Wuhao, a Chinese user on the official Sansar Discord channel, has shared some information about the current state of VR gaming and social VR in China. He said:
I have feedback from Chinese market. At present several thousands of young Chinese are playing VRChat because of the advertising effect from bilibili, a video sharing website popular with young Chinese. VRChat Chinese community have became the largest virtual world community over Second Life Chinese community based on a view to active QQ Groups (Chinese Discord). The movie Ready Player One is also very popular with young Chinese. But Chinese still have common unstable network problem causing slow loading or uploading in Sansar, and even can’t download the client.
He posted an image of a problem that many Chinese seem to face when trying to use Sansar:
He also said, in answer to a question as to whether or not VRChat is easier to access:
VRChat should be easier to access in China because it’s a game in Steam.
(I wonder when Linden Lab will release Sansar on Steam?) He added:
VR players are still not mainstream gamers. But more and more Chinese VR [gamers] are buying HTC Vive which has better support than Oculus Rift in China. For me, I only use Steam VR and [the] Oculus Store.
In response to my question about how he is able to run and use Sansar in China, he said:
I use [a] VPN. So I don’t have problem to enjoy Sansar. But many of my Chinese friends and even some Creators in SL who want to develop Sansar really have a common network problem for Sansar.
When asked if he has any information on how common Windows Mixed Reality headsets are in China, he commented:
Not sure. Based on my life in China, I haven’t seen a real AR/Mixed Reality headset product yet and also haven’t experienced one. But it’s no problem to experience VR here even in a small city.
Thank you for sharing your perspective with us, Wuhao!
Wow very interesting.