable HMD out of the box because it takes away the uneven pressure from my face. I recently tried the Quest 3 soft strap again and got a headache within minutes from the two plastic buckles pressing into the back of my head, while I could wear the heavier PSVR 1 without any modifications for hours without problems. But for someone with the "wrong" skull shape, a fixed halo can create the same pressure point problems, just on top or the side of the head.

            The Beyond is sort of the perfect combination: a HMD that is extremely light by removing anything non essential, and with an individual silicon foam face that was molded to exactly fit the user's face. The padding bends around the face with a contact area of about 20*5cm² minus two ~3cm ⌀ holes for the displays, giving you ~80cm² of skin/bone contact surface, twice as much as on the much heavier Quest 3 or Pico 4. And the shape follows the bone in 3D, so the weight isn't just pressed into the face by the strap, instead the HMD "sits" on the face, and the strap just has to prevent it from slipping. [Image with integrated DIY EyeTrackVR.]

            But if the Pico 4 padding already matches your face to the point where you aren't bothered by the ~300g (without the strap and battery at the back), going for the Beyond probably won't improve things a lot, while for someone else it can make the difference between being able to use VR or not. So please don't assume that others having issues must be weak or sick, the problem is much more about individual weight/pressure distribution than total weight. This has been discussed here dozens or hundreds of times, and we are still getting arguments just focused on total weight or "but it works for me, so it must be fine". No, not for everybody.
            https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/0f7876cee505472902b02b74d9f5841a599eaddf75236389d4d64f28450442d1.jpg

          • Andrew Jakobs

            I do admit that I'm not using the original facepad, but a third party which are VERY cheap for the Pico 4 on aliexpress, but I agree with you that a good facepad makes all the difference. But any cable makes the headset uncomfortable to me, the large cable to a computer has always yanked my head in some way, even with pulley and lighter cables, and thr battey cable always takes extra time to put on the headset and position the pack on your belt or pocket, but has always been prone to jump of the belt or out of the pocket during 'roomscale'VR or just got tangled somewhere around my body.

          • Christian Schildwaechter

            Unfortunately we lack statistical data on what works for how many, so we end up with often very opposing anecdotical assessments, and pretty much everybody is left alone to figure out which headset combined with which accessories work for them. Many hate soft straps, but they apparently work as a compromise for a lot of people, as they adapt to different skull shapes, otherwise Meta would have dropped them by now. Similarly the available face cushions fit most people.

            But a whole industry has sprung up to offer slight to huge improvements in comfort. The problem is that it is so unpredictable, and we lack systematic approaches. So people may buy lots of 3rd party straps or new HMDs, when what they really needed was thicker padding. Or the other way around, adding new padding when what was really needed was an overhead strap. Or a counter balance.

            It's very much try-and-error, while it could be a lot easier. AVP and Beyond require 3D face scans for matching padding. Not perfect, because these see the surface, not the bone structure, but a start. A full head scan could predict which types of strap fit or not, and warn new users of potential problems. Apple doesn't create custom paddings, but picks from a variety matching different face and skull shapes. Also not perfect, but at least acknowledging the importance of a matching fit for comfort, while someone trying to figure out what to do by reading forum discussions on what's important will probably end up more confused.

          • Gonzax

            Agreed! I'm fine with the battery inside the headset or attached to the strap but a separate thing like the Vision pro does would be a huge letdown, it's not convenient at all IMO.

    • Gonzax

      I am not expecting it to be revolutionary, I prefer to keep my expectations as low as possible but I do expect it to be a hell of a headset and I love those new controllers.
      I can't wait for it, I just hope they will keep the same audio and FOV as Index with much better lenses.

  • namekuseijin

    can't wait to replay Alyx again on my $1800 standalone

    • NL_VR

      And many other great VR games

      • polysix

        The best games are now all on PSVR2 esp the exclusives like a PROPERLY EXECUTED HITMAN.

        • NL_VR

          PSVR2 is still missing some of the best games unfortunately.

        • Gonzax

          Far from it, there's still many more great games on PCVR than PSVR2 with some exceptions like RE8 and RE4 or Hitman (just because the other version is crap, not because pc can't run it better)
          And even those RE games can be played via VR mods.

  • XRC

    This will be the micro manufacturing facility operated under contract by Flex for Valve?

    Previous manufacturing at the site in Buffalo Grove, Illinois included the Steam controller (seen in 2015 YouTube video) and later the 2.0 base stations; both those sold directly by Valve and from my limited understanding the 2.0 internals which HTC did final assembly in Taiwan before packaging for retail.

    HTC currently have the licensing for making 2.0 base stations in Taiwan since Valve moved away from the technology.

    Very interested to see how Deckard and Roy operate, and how Valve plan to change the VR landscape

    • Christian Schildwaechter

      Similar to the lighthouse base stations, Deckard probably won't be a large volume product due to its price. For low volume the benefits of not having to deal with the added complexity of manufacturing on the other side of the world will often outweigh the extra cost of producing in a high price country.

      But it also means that it doesn't make sense to set up multiple production facilities, so Buffalo Grove would produce the Deckards for all global sales. Unless the current "tariffs on everything" with daily changing rules and reciprocal tit for tat play on all sides is resolved by the time Deckard ships, this could meant that while most other headsets will become more expensive for US users, Deckard could become (much) more expensive for for example Europeans.

      Which I wouldn't like. I ordered the Steam Deck the moment preorders opened, never regretted it, and intended to do the same with Deckard, esp. since USD 1200 (+ ~20% VAT) for the 4K plus AMD APU running SteamOS I expect it to deliver would be a steal. So I hope this doesn't become collateral damage in a self-destructive global trade war.

      • XRC

        The manufacturing facility was shown in the 2015 YouTube video to be very modular and simple to expand with semi automated work stations, wouldn't be hard to scale up using Flex's expertise and manufacturing staff.

        However, production of 2.0 base station was limited partly by the capacity of the existing facility, and reliance on offshore supplies as indicated by their country origin listed as "assembled in USA using foreign sourced components".

        Also interesting that index hmd and controller were purely offshore affair rumoured to be goertek in China

        • Christian Schildwaechter

          Found the 2015 Valve engineeringpr0n "Building the Steam Controller" video and love the robots labeled Aperture youtu_be/uCgnWqoP4MM?t=52

          The fact that lots of the parts will still come from China etc. creates an "interesting" problem with the current tariffs not only targeting finalized products, but the whole supply chain. Valve may have to pay rather high tariffs on components imported from China and integrated into Deckard in Buffalo Grove, with the EU then adding additional reciprocal tariffs on the finalized Deckard exported from the US. At the current level of insanity this could easily double the price of the device.

          The supply chain is also why moving the whole production to the US simply isn't feasible, as the thousands of small electronics components aren't manufactured all over the world. Lots of companies produce in Shenzhen, China, which was turned into a special economic zone north of Hong Kong in the 1980s, causing tons of tech companies to set up shop there, so pretty much anything needed can be scored locally at a low price. Goertek has production facilities near Hanoi, Vietnam, where the Vietnamese government created a technology hub similar to the 500km/300mi away Shenzhen.

      • Gonzax

        As a European I hope that won't be the case. Didn't they announce yesterday that there would be no tariffs for electronic devices? (other than China, I suppose)

        • Christian Schildwaechter

          When I wrote this, China had put tariffs on some goods in reaction to the initial US one, and Trump had upped the tariffs to 145% for China. Yesterday he then took back some of the extra tariffs for 90 days, but not for China. Then they excluded some product categories like phones and computers from the tariffs, but not gaming consoles, so depending on classification a Deckard could be exempt or not. Then they announced that this was just to soon present more specific tariffs for chips.

          Nobody knows what will happen tomorrow, including the US government that basically makes things up as they go without any actual strategy besides trying to bully others into submission. China won't budge and now restricted the export of rare earth metals, for which they practically have a monopoly, which can seriously mess up a lot of US high tech production and defense projects. And the US economy simply cannot handle 145% tariffs on Chinese goods for any extended time.

          Rumors said Deckard will ship in late 2025. The Steam Deck was supposed to ship in November 2021, actually shipped in February 2022, so we probably still have to wait for at least 6-10 months. Pretty much every economist (or sane person) agrees that nobody can afford a global trade war, and expects Trump to budge, then pick some minor concession someone made and declare victory and himself the greatest negotiator ever, with most things going sort of back to normal, and the world having to clean up the created mess for next few years.

          • Gonzax

            Just wanted to say that it's a real pleasure to read your posts!

  • Christian Schildwaechter

    TL;DR: For playing flat games, Deckard needs a mouse simulation that goes way beyond the current VR laser pointer UIs. On Steam Deck this is covered by added trackpads that are missing on the Roy controllers, so Valve needs to come up with an alternative, possibly multi-gyroscope based.

    […] a new VR motion controller, codenamed ‘Roy’, which departs from standard VR motion controller layouts by offering a more traditional gamepad-style button layout […] it could mean Deckard will offer a 1:1 input experience with Steam Deck.

    Not quite. In addition to the classic gamepad controls, the Steam Deck features two trackpads, a touchscreen and gyroscope control. A gyroscope is built into every VR controller, but the trackpads are pretty much essential on Steam Deck for games that lack controller support or rely heavily on mouse use, like lots of RTS. The touch screen also works as a mouse, but fingers simply lack the precision of a mouse/trackpad, making hitting small UI elements rather frustrating.

    As Deckard is expected to be designed for both VR and flat game play, it would also need a similar way to allow for fine cursor movements. The Index controllers actually included a small touch area, though much smaller than the ones on the HTC Wands, Steam Controller or Steam Deck. Valve not integrating it into Roy probably means they have found another way to achieve the necessary precision.

    Current 2D UI implementations in VR often rely on a laser pointer metaphor, also not particularly useful esp. for very small movements, requiring very careful handling/aiming, making it a rather slow input option. Maybe Valve took another lesson from the Steam Deck's gyro control. In for example Aperture Desk Job, placing the thumb on R3/the touch sensitive surface of the right stick activates gyro control for very minute movement in addition to the regular sticks. Once you've gotten used to it, this makes aiming a lot easier, similar to gyro control on a PlayStation controller by slightly tilting the whole controller/Steam Deck.

    Deckard would have two gyroscopes in two controllers, so a similar solution for playing 2D games requiring mouse input could be using one controller to roughly control the mouse with the typical laser pointer interface, then using slight turns of the second controller for fine tuned moves. Basically the one controller moves the mouse very fast, the other very slow, allowing for both speed and precision by combining both. This would work in parallel to regular stick movement.

    Not sure how well this would work or how intuitive it could be, but for Deckard to play the majority of flat games available on Steam right now, it needs a better pseudo-mouse input option than current solutions like the imprecise laser pointer or slow joystick mouse simulation. And Valve has proven with first the Steam Controller, then the Steam Deck plus the infinite configurability of Steam Input that it means serious business when it comes to gaming input, so I'd expect them to deliver on Deckard too.

  • NicoleJsd [She/Her]

    I got a feeling this will get really unreasonably expensive

  • polysix

    The controllers look extremely mediocre and boring… like generic quest controllers vs PSVR2's great shaped controllers or even index's inovative shape/function.

    I think Valve started chasing the wrong thing just as VR fans started pulling back from those things (Standalone and generic mobile GPU trash). Proper VR fans now much prefer PSVR2 (sells more games there to TRUE VR fans while Quest owners just watch porn).. .and if it doesn't have a display port connector, a heavy battery on the head, and god forbid VR ruining LCD as rumoured then it's DOA to many. In no man's land (we'll just stick with PSVR2 until PSVR3 or move to BSB2)

    • gothicvillas

      I think its just an image placement to showcase buttons etc.. i doubt its a final version :)

      • Gonzax

        I love them, I hope the final product won't be much different. Functionality over looks any day and for God's sake no more rings!

    • NL_VR

      I think Quest controllers is better to hold and use than PSVR2.
      None of them is perfect.
      couldn't disagree more about "proper VR fans" choose PSVR2.
      I would say it's more the opposite even including my self.
      it was a ok headset on a trash platform (Playstation). Yes I know you can use it on PC (I did that also) but nothing beats beeing wireless which isn't possible with the PSVR2.

      • Gonzax

        Agreed.

    • Gonzax

      Oh come on, the PSVR2 controllers are awful with those giant rings around your hands. Quest 3 controllers are a million times better looking than that and these prototypes for Deckard are fantastic with all the same buttons as a gamepad. Meta, like it or not, is still way ahead of Sony when it comes to VR.

      And proper VR fans are those who can enjoy a standalone game like Batman VR on Quest the same as they can do Alyx on PC or RE8 on PS5.

      Personally, I like them all but give me a good PCVR game over Quest or PSVR any day.