According to Chris Pruett in an interview with Protocol Gaming, the Director of Content Ecosystem at Oculus, the Oculus Quest 2 is selling “faster than Quest” and is exceeding sales expectations.
Oculus Quest 2 Selling ‘Faster Than Quest’
This should come as no surprise to anyone that’s been following the industry at all over the last several weeks as Facebook’s latest standalone VR headset has proven to be quite popular. We dubbed it the new king of VR in our review with the massivecaveat that you need to link an active and legitimate Facebook account to the device to use it.
In the Protocol Gaming interview, Pruett said: “We really couldn’t be happier. The device is selling quite well…faster than Quest did…maybe a little beyond what we expected.”
Previously we’d heard from a few VR developers of popular titles such as Pistol Whip, Apex Construct, Waltz of the Wizard, and more that they’re all seeing big bumps in sales now that the Quest 2 is out. The Walking Dead: Saints & Sinners was one of the only big, new launch titles for the headset (all games are also on Quest 2) and Population: One, a VR battle royale shooter, drops on Quest and PC VR tomorrow with full crossplay.
We still don’t have any hard sales figures for any Oculus headsets at all, other than the Samsung collaborative Gear VR from years ago, so it’s hard to tell what Pruett’s quote means in the grand scheme of things. That being said, we can clearly tell the original Quest sold well and if this one is selling faster and beyond expectations, that’s certainly a good sign for overall VR adoption in mainstream society.
Let us know what you think down in the comments below!
Five Nights at Freddy’s VR: Help Wanted was an immediate success on Oculus Quest reaching an unprecedented number of user reviews (mostly positive) on the Quest store within mere hours of release. We loved it too, for what it’s worth.
The game’s success on Quest this year follows its previous success on PSVR and PC VR headsets as well. Now basically anyone with a major VR headset can play it.
We recently got the chance to conduct an email Q&A with Andrew Dayton, CEO of Steel Wool Studios, to chat about the game’s development, bringing the franchise to VR, and what’s in store next for the furry denizens of Freddy Fazbear’s Pizza.
UploadVR: Five Nights at Freddy’s VR on Quest seems to be doing very well. Can you speak at all to sales numbers?
Andrew Dayton, Steel Wool Studios CEO: FNAF VR Help Wanted has done amazingly well! We can’t speak specific numbers but we are free to share that we broke Oculus Quest’s 1-Day sales record as well as its 1-Week sales record.
UploadVR: Can you speak at all to how it is performing on Quest relative to other VR platforms?
Dayton: FNAF VR Help Wanted has performed exceptionally well on all the VR platforms. I can’t really compare them as they are all different ecosystems really. Between the PC-based VR, Sony’s PSVR and Oculus’ stand-alone Quest, there is an option for almost everyone who is interested in Virtual Reality and the user base is just getting larger.
UplaodVR: Steel Wool isn’t the original developer of FNAF, so what was it like working with an existing game studio’s non-VR IP?
Dayton: It has been a great experience. My co-founder and Creative Director Jason Topolski and I met while we worked at Pixar so we have experience working with larger than life IPs. What people who are not well versed in the FNAF universe may not know is that the IP and series of games are created by one person, Scott Cawthon. We were introduced to Scott through Lionsgate Games and Striker Entertainment. Since then, we’ve work directly with Scott when pitching ideas and having reviews. There is no filtered layers of communication, if we need to discuss something with Scott we can simply just jump on a call. He is very collaborative, creative, and supportive. His greatest trait is that he genuinely cares about his fans above all else. You really cannot ask for a better partner. We would be happy to work with him forever!
UploadVR: Was it difficult to adapt for VR or did it seem like a natural fit?
Dayton: It was a natural fit. Scott’s creative and aesthetic style lines up very well with ours. His games are scary to begin with. VR enhances that sense of tension and fear. What you get in VR that you cannot necessarily get in a 2D game is scale and spatial tension. You can “feel” something is behind you in VR. In FNAF, there may very well be!
UploadVR: The Five Nights at Freddy’s VR fan-base is extremely rabid and passionate. Was that surprising to be on the receiving end of?
Dayton: Surprising? Yes and no. My fellow co-founders, Jason, Stewart and I have kids and we knew well before we started working with Scott how passionate the fans are. What we didn’t know was how we would be welcomed into the community. The fans have been incredible. They are so energized and have been so supportive of us and we are so grateful to them. We get so many great messages and emails from fans. We have fan art kids have sent us hanging up in the studio. It is humbling and makes us feel a part of something special.
UploadVR: What aspect of Five Nights at Freddy’s VR development, specifically on Quest, was most challenging?
Dayton: Optimization! We worked with Oculus and an incredible team at The Forge to get FNAF Help Wanted on to the Quest. The result is an amazing version that shows off what can be accomplished on the Oculus Quest. Wolfgang Engel and his team at the Forge really helped do most of the heavy lifting and were incredible to work with.
UploadVR: What is the timeframe for bringing Curse of the Dreadbear DLC for Five Nights at Freddy’s VR to Quest?
Dayton: It is in the works but we can’t share any timelines yet.
UploadVR: Are there plans for additional DLC releases for Five Nights at Freddy’s VR?
Dayton: Unfortunately, we can’t speak to future plans.
UploadVR: Do you plan to continue supporting the non-Quest versions of FNAF VR?
We will continue supporting all versions of Help Wanted.
UploadVR: What was your favorite part of working on FNAF VR?
Dayton: My favorite part working in the FNAF world is seeing how much fun players have immersed in the universe. I truly understood what FNAF was capable of one day at the office during production. We don’t have offices, we all sit together in an open space with the offices converted into demo or art rooms. There was an art team from one of the hardware companies visiting the studio. The team was demoing an early version of Help Wanted and there was about 7 of them crowded in the demo room next to my desk. I was working and I kept hearing screams followed by hysterical laughter. The art team was having so much fun playing the game and watching their co-workers getting jump scared. Scott created this world where there was humor, horror and a deep underlying storyline.
UploadVR: Can you hint at what you’re working on next after FNAF VR?
Dayton: We are working on the next Five Nights at Freddy’s game. It is an ambitious project and will be the biggest title we have ever worked on. We also have an VR Enterprise division that is working on a VR therapy application with a medical technology company.
Upon receiving the Q&A responses, we reached out for further clarification on the final answer regarding the new Five Nights at Freddy’s game. At this time, a company representative has told us that, “the new game mentioned is not confirmed for VR” at this time. It feels like that was worded very carefully, but as of now we’re treating it as if it is not coming to VR. At least not yet.
We’ve got a big number to report from the sole developer of Virtual Desktop, Guy Godin. Today Godin told UploadVR he’s cleared $3 million in gross revenue (that’s before Facebook’s cut of sales) on just the Oculus Quest standalone headset.
The figure establishes his software, which allows owners to operate their entire PC in VR wirelessly, as one of the most successful on Quest. In May, Facebook said more than 10 titles cleared $2 million in revenue on Quest alone and named several games to the list.
When combined with Virtual Desktop’s availability on Steam, Oculus Go, and Rift, the figure establishes the utility as one of the most successful pieces of VR software ever developed primarily by a single person throughout its entire development cycle. Godin says he brought on some contractors from time to time to help primarily with art.
Virtual Desktop’s Wireless Connection
Last year, Godin slipped a feature into Virtual Desktop which allowed buyers to play PC VR games on Quest wirelessly. Facebook pressured Godin to remove the feature from his app, though, citing comfort concerns. The feature co-opts your existing Wi-Fi network to make the connection from PC to Quest, and that makes it vulnerable to congestion and other factors which could create comfort issues for some users. Godin worked around Facebook to offer a patch for Virtual Desktop through sideloading platform SideQuest. This allowed anybody who bought Virtual Desktop to still access the feature, and the release helped anchor SideQuest as a useful tool for lots of Quest owners. Godin rebuilt the feature and improved its implementation considerably over the course of the year. In recent weeks Godin even added hand tracking support to the software.
“I don’t have an exact number but I estimate about 90% of users have patched it through SideQuest,” explained Godin in a direct message, who says he doesn’t use any analytics software to track app usage. “I could be wrong however, just guessing based on the numbers provided by SideQuest and the amount of support/help questions I get; it’s always about the VR feature.”
Here’s an interview we did we Godin in February if you’d like to learn more about his journey:
That’s $100 less than the Rift S, which is priced at $399. The listing is only available in the USA.
The original Oculus Rift launched in mid 2016 for $600. This didn’t include the Touch controllers, which launched in December of that year for $200. In 2017, Facebook unified into a Rift+Touch package priced at $400- that’s what’s on offer here.
Facebook says any refurbished Rift will be free of visible cosmetic imperfections, have no scratches on the lenses, no dents, and any repairs used original components.
If you’re not happy with the headset, returns are available for 30 days. If there’s an issue with it however, there’s a 6 month warranty. That’s only half the standard warranty, and would actually be illegal in almost all other developed countries.
So how does the Rift “CV1” hold up in 2020? We got one of ours out of storage and played a little Half-Life: Alyx with it.
What Holds Up Well
The Rift CV1 is the only Oculus headset so far designed to be high end, rather than balanced with affordability. The headset has a premium feel with a cloth exterior, and more importantly it’s compact, light, and comfortable to wear.
The integrated headphones on the Oculus Rift are a lot better than they look
Rift features great integrated headphones. It was the first consumer headset to do this, pushing VR audio forwards- and leading to disappointment from many when Rift S and Quest were announced using a basic strap audio system with poor quality & low volume.
What Simply Doesn’t
The main problem with the Rift CV1 was always its tracking system. It’s awkward to set up, clunky, and often incompatible with motherboards. If you move your sensors at all you’ll need to redo setup. And unless you go to the effort of wall mounting them your controllers will track poorly when near the floor.
These problems get worse the more sensors you add. The Rift comes with two sensors in the box, but for high quality “room scale” tracking (today taken for granted) you’ll need to acquire a third.
While OLED panels give the screen great contrast, the relatively low resolution is jarring compared to modern headsets. You’ll find yourself leaning in much more often to read text, and distant objects will be hard to identify.
The biggest problem with the display system though is the “god rays” on the lenses. In high contrast scenes this can be incredibly distracting.
Should You Buy One?
$300 feels like a high price for a headset released four years ago. At the end of its life, the headset was offered for $350 brand new. We’d have expected this to be priced more around the $200 mark.
But it can still play any VR game the Rift S can. So if you just can’t wait for other headsets to come back in stock and you’re aware of the limitations, this could be your path into PC VR.
Notably, Beat Games was acquired by Facebook late last year, but the game continues to function normally on non-Oculus headsets as well. Just today, they announced the next paid music pack which will feature five Timbaland tracks. This paid DLC pack will join collections from artists such as Imagine Dragons, Panic! At The Disco, Green Day, and many others.
Two million copies is a lot, especially for a VR game, and we’re assuming that a big portion of its success is tied to the fact that it’s available on every major platform and has received a major marketing push from Facebook for the Oculus Quest version. Many games on Quest are cross-buy with their Oculus Rift counterparts, but Beat Saber is not one of them. Users must purchase the game twice if they want it on both their PC VR headset and on the Quest. Then a third time if they want to play it on PSVR.
We’re curious to see what the future of Beat Saber looks like. It’s clearly still one of VR’s most popular and well-known games and with Facebook’s Horizon social app coming soon the two platforms could combine together in enticing ways.
What do you think of the news regarding Beat Saber’s new sales figures? Let us know down in the comments below!
Impressive ping pong simulator Eleven Table Tennis released on Oculus Quest on February 27 and in roughly two weeks sold more than 12,000 copies of the $20 game for the standalone headset.
The game by For Fun Labs released in December 2017 on the Oculus Store for Rift and in June 2016 on Steam. Since then, For Fun Labs sold 28,000 copies on the Oculus Store for Facebook’s PC VR headsets Rift and Rift S, and more than 50,000 copies on Steam.
There’s an active Discord group for the game and a 3D-printed paddle you can make to approximate the weight distribution and feel of an actual paddle in your hand for either Quest or Rift S. It also features the best physics simulation we’ve seen on Quest for table tennis, local Wi-Fi support for a practically lag-free experience, and the developers already updated the game with a preset that instantly and perfectly syncs up with the adapter.
The preset even worked with the mirrored version of the 3D print I used with the left Touch controller for my southpaw Hamilton-branded paddle. The original print has been downloaded more than 700 times from Thingiverse. The Discord group for the game even features a section for coaches to teach other players the finer points of table tennis.
I played a game over the weekend with the creator of the 3D paddle in Germany from the headquarters of my social isolation in my Southern California home and — even with more than 200 milliseconds of latency — the game held up extremely well.
Taken altogether, that’s a lot of a momentum for an incredible experience and the developers say they’re just getting started now that they’ve got it up and running on Quest — so there’s a lot more in store.
Oculus Quest is ‘Out of Stock’ in some countries after being backordered into March.
We’ve been closely following availability of the standalone VR headset from Facebook with CEO Mark Zuckerberg saying sales “are stronger than we expected.” In mid-January, shipping estimates for new orders of the headset in the United States from the company’s own website were pushed into March. Valve’s high-end PC-only headset the Valve Index was also heavily backordered on Steam before the company stopped accepting new orders. In January, Valve said it would try to get the headset back in stock before the release of highly anticipated VR game Half-Life: Alyx in March.
Oculus Quest is a completely standalone VR headset that operates without any wires. The all-in-one system starts at $400 and works in wireless mode with some of the most popular VR games, like Superhot, Beat Saber and Pistol Whip, but an optional mode for the headset called Oculus Link makes it compatible over a USB 3 cord with PC VR games as well. That means the headset is one of the most versatile and robust options for people wanting both the wireless freedom of standalone VR games and the option to play PC VR games like Alyx over a wired connection to a compatible computer.
At the time of this writing Quest is out of stock in the United States and Canada from the official company site and on Amazon it says the headset will be back in stock on February 16. It is still showing as available elsewhere though, like England, where it will ship by February 12, according to the official site. Quest might also be found in some physical stores. We’ve asked Facebook for comment about demand and availability of the headset and will update this post if we hear back.
Job Simulator originally launched for HTC Vive back in the first half of 2016, nearly four years ago, and is a great example of a game that’s easy to pick up and endlessly fun to play repeatedly. It has universal appeal with a sense of humor for all ages and requires very little in the way of tutorialization. In a lot of ways, it was VR’s truly first big hit back before headsets had even officially launched.
Since release it has also made its way to the Oculus Rift when Touch controllers released, the PSVR, and the Oculus Quest putting it on every major VR platform. Owlchemy Labs is also the developer of Rick and Morty: Virtual-Rickality and Vacation Simulator, two follow-ups that build upon the foundation laid in Job Simulator.
This is a massive sales milestone to reach. When compared to traditional non-VR video games, one million units is still seen as a huge success for non-AAA products, especially in the indie space. Few VR games have reached this point. Beat Saber revealed the number back in March of 2019 after its viral success and Sean Murray from Hello Games estimated that at least one million of his players had VR headsets already before No Man’s Sky got its VR update — counting the new copies that were sold it could likely be over that figure as well. Estimates also put around one million have played Resident Evil 7 in VR on PSVR, but it has sold far more copies overall as part of a massive Capcom AAA franchise that’s also playable outside of VR.
“We first developed Job Simulator as something that could only exist in VR. It was built for hardware that wasn’t yet available to consumers and was a very risky product.” says Owlchemy Labs CEOwl Devin Reimer in the company blog post. “Job Simulator going platinum shows that the consumer VR market is capable of generating huge hits. We’re delighted that Job Simulator has found a diverse audience that enjoys our game.“
Regardless of how you look at it, this is a big milestone. As VR continues to grow and reach mainstream adoption, expect to see more breakout success stories like this.
One of VR’s most popular games — Superhot VR — grossed more than $2 million across all platforms in the week around Christmas.
The popular VR title has been available on Oculus Rift since late 2016 and released on Oculus Quest when the new standalone headset launched in May 2019. Taking full advantage of the completely wireless all-in-one system, we called the Quest version “the best version of a genuine classic” and it tops our list of the 25 best Oculus Quest games. Notably, Superhot VR was one of the few titles which did not support cross-buy with Oculus Rift meaning if a Rift owner bought a Quest and wanted the game again they needed to purchase it separately.
Superhot VR is a game in which time moves and enemies come toward you only when your body moves. It is also available on Steam for other PC VR headsets and on PlayStation VR as well. There’s also a different non-VR game with the same name available for traditional gaming platforms.
SUPERHOT VR has grossed over 2 million dollars on all platforms in the past 7 days alone. Thank you players!! 🎂🥳 pic.twitter.com/jkTINcGH4f
— Callum rawr x3 nuzzles, pounces on you, uwu (@DevRelCallum) December 29, 2019
The $2 million figure, grossed over the week around Christmas, refers exclusively to the sales performance of the VR version — Superhot VR — across all platforms. I reached out to Callum Underwood, Director of Special Projects for Superhot, and asked him if he had any detail he could provide beyond the tweet.
Underwood sent the following:
“We’re releasing these sales numbers not to brag, but to provide insight into what a successful game can bring in VR. We tend not to involve ourselves in ‘VR is dead’ or ‘year of VR?’ conversations, as we mostly just enjoy making games… and then working on making those games make money! Thanks to all the new, existing, and returning players.. we hope your holiday period is as good as ours! I can point to holiday sales of hardware, smart discounts we applied on various platforms based on IndieBI data, and the fact that we’re consistently listed in ‘top games’… but I also have to point to the designers and developers of SUPERHOT VR for making our (the biz team) job easy. The success of SUPERHOT VR is due to them.”
Underwood added that Superhot’s IndieBI tool helps track historical sales data and helped inform decisions like what kind of discounts to offer and on which platforms to offer them. For example, Superhot VR is sold at full price, $25, on Quest at the time of this writing but discounted to $17 on Steam. The game also deployed other discounts and bundles during the holiday season. IndieBI is in a testing phase right now and not available generally yet, but developers can request a beta invite.
