Virtual Reality

[Lebowski]

Valve isn't interested in the low-end VR market, if anything Apple Vision Pro helps with Valve's Deckard which is likely to be wireless while still supporting the lighthouse tracking.

https://www.roadtovr.com/valve-interview-vr-ambitions-steam-deckard/

It's not going to be Quest price - I'd be surprised if it wasn't priced above Index.

Its tricky one as how do they price this when the index has an inflated price point already compared to other headsets on the market. The base price point of the steam-deck is what made it so appealing, so if valve comes in with a headset that's £1500-£2000 its gonna be DOA.

[Asura]

Valve isn't interested in the low-end VR market, if anything Apple Vision Pro helps with Valve's Deckard which is likely to be wireless while still supporting the lighthouse tracking.

https://www.roadtovr.com/valve-interview-vr-ambitions-steam-deckard/

It's not going to be Quest price - I'd be surprised if it wasn't priced above Index.

Lighthouses are an absolute NO from me.

Not everyone works at Valve. Most of us don't have a house, much less a room in our house we can kit out as our permanent holodeck.

I'm okay with the tech existing and being supported for those who want to use it, but it has to be an option, not a requirement, or I won't go near it.

[MartyG]

The tech-specs are pure speculation at the moment, but I believe the anticipation is to support both lighthouses and standalone.

Personally, I'd want the lighthouse option because it's still by far the superior tracking method - even compared to the Quest Pro controllers.

[Lebowski]

Personally, I'd want the lighthouse option because it's still by far the superior tracking method - even compared to the Quest Pro controllers.

weren't you saying the quest pro controllers where a bit of a nightmare a few pages back????

Damn, those Quest Pro controllers are giving me some grief - they don't seem to like having their environments changed - guardian change seemed to screw everything up stopping the controllers syncing properly with the headset, no matter how much I tried to re-pair them.

Eventually, I did a factory reset on the headset - seemed to clear it. Will see when I boot it up again, but based on that, it's probably just as well the Quest 3 controllers don't have the self-tracking. They take ages to start up, which really doesn't help.

[MartyG]

Yes, hence saying - I want the lighthouses because it's superior to the Quest Pro controllers.

[Lebowski]

Yes, hence saying - I want the lighthouses because it's superior to the Quest Pro controllers.

Ah i thought you where referencing them as the peek of inside out tracking when they sound like anything but.

[MartyG]

They are better than Quest 2's when it's working - I just had issues with them syncing to the headset. It's still not as good as the lighthouses.

You can feel them getting warm too - not hot, but they do dissipate some heat as they've got that Snapdragon processor running inside them. I think that controllers being self-tracking is the way forward, it just needs a couple more iterations on the concept.

[Asura]

Ah i thought you where referencing them as the peek of inside out tracking when they sound like anything but.

They are the peak of inside-out tracking, at least right now. Vive are looking at making body-trackers that use the same tech. They really do work extremely well.

[Lebowski]

They are the peak of inside-out tracking, at least right now. Vive are looking at making body-trackers that use the same tech. They really do work extremely well.

They don't sound it they sound broken, conversely, Its like they have fixed the issue of loosing tracking when the camera goes out of site but launched a system that is pretty buggy. Loads of people on reddit saying how great they are when they work but have massive issues when they go wrong requiring a complete shut down or in the wost case a full reset. The other current inside out systems are pretty good at recovering when they occasionally loose you them.

[Asura]

They don't sound it they sound broken, conversely I've had zero issues with the standard PSVR2 controllers and the Quest 2 ones.

I'm sympathetic to what's going on with MartyG, but honestly I've not had his problems. Mine work fantastically. Like I said, the only problem I've had is an infrequent one where they don't connect, but work on a reboot (I've never had them fail that), and that's got to be less than 1-in-20 times I pick up the headset. Less than I pick up a PS4 pad to find out it isn't charged.

They really are great. Totally transformed some of my games, like Bonelab, which feel almost designed for them.

[MartyG]

I've not had the same problems since I factory reset and re-paired everything - but you do see the controllers disappear and reappear every now and again (and others have reported the same issue with the Quest Pro), it may be a specific issue with Quest Pro compared to pairing them with the Quest 2.

When they work, the tracking is better than the Quest 2 stock controllers. They still cannot keep up with Beat Saber at Expert+, even when using the native Quest version. So from my PoV, lighthouses are currently still the superior controller tracking method.

[Neon Ignition]

A lack of eye tracking is something I don't mind, I expect software support for it is going to be minimal as it cuts off too many consumers

[MartyG]

I've had enough time with the Quest Pro now, and whilst I like the quality of the image with the headset which is excellent, the controllers are not up to snuff, I've tried wired on a 40Gb USB4 port as well.

For most things, they're absolutely fine, but for anything that requires very fast movement, such as Beat Saber Expert/Expert+, they desync randomly. It's only for a fraction of a second, but it's enough to mean you're missing stuff. At first, I thought maybe it was me just missing blocks (because Expert+ is extreme), but there's a map I can consistently 100% with the Index, which I absolutely cannot do with the Quest Pro - and that's due to this dropout issue.

As I said, it's not something you're really going to notice for the most part, but for Beat Saber, sadly, they are not the be-all-end-all for inside-out tracking.

Perhaps in a couple of iterations, they'll be up to the task, but the current version is not (and looking online, I'm definitely not the only one having this problem).

[Adam Stone]

Guys! Wanted to share my excitement as I am a total VR noob. Apart from one time a decade or so ago... Ive never played VR.
This weekend got a Quest 2 - and i love it. My daughter and wife been enjoying it too, probably more than I thought they would
(my wife has zero interest in games and my daughter usually plays things to humor me, bless her...)

I naturally have many thoughts, both from a dev mind and from a player mind. However right now im happy to indulge my player-focused-excited mind!

I'm going to go back a few pages to catchup on the chat before I leave an explosion of fresh, naïvely-eyed gibberish :-)

[MartyG]

Cool; VR is something you have to actually try because describing or showing it on a 2D screen doesn't do it justice at all.