Microsoft announced it’s released a public preview of Azure Remote Rendering support for Meta Quest 2 and Quest Pro, something that promises to allow devs to render complex 3D content in the cloud and stream it to those VR headsets in real-time.
Azure Remote Rendering, which already supports desktop and the company’s AR headset HoloLens 2, notably uses a hybrid rendering approach to combine remotely rendered content with locally rendered content.
Now supporting Quest 2 and Quest Pro, developers are able to integrate Microsoft’s Azure cloud rendering capabilities to do things like view large and complex models on Quest.
Microsoft says in a developer blog post that one such developer Fracture Reality has already integrated Azure Remote Rendering into its JoinXR platform, enhancing its CAD review and workflows for engineering clients.
Image courtesy Microsoft, Fracture Reality
The JoinXR model above was said to take 3.5 minutes to upload and contains 12.6 million polygons and 8K images.
While streaming XR content from the cloud isn’t a new phenomenon—Nvidia initially released its own CloudXR integration for AWS, Microsoft Azure, and Google Cloud in 2021—Microsoft offering direct integration is a hopeful sign that the company hasn’t given up on VR, and is actively looking to bring enterprise deeper into the fold.
If you’re looking to integrate Azure’s cloud rendering tech into your project, check out Microsoft’s step-by-step guide here.
At least from the outside, it appears Microsoft isn’t actively competing for a seat at the XR table, which is fairly odd coming from a company that pioneered enterprise AR while simultaneously wrangling some of its top OEM partners to make a fleet of PC VR headsets for consumers in 2017. Microsoft gained a great early start, but now the Redmond-based tech giant is positioned to play catchup, which historically hasn’t worked out that well. Could we be in for another ‘Zune moment’? If Microsoft goes in half-cocked, maybe.
Microsoft released the first-gen Zune in 2006, an MP3 player that looked to compete with Apple’s largely dominant line of iPods. By “largely dominant,” I mean Apple not only had majority market share of the product category, making it synonymous with portable music at the time, but had already produced numerous generations of iPod Classic, iPod Mini, iPod Nano and iPod Shuffle. Apple wasn’t the first to make a portable MP3 player, although it was the first to make one everyone wanted.
Now, I can hear the Zune defenders in my head, and I sympathize. Zune wasn’t terrible, and it came at a time when full-color screens in MP3 players were just becoming a thing. It had a compelling reason to exist, which is why Microsoft directly competed against iPod Touch over the course of three device generations before eventually giving up the goat in 2011 and discontinuing the third-gen Zune. Many chalk it up to poor marketing, lack of brand cache, and not enough music to choose from. Zooming out, Zune’s ultimate defeat belies a larger pattern of behavior.
Image courtesy Digital Trends
Zune didn’t generate the sort of loyal customer base that Apple had in spades because entering rapidly evolving product categories isn’t easy. By the time platforms solidify, companies that come too late are usually tasked with flipping what’s left of undecided users or attracting users away from other ecosystems with unique selling points. Even with viable hardware on your side, it’s not an easy thing to do.
To put it into perspective, Zune entered the market one year before Apple announced the first iPhone. From that moment Microsoft was forced to play catchup not only with its MP3 players, but with its widely maligned Windows Phones which came afterwards, of which there are famously few defenders. Needless to say, Apple’s iPhone is still kicking, and that iPod/iPhone success story is why Apple is largest company in the world.
Breaking the Zune Curse?
Don’t get me wrong, Microsoft has success stories. Windows is still the world’s largest PC operating system. Azure Cloud Platform competes alongside AWS and Google Cloud. There’s a reason why we call digital slideshows a PowerPoint no matter which program you use to make them, and that’s thanks to Microsoft’s ongoing dominance in the general computing space. When Microsoft gets in early and sticks it out, you don’t generally get a Zune.
To its credit, the company had the foresight to release HoloLens in 2016, a full two years before unicorn startup Magic Leap could get its first standalone AR headset out the door. Three years later it released HoloLens 2, which directly competes today against Magic Leap Two. When HoloLens 3 will arrive, or whether it’s even in the works, still isn’t clear. We’re hoping they stick it out and it doesn’t turn into a ‘Zune moment’ down the line.
The first wave of WMR headsets launched in 2017 | Image courtesy Microsoft
In 2017, Microsoft also managed to assemble a host of major OEMs to create what would be the first Windows VR headsets, which included PC VR headsets from Dell, Lenovo, Acer, HP, Samsung, and Asus. It was a good opening gambit to break up the Oculus/HTC Vive PC VR binary that had developed a year prior, although those Windows VR headsets weren’t just new hardware destined to hook into Steam content. Microsoft made its own Windows Mixed Reality Store which ultimately failed to compete with Steam for developers, which was kind of like a Zune owner somehow getting all their music from iTunes and not Zune Marketplace.
And we’re still early, although that may not be the case for long. Compared to smartphones today, the current XR landscape is toddling out of its infancy. You’d be surprised how much competition there is already, not only across multiple hardware platforms, but entire content ecosystems—something you can’t just grow over night. Currently major contenders are Meta, Sony, HTC, Valve, Pico, Pimax, and Apple starting next year. The future leaders are shaping up to be Sony, Meta and Apple, the last two moving into mixed reality (Meta Quest Pro, Meta Quest 3, Apple Vision Pro) which feature VR displays and color passthrough cameras for AR tasks, while Sony is already in their second-gen PlayStation VR. Things are changing, and Apple jumping into XR could see a host of other companies deciding they want a piece of the pie fairly soon.
Whatever the time frame, eventually the amount of money Microsoft leaves on the table is going to pile up until it can’t be ignored. That’s essentially the strategy the company has decided to take with Xbox at least, with Xbox Game Studio head Matt Booty saying in a recent Hollywood Reporter interview that VR just isn’t big enough yet.
“We have 10 games that have achieved over 10 million players life-to-date, which is a pretty big accomplishment, but that’s the kind of scale that we need to see success for the game and it’s just, it’s not quite there yet with AR, VR,” Booty told the Hollywood Reporter.
So, while we’re no closer to knowing when Microsoft will decide it’s the right time to enter into VR (or MR for that matter), the company is well equipped and funded to break the Zune curse. Whenever Microsoft chooses to compete in consumer XR, any potential failure can’t be blamed on the lack of resources. The company now boasts a vast collection of game studios it can weaponize, which includes the entire Zenimax family of studios, including Bethesda, Arkane Studios, id Software, MachineGames, Tango Gameworks, and ZeniMax Online Studios. Provided the contentious Activision Blizzard acquisition goes through, Microsoft will also own World of Warcraft, Call of Duty, and Diablo franchises. That untapped library of IP and developer talents could make whatever Microsoft decides to bring to the XR table a serious contender.
Just the same, if the megalithic Microsoft can’t overcome what must be a massive internal friction to put out something focused, timely and well-supported, whatever it makes might as well be Zune.
Once the focus of a fateful redemption story, Microsoft is getting set to shut down its adoptive VR app AltspaceVR, finally putting an end to one of the earliest social VR platforms.
Update (March 9th, 2023): Launched in May 2015, AltspaceVR is officially headed for the long sleep tomorrow, March 10th.
If you’re looking to bid AltspaceVR goodbye, there’s actually a ton of events going on right now, which will take users all the way up to when server shutdown tomorrow. It’s uncertain exactly when servers are set to switch off, however Microsoft suggests downloading all relevant data “before” March 10th.
The original article announcing the planned shutdown of AltspaceVR and Microsoft’s Mixed Reality Toolkit follows below:
Original Article (January 23rd, 2023): We’ve written about the death of AltspaceVR once before. In the summer of 2017, the company announced it was shuttering the social VR platform due to lack of funds. In a Hail Mary that few expected, Microsoft turned around and snapped up the ailing platform only two months after the planned shut-down date. It seemed, at least for then, that AltspaceVR would live on to compete in the rapidly diversifying social VR landscape, existing alongside VR Chat, Rec Room, and Horizon Worlds.
Microsoft says it’s shutting down AltspaceVR on March 10th, 2023, and shifting its focus “to support immersive experiences powered by Microsoft Mesh,” the company says in a statement.
Mesh is the company’s software foundation for building multi-user XR applications. Announced in 2021, the tool gives developers a framework for connecting users into shared instances which support spatial voice communication, cloud-based asset management, persistent scenes, and a common avatar system.
“The decision has not been an easy one as this is a platform many have come to love, providing a place for people to explore their identities, express themselves, and find community,” the AltspaceVR team writes. “It has been a privilege to help unlock passions among users, from educational opportunities for personal growth to the development of unique and wonderful events, groundbreaking art, and immersive experiences — enabling this community to achieve more. With Mesh, we aspire to build a platform that offers the widest opportunity to all involved, including creators, partners and customers.”
Also seeing an abrupt shutdown is the company’s Mixed Reality Toolkit (MRTK). Team member Finn Sinclair shared the news via Twitter on Friday, saying the entire team was eliminated from the company. MRTK was a Microsoft-driven project that provided a set of components and features, used to accelerate cross-platform XR app development in the Unity game engine. Sinclair says the project is remaining open source.
Microsoft’s most recent round of layoffs are said to affect around 5% of its overall workforce. In a letter to employees, Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella notes “changes to our hardware portfolio”; reports from Bloomberg maintain the company’s Xbox games teams are also affected, including Bethesda Game Studios (‘The Elder Scrolls’ series) and 343 Industries (Halo).
Still rubbing your eyes? Us too, but we’re pretty sure we’re not dreaming – Microsoft really is buying Activision Blizzard.
Or at least the Xbox-maker certainly intends to. That much was made official this week, with the caveat that the deal — as with any multi-billion dollar acquisition — could be subject to an antitrust investigation, should the FTC deem it necessary. Reports state Meta itself is currently subject to such scrutiny, though Microsoft previously passed its acquisition of Bethesda (which, in fairness, was reportedly valued at about a tenth of this proposed $68 billion deal).
Those apprehensions aside, the perceived implications of such a deal are nothing short of seismic. Microsoft will have the keys to the Call of Duty franchise and a stable of other legendary series that will add yet more value to its Game Pass platform whilst Sony still appears to be playing catchup with a possible contender for PS5. It’s a move not about which console you buy in the short term so much as which gaming service you subscribe to in the future as cloud streaming technology and other services increasingly detract from the appeal of localized hardware.
So, where does VR fit into all of this?
Well it’s not immediately obvious. Certainly, there are some short-term assumptions we can come to about what franchises we will and won’t be seeing in headsets anytime soon, but there are also wider implications to consider. Before we do that, though, let’s just remind ourselves of where Xbox is at with VR today.
Microsoft’s VR History
Microsoft’s — or, more specifically, the Xbox brand’s — current history with VR could be best described as frustratingly hesitant. Just six years ago the company seemed primed to join Sony, Valve and Meta (then Facebook) in the fight for consumer VR dominance, announcing that its Xbox One X console was capable of “premiere VR experiences”. But an Xbox-made headset nor third-party device support never materialized for the console, and hasn’t yet been announced for its successors, the Series S and X.
Reports claimed Microsoft had shelved plans for a headset and Xbox executives began to state time and again that VR was not a focus for the consoles. Even though Microsoft has its own line of Windows VR headsets made in partnership with others (the most recent of which being the HP Reverb G2) and the fact that we regularly see new VR innovations from the company’s wide-reaching research efforts, there’s been no signs of that position changing for Xbox itself anytime soon. That’s even as Sony prepares to launch a PSVR 2 for its competing PS5 console.
Xbox Holds The Keys To VR’s Most Requested Games
This week’s acquisition announcement might have been Xbox’s biggest yet, but it also only adds to an already significant list of gaming series that could help define a new era for VR. From its own studios there’s Halo and Forza, from Bethesda there’s Elder Scrolls and Doom (both of which have already had passing visits to headsets), and now there’s Call of Duty and World of Warcraft among many, many others.
These aren’t just popular games – they’re legacy brands that have paved the way forward for their respective genres that could one day be hallmark VR releases. Who hasn’t wanted to see Halo VR (not counting the bad one) or a new, native Elder Scrolls game? Would there be any better indicator that the technology had achieved mainstream status than seeing a Call of Duty VR game?
In the near term at least, it seems like we’ll be waiting a little longer for these games. Unless Microsoft is planning to reveal its own VR contender for its latest Xbox consoles in the next year or two, it won’t make much sense for the company to greenlight multimillion-dollar VR projects it won’t release on its own platforms. That is of course unless there are any more contractual obligations in play – both Bethesda’s Doom 3 VR and inXile’s Frostpoint were released post-Microsoft acquisition.
Sony’s VR Strategy Becomes Increasingly Important
Dialing down on the core rivalry between Sony and Microsoft’s gaming divisions, this week’s announcement strikes a grave blow to the former company. Sony’s PS5 seems to have outpaced Xbox Series sales thus far and that’s not likely to change within the next few years but, looking beyond this console cycle, Sony now faces serious questions about how it competes in an industry with an increasingly dominant rival that has cash reserves it can’t measure up to. One answer might lie in its work with VR.
Sony’s excursions into VR and Microsoft’s focus on services are obviously very different approaches but, strategically speaking, they’re both long-term gambles that stand to pay off in the future. Just as Microsoft is focused on a time in which Xbox is an app installed onto TV sets, Sony knows that there’s a future for VR technology beyond plugging it into a console to play the latest games.
And that’s what makes its work today so critical. Sony learned a lot with PSVR, went away and improved upon it. It will, undoubtedly, learn a lot with PSVR 2, too. Its studios will continue to flesh out best practices for VR development, and its R&D teams will continue to look at the way players interact with PSVR 2’s inside-out tracking, eye-tracking and other features and continue to refine the experience. Xbox, meanwhile, isn’t able to benefit from the same pool of user data and experience (though it will have taken its own learnings from the Windows MR line, no doubt).
That may be key to PlayStation staying ahead of Microsoft as the industry continues to grow into something much more significant. It seems like a far-flung future right now but, going forward, VR could be one of the key ways Sony is able to diversify and form a significant new pillar with the headstart Microsoft has afforded it.
But Microsoft Can Flip The Switch Anytime It Wants
The real question is how long that headstart will be. Microsoft could flip the switch on VR essentially whenever it wants: it now owns multiple studios that have dabbled with VR content, including Ninja Theory, inXile Entertainment and Escalation Studios (now known as Bethesda Dallas) and has a suite of other partners that have brought games like Skyrim, Doom, Wolfenstein and many more to VR. Then it’s got its work with Windows MR, which allowed it to dip its toes into the pool of VR ecosystems, even if anyone that bought one of the headsets had to turn to SteamVR to play most games.
It feels as if Microsoft is more than capable of launching a competent and compelling VR ecosystem pretty much whenever it sees fit. And such a device will enter the company not just into a new era of rivalry with Sony but also Meta and — very likely — Apple. those are two companies the wider Microsoft is already battling on several fronts.
A Microsoft Metaverse
Many will have flinched when Microsoft made mention of the metaverse in its press blasts this week and, while it’s easy to see why you’d have that initial reaction, you might want to ask yourself this: how could buying Call of Duty, the biggest online shooter going, possibly ever effect the eventual realization of an always-online virtual platform where people can work, socialize and, most pressingly, play?
If the metaverse does indeed become the next widely-used manifestation of online productivity and leisure, then Call of Duty is on a collision course straight towards it. In fact, the entire gaming industry is on that course in some capacity, even if it doesn’t really know it yet. There’s no other talent pool out there as well-equipped to handle the stresses the concept of the metaverse imply. And now Microsoft occupies a significant chunk of that pool, not to mention much of the software that could prove foundational for the future.
So, in the near-term? Microsoft’s latest acquisition won’t mean much for VR. We probably won’t see Overwatch VR, Call of Duty VR or World of Warcraft VR in the near future but, in all honesty, that wasn’t likely to happen anyway. It’s the longer game that really has us wondering – the growth of both an incredible gaming service and an ever-expanding team of digital computing experts under its wing. It has a lot of ground to catch up in the VR industry, but these tools could be what Microsoft needs to leapfrog its competitors later down the line.
Microsoft is making a strong bid to bolster its version of the metaverse as it looks to roll out 3D avatars and immersive meetings for its Microsoft Teams communication platform.
You might define the metaverse as essentially an immersive internet where virtual experiences are interoperable, and also offer a continuity of the user’s digital identity. It’s not a new idea, as fully-functional immersive social platforms have been around since even the early days of consumer VR, although the concept seems to be picking up traction now that the established names in tech are making more concrete efforts.
First announced back at Microsoft Ignite in March, Mesh allows developers to create multi-user XR applications built on Microsoft’s Azure cloud computing arm.
Now Microsoft is gearing up to offer competition to the rest of the known tech world with the announcement of Mesh for Microsoft Teams, which effectively brings those previous efforts to build cross-platform immersive spaces and 3D avatars natively to the Teams communication platform, replete with support across mobile, PC, Microsoft VR headsets, and HoloLens 2.
“The feature combines the mixed-reality capabilities of Microsoft Mesh, which allows people in different physical locations to join collaborative and shared holographic experiences, with the productivity tools of Microsoft Teams, where people can join virtual meetings, send chats, collaborate on shared documents and more,” the company says.
Coming sometime in 2022, Mesh for Microsoft Teams will offer a new ‘Immersive experience’ option which will allow Teams users to build a 3D avatar and either use it in place of a standard webcam, or selecting it as their avatar for AR or VR interactions. While Mesh for Teams is admittedly an XR-focused offering meant for live face-to-face collaboration, when used in place of a webcam (read: without an XR headset) the 3D avatar is animated to interpret vocal cues.
Image courtesy Microsoft
Mesh for Microsoft Teams will roll out with “pre-built immersive spaces to support a variety of contexts, from meetings to social mixers,” the company says. At some point, organizations will also be able build bespoke immersive spaces so colleagues can interact.
Microsoft Teams’ large enterprise usership and interoperability with its cloud infrastructure, video conferencing, and family of Microsoft 365 products automatically positions it as a strong competitor for would-be metaverse users.
Undoubtedly the company’s biggest competition is Meta (formerly Facebook), which announced last week that it was bolstering efforts to shift its business toward building its version of the metaverse, something that saw a complete rebrand of the company.
Meta launched its own work-focused immersive space back in summer. Called Horizon Workrooms the virtual collaboration platform connects both VR and video chat users in the same place, the latter of which includes support for both Zoom and Facebook video chat.
Microsoft detailed a new software update available for some Windows MR headsets, including the Reverb G2, that will increase the visual fidelity by improving corrections made for artifacts such as chromatic aberration and light leakage.
The blog post was written by Alex Vlachos, a former member of Valve’s VR team who joined Microsoft as a ‘Partner Architect in Mixed Reality’ earlier this year. Vlachos says that many of these new corrections and improvements came about during the development of the HP Reverb G2.
The team “spent considerable time improving our approach to reducing chromatic aberration”, resulting in a new algorithm that makes better corrections to the image, and results in a cleaner view when viewed through headset lenses.
“A white pixel on the panels will refract through the lenses and separate into red, green, and blue pixels visible to the viewer. Chromatic aberration correction aims to adjust for this by pre-distorting the rendered image so that the image viewed by the user after lens refraction appears as a single white pixel as intended,” the blog post explains.
Vlachos says this helps eliminate a lot of chromatic aberration, as per the image below.
Left: an example of chromatic aberration. Right: Corrected chromatic aberration on Reverb G2.
Microsoft also made improvements to correct for light leakage. The new corrections implemented will reduce color fringing and color tinting that comes from light leakage, as pictured below.
Left: No light leakage correction (simulated). Right: Light leakage correction.
While these improvements came about during development for the Reverb G2, they will also be applied to the Samsung Odyssey+ and the original HP Reverb. For the former, Microsoft has improved chromatic aberration at the periphery of the lenses. For the latter, the team was able to “improve chromatic aberration artifacts, reduce radial distortion, apply light leak correction, and improve rendering performance by about 8% in most applications.” All of these improvements will also be applied to the Reverb G2.
The update is available now in the latest Windows Mixed Reality VR runtime, which can be downloaded using Windows Update.
If you haven’t already, be sure to check out our Reverb G2 unboxing video and keep an eye out for our full review of the headset coming later this week.
If you’re still waiting on VR support for Microsoft Flight Simulator (2020), you won’t need to twiddle your thumbs for much longer. According to a recent developer Q&A, Microsoft Flight Simulator for PC will launch with full SteamVR headset support sometime in December.
Update (November 26th, 2020): A developer Q&A livestream revealed that VR support for Microsoft Flight Simulator is indeed arriving sometime in December, before the holidays.
ASOBO Executive Producer Martial Bossard confirmed that all users will be able to play the game using SteamVR headsets, and not just the new HP Reverb G2 and other Windows Mixed Reality headsets.
The original article announcing the closed beta follows below:
Original Article (October 5th, 2020): As first reported by Eurogamer, Microsoft Flight Simulator is expected to head into closed beta sometime in late October or early November.
Interestingly, project lead Jörg Neumann says in a developer Q&A video that beta testers with a Windows VR headset will be the first allowed in, with other PC VR headsets added as the closed beta continues into its second phase (see update).
To be considered, you have to own Microsoft Flight Simulator, be a registered Windows Insider, submit your DxDiag, and agree to a non-disclosure agreement.
Microsoft’s Windows Insiders program includes short surveys, access to private forums, and weekly newsletters—all of which is designed to help developers obtain user feedback. You can sign up for your chance to become a beta tester here.
The studio also says their next World Update, which follows their Japan Update, will include the United States. That update is said to arrive sometime later this year.
HP stated that its upcoming Reverb G2 headset currently doesn’t support Xbox One consoles after a Microsoft Store listing suggested otherwise.
The listing is a free app that appears to be a utility for performing a first-time setup of the headset. Under both the minimum and recommended specifications, the OS category reads “Windows 10 version 15063.0 or higher, Xbox One,” as pictured below.
Reaching out to HP, the company told us that there is “no current support” for Xbox One with the Reverb G2. The listing is likely an error, though it’s still up and visible as of the time of this writing.
Xbox VR support has been rumored for a long time in one form or another. The Reverb G2 is made in partnership with Microsoft (along with Valve), so a partnership to bring the kit to console would make sense. Another reason the listing is likely a mistake is that only the Xbox One is mentioned in the app listing, and not the newer Xbox One S, Xbox One X, Xbox Series S or Series X consoles. However, if the original Xbox One model can support VR content, then the newer One models and the next generation Series models should hypothetically be able to as well.
While the application listing is specifically for the Reverb G2, that doesn’t rule out the possibility of connecting other VR headsets to Xbox consoles either. That being said, Flight Simulator will launch VR support exclusively for Windows MR headsets this Fall, and the Xbox release of the title is still forthcoming. Xbox VR could take a similar path, with exclusive support for Windows MR hardware to tie in with the launch Xbox of Flight Simulator around the same time.
Despite the recent PSVR port announcement, it seems a Minecraft Quest version isn’t going to be announced anytime soon.
The news comes from a verified Minecraft developer, who goes by CornerHard and works predominantly on Realms, Minecraft’s service for easily creating your own custom server through a paid subscription.
Minecraft Quest Still Far Off
While CornerHard doesn’t work directly on the VR versions of the game, a Reddit user replied to a comment of his asking whether the recent PSVR announcement might a Quest version of Minecraft is imminent. Here’s what he had to say:
No news on Quest support. We’d need to rework how VR locomotion works so you could move your player by physically walking, which is different than how it works currently.
CornerHard is of course referring to the roomscale nature of the Quest, which operates in full 6DoF. This is a bit of an odd response, however, as the existing version of Minecraft on Oculus Rift does indeed let you walk around your environment. Quest and Rift are essentially identical tracking-wise, so we don’t really see why Quest movement would need to be significantly different from the Rift version. Not only that, but Facebook’s John Carmack revealed he already had a Quest version of the game up and running earlier this year.
While it’s a disappointing response, it is perhaps to be expected. With the PSVR version only just announced, we wouldn’t expect to see Quest support for a little while yet. Recent announcements in relation to OpenXR made a Quest version of Minecraft seem more likely, but we wouldn’t start holding our breath just yet.
Would you like to see Minecraft on the Oculus Quest? Let us know in the comments below.
It’s nearly the end of the road for the Gear VR version of Minecraft; support for that version of Mojang’s enduring hit will end in October.
What does that mean, exactly? Well, as of October there will be no new updates for Minecraft Gear VR, and multiplayer and Realms support will be taken away too. You’ll still be able to play the game in single-player, but Minecraft with no online mode is a bit of a sad thought, isn’t it?
Support is also ending for Windows 10 Mobile, Android devices with less than 768MB of RAM, iOS devices running iOS 10 or below, or video cards that only support DirectX 10.1 or below. Make sure you’re updating where necessary if you want to keep playing.
Minecraft is still available on Oculus Rift and it doesn’t sound like support is ending there. Gear VR itself is basically dead at this point; Samsung itself has stopped updating its software, Facebook dropped Oculus SDK support for the device and the latest Samsung phones don’t support the headset, so it’s not too surprising to see this news. Minecraft never came to Oculus Go but, even if it had, that platform’s going the way of the dodo soon too.
Many of our hopes for Minecraft VR’s future rest on Oculus Quest, then. Back in June, Facebook’s John Carmack revealed he had the game up and running on the standalone headset, but could never get his company and Mojang owner Microsoft to collaborate on release. Minecraft VR support has always been a pet project for the legendary developer. Look, here he is wearing a Gear VR and playing the game at an Xbox E3 conference a few years back.
Online support for a port is gaining ground, though; even the Oculus Gaming Twitter account is encouraging fans to let Mojang know they want it. Fans are upvoting the idea on the official Minecraft site, too.
Still, even if it never comes to Quest, we’ll always have Minecraft Earth, right? Right?
