Population: One Microtransactions Explained – Not At Launch, Cosmetic Only

The developers behind upcoming VR battle royale game Population One commented on the nature of microtransactions in the game, after Reddit users spotted them in pre-release demo footage of the game.

A screenshot of Population One posted yesterday to r/OculusQuest pointed out the presence of microtransactions, which angered some commenters. Many users seem to feel that microtransactions have no place in a game that costs $30 to begin with.

Population: One Microtransactions Explained

Lots of online multiplayer games, especially in the battle royale genre, are free-to-play with optional microtransaction cosmetics or a paid ‘battle pass’ system that gives you rewards across a season of play. This has the benefit of keeping the game’s online population healthy with free-to-play users, while also maintaining a stream of revenue for the developers throughout the title’s life cycle.

Instead, Population: One has opted to go for another route – a paid battle royale experience in VR, which also has microtransactions. Population: One developers Big Box put out a FAQ yesterday to clear up some of the confusion surrounding the topic and confirmed that microtransaction purchases give you no competitive advantage in-game, and are purely cosmetic. There won’t be any pay-to-win features in the game, in other words.

We’re seeing some confusion about POP1’s in-game store and microtransactions.
We’ve put together some quick answers for you. 🍌🍌 pic.twitter.com/FkUKHumAbG

— POPULATION: ONE (@populationonevr) October 8, 2020

“The only microtransactions we have planned are character skins and gun skins. We will not be charging for guns, maps or other functionality that will separate the player-base.” The $30 price for the base game gives you access to the entire game, including progression systems that grant you free cosmetics. Big Box also noted that the ‘free-to-play with microtransactions’ model was not viable for Population: One, as they “need to be able to support the cost of on-going development, servers, coders, artists, etc.”

The microtransaction store is not finished yet, hence why it was missing from some preview builds, and will not be available at launch. Microtransactions will be available launch with the first in-game event after launch, which will also be available to players who choose not to make any in-game purchases.

If you haven’t already, you can read our hands-on with Population One here, which launches October 22 for Oculus Quest and PC VR with full cross-play support. Big Box is also hoping to bring the game to PSVR in the future.

October 7, 2020

Population: One Devs ‘Definitely’ Have Plans To Bring VR Battle Royale Shooter To PSVR

Population: One is fast-approaching launch on October 22nd and will be coming to both the Oculus Quest platform and PC VR headsets at the same time with full crossplay. But as it turns out, Big Box VR isn’t stopping their plans there. You can also read my latest hands-on preview right here.

In a recent interview about Population: One with the company’s CEO, Chia Chin Lee, and CTO, Gabe Brown, we discussed the past two years of development time, what it’s like to finally be building toward a firm launch date, and post-launch support.

You may not remember or know this but Population: One was originally a PC VR-only game. In fact, I played it way back at CES 2019 at the Vive Press Conference and really enjoyed it. This industry moves fast though and that version I saw back then never released.

Porting Population: One VR Battle Royale

“We basically rebuilt the entire engine over again, says Lee. “We built every single asset in-engine and wanted that to be delivered to any headset that became available. So it wasn’t even about Quest 1 or Quest 2, it was more about, ‘Can this work in a mobile device?’ Once that mobile device gets better and better, we want to extend that support.”

Brown continues: “On PC we had 24 players and on Quest now we have 18 currently. A lot of that had to do with rewriting a big chunk of Unity. The physics engine, PhysX, was too slow to run and it was running on the main threads. We had three cores so we needed to spread the work across all those cores and most game engines like Unreal and Unity don’t quite support that. So we had to rewrite a brand new, multithreaded, asynchronous physics engine, particle system, our own rendering engine, our networking layers runs asynchronously. So we had to write this new system that leverages quite a bit of super computing techniques for the mobile phone in order to make this possible…it was a big undertaking but overall we feel like this was the right investment because of the Quest, the Quest 2, and what the future of VR is going to be. We needed to be inclusive of all platforms.”

During the interview, following this description about inclusivity for devices with Population: One I asked about the potential for a PSVR version. Fortunately, it sounds like that’s already part of the plan.

“Definitely,” says Lee. “We want to be on every platform. But we have to first nail the Quest platform, then PC VR, and then we definitely have plans for PSVR.”

Population: One releases on October 22nd for Quest and PC VR. Let us know if you plan on playing down in the comments below!

February 26, 2020

Humble VR Bundle Clears $1 Million In Payments For Incredible Games Deal

The Humble VR Bundle cleared $1 million in payments for its incredible packages of games.

Several days remain to buy the game bundles which unlock at three tiers. The least expensive starts at $1 and includes Smashbox Arena and Cosmic Trip. Things start to get interesting if you pay more than $14.28 to add Gorn, Budget Cuts, and Space Pirate Trainer. Exceed $15, though, and you also add Superhot VR and Moss.

The bundle represents an incredible savings on a number of great games and, as of this writing, more than 70,000 bundle purchases have been made. The bundles also cleared $1 million in total payments, according to the Humble Bundle site. Soundtracks for some of the games are also included as a bonus.

When you make a Humble VR Bundle purchase you can choose how to distribute the funds to publishers and a charity of your choice. The games are delivered as Steam keys which makes it very easy to distribute any of the ones you already own to other people. After all, some people are likely to be getting into PC VR for the first with the March 23 release of Half-Life: Alyx and they’ll be looking for more games to play afterward. The titles in this bundle represent a fantastic introduction to several genres. We know a lot of VR gamers already have some of these games so, in addition to donating to a charity and supporting development, you could also help introduce new headset owners to some games they might have missed in the first few years of consumer VR.

Did you pick up the bundle? Let us know down in the comments below!

The post Humble VR Bundle Clears $1 Million In Payments For Incredible Games Deal appeared first on UploadVR.

June 4, 2019

Join the Smashbox VR Dodgeball League to Win up to $4,500 in Prizes

Based in North America and fancy winning some cash with your mates? Then you’ll want to enter Ctrl V’s Smashbox Arena League which will be taking place during the summer, with players able to compete for over $4,500 CDN worth of prizes.

Smashbox VR Dodgeball League

Using Bigbox VR’s multiplayer arena shooter Smashbox Arena, location-based entertainment (LBE) specialist Ctrl V is running the promotion starting in July and all the way through August sponsored by Survios. Encouraging participants of all ages, teams of three have to register by Friday 28th June, either at a Ctrl V location or online.

It costs $99.99 per person to enter the league which will last up to eight weeks. Players will need to commit at least one hour of their time each week, with competitions held every Monday evening from 6:30pm – 9:30pm (local time) from 8th July onwards.

Then on Monday, 19th August, the top two teams from each location will be selected for the grand championship on Monday 26th August which will be live-streamed. Over $4,500 will be available to win at each of Ctrl V’s locations, with first place getting $3000 cash, second place getting $1000 gift cards and $500 worth of gift cards for third place.

Smashbox Arena image 2

The competition will be taking place at Ctrl V’s 16 VR arcade locations:

Brampton (West)
Calgary (Glenmore)
Cambridge
Edmonton (West)
Guelph
Hamilton
Howell
Lethbridge
Lindsay
London
Mississauga
North York
Red Deer
St Catherines
Waterloo
Winnipeg

Originally released back in 2016 for HTC Vive and Oculus Rift before coming to PlayStation VR the following year, Smashbox Arena is a team-based first-person shooter (FPS) with over the top physic-driven power-ups such as Giant Boulders, Sniperballs and Heat Seeking Missiles to play with. While the home version does have a single-player campaign, the core gameplay revolves around the multiplayer mode.

BigBox VR is currently working on another arena style shooter called Population: ONE. Far more in the vein of popular battle royale titles such as Fortnite, Population: ONE will allow gamers to climb, fly and build with up to 24 other players in a match.

As further details regarding Ctrl V’s future plans are released, VRFocus will keep you updated.

June 4, 2019

Smashbox Arena League VR Dodgeball Competition Includes $4,500 In Prizes

If you can throw on a VR HMD, you can throw a dodgeball. The Smashbox Arena League is a virtual competition held across 16 of Ctrl V’s global VR arcade locations and the second annual event is going down this summer. Teams of three have to be registered by June 28 with the competition for a piece of the $4,500 total prize pool starts on July 8.

This year’s Smashbox Arena League will be sponsored by Survios and welcomes VR gamers of all ages. The event is set up like traditional sports summer leagues, giving participants competition for up to eight weeks. The cost of entry is $100 per person and comes with Smashbox League T-shirt in addition to league access.

The prize pool will be distributed at the end of the Smashbox Arena League to the top three teams. The competition starts on July 8 and the top two performing teams will be selected on August 19. Those teams will face off in the grand championship on August 26 and it will be livestreamed on the If you’d like to play Smashbox Arena without the pressure of live competition in a VR arcade, BigBox VR’s game is available on Oculus Home or SteamVR and can be played on the Rift and HTC Vive. It features a single player story mode and online multiplayer supplemented by AI bots if there aren’t enough players around. If you want to participate in Smashbox Arena League, check to see which venue is the closest to you via the list below and Full list of competing Ctrl V venues

Brampton (West)
Calgary (Glenmore)
Cambridge
Edmonton (West)
Guelph
Hamilton
Howell
Lethbridge
Lindsay
London
Mississauga
North York
Red Deer
St Catherines
Waterloo
Winnipeg

Grand championship winners will walk away with $3,000 to split between the three team members. Second place gets $1,000 and third place takes home $500. Check out the CtrlV, smashbox arena

The post Smashbox Arena League VR Dodgeball Competition Includes $4,500 In Prizes appeared first on UploadVR.

May 27, 2018

Something For The Weekend: End Of May Deals For PlayStation VR

With May soon coming to an end it is time for the last Something For The Weekend for the month and this time VRFocus brings you a selection of some of the latest deals on virtual reality (VR) titles from the PlayStation store. With the PlayStation VR home to a number of impressive titles, covering a wide range of genres, there is bound to be something for everyone this weekend. As always, be sure to check back every weekend for even more deals right here on VRFocus.

The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim VR

“The achievement made by The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim VR is one by way of both hardware and design to capitalise upon this. The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim VR’s level of immersion is simply fantastic, and while Bethesda Softworks could well have gone the route of DOOM VFR and created a shorter spin-off experience, developing a brand new The Elder Scrolls instalment specifically for VR would have taken many years and far too much in the way of resources for what is still a nascent audience. As it stands some may find the price point of the videogame a bitter pill to swallow, but for those who dreamed of a truly immersive role-playing experience, The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim VR is simply the best opportunity available today.” – Read VRFocus’ Editor Kevin Joyce’s review of The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim VR.

The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim VR is available now for PlayStation VR for £24.99 (GBP) down from £49.99.

Knockout League

Have you ever wanted to punch a top hat wearing octopus in the face? Well, in Knockout League that is something you can do. Enter the ring in this arcade boxing title where you will need to go up against a crazy cast of characters to become the champion of the Knockout League in immersive boxing action. Dodge with your body and attack with your hands as you make use of the 1:1 movement to unleash a deadly assault of punches on your foe. Think you can be the champion?

Knockout League is currently available for £15.99 (GBP) down from the usual £24.99 with PlayStation Plus members able to save an extra 10%.

End-Space-Oculus-Screenshot-1

End Space

Jump into the pilot seat of the most advanced starfighter the United Trade Consortium has ever built and enter intense space dogfights in this immersive title. Track targets using your gaze and blast them away with a range of powerful and visually impressive weapons. With plenty of missions and upgrades to unlock as you fight to protect the UTC’s secret jump-drive technology from the Tartarus Liberation Front insurgents. Welcome to the fight, pilot.

End Space is available now on PlayStation VR for £7.99 (GBP) down from £15.99.

Waddle Home

“Waddle Home is a game about life as a benevolent alien who loves saving penguins and solving puzzles. Guide penguins through a snowy world filled with traps, guards, and ice, and lead them back home to the Rescue Ship. Bop blocks and toggle switches to help them escape nasty traps and dodge those pesky robot guards. Save the penguins as fast as you can, and collect all three eggs in each level to get a high score!”

Waddle Home is available now for £3.29 (GBP) on sale from the usual £7.99 for PlayStation VR.

ApexConstruct_Screen_04

Apex Construct

“Despite some minor gripes, its clear that Apex Construct represents the way forward for VR videogames, an absorbing, intriguing experience that draws you in with a rich world complete with its own history and mysteries to be unravelled as well as a fluid combat system. Apex Construct is the standard by which future VR titles will be judged, and an indicator that VR has stepped up its game.” – Read VRFocus’ Staff Writer Rebecca Hills-Duty’s review of Apex Construct.

Apex Construct is only £17.99 (GBP) down from £24.99 with PlayStation Plus members saving an extra 10%.

VR Ping Pong screenshot 2

VR Ping Pong

If you are looking to lose yourself in some immersive Ping Pong fun then look no further than VR Ping Pong. With a number of different gameplay modes and plenty of immersive environments to play in, Table Tennis fans are sure to enjoy their time in this virtual recreation of the popular sport. With a number of difficulty levels available for the AI in each mode players can fine tune the experience and work their way up to being the ultimate VR Ping Pong champion.

VR Ping Pong is available now on PlayStation VR for £5.79 (GBP) down from £11.99.

Statik

“Statik is a superb example of a puzzle game, intelligent, immersive and lots of fun to play. The subtle story woven through is interesting, the puzzles challenging without being too frustrating. VR is used superbly as an integral part of the experience and not a tacked on gimmick. Definitely worth picking up for anyone who owns a PlayStation VR.” – Read VRFocus’ Staff Writer Rebecca Hills-Duty’s review of Statik.

Statik is currently £7.39 (GBP) down from £15.99 with PlayStation Plus members able to save a further 10%.

VR Karts

“The checkered flag is about to drop on a new Virtual Reality racing experience!Get in the drivers’ seat of your own customized kart and race against other players. Race through stunning environments, collect power ups and use weapons to gain the upper hand over other racers. VR Karts is a fun and family-friendly racing game designed specifically for Virtual Reality.”

VR Karts is currently on sale for £9.49 (GBP) down from £19.99 for PlayStation VR.

Rick and Morty: Virtual Rick-ality

If you are looking for a title that is sure to make laugh out loud and enjoy interacting with two popular character then Rick and Morty: Virtual Rick-ality is for you. Be a fan of the show or not, there is something for everyone in this title. Packed full of mini-games and moments to experience, portals to strange worlds to explore and even puzzles to solve, players will be lost within the world of Rick and Morty for sometime with this title and it is sure to be a crazy ride. Time to go Morty!

Rick and Morty: Virtual Rick-ality is currently available for £15.99 (GBP) down from £24.99 for PlayStation VR.

Smashbox Arena

“The core gameplay itself is fun, amounting to what is essentially a game of hardcore dodgeball. There are strategic elements involving dodging, blocking, rebounds and power-ups as well as careful positioning which can provide plenty of entertainment if you manage to get a full group of humans together. Which unless you have a lot of friends who all have a PlayStation VR and a copy of Smashbox Arena, you probably won’t, since the servers seem to be very sparsely populated. This is partially compensated for with the addition of AI bots, but half the time, the bots are as dumb as rocks and cause more problems than they solve.” – Read VRFocus’ Staff Writer Rebecca Hills-Duty’s review of Smashbox Arena.

Smashbox Arena is available for only £9.99 (GBP) right now on sale from £24.99 for PlayStation VR.

That is all for this week but remember that VRFocus gathers all the best sales and deals every week, so check back next weekend at the same time to discover more.

August 10, 2017

Review: Smashbox Arena

As virtual reality (VR) matures and expands, several titles have been hopping over from other platforms. One such title is Smashbox Arena, a title that developer BigBox VR have created to be part of the tried-and-true arena shooter genre, and one that previously launched on Steam for HTC Vive and Oculus Rift. How does its PlayStation VR version fare?

The first thing that strikes you is how bland everything looks. Though there are no serious graphical flaws, the flat, cartoonish style does little to distinguish Smashbox Arena, and even less to show off the power of the PlayStation 4, and some of the more detailed backgrounds and environments don’t quite seem to match the smooth, plastic-like appearance of the avatars.

Secondly, there are few options available to alter to comfort, preference or playstyle. There are no control options and no comfort options, not even a proper pause menu. The controls as they are work fine, though at times feel very stiff and awkward, and the teleportation movement seems to be very sluggish for such as fast-paced title.

Smashbox Arena Screenshot 2

The core gameplay itself is fun, amounting to what is essentially a game of hardcore dodgeball. There are strategic elements involving dodging, blocking, rebounds and power-ups as well as careful positioning which can provide plenty of entertainment if you manage to get a full group of humans together. Which unless you have a lot of friends who all have a PlayStation VR and a copy of Smashbox Arena, you probably won’t, since the servers seem to be very sparsely populated. This is partially compensated for with the addition of AI bots, but half the time, the bots are as dumb as rocks and cause more problems than they solve.

The single player Story Mode feels very tacked on, amounting to little more than an extended tutorial against AI bots, and for something called ‘story mode’ there is little to no story involved.

Smashbox Arena image 1

Smashbox Arena was blatantly built to be a multiplayer title, but the lack of cross-platform play and sparsely populated servers for the PlayStation VR hurts it a lot. The single-player mode is barely worth the time, and it lacks any sort of depth. If you have lots of friends to play with online, it might be worth a look, but otherwise, there are better titles available.

40%

Awesome

Verdict

July 25, 2017

Smashbox Arena Launches Today for PlayStation VR

Previously a success on the HTC Vive, developers BigBox VR have launched multiplayer arena shooter Smashbox Arena on to the PlayStation VR today.

Smashbox Arena was designed specifically for virtual reality (VR). The project began as a way to explore VR and its capabilities and limitations, but once BigBox VR founders Gabe Brown and Chia Chin added guns and multiplayer, they discovered how much fun it was, and the genesis of Smashbox Arena began.

Originally launched on HTC vive on Oculus Rift, it became a highly-rate multiplayer VR title and its players logged over 43,000 of gameplay. The developers announced in May that there were plans to release the title on to PlayStation VR, and Smashbox Arena is now available on the PlayStation Store for $29.99 (USD).

Smashbox Arena Screenshot 1

Smashbox Arena is a physics-driven title. Players must rapidly learn the layout of the arena in order to dodge and seek cover from enemy fire before finding the best way to launch their own assault. The power-ups that are periodically made available are over-the-top items such as giant boulders.

“A team deathmatch-style, extreme dodgeball game gets as competitive, and high-spirited as you’d imagine” said Eric Hine, executive producer at Archiact, “Smashbox Arena shows how designing a VR game around competitive team play makes for an over-the-top entertaining experience with a surprisingly high skill ceiling and great re-playability. We’re thrilled to have partnered with the talented BigBox VR team to bring all this fun to PlayStation VR fans.”

You can watch the PlayStation VR launch trailer for Smashbox Arena below.

VRFocus will bring you further news on Smashbox Arena as it becomes available.

July 25, 2017

‘Smashbox Arena’ Now Available on PSVR – Launch Trailer

Smashbox Arena, one of SteamVR’s best rated titles, today launches on Playstation VR. The game plays like a mashup of a first person shooter and a game of dodgeball.

Smashbox Arena originally launched for the HTC Vive in late 2016. On SteamVR the game has been well received, holding an impressive 97% positive rating among user reviews and has seen regular updates since launch (including official Rift & Touch support on SteamVR). The game has since found its way onto the Oculus store as well, and today a version comes specially made to PSVR priced at $30 ($10 more than the PC version; we’ve reached out to the developers to understand why).

With singleplayer and multiplayer modes, Smashbox Arena is a knockout style shooter where teams of 3 vs. 3 aim to eliminate each other by firing dodgeball-like projectiles. With just one life per round, the tension amps up as the match winds down to the final combatants. Powerups like shields, exploding balls, sniper balls, homing balls, and more, add strategy and diversity to the gameplay. Players get around the maps with teleportation, but there’s also an emphasis on physical movement to dodge incoming fire and to hide and & shoot behind cover.

Though the game is available on all three major VR platforms, unfortunately there’s no cross-play between headsets supported at this time. If you’re looking for great games to play across headsets, check out our list of the best cross-play multiplayer VR games.

The post ‘Smashbox Arena’ Now Available on PSVR – Launch Trailer appeared first on Road to VR.

July 16, 2017

Smashbox Arena Developers Release PlayStation VR Gameplay Videos

Competitive multiplayer title Smashbox Arena has already delighted players on the Oculus Rift and HTC Vive with its simple, fast-paced combat, and back in May, developers BigBox VR announced that they were bringing the title to PlayStation VR, and have now released three videos showing what it will look like on Sony’s virtual reality (VR) platform.

Smashbox Arena is a team-based first-person shooter that offers fast-paced action and over-the-top physics driver power-ups to make the action within the arena maps even more ridiculous. The title has a single-player story mode in addition to the multiplayer which delivers three possible difficulty modes and character customisation options that can be unlocked.

Smashbox Arena image 1

The newly released videos cover three areas of Smashbox Arena, the first detailing the available characters, the second covering the different maps than can be battled through and the third focussing on the various power-ups that are on offer, such as Giant Boulders and Sniperballs.

Smashbox Arena will be launched on the PlayStation VR on Tuesday 25^th July, which will be a worldwide launch with North America, Europe and Japan all getting access to the title at the same time. Sadly, while the HTC Vive and Oculus Rift versions offer cross-platform play, that feature will not be available on the PlayStation VR.

You can watch the three PlayStation VR trailer videos for Smashbox Arena below.

VRFocus will bring you further information on Smashbox Arena and other PlayStation VR titles as it becomes available.