Comment by echelon
6 years ago
Facebook might be sensing that their market is dwindling as other vendors catch up. They might be trying to extract value why they have the lead.
I honestly have no idea though. I don't get why they're in this space as it doesn't appear from the outside that they're trying very hard.
Maybe they think the entire market is drying up? The AAA blockbuster everybody thought would make VR mainstream (Half Life) seems to have fizzled with great reviews but not many sales. Maybe Facebook now believes VR will prove to be a bubble and they want to juice it for all they can while they still can.
Not sure this makes much sense. All the top end VR headsets are constantly sold out and require waiting months to get one (Index and soon the HP Reverb G2). People want to play Alyx but they can't.
Also a PC only game is niche enough, no PCVR game will ever make VR mainstream. Really, the mainstream VR game is Beat Saber - that alone has probably sold more VR headsets than any other app or game combined.
The only way to make VR mainstream imo is to offer it at console prices or less and make it standalone, which is exactly what the Quest is doing. It's really unfortunate it requires an FB account. I guess they justify it because Xbox and PS5 both require online accounts too.
>Really, the mainstream VR game is Beat Saber - that alone has probably sold more VR headsets than any other app or game combined.
Ironically, Facebook also acquired Beat Games (who makes Beat Saber) last year and effectively ruined it by intentionally breaking all the mods and custom songs, leaving it a shell of its former glory.
According to steamcharts [1], player counts peaked around July 2019 and have only dwindled since the acquisition (with the exception of two small bumps when the acquisition happened in November). Average player counts are have been cut in half since then, in less than a year.
I have almost 200 hours in Beat Saber, but I haven't played it for almost a year now, now that it's just the same two-dozen songs over and over.
[1] https://steamcharts.com/app/620980#1y
5 replies →
I dunno, I feel like it’s reaching saturation. Those that want VR are getting it, but then there’s those of us who are gamers, but forget it’s even a thing until someone mentions it. I am a gamer myself (have a 2080, sitting out the 3000 series), and I honestly don’t want one nor see how it can make gaming more enjoyable for me. So to me it seems like it’s going the same route attempt #1 did in the 90s, there’s some market but not enough.
2 replies →
I want to like Alyx, but the hassle of connecting my VR headset to the computer every time I want to play is just too much of a pain.
Simple. Leave it connected.
Joking aside. What headset have you got that takes more than a few minutes to connect?
1 reply →
Quest + VirtualDesktop is great untethered experience.
Selling a loss leader to build mindshare and market share isn't my idea of value extraction as compared to building the base for future value extraction.
If you don't think they're trying very hard though, I'm not sure if you've been following VR particularly much.