Stormland, Insomniac Games’ final Oculus Rift exclusive game published by Oculus Studios, has gone missing from the headset’s digital storefront as has The Unspoken.
That is if you haven’t purchased the games already. We’ve been able to search, find and download Stormland as we already own it but, if we log out of our accounts, we can’t find the game in the store, and the same is the case for The Unspoken. You can still find the games via a Google search but it seems you’re unable to actually buy them. Insomniac’s other Rift titles, The Edge of Nowhere and Feral Rites, remain available for sale.
We’ve reached out to Meta for comment.
Stormland was the last VR game Insomniac released after Sony Interactive Entertainment purchased the developer in 2019. The game was a first-person shooter in which players took on the role of robots that traveled across islands separated by a sea of clouds, fending, taking down enemies and upgrading their inventories. The game featured a co-op element with a friend, though this element wasn’t mandatory. Insomniac did, however, refresh the layout of the Stormland once a week.
The Unspoken, meanwhile, was a competitive spell-casting game. It’s main focus was on online play, though it did add a single-player campaign after launch.
It’s not clear why the games are missing from the store but they wouldn’t be the first Rift exclusives to be taken off of the storefront. In late 2020 the Sanzaru Games-developed Marvel Powers United VR shut down, with its four player co-op going offline and owners being unable to open up the experience from March of last year.
We were quite fond of Stormland, awarding the game a 4/5 star rating back when we did those. “There’s plenty more work to be done, then, but when looking back at the shape of VR shooters over the past three years, Stormland shines as a real achievement,” we said. “Many of its dizzying strands of design are dreamlike in delivery, from the seamless UI and scaling cliff faces with Olympic proficiency to effortlessly surfing its bed of clouds or unloading a rattling barrage of bullets on enemies.”
Following the launch of Half-Life: Alyx and subsequent spikes in virtual reality (VR) adoption rates (more on that later), there’s a real buzz around VR at the moment which is highly encouraging but tempered slightly by one key omission: the lack of AAA videogames in VR. As with most new technologies, game development to date in the VR industry has been almost exclusively the preserve of small, independent studios. The reasons for that are clear: small studios can operate off reduced budgets and so are more willing to experiment with new technologies and game design techniques.
These indie studios have done an incredible job, but it’s undeniable that as the VR space matures and grows the lack of large, highly polished AAA titles, particularly from key third party studios, is a notable weakness in the overall offering. Anyone who’s recently finished Half-Life: Alyx and then craves a similar experience will know that feeling only too well. However, I would argue that now is the perfect time for AAA studios to take the plunge. The key reasons being:
Flatscreen AAA game design has largely stagnated and gamers are desperate for a proper ‘next generation’ experience when the new console generation begins.
Core VR game design principles are now well established and have been successfully implemented in a large range of titles.
Unlike in the over-saturated AAA flatscreen space, there is not much competition in the AAA VR space – any new AAA game is a big event.
AAA flatscreen games have lost their sense of wonder and excitement
I’ve been playing a lot of Assassin’s Creed Odyssey during lockdown as I managed to snag it cheaply on Steam during a sale. It’s the first AAA flatscreen game I’ve played in a long time. Its a fun videogame and I’m enjoying it, but I find that it just washes over me and that it very much feels like a game I’ve played before. The incredible amount of polish and craftsmanship on display is impressive, but it can’t help but feel generic and similar to any number of other flatscreen open-world titles. There’s no moment of genuine excitement when I discover a new area, enemy, weapon or mission. There’s no sense of wonder as I’ve seen variations of what it has to offer many times before, just at a lower resolution and graphical fidelity. This is not an issue specific to Assassin’s Creed Odyssey. Look at any AAA flatscreen videogame released in the last three years and it’s hard to escape the thought that there really hasn’t been much progress – outside of improved visuals and scale – since the PS3/Xbox 360 days.
It’s a well-recognised problem in the AAA space that developers have been struggling with for many years: how do you make the latest iteration of a game feel new and exciting when the input method – a gamepad or mouse and keyboard – is essentially the same as it has been for two decades. How do they make a videogame feel truly next-gen outside of improved graphics? VR is the answer. Half-Life: Alyx demonstrated how powerfully new an established franchise can feel when it leverages the potential of VR. It absolutely felt like a Half-Life game, even down to having a very similar, linear structure to previous outings. However, by being in VR, and leveraging what VR does best (and notably by not taking any big risks with VR mechanics – most of Alyx’s mechanics have been seen before), it is elevated far beyond a typical sequel. The ability to actually stand in City 17 and manipulate objects in that environment with virtual hands while shooting and reloading a gun and using real-world objects like you would in real life instils a sense of presence and wonder into an existing template that is fresh, fun, immersive and feels truly next-gen.
Just imagine what Ubisoft could do with Splinter Cell or Assassin’s Creed in VR, or Rockstar with Grand Theft Auto or Activision with Call of Duty. As discussed further in this piece, the building blocks are already there. In many ways, it’s the simplest way for the big studios to breathe new life into their existing franchises.
Core VR game design principles have now been established
Crucially for AAA developers, many key VR mechanics have already been discovered and tested with a sizable player base and so they wouldn’t be starting with a blank piece of paper. Movement in VR can be implemented effectively via smooth locomotion or teleportation. There are well-established comfort settings for those who suffer from motion sickness. Climbing is huge fun in VR and numerous videogames have been built around that core mechanic. Gunplay in VR is realistic and intuitive and games like Boneworks, PavlovVR and Hot Dogs, Horseshoes & Hand Grenades have shown how immersive it is to use a virtual gun just like you would a real life gun. Inventory systems, physics simulations, hand interactions, throwing and sword fighting have all been implemented in numerous videogames and so there is a blueprint for how to successfully incorporate these mechanics into a VR experience.
Hell, one really simple way for a AAA studio to effectively implement VR into their franchise would be to buy an existing VR engine and use that as the foundation for their game. Imagine a Call of Duty that is built off of the Boneworks physics engine and gunplay. That’s a mouth-watering prospect. The key point here is that we’re now several years into VR development and a lot of the significant design barriers to entry have been removed.
The install base is already sizeable and growing at a fast pace
As has been widely reported, the latest Steam survey pointed to some highly encouraging VR adoption figures during April 2020. Even with coronavirus supply shortages making it difficult to buy a headset – the Valve Index has been sold out for months and Oculus headsets have only just come back to the market – the launch of Half-Life: Alyx saw almost a million additional VR users connecting headsets to Steam VR over the previous month and overall the userbase has been growing rapidly month on month over the past year.
This huge spike in users now means that it’s estimated that 1.91% of Steam users actively use a VR headset which equates to roughly 2.7 million VR users on Steam (and it’s worth noting that a considerable amount of Oculus PC VR users don’t use Steam). Sony has sold over 5 million PlayStation VR headsets and while Oculus has never been forthcoming with sales numbers we know the Quest has been a big success – Mark Zuckerberg recently stated that “Quest is selling as fast as we can make them”. All of this is to say that across the various platforms there is a significant amount of existing users and crucially the install base is growing rapidly month-on-month. With the next generation of consoles around the corner and with Sony reportedly committing to a PlayStation VR 2, Oculus seemingly about to bring out a new headset and Valve fully supporting VR, not only is there a sizeable market already but it looks highly probable that it will be an exponentially bigger one in the coming years.
Any AAA VR release will be a BIG event
As of today, we’ve only really had one proper AAA title in VR – Half-Life: Alyx. Lone Echo, Asgard’s Wrath, Blood & Truth and Stormland come close, but in reality the scale of those projects and the teams that worked on them were relatively small compared to a flatscreen AAA project. I’m also not including AAA titles that have been adapted for VR – such as The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim VR and Fallout4 VR– as while enjoyable they weren’t built from the ground up for VR and so don’t fully take advantage of what the technology has to offer.
As such, and as seen with the release of Half-Life: Alyx, a AAA release is a big event in both the VR space and in the broader gaming community as players react (sometimes not so positively) to seeing a beloved franchise in a new medium. The VR community were hyping Half-Life: Alyx for months before its release and the gaming community is still talking about it now, mainly due to how it’s unlike anything anyone’s seen before. With so many AAA games releasing in the flatscreen market – most have annual releases – gamers find it hard to keep up with and play each AAA release and they have in many ways lost that ‘big event’ release buzz.
Half-Life: Alyx has reportedly sold over 1 million units since its launch at the end of March, it was played by over 40,000 players concurrently on Steam just after launch and was also watched by 300,000 Twitch viewers on release day – by far the most viewed VR title ever and comparable, and in many cases surpassing, AAA flatscreen games. Furthermore, the amount of press coverage and articles written about Half-Life: Alyx has been huge. Sure, some of this has been down to the return of a gaming franchise that hasn’t had a release for over 10 years but much of it is due to the decision Valve made to make it in VR. There has been a big and enduring buzz around the game and it has felt like a real video game milestone event.
VR as part of the AAA space
This is all not to say that somehow AAA VR videogames should replace indie VR titles or that we should no longer have flatscreen AAA games. There is, of course, a place for both of them in the wider gaming ecosystem – I’ve enjoyed Assassins Creed Odyssey and find it relaxing, and we need indies to keep pushing the boundaries of what’s possible – but it’s undeniable that flatscreen AAA games have lost some of their wonder and excitement and a bump in resolution and fidelity will not be enough to provide that crucial next-gen experience. Whilst at one stage developing in VR was a daunting prospect, the core mechanics have now been worked out and there’s a healthy and rapidly growing user base that’s craving AAA content. It’s time for the big studios to get involved.
No matter who you are it’s almost a given that at points you just want to shut the world out and cocoon somewhere to relax and unwind. This can take many forms, from delving into a good book, binge-watching the latest Netflix series or listening to your favourite album. Of course, videogames can also provide a superb means of escape and virtual reality (VR) titles take that one step further. So here are a few of VRFocus’ favourites.
OrbusVR: Reborn
If you want plenty of content then massively multiplayer online role-playing games (MMORPGs) are a good place to start. Which means you should take a look at OrbusVR: Reborn by Ad Alternum.
Originally released in 2017, OrbusVR was reborn in 2019 expanding the experience with more content as well as improving the visuals among other tweaks. While you can adventure alone, the title is best experienced with others. Go on raids, explore dungeons, fight monsters and just enjoy a huge open world. Plus there’s a free demo over on Steam so you can try it first.
If single-player adventuring is more your thing then Turtle Rock Games’ latest, Journey of the Gods is another worthy of your time. An RPG with a bit of a Legend of Zelda vibe, this about saving townsfolk, upgrading weapons and generally fighting lots of big monsters.
There’s a twist in the gameplay in the fact that you get to unlock some god-like powers, transforming you into a massive deity that can crash trees, make impassible terrain passable and rain down lightning bolts onto enemies.
Some videogames just don’t need an explanation, it’s simply best to just play them and go with the flow. Paper Beastfor PlayStation VR is one of those titles.
Wonderfully esoteric with its gameplay design, Paper Beast is an amalgamation of genres with a story putting you inside a living, breathing digital world made up of random code from big data. Interact with the strange creatures which inhabit the world, solve environmental puzzles and begin a journey with no dialogue or written cues.
Rather than losing yourself on an adventure why not lose yourself in the music. There are an ever growing number of rhythm-action titles which could have made this list but Beat Saber has the right mix of energetic gameplay, infectious tunes and wide platform support.
The experience has evolved considerably since its initial release, adding more music packs, allowing gamers to create their own beat maps and throwing in some 360-degree challenges for good measure. You might start on normal difficulty but soon the desire to complete Expert+ will take hold.
If you love as much physical interaction as possible in your VR experiences then Stress Level Zero’s Boneworks is certainly one to consider.
The studio has painstakingly ensured that Boneworks physics, from using guns to swinging a sledgehammer is as closer to their real-world counterparts as possible. Offering a single-player, story-based adventure, with puzzles to solve and enemies to deal with, Boneworks is recommended for those with previous VR experience due to the nature of the mechanics.
Plenty has been said about this definitive VR title from Valve, offering some of the best immersive gameplay you’ll find anywhere.
Whether you’re a fan of the original series of videogames or coming into the franchise fresh, you can play Half-Life: Alyxlike a normal single-player FPS or experiment with all the little additions which Valve has dotted around. One thing is for sure, you’ll want to dive straight back in after the first playthrough. Plus, there are all the community mods to come.
A superb title which arrived late in 2019 from Insomniac Games, Stormland offers a free-flowing experience that lets you just enjoy being in a VR world.
With a single-player narrative at its core, inhabiting a robot form you can run around and take down enemies, clamber over any rock face or building, and then glide between the islands which make up the areas. Better still, bring a mate in for some co-op gameplay plus once the campaign is complete, each week the Stormland will change, providing new reasons to return.
Some may feel its the same old gameplay simply rehashed with fancy new visuals and sounds – and it essentially is – but that doesn’t mean VRFocus doesn’t love playing it.
With a myriad of modes to challenge you, Tetris Effecthas an almost hypnotic effect as all those fancy visuals dance around your vision, changing as you complete each line and score more points.
The PC version might be exclusive to the Epic Games Store but that’s no reason to ignore it. If you love puzzle titles then this is a VR classic.
Stormland released in November last year and we called it VR’s slickest shooter yet, even if it does have a few issues here and there. The game is now on sale at 20% off for an unspecified limited time, bringing the game down from $40 to just $30. This is a pretty decent deal for a game that’s still relatively recently released. Plus, Stormland also supports co-operative play, so if you already own the game, the sale might be a good way to encourage your friends to pick it up and start fighting the Tempest alongside you.
Overall, Jamie was a big fan of the game in his review. “When looking back at the shape of VR shooters over the past three years, Stormland shines as a real achievement. Many of its dizzying strands of design are dreamlike in delivery, from the seamless UI and scaling cliff faces with Olympic proficiency to effortlessly surfing its bed of clouds or unloading a rattling barrage of bullets on enemies.”
Will you be picking up Stormland now that’s on sale, or have you already been playing for a while now? Let us know in the comments.
Last year Sony Interactive Entertainment acquired Insomniac Games, the developers of critically-acclaimed and commercially successful games for both VR and non-VR formats.
Some of their standout non-VR games include Marvel’s Spider-Man on PS4, the Ratchet & Clank series, and the Spyro the Dragon series on PlayStation 1. All of the studio’s VR work was only for Facebook’s Oculus platform, such as Stormland, The Unspoken, and Edge of Nowhere.
We didn’t know how much the price was, but it was recently revealed in an SEC filing that Sony paid $229 million for the acquisition and most of that was entirely paid in cash. According to the filing, as cited on Twitter by ZhugeEX:
“The consideration for this acquisition of 24,895 million yen (229 million U.S. dollars) was mainly paid in cash. The amount may be adjusted by the end of fiscal year ending March 31, 2020, based on the final closing date financial statements of Insomniac Games. As a result of this acquisition, Insomniac Games has become a wholly-owned subsidiary of Sony.”
The filing goes on to state that Sony has acquired $165 million of goodwill and $62 million of intangible assets.
This is honestly one of the least surprising acquisitions in recent memory given their long history of working with Sony on exclusive titles across various franchises and even more so when considering their more recent VR experience as well. Having a developer like Insomniac is going to be a huge boost for the potential of PSVR going forward.
There’s no news on what Insomniac is working on next, but we’ll report on it as soon as we find out. Let us know what you think of the news down in the comments below!
With over 20 different award categories, the 23rd annual DICE Awards have released their list of finalists, including two entire categories just for immersive reality, and it features lots of VR games across multiple awards.
The winners will be announced at the DICE Awards ceremony on Thursday, February 13th at Aria Resort Las Vegas as the culmination of the week-long industry gathering at the 2020 D.I.C.E. Summit. For the fourth year in a row the show will be hosted by Greg Miller and Jessica Chobot.
At the DICE Awards the two VR-focused categories are Immersive Reality Technical Achievement and Immersive Reality Game of the Year. You can see the full list of nominees below:
Immersive Reality Technical Achievement
Asgard’s Wrath
Blood & Truth
Pistol Whip
Stormland
Westworld Awakening
Immersive Reality Game of the Year
Asgard’s Wrath
Blood & Truth
Pistol Whip
The Curious Tale of the Stolen Pets
Trover Saves the Universe
Both are very good lists. Every game nominated in these two DICE Award categories made appearances in our own Best VR Of 2019 Awards and they’ve done a great job picking titles that represent a wide gamut of what VR can offer. And it’s focused on actually new releases.
Beyond those we’ve also got some VR and VR-optional games showing up in other categories too. PSVR-exclusive Concrete Genie, which includes some side VR content, is nominated in both Outstanding Achievement in Art Direction and Outstanding Technical Achievement — deservedly when taking the entire game into account. We’ve also got another PSVR-exclusive getting some love with Golem showing up in the nominee list for Outstanding Achievement in Original Music Composition. Finally, the VR-optional DiRT Rally 2.0 is nominated for a DICE Award in the Racing Game of the Year category.
Who do you think will take home the honors for each category at the DICE Awards next month? Let us know down in the comments below!
After a slow start, 2019 rounded out to be an undeniably strong year for consumer VR, setting up a springboard into a big 2020. Here’s an overview of the major happenings in VR over the last year, and a glimpse of what will come in 2020.
5 Major New Headsets and What They Mean for the Market
2019 started out slow as the industry waited with baited breath for the launch of the latest wave of headsets, but things started heating up once they finally hit the market. Here’s a look at the biggest headset launches of 2019 and what they’ve meant to the industry so far.
Oculus Quest
Image courtesy Oculus
Oculus Quest is surely the most important headset to launch in 2019. We called it the “first great standalone VR headset” in our review, thanks to a reasonable $400 price point, full 6DOF tracking (which allows it to play games functionally on par with high-end VR headsets) and no PC required.
As a standalone VR headset built on smartphone hardware, Quest can’t compete in the graphics department against high-end PC VR headsets, but there’s no question that it’s the class leader in ease-of-use (a place where tethered headsets are still struggling). And if you happen to have a gaming PC anyway, Quest also doubles as a PC VR headset.
On those fronts, Rift S seems to have largely succeeded; its $400 launch price was half of the launch price of the original Rift with Touch controllers, and we certainly haven’t been missing the external sensors of the original since getting our hands on Rift S. Thanks to the backing of a strong content library, Rift S packs a lot of value, making it easy to recommend as the best entry-level headset for PC VR.
Valve Index
Image courtesy Valve
After tons of speculation, Valve finally jumped into the VR headset space with its own first-party hardware in 2019. While the company had originally collaborated with HTC to create the Vive, this time around Valve opted to handle everything on their own.
In our review we called Index “the enthusiast’s choice” thanks to category-leading visuals, ergonomics, and audio, as well as solid controllers. And while it’s a lovely headset once you’re inside, there’s no denying the significant $1,000 price tag and sub-par ease-of-use due to external tracking sensors and last-gen boundary setup.
Still, Index is a hugely important headset because it acts as a high bar that future headsets can strive toward and demonstrates the continued existence of an enthusiast class of VR consumers who are willing to pay for a high-end VR experience. But it’s also made for an awkward relationship between Valve and HTC who are now positioned more as competitors than partners.
Vive Cosmos
Image courtesy HTC
In 2019 HTC launched Vive Cosmos, its first true successor to the original Vive headset. Like Facebook with Rift S, HTC opted to make its latest headset easier to use by ditching external tracking sensors for inside-out tracking.
In our review we called Cosmos “a decent headset up against stiff competition.” Indeed, worst-in-class tracking and iffy ergonomics has left Cosmos overshadowed by the considerably less expensive Rift S and the more expensive but higher-fidelity Index. And while HTC had positioned Cosmos as a move toward a more user-friendly headset, the device’s awkward reliance on Steam (despite a Viveport front-end) arguably takes it a step back in user-experience compared to the original Vive.
While Microsoft and its other VR partners seem to have largely abandoned the Windows VR platform, HP surprised us in 2019 with the launch of Reverb, its second VR headset. While it’s still stuck with Windows VR (and the worst-in-class controllers that come standard with such headsets), Reverb leads in pixel density, making it a compelling choice for simulator enthusiasts who tend to value resolution above other specs.
While Reverb’s launch in 2019 shows that HP is seriously committed to PC VR, it hasn’t done much to alleviate the feeling that Microsoft is knowingly allowing the Windows VR platform to wither away.
Big VR Game Launches and Growing Developer Success
Since the first consumer VR headsets hit the market in 2016, developers have been steadily honing in on what makes a great (and successful) VR game. While it’s been a painfully slow process for developers and consumers alike, 2019 saw the launch of games which have objectively moved the needle forward in VR game design and set new records for developer success. Here’s a look at the most important moments in VR gaming in 2019.
Beat Saber’s Full Release and Developer Acquisition by Facebook
Image courtesy Beat Games
It wasn’t long after Beat Saber’s early access launch in 2018 that it was a clear success for its small indie developer Beat Games. Later that year the game launched on PSVR where it remains one of the best rated games on the platform. In 2019, Beat Games added new music & features and brought feature-parity to all versions of the game, culminating in a full launch out of early access alongside the launch of Quest on May 21st, 2019.
Even before the game launched on Quest, it reached a huge milestone as the first VR title—as far as we know—to have sold 1 million copies. This staggering success caught the attention of Facebook, leading to the surprise acquisition of Beat Games. This was likely primarily a defensive move in order to keep platform competitors from getting their hands on what is surely Quest’s most important game. But there’s an offensive element too: Facebook seems keen to accelerate the game’s adoption of new Oculus platform technologies aimed at driving user engagement.
Asgard’s Wrath Delivers the First Great VR RPG
Image courtesy Oculus
Purportedly VR’s largest game production yet released, Asgard’s Wrath capitalized on the longstanding desire for a meaty VR-native RPG. Players were treated to some 30 hours of content and a game which has been called a “must buy” by many. We thought enough of the title that we gave it our 2019 Game of the Year Award for the Oculus Rift.
The Oculus Studios-backed title appears to have been a success, but it also sets a very high bar for third-party (and mostly indie) developers to follow.
Stormland’s Innovative Open World and Developer Acquisition by Sony
Image courtesy Insomniac Games
Developed by veteran game and VR studio Insomniac Games, Stormland raised the bar in VR open-world game design with an innovative take on locomotion which offers players a sense of large scale freedom rarely seen elsewhere in VR. The game successfully combines a handful of different locomotion schemes and integrates them with satisfying combat for a core gameplay loop that’s easy to love.
We expect VR game design concepts from Stormland to proliferate into VR titles in 2020 and beyond. For its contributions we gave the title our 2019 Design Award for Excellence in Locomotion.
While Facebook scooped up Beat Saber’s Beat Games, Sony acquired Stormland’s Insomniac Games in 2019. Though the company probably bought the studio primarily for its success in the non-VR space, it was a strategic blow to Oculus nonetheless.
Blood & Truth Proves PSVR is Still Going Strong
Image courtesy SIE London Studio
Blood & Truth was PSVR’s biggest game to launch in 2019 and managed to delight players with an action-packed narrative full of interesting moments. Blood & Truth is an impressively crafted experience that is not only expertly designed around the limitations of the aging PSVR, but even manages to raise the technical bar for character rendering and performances on any VR platform, even against much more powerful PC hardware.
By making nearly everything in the game physical and interactive, Boneworks delivers on player’s expectations of agency in a way that often goes far beyond its contemporaries. In the game, just about every object, enemy, and weapon is physically interactive, leading to moments where novel ideas—like, say, using a coffee mug as a melee weapon—actually work. While the heavy emphasis on physics can be frustrating and wonky at times, it’s hard not to feel a sense of added embodiment when your ideas about what’s possible in the game world are satisfied in a realistic fashion.
For its part, Boneworks is a flag in the ground which represents perhaps the most interactive physics sandbox seen in VR to date, and a proof point that glimpses the immersive benefits which come from more realistic virtual interactions—something we expect to see developers expand on into 2020 and beyond.
Star Wars: Vader Immortal Successfully Brings Big IP Into VR
Image courtesy ILMxLAB
While the number of great VR games is steadily growing, only a small handful of titles so far have been based on major franchises, and of those that are, even fewer still have actually been made from the ground-up for VR.
Star Wars: Vader Immortal is shining example of bringing a massively popular intellectual property into VR in a way that feels authentic and enjoyable. It’s key to have major franchises jumping into the VR landscape to pique the interest of mainstream consumers who may not be interested in VR as a technology unto itself; it’s even more important that the execution of big IP in VR is done well so that new users don’t get a bad taste from their first experience.
On that note, Vader Immortal—which was released in three parts over the course of 2019—hits all the right notes. It’s engaging and easy to play, thanks to a focus on narrative and immersion, rather than raw gameplay, making it a great first-time VR experience; it’s also one of the most visually impressive games available on Quest. So it’s no wonder why we gave the game our 2019 Game of the Year Award for Quest.
While only a small handful of indie VR studios so far have found this sort of ongoing success, Superhot VR shows that, for projects of the right scope, there’s considerable (and growing) developer opportunity in VR.
Peering Into 2020
So, 2019 was a big year for VR in many ways, but what does 2020 hold? Here’s a few reason why we think 2020 will be VR’s biggest year yet.
Oculus Quest 2
Image courtesy Oculus
There’s no doubt that Facebook has been happy with the traction of its latest standalone VR headset, Oculus Quest. The company is moving quickly to build out the headset’s software features—like adding hand-tracking and PC support with Oculus Link—and it’s all but certain that Quest 2 is already in the works. The big question is when.
While Oculus’ history with the Rift would suggest that it would be several years from one headset to the next, VR as a market is much more defined today than it was back in 2016 when the first headsets hit the market. With the resources Facebook is pouring into Quest, we doubt there will be a similar three year span (like with Rift to Rift S) until the next Quest headset.
There’s reason to believe that Quest 2 will be announced in 2020. The biggest, perhaps, is that the current headset is based on a fairly old Snapdragon 835 processor which puts a pretty hard limit on what can be done with the headset by both Facebook and third-party developers. Moving to a more advanced hardware platform like, say, Qualcomm’s recently announced Snapdragon XR2, would open the door to substantial improvements. Of course, that’ll only happen if the price is right; Quest’s reasonable $400 price point is a big part of its appeal.
And then there’s Oculus Rift 2. Facebook launched its second PC headset, Rift S in early 2019, but it was a bit of a side-grade and cost-down to the original Rift rather than a true successor. In 2019 Facebook showed some very impressive prototype VR headsets with major advances in optics and form-factor, but has yet to announce Rift 2.
The prototype tech seems like it will form the foundation of Rift 2, but there’s a bigger question on our mind: will Quest 2 and Rift 2 be the same headset? This would be an ambitious move, but there’s already some hints that it’s the direction Facebook is headed.
Along with cross-buy between many Quest and Rift apps, Facebook is trying to unify its VR userbase to make a broader audience for developers. If every customer that owned an Oculus headset could play both standalone Quest content and PC-powered Rift content, that’s a huge win for the ecosystem.
Alternatively, rather than combining Quest 2 and Rift 2, Oculus could keep Quest as its lower-end product line while positioning Rift 2 as a piercer but higher-fidelity headset to compete for against Valve’s Index in the VR enthusiast space.
All Eyes on Half-Life: Alyx
Image courtesy Valve
There’s no doubt that the Half-Life: Alyx, the upcoming made-for-VR game from legendary developer Valve, is the most anticipated VR title of 2020. And it will have ramifications beyond the existing VR market; many mainstream gaming and tech publications which rarely (or effectively never) cover VR will be picking up the requisite headsets and hardware to take a good close look at the game when it launches. Half-Life: Alyx will be the biggest opportunity to date for VR to show mainstream gamers why it’s worthy of their attention.
Big Oculus Games on the Horizon
Image courtesy Ready at Dawn
After a string of not-so-great titles from Oculus Studios, Facebook’s first-party VR publisher, between 2017 and mid-2019, Asgard’s Wrath and Stormland ended the year as wins for the Oculus content library.
Oculus Studios also has placed big bets on several highly anticipated games set to launch in 2020: Medal of Honor: Above and Beyond, Lone Echo II, and Phantom: Covert Ops. It remains to be seen whether these games will become key additions to the Oculus content lineup or go down in history as flops, but the outcome is important because Facebook is effectively the only company in town that’s funding big VR titles from third-party studios.
Beyond games, Facebook is also set to launch its brand new social VR platform, Facebook Horizon in 2020. Despite being one of the world’s leading social media companies, Facebook’s social VR strategy has been chaotic at best, but it looks like the company is finally trying to consolidate its efforts into a platform that’s more universally available across its biggest headsets in 2020.
Facebook Horizon | Image courtesy Facebook
Facebook Horizon will be the only first-party social VR application of its kind, and it has the potential to seriously shake up the social VR space which is currently dominated by third-party VR apps.
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What were your personal ‘most important moments’ in VR for 2019 and what are you looking forward to most in 2020? Drop us a line below!
So far VRFocus has listed its favourite PlayStation VR and Oculus Quest videogames of 2019 and now it’s the turn of Oculus Rift. While there will always be some crossover thanks to some awesome multiplatform releases, the headset also has some choice exclusives which aren’t to be missed. So here’s VRFocus’ roundup of the best titles which have arrived this year.
The Best Oculus Rift Games of 2019:
Asgard’s Wrath
There were always going to be certain titles which would make this list, showcasing how far VR development has come over the last few years and Sanzaru Games’ Asgard’s Wrath is most certainly one of them. While it may require a decent VR-capable PC to make the most of the stunning visuals, Asgard’s Wrath also rewards Oculus Rift owners with plenty of close-quarters combat, a rich narrative based on Norse mythology and challenges galore.
As an Oculus Rift exclusive Asgard’s Wrath is one of those videogames all owners of the headset really should own, being a definitive AAA VR experience.
Stormland
Another massive VR exclusive for Oculus Rift was Insomniac Games’ sci-fi adventure Stormland. If you prefer guns and robots over swords and monsters then Stormland is the place to be. Giving players an ever-changing open world to explore set across three cloud levels, Stormlandoffers a campaign allowing for single-player and co-op multiplayer gaming.
With excellent gun mechanics and a mixture of locomotion options including gliding across clouds, Stormland encourages you to explore everywhere by making almost everything climbable. Once the campaign has been completed you can keep returning to find fresh challenges as each week the world changes.
Pistol Whip
If there’s one genre that’s surely captured the imagination of VR developers and consumers alike it’s rhythm-action. There are a number of videogames which could’ve made the cut but VRFocus went from Cloudhead Games’ latest, Pistol Whip.
Designed to make you feel like an action hero badass such as John Wick, on the standard setting you can hit bad guys at distance like a marksman, all to thumping beats. Find the gameplay is a little too easy then start to activate some modifiers like Dead Eye which removes the auto-aim feature. With or without these extras Pistol Whipis super fun to play no matter your VR experience.
Vader Immortal: A Star Wars VR Series
Only available for Oculus Rift and Oculus Quest, Vader Immortal: A Star Wars VR Seriesmade the cut on the standalone headset and equally does the job here. While some may consider this an interactive experience rather than a fully-fledged videogame, however, you want to categorise it ILMxLAB’s trilogy expertly mixes the iconic franchise with VR technology.
Almost putting you inside a Star Wars film where you’re the central character, the main storyline lets you learn skills such as lightsaber duelling and using the force, all taught by Darth Vader himself. Once the campaign is over you can head to the dojo to really practice those skills. Sci-fi and VR fans will enjoy the experience, Star Wars fans will love it.
Groundhog Day: Like Father Like Son
Certainly one of the more unusual (and unexpected) movie tie-ins of 2019, Groundhog Day: Like Father Like Sonis essentially a sequel to the early 90s movie starring Bill Murray. As the title suggests, you play Phil Connors Jr. as he returns to Punxsutawney, Pennsylvania. Caught in another time loop, you need to relive the same day over and over, solving residents problems and other challenges to escape.
VRFocus’four-star review noted: “Groundhog Day: Like Father Like Son is a lovable VR adventure that doesn’t do any disservice to the original material on which it’s based. With a unique art style and engaging story, Groundhog Day: Like Father Like Son offers an unexpectedly enjoyable adventure, and you don’t even need to have seen the film.”
GORN
After blood, carnage, and utter, utter mayhem? Well, then Gorn should be on your want list. Originally a Steam Early Access title from 2017, Gorn saw its official launch back in the summer, allowing players to engage in some brutal gladiatorial combat.
While screenshots make this bloody brawler look gruesome thanks to decapitated heads, smashed in body parts and wall to wall crimson, Gorn doesn’t take itself seriously. The weapons bend and flex like comedy mallets, and enemy bodies all have rag-doll physics. Due to the nature of the combat, the experience is very physical, encouraging you to put in plenty of effort. As VRFocussaid in its review: “Brutal, dumb and addictively fun.”
Angry Birds VR: Isle of Pigs
Resolution Games brought Rovio Entertainment’s massively popular mobile puzzler Angry Birds into VR at the beginning of the year, with the experience offering a fine take on the building destruction videogame. Its inclusion in this listing is thanks to a new update, greatly expanding the gameplay possibilities.
This month saw the studio release a Level Builder option for Angry Birds VR: Isle of Pigsso you can make your own levels and challenge your friends to complete them. Thanks to the level builder Angry Birds VR: Isle of Pigs now offers a far more rounded experience, that doesn’t simply end when he single-player campaign is over. One for puzzle fans the world over.
Espire 1: VR Operative
Digital Lode’s very first VR title Espire 1: VR Operative had a bit of a rocky start, with the initial September launch delayed with 24hrs notice. The delay saw the videogame pushed back a couple of months but that hasn’t hindered the experience. Offering a futuristic plot where you control an Espire model 1 robot to complete missions, the gameplay is designed around stealth, so there are plenty of places to hide, you can scale walls to maintain vantage points and you can tranquilise enemies rather than killing them.
Of course, should you get spotted or simply find a gung-ho approach more exciting then all hell will break loose and guards will start raining down gunfire. Espire 1: VR Operative offers the most standard first-person shooter (FPS) gameplay of any title on this roundup, yet it manages to deliver a videogame for VR fans looking for a Metal Gear Solid or Splinter Cell experience.
Five Nights at Freddy’s: Help Wanted
Who doesn’t love a good scare from a horror videogame? It’s something VR does so well and for 2019 fans were treated to the resurgence of a classic, Five Nights at Freddy’s. Steel Wool Studios kept what made the originals great and expanded upon the concept of original creator Scott Cawthon, including both the classics and brand new mini-games.
If you’ve not heard of the Five Nights universe the basic premise revolves around a theme park with some fairly questionable animatronics. Each mini-game will have you watching CCTV systems or repairing ventilation systems, whilst at the same time trying to stay alive and avoid being…well you know, killed. Not one for the faint of heart, Five Nights at Freddy’s: Help Wanted offers some of the best jump-scares for any VR headset.
Tetris Effect
Possibly a little controversial because the PC version of Tetris Effect is exclusive to the Epic Games Store, that doesn’t mean to say it shouldn’t be included here as its still an awesome VR puzzle experience.
The classic Tetris gameplay is still there, it’s the visuals and audio that have really been overhauled. They are in sync with the gameplay so as you score more points by making lines you’ll be treated to evermore stunning effects which envelop and mesmerize, without distracting from the gameplay. It’s why VRFocus gave Tetris Effect five stars for its review.
Every year is the biggest year for virtual reality. It seems more developers are delving into VR to explore the medium, hone their techniques and find out what works and what doesn’t. Virtual reality fans walk a similar path; every achievement in this burgeoning medium sets a new bar, and a new expectation of something greater as a result.
Now, a little under four years since the big names in hardware released their first generation consumer headsets, we live in a time when a number of VR games have actually approached the best that any gaming platform has to offer. And although this next decade is slated to include big titles from established studios, next-gen hardware built by the biggest in manufacturing, and experiences that teeter on complete photorealism, it’s these formative steps that are defining what’s fun, meaningful, and technically possible.
In our third annual Game of the Year Awards, we again celebrate those VR games—those stories that can only be told through the act of suspending your disbelief and immersing yourself in another world, head-first.
Without further ado, Road to VR’s 2019 Game of the Year Award winners:
Sanzaru Games and Oculus Studios brought Asgard’s Wrath to life as a part of the Oculus initiative to fund less, but bigger titles for the Rift platform. And outside of some PC-to-VR ports, it doesn’t get bigger than this melee-focused action RPG, which puts you squarely in a world that’s surprisingly alive, and boasts a depth in gameplay and visuals that make it truly something to behold. There’s little filler in the 30+ hour adventure, but even if you go for the meatiest bits, you’re looking at very least a hearty helping of gameplay that should last you well into the double digits.
While this Norse-inspired adventure doesn’t occupy an open world, it feels impressively large in scope as you traverse the game’s many layers, including moments when you need to either be god-sized or mortal-sized to solve puzzles and engage in epic combat, and when you have to control your chimeric animal pals to act as both keys to specific puzzles or order around as essential combat partners.
The game’s gestural-based combat takes some time to massage into muscle memory, but once you get down the basic moves of parrying, blocking, and countering, the game really starts to take flight. And when you begin matching those moves with more difficult enemies, many of which have their own combat styles, you’ll quickly learn that Asgard’s Wrath demands nothing short of precision (i.e. no wildly waggling your controller).
How much you like the puzzles or combat is basically subjective, but one thing that’s positively undeniable is the game’s visual finesse. Although object interaction wasn’t notable, Sanzaru expertly showcases its attention to detail as one of the key pillars of immersion. Textures, character animations, level design, all of these things are impressively realized, making it one of those games that begs for your attention long after you complete its twisty-turny story.
Wary of other rhythm games in the wake of Beat Saber (2018) hype? You shouldn’t be, as Cloudhead Games thrusts into the genre with its addictive and mightily impressive title Pistol Whip.
Pistol Whip successfully marries rhythm and shooting, and gets mega style points in the process, as it draws on things like the John Wick film series and Equilibrium (2002) for inspiration. You might also describe it as a fun mashup between Superhot VR (2017), Beat Saber, and Smash Hit (2015).
Like any good arcade game, cognitive load is high in Pistol Whip. You’re tasked with returning fire and dodging incoming bullets from scores of enemies—approaching the sort of flow state you achieve in a bullet hell game, except you’re using your whole upper body to physically flow to the beat. Its bass-heavy music goes particularly well with the punchy tones of your gunshots.
The more you fire on-beat, the more points you get, forcing you to not only shoot accurately, but to feel the music and really immerse yourself in the cool, stylized world. The song library is still a little on the low side, but it doesn’t stop the game’s replayability from being both extremely high and ultimately super satisfying.
PlayStation London Studio heard loud and clear from players of PlayStation VR Worlds (2016), the studio’s PSVR launch title, that VR needed more of the narrative-driven action teased by the ‘London Heist’ mini-game. And in Blood & Truth, the studio delivered, full stop.
Blood & Truth is the fully fleshed out vision that ‘London Heist’ deserved. Set in the midst of two warring crime families, the game takes players on an action-packed journey with strong gun and shooting mechanics, richly detailed environments, and action set pieces made to make you feel like you’re the star of your own action movie. With a smart approach to locomotion (which lets players focus on the fun) and thoughtful details (like the ability to twirl pistols around your finger for extra flair) the game manages to hit a consistently satisfying note throughout.
We also really enjoyed the scene where the player sneaks into a modern art museum, which London Studio used as a genius way to pepper the game with some rather unique VR moments that otherwise would have lacked context.
Blood & Truth is an impressively crafted experience that is not only expertly designed around the limitations of the aging PSVR, but even manages to raise the technical bar for character rendering and performances on any VR platform even against much more powerful PC hardware.
Note: VR games which were available on other VR platforms in previous years were not considered for our Quest Game of the Year award.
From the earliest days of VR you can people talking about how cool it would be to wield a lightsaber. And as VR matured over the years that talk slowly moved toward wanting a full-blown VR game in the Star War universe. There were teases… oh there were teases. ILMxLab itself put out the 10 minute Trials on Tatooine back in 2016, but it only made one thing clear: this wasn’t enough.
That project, along with other pioneering VR work by ILMxLab, like Star Wars: Secrets of the Empire at The VOID, finally culminated in Star Wars: Vader Immortal – Episode I, the first of a three-part narrative adventure on Oculus Quest.
Not only is Vader Immortal – Episode I (and the two following episodes) likely the most successful fusion to date of consumer VR and one of the worlds biggest media franchises, it’s also a stunning proof that you don’t need high-end computing power for an engaging and immersive experience.
For players taking their first steps into VR with Quest, Vader Immortal – Episode I is an ideal opening act that strikes a great balance between narrative and gameplay. Though this singular episode doesn’t run very long, it takes players on a thoughtfully crafted journey that sells the feeling of actually being part of the Star Wars story.
And for the more hardcore gamers that can’t quite get enough Vader Immortal – Episode I‘s ‘lightsaber dojo’ offers up wave-based combat which is challenging and engaging enough to easily triple the time spend in the campaign portion of the game. And as the first part of a trilogy, Episode II & Episode III are already available for players to continue the story.
Five Nights at Freddy’s took the Internet by storm back in 2014 with its memorable jump scares and bizarre re-imagining of the Chuck E. Cheese restaurant/arcade attraction. Now, Steel Wool Studios has rebuilt the game from the ground-up as a Freddy Fazbear-brand VR experience, which includes a number of minigames in addition to the good ol’ classic task of evading the deadly animatronics from your curiously unsafe control room.
Object interaction is well designed in Five Nights at Freddy’s VR, which helps ground you in the world, and it’s really well polished on the graphical side as well. One big part of what makes FNAF VR great though is sound design, as you’re forced to not only look at the CRT monitors to see where each of the monstrous creations could be lurking, but you also have to listen for them clanking around. Ambient noises such as spinning fans and flickering lights really crank up the fear factor as you frantically pick apart what’s an important sound and what’s simply background filler. The lack of sound is even worse, as any FNAF fan can attest to.
Taking a big screaming Freddy to your face when you eventually fail to correctly manage resources is about 100 times scarier in VR; you simply can’t look away. You’d be forgiven if you’d rather watch someone else play from the comfort of your couch and a security blanket than actually dive in head-first based on how immersive and scary Five Nights at Freddy’s VR truly is.
Stormland, like most great VR games, is very much designed around its locomotion. While all too many VR games have players slowly (and boorishly) walking from A to B, Stormland makes moving around part of the game’s core fun.
This is achieved first with an expansive world. The game is set in a world where floating islands jet out of a sea of clouds. The disparate islands are a marvel to look at as the sun strikes them just right, and knowing that they are real places that you can actually travel to makes them that much more alluring.
Second, Stormland makes its movement between important gameplay spaces fun by making it interesting and different from the typical locomotion. When you set foot onto the cloud sea, you immediately kick into speedy slipstream which has you jetting around at high speeds. While we’d normally expect this kind of quick movement in VR could make players dizzy, developer Insomniac Games realized that trying fast locomotion to broad body movements goes a long way to helping players remain comfortable. And so when you slipstream along the clouds, you keep your arms pointed outward in a superman pose and steer based on the direction they face.
Third, Stormland mixes and mashes locomotion schemes to give players freedom. Slipstreaming gets you from island to island quickly, but what do you do when you get there and find that the precipice is hundreds of feet overhead? Nearly everything in the game can be climbed with a laser that projects to nearby objects from the palm of your hands, and you can even grab a wall and ‘fling’ yourself for some extremely quick cliff scaling. And once you’re up there, you can glide naturally through the air to land on unsuspecting opponents or even cruise toward your next island destination.
With these gesture-driven locomotion schemes working together effectively, Stormland gives players a thrilling freedom of movement that’s unsurpassed in other titles. We hope (and expect) to see future VR titles borrow heavily from the foundation of excellent locomotion that Insomniac built into the game.
Available On: Steam (Vive, Rift, Windows VR), PlayStation (PSVR)
Release Date: August 14th, 2019 (VR mode)
PC-to-VR ports aren’t “perfect” for a number of reasons. It can come down to the limitations of aging game engines, a misunderstanding of what makes VR great, or the basic lack of time investment to fully realize a true VR version. Here, No Many’s Sky bucks the trend by presenting a fun and fully-playable VR mode, which thankfully came to all users this summer for free as a part of the base game on PC or PlayStation 4.
The VR mode is basically exactly what you’d imagine from No Man’s Sky in VR;blasting off into space is magical, exploring planets is awe inspiring, riding around in exovehicles is really awesome. It also looks great too, as the rich and vibrant universe demands even more inspection from the immersive viewpoint of a VR headset. That’s not to say we didn’t have our gripes with No Man’s Sky’s VR mode, as it largely ports over the same 2D inventory scheme as in the flatscreen version, and suffers from some clunk around the edges, the latter of which seems to have gotten better over the course of the last few updates.
But what really attracts us to No Man’s Sky is the utter vastness of the universe. The game is rife with opportunities to become a pirate, trader, fighter, bounty hunter, farmer—so much so that every quality-of-life update seems to tip the balance in favor of staying in the VR headset as opposed to just firing the game up on a flatscreen—the true mark of a great VR adaptation.
Available On: Oculus (Rift), Steam (Index, Vive, Rift)
Release Date: August 27th, 2019 (Early Access)
Until You Fall might seem like an odd choice for an Excellence in UI accolade, but the game succeeds here by knowing what to avoid in the game as much as what to add to it.
This rogue-lite melee combat game does a lot well, but in the interface department it makes several especially smart choices. For one, Schell Games was smart enough to realize that—in a game where players would not be using weapons other than their own—the ability to drop your weapons would merely add useless clunk to the game. Instead, weapons are summoned into players hands whenever they squeeze the grip buttons. This not only serves as a supremely efficient version of a ‘holster’, but it also feels really bad-ass to manifest your blades in the palm of your hand just before diving head first into a fight.
What’s more, when players aren’t holding their weapons, their hands become useful for other critical game tasks. Turning your palm upright reveals a menu of stats which speaks specifically to the weapon assigned to that hand. The menu floats above your hand, making it easy to optimally position, and disappears when you don’t need it any longer.
The game has also pioneered a very satisfying ‘crushing’ interaction which serves as a very engaging way to make important choices and selections. At the end of each room you get to pick between three different power-ups. When you decide which one you want, you reach out and grab it and continue to squeeze your grab trigger until you crush the power-up and consume its energy. With the addition of haptics and sound effects, it feels great every time, so it’s no wonder that we also see this same interaction used back in the forge for selecting and upgrading weapons.
And then there’s the game’s block and attack indicators. When enemies are attacking you you’ll see blue 2D block indicators appear showing you where to place your sword to block the attack. Although these can look and feel ‘arcadey’, their function outweighs any visual concerns; knowing when to block and where is part of the way that Until You Fall manages to set a deliberate and satisfying combat pace. Equally ‘arcadey’ but important and satisfying are the attack indicators. Once you break through the opponents shield you’ll get the opportunity to start a combo. In a combo you can dish out tremendous damage, but only if you strike along the indicated line in quick succession. Here too, great haptic and audio feedback make this feel awesome and satisfying.
Boneworks is a prime example of how independent developers who have the freedom to take risks can make huge contributions to their field. With two VR titles previously already under their belt, Stress Level Zero set out to make a no-compromise physically simulated VR experience.
By making nearly everything in the game physical and interactive, Boneworks delivers on player’s expectations of agency in a way that often goes far beyond its contemporaries. In the game, just about every object, enemy, and weapon is physically interactive, leading to moments where novel ideas—like, say, using a coffee mug as a melee weapon—actually work.
While the heavy emphasis on physics can be frustrating and wonky at times, it’s hard not to feel a sense of added embodiment when your ideas about what’s possible in the game world are satisfied in a realistic fashion. Things as simple as being able to push enemies away from you with the barrel of your gun—or as morbid as stabbing through multiple enemies simultaneously with a claymore—show a glimpse of the rich interactivity that is the ultimate goal of VR.
For its part, Boneworks is a flag in the ground which represents perhaps the most interactive physics sandbox seen in VR to date, and a proof point that glimpses the immersive benefits which come from more realistic virtual interactions.
Wolves in the Walls started out in life as an Oculus Story Studios project, although Facebook shuttered its first-party VR studio before the experience could be finished. It would have been a real shame if this highly immersive and well-realized retelling of Neil Gaiman and Dave McKean’s eponymous children’s book wasn’t completed as a result. Thankfully, some ex-Story Studio veterans created Fable Studio and picked up the mantle to finish what Oculus had started.
Releasing its final chapter in November, the end result culminated in an intriguing and engaging story that centers around eight year-old Lucy, whose wild imagination has her convinced that wolves live in the walls of her home.
One of the biggest takeaways from Wolves in the Walls was how much digital humans can provide a sort of emotional immersion that will no doubt play a fundamental role in the VR games and stories of tomorrow. As cartoony as she was, it feels like Fable Studio really made it impossible to disappoint little Lucy. You’re her only friend and ally, and it’s too cold-hearted a prospect to break that trust, even just to see what happens if you don’t pay attention to her when she reaches out for assurance. In so doing, Wolves in the Walls shows off Pixar-level character design, which comes part and parcel with a rich color palette, cohesive set design, and a depth of animation expertise—all of which makes you genuinely feel like you’ve jumped into the pages of the book.
Fable Studio based their VR experience on a solid source material, but drawing you into that story would have been fruitless if you couldn’t connect with Lucy on some level. Here, she’s a real enough person to make you care about where the story ultimately goes, leaving you with a solid moment of self-reflection on your own ‘wolves in the walls’ once the credits roll.
Note: Games eligible for Road to VR‘s Game of the Year Award must be available to the public on or before December 13th, 2019 to allow for ample deliberation. Games must also natively support the target platform as to ensure full operability.
This is one of the biggest weeks for VR news yet, with two huge but separate stories. For that reason, we’ll have two episodes of The VR Download.
Unlike regular video podcasts, The VR Download is broadcast from a virtual reality studio! Our team are together in a virtual space, giving us many of the benefits of a studio even though we live on different continents.
Episode 7: Wednesday 10:30 am PST
Our Special Guest this week is Mike Daly, the Lead Designer of Stormland! He’ll be joining us for the duration of the show, and at the end we’ll be interviewing him.
Since Valve just announced Half Life: Alyx, its “flagship” VR game, and will be sharing more details on Thursday morning, we’ll be having our first special episode all about this game after those details are revealed.
This won’t follow our normal show structure, and we won’t have a guest. You’ll get our opinions, insights, and hopes about what this game could mean for you and for the VR industry as a whole.
Watch In VR With BigScreen!
Every week, you can watch The VR Download LIVE in virtual reality with an audience of other VR users on any major VR headset (including Oculus Quest and Oculus Go!), via the BigScreen platform.
Click on the image above to subscribe to the event.
Stormland
Pistol Whip
GORN
Angry Birds VR: Isle of Pigs
Espire 1: VR Operative
Tetris Effect
