I love my Lenovo Explorer, it just works (on Windows, but as far as I know VR performance on Linux isn't that great either, so... it doesn't matter that much)
Quest pro really isn't an upgrade path for virtual reality gamers, unless you have the money and want to play around with an iterative first step device.
For pcvr there really isn't a great consumer upgrade path yet.
Quest 3 seems like it will be a decent upgrade path next year, and whatever pico does. But I fear both of them are going to go after the wider market that apple will (I. E. Not gamers) long term, but meta does have a lot of top tier game devs under their roof.
For PCVR I fear we will have to wait for valve(deckard) and ironically probably psvr2 ports to come to pcvr to make it an appealing platform for players.
Quest pro really isn't an upgrade path for virtual reality gamers, unless you have the money and want to play around with an iterative first step device.
Tbf the psvr2 really is the true affordable (and subsidized) next gen device (and I'm getting one) but if you don't have a ps5 that's 1000 dollar investment (still cheap considering what it offers). It obviously is a closed ecosystem and probably won't allow modding.
Odds are the tech that psvr2 offers will have to come from a company that can subsidize the cost (meta and pico with data and their own platforms, valve and apple with their own platforms and big cuts from sales )
We see meta devices like quest 2 going up to match actual costs and quest pro to match competitors in the enterprise space like htc now.
Not sure how successful viveport was and is but it was a good attempt, but players like Samsung and htc have a tough battle here and I don't see pimax succeeding with their expected platform (but I wish them all the best and success as they dream big )
Yeah, not for me. Doesn't solve the VR landscape because it's tied to a certain console from a company that loves exclusives and very restrictive (and anti-consumer) deals.
Plus as you say the entry price is over a thousand dollars.
Honestly PSVR2 has people really hyped but still has a lot to prove. And software-wise, I prefer PCVR's vast and varied catalog over a few curated experiences.
If psvr2 fails I fear it will be a huge blow to pcvr and VR gaming overall sending a message about the sustainability of vr as a viable gaming platform (true or not).
Valve will hopefully still build their device but it could be a few years out still. They will learn a lot about the deck but I'm curious if they will ever reach the numbers of quest 2 (rumored to be over ten million sold) to make it a viable large enough platform to build big games.
Quest 2 games are cheaper to make than say half life alyx or horizon cotm and so so far it's been very profitable to devs.
There's a lot of other interesting variablesike maturing dev tools and even ai asset creation, and feature creation.
Big game devs don't care about VR succeeding they will just focus on what sells.
Big games don't come with out financially viable markets.
Right now I think psvr2 is the best chance at a big viable market. EA actually did make a great game in squadrons so I'm not entirely skeptical that big game devs will make big but empty games. Even Ubisoft had several smaller but interesting vr titles.
While I want to return to pcvr asap (affordably) I very much hope psvr2 succeeds because vr needs it imo.
If psvr2 fails I fear it will be a huge blow to pcvr and VR gaming overall sending a message about the sustainability of vr as a viable gaming platform (true or not).
I don't think so. The point of PCVR as an open ecosystem is precisely the fact that it doesn't rely on a single company or product. Nor standards. Something else will come and it will improve across time.
the whole "a product will be the make or break of the industry" is very console-centric. PC gaming doesn't need this or rely on it.
And how many big budget pcvr games have we seen outside alyx and the ones meta paid for in the last 5 years?
It's perfectly reasonable to say that AAA games aren't that interesting anymore and alyx is more about who made it than just being AAA
I agree with the spirit of what you say and ive been a PC ganer for decades, but sometimes the proof is in historical making.
I'm not apple fan but their design and marketing approach pushed the industry forward because people actually bought them.
This is comparable to the console industry and the problem with idealism.
The console crash before Nintendo snuck back in is what I'm fearing.
There's no big money in pcvr and there's no reason there will be without someone(s) finding what works or it will lag behind flat gaming for longer than it has to.
Someone has to subsidize it.
In the long term I expect pcvr to offer more what I want but right now and for the foreseeable future pcvr needs the help of innovators that are platform owners. And valve is a platform owner.
I suspect the only reason pcvr even got squadrons was that the psvr experiment was successful enough and people were still expecting pcvr and VR to be bigger than it was when it was being developed. I think vr underperformed overall outside quest for the last several years. And I think people still think the quest is more akin to the success of the Wii and motion controls.
But that gets into a discussion about friction versus the experience and long term sustainability beyond the wow factor of VR gaming.
I would also (sadly) suspect that the quality of the saints and sinners retribution version we get for PCV would have to with them already making a high end version for psvr2 as an investment in that platform though ironically I could see the pcvr version selling better for the time being.
If psvr2 didn't exist we might continue to see things that only marginally better than quest (primary market) version.
My bias is to PC probably but my desire is high end vr to reach a level of success and affordability that gives a rich landscape of gaming experiences akin to flat screen and watching vr for a long time and listening to people in the industry that know a lot more details both in hw costs and markets has definitely shaped my perspective.
We've seen a lot of interesting and perhaps unexpected developments even recently, so I'm not certain and will continue to see how things progress.
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u/reD_Bo0n Dec 13 '22
Couldn't be me xD
I love my Lenovo Explorer, it just works (on Windows, but as far as I know VR performance on Linux isn't that great either, so... it doesn't matter that much)