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Microsoft announces Mesh, an XR collaboration platform. Alex Kipman promised us a Microsoft Ignite conference with an amazing level of immersion , and he kept his word. But since Microsoft owns one of those studios (and using it costs around $100K/day if I remember well!), You are all fantastic! Here you are my flower for you!
Microsoft Maquette is a brand new VR tool from Microsoft which is all about prototyping spatial designs. Maquette appeared quite suddenly this week, apparently without any official announcement from Microsoft; it seems to have been picked up by MSPoweruser after being spotted by twitter user WalkingCat.
A new FCC listing appears for an HTC Vive headset. While Oculus is getting all the glory for the Quest, its competitors are not sleeping. And in fact, a new request to FCC for a new device has arrived from HTC. Since HTC has always made announcements during the CES, I think it will be announced in January.
Image by Road To VR, from HTC images). HTC launches Vive Tracker 3.0 HTC was not teasing a new standalone headset, but a new Vive Tracker. I know that many of you won’t be excited by this news, but remember the Vive Tracker is one of the most successful accessories ever created by HTC. Come and visit it!
Khronos Group , the consortium behind the OpenXR project which aims to standardize the way applications communicate with AR and VR headsets, just added Microsoft to its ranks. Among its count of members, the OpenXR working group consisted of nearly every major player in the industry except Microsoft until now.
Microsoft has released initial support for OpenXR on both HoloLens and Windows VR headsets , and Collabora has released its Monado open-source Linux OpenXR runtime. Oculus has committed to bringing OpenXR runtime support to both Rift and Quest later this year. Epic says that it has previously implemented OpenXR 0.9 The post OpenXR 1.0
Image by Oculus). The other bombshell news is that Resident Evil 4 is coming to the Oculus Quest 2. On April, 21st, Oculus will host its first Gaming Showcase , with news on ‘Lone Echo II’, ‘Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge’, and many other titles. HTC is going to launch its headset on May, 11th. Top news of the week.
The company offers access to one of the most affordable and flexible VR headsets on the market in the form of the Oculus Quest, allowing all businesses, large or small to explore virtual reality. Meta recently announced the arrival of a popular architectural tool “ Unity Reflect ” in the Meta Quest environment for 2022.
Image by HTC Vive). HTC launches Vive Focus 3 and Vive Pro 2. In the end, the rumors were correct and HTC launched two headsets at VIVECON: the Vive Pro 2 and the Vive Focus 3 Business Edition. But this device got also some criticism: first of all , HTC has not released new controllers and still sells it with the old Wands.
Providing “access, support, and savings” to qualifying indie developers, the new Oculus Start program hopes to encourage and enable the development of great apps from those just getting started in VR. The program, which was introduced in a brief post on the Oculus developer blog , has begun to accept applications via this form.
What is interesting the most are not the features, that more or less are the same as most other headsets: integrated headphones, halo+headband, IPD adjustment, etc… It seems a mix of a Samsung Odyssey and an Oculus Rift S. Or that Microsoft is working on a new reference design that fixes the issues of the first one?
It’s no doubt been a massive undertaking creating a platform agnostic standard for VR and AR, as The Khronos Group consortium has included in its ranks the important hardware and software creators in the industry, including AMD, ARM, Epic Games, Facebook, Google, HTC, Microsoft, NVIDIA, Qualcomm, Unity, and Valve.
Some time ago, the most important companies of the XR ecosystem (HTC, Oculus, Microsoft, etc…) joined the Khronos Group to discuss a standard to end the fragmentation of the XR space. That is if every company implemented OpenXR, a program built for the Oculus should work with SteamVR as well. Image by Oculus).
More info The Vive Focus Vision has been released HTC has decided to release the Vive Focus Vision the same week as the Quest 3S. It seems that HTC has invested a lot in providing a standalone headset that is great for PCVR and so it features a lossless wired Displayport connection, very high display resolution, and integrated eye tracking.
Meta (Oculus). With the Oculus ecosystem, schools and professional training companies alike are beginning to scale their virtual curriculums for a wide range of use cases. Perhaps the biggest company in the mixed reality landscape right now, Microsoft is paving the way to a future of incredible hybrid learning.
In recent years, Microsoft has begun making a name for itself as perhaps the most significant innovator in the mixed reality space. The company offers not just a powerful development environment in the form of Microsoft Mesh, but also one of the most immersive “MR” headsets on the market, with the HoloLens 2.
Meta is also the company behind Oculus, one of the more accessible and affordable VR headsets on the market. Similar to Meta, Microsoft has made some significant investments into the XR landscape in the last couple of years. For most people interested in the Extended Reality landscape, the name “HTC Vive” will be familiar.
From time to time, I like to look at the adoption graph of XR shown by John Riccitiello (the CEO of Unity) in 2017 , where you can see that the real acceleration of immersive technologies should start around 2022-2023. Not to mention the millions spent on marketing , especially in the US (Oculus was one of the sponsors of NBA, for instance).
This week has mostly been in the sign of Oculus, with many news and updates from the brand controlled by Facebook. Before leaving you to the best news of the week, I would like to highlight two notable things about my work: My crazy trolling game “The Unity Cube” has been featured in a video by Upload VR! Top news of the week.
Major VR stakeholders—including Oculus, Valve, HTC, Microsoft, Unity, and Unreal Engine—now offer full or partial support for the standard. Image courtesy Khronos Group. After years of development, the OpenXR 1.0 specification has taken major strides toward real industry adoption. Sony, however, remains an odd one out.
Oculus devices will require a Facebook login. The enormous piece of news of the week is tha t Facebook has communicated that from October, 20th, all people that want to use an Oculus device for personal use will have to use their personal Facebook account to log in. Top news of the week. Image by Tweakanalogy). The same on Twitter.
Ok, of course, I’m kidding, but, you know, the possibility of saying the wrong name is so high that my proposal actually starts making sense… Top news of the week (Image by HTC Vive) HTC reveals inside-out-tracked Tracker With a totally unexpected move, HTC has revealed a new kind of Tracker.
Or maybe “relaxed” is not the right word to use, considering the little drama on Microsoft’s headsets. Top news of the week (Image by HP) Microsoft officially drops support for its Mixed Reality headsets Microsoft has just released the infamous Windows 11, version 24H2 update. I think this speaks a lot.
And while this is anyway a good result for a startup (developing an AR headsets means spending billions in R&D), targeting the consumer market has been a suicide move , that let Microsoft get full control of the profitable enterprise market. Valve Index and Oculus Quest were on sale again. Image by Oculus). Who knows….
The shape of the controllers is slightly different than the one of the Oculus Touch, though, and there is a ring that surrounds the wrist of the user. There is also “finger-tracking” a la Valve Index , but just for the thumb, index, and middle finger (so, it is more a la Oculus Touch). Image by Microsoft).
Rikard Steiber, President Viveport and SVP of Virtual Reality, HTC Vive. Katie Kelly, Head of Engagement, AltspaceVR / Microsoft. Other experiences to look forward to include Red Frog Digital’s Zombie Holomaze, which will offer a terrifying AR experience for attendees to explore while wearing a Microsoft HoloLens.
See Also: Redefining the Future of Location-Based Entertainment With HTC VIVE Focus 3 and The Park Playground “Virtual reality is often perceived as being limited to the world of gaming. We’re already seeing key metaverse players coming together in the collaboration between Meta and Microsoft.
Epic Games is a prominent member of the Khronos Group working alongside a host of industry pros including Oculus, HTC, Valve, Microsoft, Google, AMD, NVIDIA, and Unity. Epic Games Store is said to launch soon and begin what Sweeney calls “a long journey to advance the cause of all developers.”
The Mixed Reality Toolkit (MRTK) by Microsoft is an open-source toolkit that has been around since the HoloLens was first released in 2016. Understanding the MRTK-Unity Toolkit for MR Developers. Microsoft-driven MRTK-Unity is a suite of components and capabilities used to speed the creation of cross-platform MR applications in Unity.
More info (Road To VR review) More info (Ars Technica comparison with other devices) More info (Polygon review) More info (Playing Oculus games with the Knuckles) More info (Orders backlog) More info (Valve Index fitting guide) More info (Wireless Index) More info (All games compatible with Index) More info (Gabe Newell talking about the Index).
We can say the new cycle started with the announcement of the Apple Vision Pro , because that has been a disruptive moment for our market: Road To VR’s Ben Lang says that it has been the most important moment for virtual reality after Facebook’s acquisition of Oculus , and I agree. Photoshop is doing the same.
Microsoft’s play for command of next generation personal computing can be seen today with the announcement of a series of Windows-powered VR headsets starting at $300. This is not the case with the headsets on the way from Microsoft’s partners. An example of the Windows Holographic user interface.
More info (Snap announces new Spectacles glasses — Road To VR) More info (Snap announces new Spectacles glasses — Upload VR) More info (Ian Hamilton reviewing the device) More info (A comment on the launch video of the device) HTC announces Vive Focus Vision HTC has announced its latest standalone headset: the Vive Focus Vision.
Didn’t work (Image by Microsoft). I expect the smartglasses from Facebook, first of all, to be Facebook-branded (so, goodbye Oculus), to be very stylish (remember that Luxottica is the leading company for glasses and sunglasses), and to be able to connect to the smartphone without a tether. Sounded good.
Sinespace was built using the Unity game engine allowing for an easily customizable as well as upgradable experience. Sinespace is currently available on PC via download or a web client, all OpenVR compatible headsets including the HTC Vive, Oculus Rift and Microsoft Mixed Reality, with plans for iOS and Android releases in the near future.
In the fall of 2016, Microsoft announced a partnership with a handful of hardware manufacturers to make developer headsets implementing the inside-out tracking technology seen on the HoloLens. LOTS OF BIG UNITY ANNOUNCEMENTS AT GDC. HIGH-END VIRTUAL REALITY JUST GOT MORE AFFORDABLE. VALVE’S R&D IN EYE-TRACKING TO INCREASE.
How Unity is preparing for the mobile VR revolution The gaming landscape looked quite different when TechRadar spoke to John Riccitiello, CEO at game engine Unity, back in June 2015. That hasn’t caused Unity to shy away from VR though, quite the opposite. billion PCs).
Last year, it was still called Oculus Gaming Showcase, and it featured important updates on games like Pistol Whip, The Climb 2, I Expect You To Die 2, and Resident Evil 4 VR. Ruth Bram, Executive Producer at Oculus Studios, will be the host of the show. Pico Neo 3 , Vive Focus 3 , Oculus Quest 2 ) only offer Wi-Fi connectivity.
Industry-leading companies sponsoring this year’s expo include Intel, Dell, Qualcomm, VIVEPORT, Microsoft, Neurogaming and OptiTrack, as well as a full lineup of innovative companies shaping the future of immersive tech. Rikard Steiber, President Viveport and SVP of Virtual Reality, HTC Vive.
The Oculus Quest 2 continues its march towards mainstream adoption. It wouldn’t be a normal week without some news about Facebook and/or the Oculus Quest. The first one is that the Quest 2 has now sold in some months more than all the other Oculus headsets (with the exclusion of Gear VR) combined in all these years.
We’re looking for a Unity dev for a freelance gig lasting 1–2 months, ideally from Italy or a nearby country (for easier management). It is in Italian, but basically it says that we’re looking for a Unity dev with preferred experience with VR and/or multiplayer games. Maybe Oculus planned to showcase Del Mar at GDC.
To make you understand how these features are incredible, Qualcomm has stated that “the [XR2] reference design has 2x the CPU and GPU performance, 4x more video bandwidth, 6x higher resolution and 11x AI improvement compared to our current widely adopted XR platform [the Oculus Quest ]”. base stations and a 20m fiber cable.
They should guarantee better tracking both for the headset and the controllers; The controllers are smaller and seem a mix between the Oculus Touch and the WMR 1 controllers. HP and Microsoft have a long track in offering enterprise hardware, so this headset may battle HTC on his own land (B2B). pounds (0.55kg) Cable Length: 19.5
This is a simpler mechanism than the waveguides employed by Microsoft HoloLens 2 or by Magic Leap, and while it may provide a bit less immersive holograms, it is the only way to provide affordable wide-FOV glasses at the moment. Realmax has an SDK that is compatible with Unity 2017 and Unity 2019.
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