Xiaomi makes everything, from phones and vacuum cleaners to massage guns and even electric cars. Now, according to a report from Chinese media 36kr, Xiaomi may be developing a device that goes toe-to-toe with Ray-Ban Meta smartglasses.

The report maintains Xiaomi is planning to launch a new generation of AI-assisted smartglasses, which will be built in collaboration with Goertek, the China-based ODM behind a bevy of XR parts, reference designs, and finished white-label hardware.

The rumored Xiaomi smartglasses are said to “fully benchmark” against Ray-Ban Meta, which includes AI functions, integrated speakers, and camera modules. Notably, Ray-Ban Meta smartglasses aren’t officially available in China.

Citing insider sources, the report maintains the device is slated to arrive in Q2 2025, with 36kr noting it may launch in time for the Mi Fan Festival, which is typically held in April to mark Xiaomi’s founding anniversary.

The report further maintains, Xiaomi co-founder Lei Jun expects to ship more than 300,000 units.

Xiaomi has dabbled in XR hardware in the past, although it really hasn’t entered full force. The Chinese tech giant hyped a widely reported AR glasses prototype at Mobile World Congress (MWC) in 2023. A year prior, the company launched a pair of smartglasses, called Mijia Glasses Camera. Much like the now defunct Google Glass, the device featured a single heads-up display.

All of that is changing though, it seems. Next year is shaping up to be a big year for smartglasses in China, as the country’s largest brands may be hoping to replicate Meta’s success with Ray-Ban Meta Smart Glasses.

Baidu announced at its Baidu World Conference on November 12th its own co-product with Xiaodu, the Xiaodu AI glasses, which is launching in China in the first half of 2025.

The 36kr report also notes that Chinese heavy-hitters OPPO, vivo, Huawei, Tencent, and ByteDance are also currently evaluating their own smartglasses projects.

Clone Drone in the Danger Zone (2021), the hit arena battler from indie studio Doborog, is bringing the game’s voxel slice-em-up action in a new VR-exclusive sequel next month, coming to Quest and PC VR headsets.

Called Clone Drone in the Hyperdome, the new single-player VR experience includes a thick slice of the series’ unique combat and action-based storyline, where players fight to the death against killer robots—which just so happen to be very frangible.

Doborog says in Clone Drone in the Hyperdome, players take on the role of Blink, a teleporting robot who is the newest ‘looprunner’ gladiator forced to compete in Crashloop, a deadly roguelike combat sport.

“Players die and reawaken in an endless loop, leap over lava pools, avoid turret fire and take down waves of enemy defendroids, as well as deal damage exactly where their cut lands using a stunning voxel combat engine. In order to win and feel freedom, players must battle their fellow looprunners for a chance to fight the Captain in the Hyperdome.” the studio says.

Doborog says the follow-up builds on the series’ fast-paced combat, where you can shear off a robot’s limb or take them down with one perfect slice. They can also do to you if you’re not careful, so make sure to block.

The game promises to let you take on voxel combatants with more than 10 weapons, which you can grab off your fallen competitors and use them in any combination, including things like spears, bows, scythes, and axes.

Clone Drone in the Hyperdome is launching on Steam and the Horizon Store for Quest 2/3/Pro on December 12th. You can wishlist it now on Steam, and pre-order on Quest, priced at 10% off its $20 launch price.

Monstercat Mixtape released a little over five years ago, marking Beat Saber’s first foray into paid DLC. Now, VR’s favorite block-slashing rhythm game just got the long-awaited Vol. 2 follow-up: Monstercat Mixtape 2.

The 12-track paid DLC, now available across all supported VR headsets, includes a few familiar names like Tokyo Machine and Pegboard Nerds.

Priced at $14.99 (or $1.99 per track), Meta calls it “the most challenging paid music pack to-date.”

Check out the full track list below:

• “Accelerate” — Teminite & Skybreak
• “DABADABADABADABA” — Excision & Dion Timmer
• “Dead Man Walking” — Grant & Ellis
• “Endgame” — Bossfight
• “Final Boss” — Nitro Fun
• “Memory Bank” — Dyro x Conro
• “Mercenary” — F.O.O.L & Power Glove
• “Pump” — Teddy Killerzs & Pegboard Nerds
• “RAD” — Tokyo Machine
• “RIOT” — Öwnboss & Selva
• “Thrones of Blood” — Sullivan King
• “Wake Up” — Alan Walker

Additionally, Meta says in the DLC’s announcement the new Monstercat Mixtape 2 includes a dedicated environment and levels with Arc and Chain notes, and multiplayer mode for all songs.

You’ll find Monstercat Mixtape 2 on all supported platforms, including Quest, PSVR 2 and SteamVR.

If you don’t already own Beat Saber, there’s a Monstercat Mixtape 2 + Beat Saber bundle available on the Horizon Store, Steam, and PlayStation Store for $39.99, representing a $5 savings.

bHaptics, the South Korea-based VR haptics creator, announced it’s launching a refreshed lineup of its most popular haptics hardware, which are said to support over 270 titles across Quest, PSVR 2, and PC VR headsets.

The company today announced pre-orders for three new accessories: TactSuit Pro, TactSuit Air and TactSleeve.

Pre-orders for all three are set to launch today, November 12th, and go until November 26th.

TactSuit Pro – $499

TactSuit Pro is the company’s new flagship haptic vest, priced at $499. bHaptics says the device’s standout feature is the addition of a new breast-mounted Controller Wheel, which allows users to precisely adjust the intensity of haptic sensations during use, and keep an eye on the vest’s haptic status with a ring LED.

In comparison to the previous bhaptics TactSuit X40, which launched at $499 in 2020, the new TactSuit Pro technically features fewer haptic motors, reducing the count from 40 motors to 32.

Like its previous vests though, out of the box you’ll find expandable straps, which bHaptics says will ensure “a comfortable fit for users of all body types,” and a single black-themed colorway.

TactSuit Air – $249

TactSuit Air cuts down on the price, meanwhile cutting down on the number of haptic motors in comparison to TactSuit Pro. It does however deliver the same number of haptic motors as its previous TactSuit X16, and is notably cheaper than its predecessor, which launched in 2020 for $330.

Like TactSuit X16, bHaptics is offering two colorways: Onyx and Ash, both of which carry the same $249 price tag.

TactSleeve – $199

bHaptics is also launching a new version of their popular arm-based haptic device, called TactSleeve, which is priced at $199. Tactosy for Arms, which the company released in 2019 for $250, featured six haptic motors per-arm, while the new TactSleeve features three per-arm.

The company says however the motors have been optimized to deliver powerful haptic feedback while also being over 40% lighter than previous model, letting you feel things like kick-back from weapons, and better experience environmental noise such as rumbles and music.

You can pre-order all of the above devices from today until November 26th, direct from bHaptics. There’s also a bundle available which includes both TactSuit Pro and TactSleeve, priced at $600, representing a $100 savings.

Note: While not all VR games are officially supported across TactSuit Pro, TactSuit Air, and TactSleeve—they do however support all previous titles available to bHaptics main slate of haptic vests, which now boasts a list of over 270 titles across Quest, PSVR 2 and SteamVR headsets. Check out game compatibility here.

Virtual reality’s most compelling Rube Goldberg sandbox Gadgeteer (2019) just got an update on Quest 3 and Quest 3S which finally brings mixed reality gameplay into the fold.

Launched in 2019 for PC VR headsets, Gadgeteer was initially conceived to work in homey virtual spaces that replicated what it might be like to build a massive marble ramp in your kitchen, ad hoc music boxes in your living room, and (of course) intricate loops of machines filling the floorplan of an entire virtual apartment.

The long-awaited mixed reality update, which launches today, now lets users transform their physical spaces with the game’s myriad of puzzle pieces, letting you do things like build a row of dominos across your couch, launch rubber ducks from one table to another, or roll balls down a flight of stairs and watch them blast through castles—no cleanup required.

This isn’t the first time Gadgeteer developer Metanaut wanted to bring the game out of virtual reality however, as the studio was accepted into the Magic Leap Independent Creator Program back in February 2019. While Magic Leap pivoted to enterprise in 2020, ostensibly forcing Metanaut to shelve its AR edition, it was clear Gadgeteer would translated well to mixed reality.

“Gadgeteer is the ideal game for mixed reality,” says Creative Director, Peter Kao. “Chain reaction machines inherently rely on the clever use of the surrounding environment. With this update, our players can now build complex, imaginative machines that weave through their furniture, bounce off of their walls, and use the unique contours of their homes as canvases. This update is all about giving players more opportunities to be more creative and innovative using their familiar surroundings.”

The mixed reality update for Gadgeteer is available for free to all Quest 3 and Quest 3S players right now. If you don’t own the game, you can grab it over on the Horizon Store, priced at $18.

Ember Souls, the upcoming VR hack-and-slash inspired by Prince of Persia, is officially set to launch on Quest this month.

VirtualAge, the studio behind Gladius VR and Guardians Frontline, announced that Ember Souls is coming to Quest 2, Quest 3, Quest 3S on November 21st. Pre-orders are now live on the Horizon Store, offering a 16% discount off the $25 launch price.

The game is also headed to SteamVR headsets at some point, although the studio hasn’t confirmed precisely when. Spanish language XR news site Real o Virtual reports we should expect it sometime in 2025 however.

In addition to some clear inspiration from Prince of Persia, VirtualAge says Ember Souls also patterned some of the action after Assassin’s Creed, putting you in the shoes of the (frightfully adept) last Immortal as you battle against the mysterious Shadow Sultan.

As a singe-player game, Ember Souls is said to feature intense sword fighting with over 20 different weapons against a host of enemies, which you’ll fight across five distinctly Persian locations, like opulent sultan’s baths and serene gardens.

While we’re still waiting for confirmation on the PC VR release, you can wishlist Ember Souls over on Steam to be notified when pre-orders drop.

Cyborn, the team behind VR sci-fi adventure Hubris (2022), announced it’s releasing mixed reality city builder Wall Town Wonders on Quest 3 next week.

Coming November 21st to Quest 3 and Quest 3S, Wall Town Wonders promises to turn any room in your house into a magical miniature town.

Supporting hand-tracking, the mixed reality game lets you interact with tiny characters as you help them rebuild and customize their world, rightfully built across your real-world walls.

Wall Town Wonders also promises to bring “a peaceful environment where you can progress at your own speed,” which includes a variety of quests, mini-games, and hidden surprises.

The studio says it’s cued up post-launch seasonal content, letting you keep your little town fresh with new themes, events, and special decorations for the game’s 100 unique buildings, 40+ characters, and variety of skins and decorations already available at launch.

You can pre-order Wall Town Wonders on the Horizon Store for Quest 3 and Quest 3S at a 10 percent discount, which is regularly priced at $20.

If you’re one of the few remaining PSVR owners looking to use the original 2016 headset on PlayStation 5, you only have a few more days to request your free PS Camera adapter, as Sony is discontinuing the device later this month.

Sony released its PlayStation Camera Adapter for free in 2020 to help bridge the gap for PSVR users looking for a console upgrade to PS5, which notably didn’t offer full PSVR support out of the box.

The PlayStation 5 HD Camera that launched alongside PS5 can’t track the original PSVR headset or PS Move controllers spatially, requiring the additional adapter.

Of course, this was nearly three years before Sony released PSVR 2, making the adapter indispensable for playing any VR title on PS5.

Now, Sony says it’s discontinuing the free adapter program come November 26th, or “until supplies last.”

If you still haven’t requested a free adapter, all you need is the serial number on the PSVR Processing Unit. In the US, requests can be directed to Sony’s toll-free number 1-800-345-SONY (7669).

Notably, the adapter has never officially gone on sale. There are however heaps available through eBay if for some reason you own a used PSVR that has already technically claimed its one free adapter. You’ll need it!

Cyan, the studio behind MYST and RIVEN, announced its PC VR-supported puzzle adventure Firmament (2023) is coming to PSVR 2 later than expected.

The news comes following the release of the game’s big PC and Mac 2.0 patch, which includes the studio’s upgrade from Unreal Engine 4.27+ to Unreal Engine 5.3.2.

“Doing this has resolved a WIDE number of stability issues related to the game running on various platforms,” Cyan says in the 2.0 patch notes.

The studio says Firmament for PC and PC VR headsets now includes a number of quality of life fixes similar to those seen in its recent update to the Myst remake, such as increases to performance and stability, as well as the adoption of OpenXR.

Now, the studio says its long-planned PlayStation and PSVR 2 release of Firmament is coming in Q1 of 2025, which follows a previous announcement in May that Cyan had “high hopes that [they] will be able to ship Firmament on PlayStation this Fall.”

“We have to update the PlayStation SDKs we use with the engine once more, and address a few remaining PlayStation-specific issues,” the studio says in a Kickstarter update. “Unfortunately this has taken us longer than we estimated, but we want to make sure the game is completely stable (and looking good!) on PlayStation before we ship it.”

Continuing: “All this work is not without a cost, though. Unfortunately it means that Firmament’s estimated PlayStation release has to be moved into Quarter One of 2025. We hope you’ll join us in the excitement we all share to be able to deliver Firmament on PlayStation 4, 5, and PS VR2 to you next year!”

Released in 2023 on PC and PC VR headsets, Firmament combines impressive visuals with the studio’s patently difficult puzzles, tossing you into a strange, interconnected realm filled with gigantic machines, voice recordings, found notes… everything you’d expect from a game from the studio behind Myst, Riven and Obduction.

None of those happen to offer PSVR 2 support though, making Firmament the first in the bunch, which could point to a rash of PSVR 2 releases yet to come from the storied studio.

Apple has finally dropped the ultrawide virtual display for Vision Pro in beta, giving the existing virtual display feature the ability to stretch to wide and ultrawide widths for extra screen real-estate. Out of the box it’s impressive, but default MacOS window management makes it kind of a pain to use. But with the right third-party window manager, it’s even better than I hoped for.

I’ll be honest, I didn’t know just how useful the new ultrawide feature would be. I’ve used Vision Pro’s virtual desktop feature many times before. It’s a great way to get some extra screen real-estate out of my MacBook Air (M2). But it was limited in that it could only really act like a single, large 16:9 monitor.

My productivity workhorse is my desktop PC on which I’ve used two side-by-side monitors for years. For a power-user like me, having the extra width to have multiple things on screen at once is great; constantly minimizing and maximizing apps is a pain. I also combine my dual monitors with additional virtual workspaces, meaning I can group applications together on a specific workspace for a specific task.

I’ve yet to make the leap to a single ultrawide monitor over dual monitors. They’re pretty damn expensive and physically take up a lot of space.

But with a little software update, Apple just gave me an ultrawide monitor that I can take with me wherever I take my Vision Pro. The ultrawide setting essentially gives you two 16:9 monitors side-by-side, but without the seam in the middle if you were using dual monitors.

So not only is my little MacBook Air now able to replicate all the screen real estate that I have with the big setup that takes up my whole office desk, it also has the benefit of no seam in the middle of the monitors. I didn’t fully appreciate how much this would increase the flexibility I have with setting up my workspaces. Now it’s easy to span an app seamlessly in the ‘middle’ of the workspace, while less important apps can be on the flanks. It’s great! But…

MacOS window management is simply not ready to handle ultrawide monitors. Even though Apple just added improved window tiling in the latest version of MacOS, it really isn’t very helpful on an ultrawide monitor.

At best you can ask the system to put an app into any quarter of the monitor, but this results in super-wide apps that aren’t useful in that particular shape. You can make a window go to just one half of the screen, but that gives you a maximum of only two apps on the screen at once.

Without window management that’s actually made for ultrawide monitors, you’re stuck doing a lot of resizing of windows to get them into useful arrangements to really take advantage of all the space you have. Or you do the seemingly insane thing Apple always shows in their marketing: just use randomly sized windows that overlap with other windows while also wasting a bunch of screen space. I mean look, this is literally what they showed when promoting this feature:

Being able to quickly get apps into useful size and position is essential to really benefiting from an ultrawide monitor. The more time it takes to size and position apps, the less often you’re going to actually use the extra space to your benefit.

Luckily there’s many third-party window managers out there for MacOS. And I would argue that having one is essential if you’re using the Vision Pro ultrawide virtual display.

For now I’ve landed on a window manager called Rectangle. With it I can easily set up a ‘main’ app in the center 2/4 of the monitor, then stick apps in the remaining 1/4 on the left or 1/4 on the right. Or I can even stack two apps on the sides, taking up 1/8 of the monitor each.

This works great and makes me feel like I have even more room than I did when using two physical 16:9 monitors (again, the lack of gap in the middle is a surprising benefit because you can put your most important app directly in front of you).

Although Rectangle has the features that make this work well, the app itself is overcomplicated; like using a sledgehammer when all you really need is a regular hammer. There still might be a more streamlined solution out there.

There’s really no reason why MacOS itself shouldn’t have similar window-arranging capabilities that actually make sense for ultrawide monitors, especially now that Vision Pro doubles as one.

Anyway… with the window management issue taken care of, I’m finding the ultrawide virtual display feature even more useful than I expected. When combined with MacOS’s built-in Spaces feature—which allows me to slide easily between multiple ultrawide workspaces—my little MacBook Air feels like an absolute productivity powerhouse. It’s wild to me that it can run five ultrawide workspaces worth of apps and still feel nice and smooth.

For me, the ultrawide option (with some third-party help) has changed Vision Pro’s virtual display feature from something that’s nice to have here and there, into an essential capability of the headset.

Now listen, some of you who have made it this far might be thinking to yourself: “to some extent you’re just praising ultrawide monitors in general.”

You’re not wrong. But the thing is, this one fits in my headset, which means I can bring a highly productive workspace with me anywhere that I would take my laptop.

Vision Pro is still too heavy to want to use this setup all day (and it’s still more expensive than an ultrawide monitor itself!). But mark my words: once Apple has an equivalent headset that’s half the size and half the price, people are going to see huge value from this kind of work setup.

Ray-Ban Meta smartglasses are already pretty fashionable, as they look nearly identical to a few of EssilorLuxottica’s best-selling sunglasses, albeit with the inclusion of neatly integrated cameras, speakers, battery and onboard AI driven by a positively tiny Qualcomm Snapdragon AR1 Gen1 processor. With the launch of a new pop-up store in Los Angeles today, Meta is hoping to test out whether it can move the needle with broader adoption.

Meta calls the LA pop-up store “experiential retail,” having modeled it after the Meta Lab pop-up at Connect 2024 in October, which allowed event-goers to try on a pair of Ray-Ban Meta smartglasses to capture photos and videos and keep the resultant files, or even buy a customized pair of the $300 glasses right then and there.

Ultimately, the idea with its first publicly available pop-up in LA is to increase word-of-mouth marketing, which Creative Director Matt Jacobson hopes will make its users into the “best salesperson ever.”

Adorned with a giant pair of Ray-Ban Meta glasses on the outside (with the glasses’ LED privacy light), the flagship pop-up in LA is only going to be around until December 31st, although it won’t be the last.

The company’s next pop-up is planned to hit Phoenix, Arizona in January, which the company calls a “real shop-in-shop,” the exact location of which is still a mystery.

“Can we build a store inside somebody else’s business? Can we drive traffic to it, and can we leverage their marketing as well as ours? By the end of January, we will have tested all three expressions of our experiential first-party retail.”

To boot, the Meta Lab location is doing more than just letting people try on and buy Ray-Ban smartglasses. The company says it will have “regular programming,” which includes stand-up comedy with Desi Banks, a live podcast with Madeline Argy, a ‘paint and sip’ night with Tinashe, a Ray-Ban Meta-focused workshop with Director Drex Lee, and a cooking class with Cassie Yeung.

From there, Meta hopes to share its findings with EssilorLuxottica, which operates over 17,000 stores worldwide, as well among third-party partners. Meta announced in September it was expanding its smartglasses partnership with the eyewear conglomerate into 2030.

As pop-ups go, the LA and Phoenix locations may be a limited engagement, but it may also spark more to come.

“We can’t scale a hundred of these, but we can build a few of them at locations around the country, and then fill in if we decide we want to do more first-party retail. This is aspirational, inspirational. They’re not easily scalable in terms of what they look like, but in terms of experience, they are,” Jacobson says.

If you’re in the LA area, you can find the Meta Lab pop-up over at 8600 Melrose Avenue, open from 10:00 am – 7:00 pm PT seven days a week beginning November 8th through December 31st.

Posted holiday hours are 10:00 am – 3:00 pm on Black Friday and Christmas Eve, with the location closed on Thanksgiving, December 3rd, and Christmas Day.

Alien: Rogue Incursion is coming to Quest later than expected, as developer Survios announced the Quest 3 version of the game is now delayed to “early next year.”

The studio announced the news in an X post, noting that both PSVR 2 and SteamVR versions of the game will still arrive on the original December 19th launch date.

Survios says the delay, which affects Quest 3 and Quest 3S, is to “ensure Alien: Rogue Incursion meets these high standards and provides the Alien VR experience that fans and players expect.” You can find the full message from Survios at the bottom of the article.

This follows the game’s first preview event, where press went hands-on with the game running on Quest 3 tethered to a PC, consequently showing off the SteamVR version. Notably, previews were promising, with previewers from IGN and UploadVR praising the game’s immersive environments, smart narrative beats, and intuitive weapons and tools.

Fitting all of those complex and necessarily lush environments into Quest 3’s comparatively more demanding performance budget however is a big sticking point for practically all VR developers, as it requires a lot more care and polish to meet those ‘AAA’ visuals fans are expecting—making the delay regrettable, if not understandable from a developer standpoint.

A single-player action-horror game, Alien: Rogue Incursion is puts you in the shoes of Zula Hendricks, an ex-Colonial Marine on a dangerous mission that brings her to the uncharted planet Purdan. Accompanied by the sentient AI companion, Davis 01, you’re tasked with fighting to the heart of the infested Gemini Exoplanet Solutions research facility, fighting against packs of Xenomorphs along your way.

The full message from Survios follows below:

At Survios, we take pride in delivering top-tier immersive gaming experiences for our players. To ensure Alien: Rogue Incursion meets these high standards and provides the Alien VR experience that fans and players expect, we’ve made the difficult decision to delay the game’s release on Meta platforms until early next year. PlayStation VR2 and Steam versions of the game will still launch on December 19, 2024.

Our team has been delighted to see the reactions from the community, press, and creators following our first hands-on previews over the past few weeks, and we couldn’t be more excited to deliver this terrifying, action-packed, and authentic game for fans of Alien, VR enthusiasts, and players new to VR.

We can’t wait for you all to immerse yourselves like never before in this fan-favorite universe. Stay tuned to our social channels for the latest updates on the game – we’re confident it will be worth the wait, no matter where you play.

Metro Awakening brings the post-apocalyptic tunnel-dwelling franchise to VR for the first time, but is it a good fit? Read on to find out in our full review.

Metro Awakening Details:

Publisher: Vertigo Games
Available On: Quest, PC VR, PSVR 2
Reviewed On: Quest 3
Release Date: November 7th, 2024
Price: $50

Editor’s note: all clips in this review are from the Quest 3 version of the game. Screenshots are from the PC VR version.

Gameplay

Developer Vertigo Games did a fine job of making Metro Awakening feel like a Metro game, but in VR. Although not nearly as broad in scope as the most recent title in the franchise, Metro Exodus (2019), it captures many of the series’ staples: a gritty, post-apocalyptic setting, interesting improvised weaponry, and a gameplay loop based around the pillars of scavenging, sneaking, and shooting.

The game’s weapons and shooting mechanics are its strengths. You start with a fairly basic pistol and AK-47. I particularly like that enemies stagger visibly when taking shots, making the impact of shooting feel much better than the more often seen bullet-sponge enemies. You’re pretty vulnerable yourself, and will find that squeezing off a few AK rounds into a bad guy and then taking cover is more effective than just standing out in the open. Gun fights feel scrappy rather than bombastic.

Later in the game you find a crossbow and a shotgun. While these weapon archetypes have been seen a hundred times before in VR, these two feel right at home among the uniquely cool makeshift weaponry the Metro series is known for.

The crossbow is a revolver with a pop-out cylinder into which you slide sharp metal rods. Cocking the crossbow requires pulling back a huge lever on top. Because of the weapon’s barebones construction, can watch exactly how the mechanism articulates to lift one of the bolts into position. And dang, it’s sure cool to see.

Like any good crossbow, this thing is quiet. And there’s an absolute satisfaction with not only dropping someone silently from the shadows, but then pulling the bolt from your victim, popping out the crossbow’s revolver-style cylinder, and sliding it right back in for the next shot. Retrievable ammo weapons in games always have that extra layer of fun, but there’s something especially unique about doing this in VR when it’s your own hands removing and reloading the bolts.

The next weapon, the shotgun, is for when you’re ready to go loud. Surprisingly, this one isn’t pump action, but it has a unique design all its own that makes it a standout. And you may know that I have a pretty high bar for what constitutes a great feeling shotgun in VR.

The shotgun in Metro Awakening is actually a revolver like the crossbow. But, interestingly, it has an exposed cylinder, which means you can pop shells into any open slot before pulling the charging handle to load a round. Again, the skeletal, makeshift construction of the weapon means you can really see how it operates, which is just extra cool in VR because you can inspect and articulate your gun however you want (rather than being stuck looking at canned animations).

The game’s final weapon is the blowdart gun, and while I love the idea of physically raising it to your mouth to fire, it doesn’t feel like it fits well with the rest of the game’s weapons. Not only does it feel like an inferior version of the crossbow, it’s just less fun and less satisfying to use.

All things considered, the game’s weapons have a great feel—especially the crossbow and shotgun—even if there are only four primary weapons to be found overall.

Scavenging also feels good. The detailed environments generally give me enough to look at to enjoy peeking around corners and down hallways to see if I can spot some extra supplies.

Scavenging goes hand-in-hand with being prepared, which is a must in Metro Awakening. If you jump into a fight without making sure your mags are loaded, knowing which weapons are equipped, and being able to operate your weapons confidently under pressure, you’ll get overwhelmed and overrun quickly.

I enjoyed the feeling of the scavenging and emphasis on preparedness. I found myself regularly picking magazines off of dispatched weapons to steal the ammo, making sure my health syringe was prepared, and pre-selecting my shoulder-slung weapon depending upon which enemies I expected to encounter.

Rather than just finding extra supplies, some kind of ‘currency’ (ie: ‘weapon parts’) that could be applied to upgrade your weapons would have made for a more exciting scavenging reward, and would have fit well into Metro gameplay tropes.

Though there were ample opportunities to fight stealthily instead of going in guns-ablazin’, I didn’t find the stealth opportunities particularly exciting. Knocking people out with a punch to the head doesn’t feel very satisfying, and it seemed to backfire in many cases, with the bad guy just being confused for a moment before blasting.

Enemy AI was good at least, which keeps combat interesting. The enemies frequently communicate and move around the environment, giving them a sense of intelligence. Some enemies, like the rat mutants, can be a bit annoying because they sometimes come up behind you with little time to react to their presence.

But I do appreciate their behaviors like running away after taking some initial damage and peering around corners before popping out for a bite.

The game has a literal arachnophobia warning at the start, and for good reason. There are several sequences with spider enemies, including times where spiders are literally crawling on your head. I appreciate the creepiness of these moments, but found the actual combat with these enemies more annoying than not. Spiders can leap onto your face or hand, and it isn’t exactly clear what the player is supposed to do about it. I imagine a lot of people will end up smacking their headset once or twice while trying to pull the spider off.

Another annoying enemy were the game’s frequent ‘shadow’ figures which made for some boring and poorly telegraphed gameplay. The figures, which blend quite well into the game’s dark tunnels, will kill you if you stand near them for a few seconds. But given they’re hard to see, and that taking damage from them makes your screen even darker, it’s sometimes hard to tell when you’re even being hurt by them. Oh and there’s friendly shadows that look almost the same, but don’t do damage to you….

Even after beating the game, I’m still kind of unsure exactly what was intended with this ‘shadow figure’ gameplay. Waiting for an NPC to move out of the way so you can get to where you’re going just isn’t fun. Maybe there was some way to dispel them? Shooting certainly didn’t do the trick.

While Metro Awakening has strong VR fundamentals and a compelling first half, the latter half of the game unfortunately lacks the variety for a strong finish. From a story that’s nebulous and difficult to care about, to repeating gameplay sequences that aren’t particularly fun on your fourth or fifth go, to just a lot of needless walking, it felt like a great first half of the game gave way to a padded and uninspired second half.

It took me 7.5 hours to finish the game on medium difficulty, but I would have been happy if they had cut out some of the repetitive gameplay segments for a tighter and overall more fun experience.

Immersion

Metro Awakening isn’t high up there in environmental interactivity, but it does have a great sense of atmosphere. Environments are detailed, decrepit, and feel authentic in the way that much of the world looks like it’s been cobbled together from the remnants of a fallen society.

Although the game looks significantly better in its PC and PSVR 2 version (thanks to better textures, models, and much better lighting), I was generally impressed with the visual presentation on Quest 3. Although not as well lit or textured, environments felt equally dense on Quest 3, without any obvious cases of assets being carelessly crushed to meet the performance budget. The game relies heavily on Meta’s Application Spacewarp tech to run as well as it does on the standalone headset—bringing with it some artifacts—but generally I think it’s a good trade for how the game looks on Quest 3. I haven’t had a chance to test Metro Awakening on Quest 2 yet, so the verdict is still out on that.

For better or for worse, the inherent claustrophobia of being stuck in an abandoned metro really lands in a VR headset. Walking through the game’s labyrinthine tunnels and hallways makes you feel like there’s nowhere to run and that every corner could be hiding a threat. Consistently good ambient sound design helps to sell the game’s well measured tension. Though I didn’t appreciate how the game’s music would frequently kick in and spoil an upcoming encounter that would have otherwise been surprising.

I personally enjoyed getting immersed in this tense atmosphere, but some might find it oppressive.

Although the game’s holster system generally works quite well, the complete lack of a body or any indicators as to the location of the inventory volumes are felt like a miss for a VR game of this scope in 2024. All you see is floating hands… it’s up to you to remember where all the invisible inventory locations are. In the midst of combat, for instance, if you can’t remember exactly how to pull out your weapon backpack (reach over your left shoulder with your right hand), you’re going to be scrambling.

Although the affordances for the inventory system aren’t great, I did appreciate the usability. I haven’t seen a VR game use the gesture of ‘reach with your right hand over the opposite shoulder’ before, but it seemed like the game did a great job of detecting this consistently with few false positives.

I also liked the diegetic inventory design. Basically you have two backpacks: one for guns and one for other equipment like grenades, gas mask, and health vials. In both cases, items are generally represented on your backpacks at full size and their actual count, rather than shrinking unrealistically and ‘stacking’ into infinite piles. So if you have three grenades, you’ll see three full-sized grenades on your backpack. And you can’t fit any more, because there’s only enough room for three.

This makes for an immersive way to not only communicate to the player how many supplies they have, but also an immersive way for players to actually retrieve the items. I also like that the game will give the player key items contextually from the chest inventory slot. If you’re holding a pistol and reach to your chest, you’ll pull out a pistol magazine. If you’re holding the health syringe and reach to your chest, you’ll pull out a fresh health vial. It feels very natural in practice and minimizes the cognitive load of frequent actions like reloading—a smart design that also worked great in Half-Life: Alyx (2020).

As a general framework for VR game inventory, this one has legs.

While the game’s atmosphere is compelling, I did find myself wishing there was more environmental interactivity. This is one of those games where some objects are interactive and some just… aren’t, with little rhyme or reason between what you can pick up and what you can’t. Even if there wasn’t any extra gameplay associated with making more of the world’s objects interactive, there’s so much detail visually in the world that it would add to the immersion to know that I could actually grab and look at all the things scattered about.

Comfort

Metro Awakening offers a full set of modern VR comfort options, including teleport movement. However, its particular choice of setting—cramped environments and quite a few steep stairs—is going to be less comfortable to those sensitive to motion discomfort than an equivalent game with more open environments and less frequent stair motion.

There are several moments in the game where the horizon is shifted significantly. For most, these are brief enough to not be problematic, but such moments can be triggering for certain people (and generally speaking, they could have been executed without altering the horizon).

Metro Awakening’ Comfort Settings – November 7th, 2024
Turning
Artificial turning
Snap-turn
Quick-turn
Smooth-turn
Movement
Artificial movement
Teleport-move
Dash-move
Smooth-move
Blinders
Head-based
Controller-based
Swappable movement hand
Posture
Standing mode
Seated mode
Artificial crouch
Real crouch
Accessibility
Subtitles
Languages	English, French, German, Japanese, Korean, Simplified Chinese, Spanish (Latin America), Czech, Polish, Russian, Ukrainian
Dialogue audio
Languages	English
Adjustable difficulty
Two hands required
Real crouch required
Hearing required
Adjustable player height

Stranger Things VR (2024), the Quest game from Tender Claws, is leaving timed Quest exclusivity next month.

Originally launched on Quest 2/3/Pro in February, the studio announced it’s bringing Stanger Things VR to to PSVR 2 and SteamVR-compatible headsets on December 5th.

Here’s the breakdown, courtesy of Tender Claws:

Experience the world of Stranger Things from the never-before-seen perspective of Vecna as he explores unknown realities, forms the hive mind, and enacts his plan for revenge against Eleven and Hawkins.

Players will invade the dreams and memories of fan-favorite characters and harness telekinetic powers to possess minds and battle creatures, as Henry Creel’s transformation into Vecna and his influence on the events of prior seasons is revealed.

In our review on Quest earlier this year, we lauded the game’s visually intense retelling of the show’s last two seasons, showcasing extremely deft art direction in the process. On the flipside, it retreads a lot of familiar ground for fans of the show, and puts some of its most engaging gameplay mechanics in the backseat, presenting itself as more as mélange of interesting scenes than a truly indispensable addition to the franchise’s lore.

Still, it’s a visually intense experience, letting you follow the show’s villain Vecna and protagonist Eleven as you traverse the terrifying world of the Upside Down and a shattered version of Hawkins, letting you confront Dr. Brenner and duke it out with Demodogs and Demobats alike—culminating in around four hours of gameplay.

You can pre-order Stranger Things VR on the PlayStation Store for PSVR 2, priced at $20, and wishlist the game on Steam for PC VR headsets.

Meta may be rethinking its approach to third-party app funding, as the company has reportedly cut funds to some outside VR game developers whilst reshifting its focus to non-gaming apps.

According to a report from The Information, Meta is becoming “more discriminating” in how it spends to stock its Horizon Store for Quest.

Citing unnamed Meta staffers, the company has reportedly cut funding for some outside app developers amid a wider shift to fund apps that have seen comparatively better traction. The Information maintains Meta is hoping to boost “lifestyle apps,” such as fashion, beauty and music. Funding for these apps is said to arrive at some point via an accelerator that grants seed-stage funding.

Meanwhile, The Information has cited two VR developers that have taken a hit as a result, requiring them to slash staff numbers following the funding pull.

Netherlands-based studio Monks has reportedly halved its team of 100 people, which was creating content for the company’s Horizon Worlds social app. France-based Atlas V, known for work on Wallace & Gromit in The Grand Getaway (2023) and Mobile Suit Gundam: Silver Phantom (20240, has also apparently cut half of its team, according to The Information report.

This follows Meta’s shutdown of first-party VR studio Ready at Dawn in August, creators of the Lone Echo franchise and Echo VR.

A few months prior, the studio concluded a protracted legal battle with the United States Federal Trade Commission (FTC) to acquire Within, the studio behind popular VR fitness app Supernatural.

Nature Relaxation

Ocean Rift (Quest, PC VR) – $10

Ocean Rift is like an aquarium where you get to swim around with the fish. You’ll get to see lovingly animated sea creatures up close and you might even learn a thing or two with more than 40 narrated points of interest to find. And if you’re on Quest 3, Ocean Rift has a mixed reality mode that lets you turn your own room into an aquarium.

Real VR Fishing (Quest) – $20

You can probably guess what this one is about… but you might not expect that the app has some rather beautiful environments. So yes, you’ll be fishing and you can take it as fast or as slow as you’d like. Consider putting on some music or even a podcast while you relax and wait for the big one. Real VR Fishing also supports multiplayer so you can fish with friends.

Google Earth VR (PC VR) – Free

Google Earth VR is exactly what it sounds like… its Google Earth, but in VR. Beyond being able to explore essentially the entire globe as if you were a giant towering over it, the app can also be a wonderful way to relax. Find yourself a pretty place (there’s some great ones in the ‘Featured’ section inside the app), bring yourself down to ground level, and simply sit as a giant and take in the scene around you. You can even set the mood by adjusting the time of day. It can also be magical to just ‘wander’ starting from a familiar place and see where you wind up. Considering both the quality of the experience and the fact that its free, this one is an absolute must-try.

EarthQuest (Quest) – $10

EarthQuest aims to not only bring the Google Earth VR experience to Quest, but modernize it too. EarthQuest adds multiplayer so you can explore the globe with friends as well as natural language input allowing you to ask ChatGPT to tell you more about the things you find.

Musical Relaxation

Tetris Effect: Connected (Quest, PC VR, PSVR 2) – $30, $40

Tetris Effect is classic Tetris gameplay wrapped in an audio-visual experience which uniquely accompanies each of the game’s levels. As you maneuver the blocks you’ll hear sounds that fit into the beat. Don’t lose yourself too much in the sights and sounds though as some of the levels will take skill and practice to complete, even on ‘Normal’ difficulty. A post-launch update to the game has brought cross-platform multiplayer to Tetris Effect so you can vibe with friends no matter if they’re playing in VR or on a flat screen.

Sheaf – Together EP (SteamVR) – Free

Ever wish you could cruise down an endless highway, watching as the trees, buildings, and city streets pass you by while a synthwave soundtrack perfectly fits the vibe? Artist and musician Sheaf has created just that—a short VR experience which is hand-crafted to fit a three track synthwave album. For the great price of free, this one is a no-brainer.

Creation & Puzzling

Squingle Mini (Quest, $1) & Squingle (PC VR, $15)

Squingle is one of those games that you can look at and still not entirely understand what you’re actually seeing. But once you get your hands on the game all becomes clear: it’s a clever, trippy, and fun puzzle game that plays to VR’s spatial strengths. To put it simply, the goal of Squingle is to guide a pair of spinning balls through a pipe. Sounds easy enough, right? Well like any good puzzle game, Squingle starts simply enough but introduces more difficult concepts as you go—like a button that reverses the spin of the balls or one that changes the axis of the spin. And the pipe? It’s actually a bit more like a cosmic bowel that undulates with twists, turns, and parallel tunnels.

Read Our Hands-on

Puzzling Places (Quest, PSVR 2*) – $15, $20 (*free demo)

Puzzling Places is a series of 3D puzzles made out of 3D scans of real-life places. Going from flat jigsaw puzzles to 3D puzzles will stretch your brain in satisfying new ways as you use all your 2D jigsaw strategies (like sorting by color, edges, and the like) while leaning into your spatial reasoning sense to find the right connections between pieces. Even more satisfying—when you’re done you have a tiny 3D diorama to explore! Since launch, Puzzling Places has been updated with a multiplayer mode so you can relax and puzzle with friends, and mixed reality mode on Quest 3 so you can solve puzzles right in your room.

*Free Puzzling Places demo on PSVR 2

Vermillion (Quest, PC VR) – $20

Vermillion is a free-form painting app designed to replicate the oil medium. You can do everything from basic paint-by-number to completely freestyle painting with color mixing and the use of various brushes to achieve different effects. With a multiplayer mode up to four players total can paint together. You can also paint in your own space thanks to mixed reality on Quest 3, or even do co-located painting with a friend so you’re both painting in the same physical room.

Gadgeteer (Quest, PC VR) – $15

Have you ever wished you had a whole room and a box full of tracks, balls, and dominos to build the ultimate Rube Goldberg machine? You’re in luck. Gadgeteer will let you finally imagine your childhood dream of filling an entire room with a crazy chain-reaction-machine without the cat knocking everything over. Beyond being able to build whatever you want in ‘Sandbox Mode’, Gadgeteer is a full fledged puzzle game with 60 puzzles to complete and a pleasant soundtrack to boot.

Read Our Review

Cubism (Quest, PC VR) – $10

Cubism is a casual VR puzzle that plays a bit like a 3D version of Tetris. Its sleek, casual design makes it great for relaxing seated play. But fear not, while the puzzle concept is simple, Cubism will have you scratching your head in short order as difficulty increases across 60 stages. The bright, void-like environment makes it easy to forget about the woes of the real world as you focus on finding the right fit for the pieces before you to the backdrop of a beautiful piano soundtrack. Thanks to hand-tracking support, you can even play without needing to pick up your controllers. A post-launch update has added a mixed reality mode on Quest 3 so you can solve puzzles from the comfort of your own room.

Vrkshop (PC VR) – $20

Vrkshop describes itself as a “VR woodworking game” and aims to recreate a hands-on woodshop where you can measure, mark, cut, nail, and much more. With a realistic wood-cutting system, the app challenges you to use the tools at your disposal to create furniture and other objects with no explicit instructions.

Color Space (Quest) – $10

Color Space is a virtual reality coloring book where you get to bring life to a full 3D scene rather than just a flat page. Step into one of 26 environments and start adding color as you see fit. As you color the scene, it will start to come alive with animated elements and ambient sounds.

Musical Creation

Electronauts (Quest, PC VR) – $20

Electronauts is like a VR DJ station with training wheels. Though you can take the training wheels off if you’re especially talented, the training wheels are actually part of the appeal; Electronauts does an incredible job of letting you express your inner musical creativity even if you don’t have instrumental talent. The game serves up some 80 tracks, each which function as a custom sound-kit with unique instruments, backing tracks, and more. And as a huge bonus, PC VR version of the game are multiplayer, meaning you can jam out with a friend. The track list is heavy on the EDM side (though there are some chill songs to be found) so if that’s not your cup of tea you might want to look elsewhere.

Read Our Review

Drops: Rhythm Garden (PC VR) – $7

Drops is a musically focused experience where shapes that you place make different sounds when struck with falling balls. With an endless flow of balls, you can construct a cacophony of sounds on the fly, adding new shapes and creating new paths as you go. Think of it like a Rube Goldberg machine, but for making minimal, meditative music.

Continue on Page 2: Meditation, Reflection, Mindfulness, and Exploration »

Apple has released initial access to the long-promised panoramic display feature for Vision Pro’s Mac Virtual Display, which now brings three virtual screen sizes via its visionOS 2.2 beta release.

Having initially launched with Vision Pro back in February, Mac Virtual Display only included a single virtual screen size, albeit allowing Vision Pro users to have multiple app windows open at the same time.

Many were hoping Apple would release the new ‘Wide’ and ‘Ultrawide’ display formats for Mac Virtual Display last month during the company’s online Mac product reveal event. Now, as reported by MacRumors, visionOS 2.2 is here in beta, allowing Vision Pro users who opt in to finally take advantage of long-awaited wider screen real estate.

Apple said during the feature’s unveiling in June the update would bring an “ultra-wide display that wraps around you,” allowing for resolutions “equivalent to two 4K monitors, side by side.” Mac-side dynamic foveated rendering also keeps content “sharp wherever you look,” Apple said.

While it’s unclear exactly when Apple plan to push out visionOS 2.2 to the stable branch, it’s likely to come alongside the next ‘X.2’ updates for iOS, iPadOS, macOS Sequoia, watchOS, and tvOS, MacRumors suggests.

In the meantime, to enroll in the visionOS 2.2 beta, simply follow these few steps:

Updating Vision Pro via OTA updates

1. Sign in to the Apple Developer Center with with your Apple ID and accept the ToS.
2. Put on Vision Pro, and go to Settings General > Software Update > Beta Updates and choose the developer beta.
3. When a new developer beta is available, you can install it from Software Update.
4. From there, you should see the new ‘Wide’ and ‘Ultrawide’ options when tethered to your Mac.

Human Within is a sci-fi interactive VR film coming to Quest in January that explores how AI affects humanity. Departing from standard VR films, which are usually pretty ‘one-and-done’, the upcoming interactive experience promises to give you the choice in how the story progresses and ends.

Created by Signal Space Lab and Actrio Studio, Human Within is set to arrive on Quest on January 9th, and “soon” to SteamVR headsets.

Like the interactive Black Mirror episode Bandersnatch, Human Within is slated to offer the user choices and consequences, but also explore digital recreations of the films environments, displayed as point clouds, in addition to viewing some of the action from what the studios call “a virtual internet space.”

1 of 4

Directed by Avi Winkler and Anne Weigel, Human Within follows engineer Nyla, and her sister Linh, who are employed at Forward Industries. Having pioneered a groundbreaking supercomputer that harnesses the human brain’s processing power, Nyla pulls back from the project after confronting its implications. But the sisters are forced by the company to continue their work, and Lihn’s consciousness is transferred to the metaverse.

Lihn’s now-digital brain is where the narrative plays out, presented as a mix of 3D spaces, and both 2D and 360 video, offering a total of five possible endings.

“At key moments in the story the events that take place are defined by the user’s choices. These moments define how events unfolded in the past and determine how it all ends in the present,” the film’s Horizon Store page says.

“We wanted to explore how advanced tech affects the human experience, and how we connect to one another,” said Avi Winkler, Creative Director at Signal Space Lab. “Launching at a time of rapid advancements, like ChatGPT 4.0 and Neuralink, Human Within no longer feels like science fiction, but rather a timely reflection on the shifting realities of modern life.”

Virtual reality was a key component, Winkler says, noting Human Within “immerses viewers in the reality of now – and where we’re headed – in a more immersive, nuanced way than through a traditional film or video game.”

You can pre-order Human Within on the Horizon Store for Quest 2 and 3, regularly priced at $18, and wishlist it on Steam for PC VR headsets.

Code discovered in a recent Google Play update indicates the company may soon roll out support for XR headsets on its Android app store, which would mark a decisive shift in the competitive landscape.

As reported by Android Authority, code in version 43.3.32-31 of the Google Play app contains mention of “XR headset,” including a new headset icon that ostensibly indicates whether an app works with the supported device.

Google has technically hosted XR games on Play in the form of Cardboard apps since 2014, which use Android smartphones as ad hoc VR displays—something that was big in kickstarting user interest in the early days of consumer VR, but not so much in the day of standalone headsets like Meta Quest 3 and Apple Vision Pro.

The addition of a dedicated section in the Play store and official device support however points to something bigger than Cardboard, or even its now-defunct Google Daydream platform, which the company abandoned in 2019.

So what’s spurred this renewed interest in XR? There are a few things, arguably the largest of which is the Google, Samsung and Qualcomm headset collaboration, which was announced in early 2023. Samsung is building the hardware, Qualcomm the chipset, and Google the Android-based XR operating system.

Although the companies have confirmed the headset will be announced (and possibly launched) by the end of this year, practically nothing is known about the XR collab. Industry rumors maintain Samsung initially delayed the device to better compete with high-end mixed reality headsets, such as Vision Pro.

Then there’s the recent report from The Information that claims Google and Samsung are looking to partner on a Ray-Ban Meta Smart Glasses competitor, which would be materially ‘easier’ to produce than a full-fledged XR headset, since the comparatively cheaper AI-centric smartglasses don’t include displays.

Still, such a device likely wouldn’t need such a close tie-in to the broader Android ecosystem like a potential Vision Pro competitor, which would likely trade on its ability to not only play XR games published on Google Play, but also run standard 2D apps too, like Vision Pro does with its millions of compatible iOS apps.

This follows revelations from earlier this year that Meta and Google held talks in effort to bring Android XR to Quest, however talks apparently stalled due to Google’s terms being too restrictive for the liking of Meta. In the meantime, Meta has been making overtures to Android developers to bring their apps directly to Quest in a bid to further flesh out Quest as a general computing platform.