Category: VRChat

UPDATED! Meta Announces the Meta Horizon Operating System for Future Third-Party VR/AR/MR Headsets, and Partnerships with ASUS, Lenovo, and Xbox (Also: Reports of Slower-Than-Expected Sales for the Apple Vision Pro)

WARNING: This blogpost goes off on a couple of tangents, including a recent report on faltering sales of the Apple Vision Pro, plus a new update at the very end with some very insightful commentary on Meta’s Horizon Store plans and how they might negatively impact the VRChat in-world creator economy, which is still in beta test.

On April 22nd, 2024, Meta (the company formerly known as Facebook) made an announcement titled A New Era for Mixed Reality:

Today we’re taking the next step toward our vision for a more open computing platform for the metaverse. We’re opening up the operating system powering our Meta Quest devices to third-party hardware makers, giving more choice to consumers and a larger ecosystem for developers to build for. We’re working with leading global technology companies to bring this new ecosystem to life and making it even easier for developers to build apps and reach their audiences on the platform.

This new hardware ecosystem will run on Meta Horizon OS, the mixed reality operating system that powers our Meta Quest headsets. We chose this name to reflect our vision of a computing platform built around people and connection—and the shared social fabric that makes this possible. Meta Horizon OS combines the core technologies powering today’s mixed reality experiences with a suite of features that put social presence at the center of the platform.

Of course, this also includes the Meta Quest Store, which will apparently be renamed the Meta Horizon Store:

Developers and creators can take advantage of all these technologies using the custom frameworks and tooling we’ve built for creating mixed reality experiences, and they can reach their communities and grow their businesses through the content discovery and monetization platforms built into the OS. These include the Meta Quest Store, which contains the world’s best library of immersive apps and experiences—we’re renaming it to the Meta Horizon Store.

And, as you might expect with a company whose profits still largely derive from social media based on surveillance capitalism, you’d best believe that Meta wants to make sure that it inserts itself into all the social aspects of this technology, as it licenses the tech to other companies:

The Horizon social layer currently powering Meta Quest devices will extend across this new ecosystem. It enables people’s identities, avatars, and friend groups to move with them across virtual spaces and lets developers integrate rich social features into their apps. And because this social layer is made to bridge multiple platforms, people can spend time together in virtual worlds that exist across mixed reality, mobile, and desktop devices. Meta Horizon OS devices will also use the same mobile companion app that Meta Quest owners use today—we’ll rename this as the Meta Horizon app.

It looks very much as though the word Quest is going to be replaced by the word Horizon throughout (much as Oculus was replaced by Quest previously). I guess those Meta marketing people need to justify their paycheques by constant rebranding! Gotta keep it fresh! Personally, I think they should have stuck with Oculus… 😉

Also part of this announcement are three key partnerships with third-party hardware developers:

  • ASUS and its Republic of Gamers subsidiary “will use its expertise as a leader in gaming solutions to develop an all-new performance gaming headset.”
  • Lenovo will apparently focus on education and the workplace: “Lenovo will draw on its experience co-designing Oculus Rift S, as well as deep expertise in engineering leading devices like the ThinkPad laptop series, to develop mixed reality devices for productivity, learning, and entertainment.”
  • Meta will also be working with Xbox to create a limited-edition Meta Quest (Microsoft and Meta also worked together recently to bring Xbox cloud gaming to the Quest).

Reactions to this new on Reddit have varied. One person on the r/VisionPro subreddit (hardly an impartial source!) commented, “Feels more closed than Apple. And also less developer friendly.” (As if Apple doesn’t have its own walled-garden approach to its technology.)

Also mentioned in Meta’s announcement was that software developed through the Quest App Lab will be featured in the newly-renamed Horizon Store:

As we begin opening Meta Horizon OS to more device makers, we’re also expanding the ways app developers can reach their audiences. We’re beginning the process of removing the barriers between the Meta Horizon Store and App Lab, which lets any developer who meets basic technical and content requirements ship software on the platform. App Lab titles will soon be featured in a dedicated section of the Store on all our devices, making them more discoverable to larger audiences.

I think that this is good news for smaller developers, who often struggle to get word out about their products. (Of course, Meta will get a cut of any sales through its store!)

In an Engadget report by Devindra Hardawar, she writes:

Think of it like moving the Quest’s ecosystem from an Apple model, where one company builds both the hardware and software, to more of a hardware free-for-all like Android. The Quest OS is being rebranded to “Meta Horizon OS,” and at this point it seems to have found two early adopters. ASUS’s Republic of Gamers (ROG) brand is working on a new “performance gaming” headsets, while Lenovo is working on devices for “productivity, learning and entertainment.” (Don’t forget, Lenovo also built the poorly-received Oculus Rift S.)

As part of the news, Meta says it’s also working on a limited-edition Xbox “inspired” Quest headset. (Microsoft and Meta also worked together recently to bring Xbox cloud gaming to the Quest.) Meta is also calling on Google to bring over the Google Play 2D app store to Meta Horizon OS. And, in an effort to bring more content to the Horizon ecosystem, software developed through the Quest App Lab will be featured in the Horizon Store. The company is also developing a new spatial framework to let mobile developers created mixed reality apps.

Devindra does have a good point; Apple has long been opposed to opening up its hardware to third-parties (and it would appear, based on recent media reports, that sales of the eyewateringly-pricey Apple Vision Pro are not as brisk as the company had hoped):

Apple has dropped the number of Vision Pro units that it plans to ship in 2024, going from an expected 700 to 800k units to just 400k to 450k units, according to Apple analyst Ming-Chi Kuo.

Orders have been scaled back before the Vision Pro has launched in markets outside of the United States, which Kuo says is a sign that demand in the U.S. has “fallen sharply beyond expectations.” As a result, Apple is expected to take a “conservative view” of headset demand when the Vision Pro launches in additional countries.

Kuo previously said that Apple will introduce the Vision Pro in new markets before the June Worldwide Developers Conference, which suggests that we could see it available in additional areas in the next month or so.

Apple is expecting Vision Pro shipments to decline year-over-year in 2025 compared to 2024, and the company is said to be “reviewing and adjusting” its headset product roadmap. Kuo does not believe there will be a new Vision Pro model in 2025, an adjustment to a prior report suggesting a modified version of the Vision Pro would enter mass production late next year.

According to Apple industry analyst Ming-Chi Kuo, initial sales of the high-end Apple Vision Pro have “fallen sharply beyond expectations.”

I find it an absolutely fascinating time to be working in virtual reality, augmented reality, mixed reality, and spatial computing! While Apple has aimed for the high-end with its US$3,500 headset, Meta has focused its attention on the low end, with a wireless headset that is seven times cheaper than the Apple Vision Pro! (Of course, you could also use the Quest 3 as a PCVR headset, but most people don’t do that.)

I never would have predicted that we’d have two firmly-set goalposts at each end of the field, instead of companies releasing a mass of options in the middle of the field! This leaves a huge gap between the ultra-low-end Meta Quest 3 and the ultra-high-end Apple Vision Pro, and I do believe that there is certainly opportunity for companies to fill that gap, with existing hardware (e.g. the Valve Index, the Vive Pro 2, etc.), as well as some new devices which fall in between the two extremes.

I think that Meta is very smart to partner up with third parties who already have some experience in this space (notably Lenovo), and from those partnerships, new products will spring up to address that gap. While it will likely not be until 2025 or 2026 until we see the fruit of these new partnerships, interesting times are ahead!

UPDATE April 26th, 2024: I sometimes post my blogposts to the various virtual world and virtual reality Discord servers I belong to, in order to drive a bit more traffic to my blog (I don’t do it nearly as often as I used to, though). And PK, on the MetaMovie Discord server, made the following insightful and thought-provoking comment on this announcement from Meta/Facebook:

I want someone to dig into what sort of access Meta would have to data on these third-party headsets, potentially, through various software that would be required. I think it’s existential that we need to keep metaverse data out of their hands.

Even now, having failed with five or six different social VR attempts so far, they still manage to collect 1/3 of every virtual transaction in VRChat, at least those using Quest headsets, which is the majority of users now. Their [i.e., VRChat’s]creator economy is only in beta so far, but thanks to Facebook and Steam, and Apple for pushing this model, we don’t have the thriving virtual economy we would have had by now, because even taking 1% of every transaction just for monopolizing app downloads, that would be too much. A third is robbery, but because [Meta CEO Mark] Zuckerberg could afford to make mobile headsets affordable without worrying about profits so far, they’re now cornering commerce in this space. I don’t think it’s safe to trust them with our future, and so I’m very skeptical about these sorts of initiatives.

PK is correct; it is troubling that the walled-garden gatekeepers like app store owners (Meta, Google/Android, and Apple) are each taking a cut of any in-world transactions. It has a chilling effect on anybody trying to make money within VRChat (of course, the social VR platform has long had a booming economy going on outside of VRChat, with places such as the Virtual Market series of avatar shopping events and the VRCMods Discord server, where avatar buyers and sellers can connect).

Linden Lab was luckily able to avoid this entire mess by creating its own in-world economy within Second Life well before the advent of Google Play and Apple’s App Stoe—but now that they are actively working on a new mobile Second Life app for Android and iOS, it will be interesting to see whether Second Life, too, will be impacted by other players like Meta wanting to take their cut. (Probably not, since you can do things like buy Linden dollars directly from the Second Life website.)

Interesting times lie ahead! As drag queen RuPaul likes to say on her hit reality TV show, RuPaul’s Drag Race (and my guilty pleasure!):

Mama Ru raises her opera glasses and says, “I can’t wait to see how this turns out.”

Thank you to PK of the MetaMovie Discord, for giving me permission to quote them directly!

Unity Drops a Bombshell: What Will Be the Impact on Social VR Platforms?

A collage of Twitter (sorry, X) statements from smaller game developers announcing they are dropping Unity after the company’s announcement earlier this week (source)

On Tuesday, Unity dropped a bombshell on software developers: a new fee structure that will charge devs using its popular game engine on a per-install basis, with less than four months advance notice. Ars Technica reported:

For years, the Unity Engine has earned goodwill from developers large and small for its royalty-free licensing structure, which meant developers incurred no extra costs based on how well a game sold. That goodwill has now been largely thrown out the window due to Unity’s Tuesday announcement of a new fee structure that will start charging developers on a “per-install” basis after certain minimum thresholds are met…

This is a major change from Unity’s previous structure, which allowed developers making less than $100,000 per month to avoid fees altogether on the Personal tier. Larger developers making $200,000 or more per month, meanwhile, paid only per-seat subscription fees for access to the latest, full-featured version of the Unity Editor under the Pro or Enterprise tiers.

“There’s no royalties, no fucking around,” Unity CEO John Riccitiello memorably told GamesIndustry.biz when rolling out the free Personal tier in 2015. “We’re not nickel-and-diming people, and we’re not charging them a royalty. When we say it’s free, it’s free.”

Now that Unity has announced plans to nickel-and-dime successful Unity developers (with a fee that is not technically a royalty), the reaction from those developers has been swift and universally angry, to put it mildly. “I can say, unequivocally, if you’re starting a new game project, do not use Unity,” Necrosoft Games’ Brandon Sheffield—a longtime Unity Engine supporter—said in a post entitled “The Death of Unity.” “Unity is quite simply not a company to be trusted.”

Sheffield goes on to say:

…I can say, unequivocally, if you’re starting a new game project, do not use Unity. If you started a project 4 months ago, it’s worth switching to something else. Unity is quite simply not a company to be trusted.

What has happened? Across the last few years, as John Riccitiello has taken over the company, the engine has made a steady decline into bizarre business models surrounding an engine with unmaintained features and erratic stability.

…

Ultimately, it screws over indies and smaller devs the most. If you can afford to pay for higher tiers, you don’t pay as much of this nickle and dime fee, but indies can’t afford to on the front end, or often it doesn’t make sense in terms of the volume of games you’ll sell, but then you wind up paying more in the long term. It’ll squash innovation and art-oriented games that aren’t designed around profit, especially. It’s a rotten deal that only makes sense if you’re looking at numbers, and assume everyone will keep using your product. Well, I don’t think people will keep using their product unless they’re stuck. I know one such developer who is stuck, who’s estimating this new scheme will cost them $100,000/month on a free to play game, where their revenue isn’t guaranteed.

Unity is desperately digging its own grave in a search for gold. This is all incredibly short-sighted and adds onto a string of rash decisions and poorly thought through schemes from Unity across the last few years.

And it’s not just games that are affected by this news; many metaverse platforms are using Unity too, and it remains to be seen how this news will impact them. Among the social VR platforms I have blogged about, which rely on the Unity game engine, are:

  • Anyland
  • Bigscreen
  • ChilloutVR
  • Engage
  • Lavender
  • NeosVR
  • Rec Room
  • Sinespace/Breakroom
  • Somnium Space
  • VRChat

(Ironically, the social VR platform Sansar deliberately made the decision not to use a third-party game engine, to avoid being blindsided by exactly what happened to Unity developers this week. Not that it helped with uptake of the platform.)

So, I posted the following question to the most knowledgable (and opinionated!) group of metaverse experts I know, the over 700 members of the RyanSchultz.com Discord server. Here’s a sample of some of their comments:

The devs at VRChat say, on Reddit, that nothing will change. We shall see…this guy is staff:

Other comments and responses to the news, from my Discord, are:

Lots of big-name devs are swearing off of Unity, dropping it even for projects already in progress.

For Neos itself I’m actually worried the least. For years they have planned to eventually move away from Unity, so the way the FrooxEngine actually interfaces with Unity is quite minimal. But like, most other VR Social games don’t have the “luxury” of running on two Engines frankensteined together. VRC will probably have to pay for it, the likes of Chillout are likely still far too small for that… But it still sucks that they have that lingering over their head now as the platform continues to grow.

Yeah, I mean, this is exactly why you shouldn’t rely too heavily on a third-party like this, because they can pull the rug out from underneath you…I am quite sure that VRChat is going to be okay. It’s the smaller, more niche metaverse platforms I’m a little worried about.

Sansar’s in-house engine looks pretty good right now, eh?

Okay, so it’s clear to me that this IS gonna have a large impact on any company that uses Unity. Question: how hard is it to move from Unity to, say, Unreal, or Godot? Is it an impossible task?

For an existing game? You’re usually basically re-writing it from scratch at that point.

For an existing project, it’s like remaking it from the ground up. An open engine similar to Unity would be a much better choice probably, for example Stride 3D.

The skinny seems to be that Unity will undo this, but trust will have been broken.

The last commenter makes an excellent point: even if Unity responds to the backlash by retreating from this decision, the damage has already been done, and the trust between Unity and developers has been broken.

The comments over on Reddit have also been uniformly negative. Again, here’s just a couple of examples:

Whatever Unity does, they already lost the trust of devs. Even if they retract, it will be “for now”. Fuck them.

and:

Cost per license sold? Sure. That’s fine, you can just bake it into the cost of the game.

Cost per install? Charged to the developer/distributor???? Fuck no. You have no idea how much money each customer will cost you.

Initially, Unity stated the fee would apply every time the game was installed, or reinstalled. Then they backtracked that, but installs on multiple devices will have the fee charged multiple times. Install it on your PC? That’s a fee. Now also on your Steam Deck? That’s another fee. Your laptop? Fee again. Replaced your PC? Have another fee! And god forbid someone remembers that PC cafes are a thing. There’s zero information about how a “device” will be kept track of, so potentially just changing the hardware in a device will cause the fee to reset.

Piracy is a huge unknown. Unity says developers will simply have to trust that Unity’s anti-piracy solution works.

You just don’t do business like that, ESPECIALLY when you make this change retroactively. Companies are going to have to retool their entire profit estimation for something they cannot even account for.

Anyway, it will be interesting to watch as developments unfold over the next few weeks. Unity is a part of so much software development work (it’s even said to be a part of the upcoming Apple Vision Pro VR/AR headset!), so there will definitely be ripple effects. And, of course, the only people guaranteed to make money off this are the lawyers, so expect to see the lawsuits fly! Stock up on popcorn…

UPDATED! Editorial: The Importance of Discoverability in the Metaverse

The Second Life Destination Guide has had an overhaul!

People whose introduction to the concept of the metaverse started with VRChat, Horizon Worlds, and other social VR platforms may question why I choose to write so often and so fondly about Second Life, a virtual world which was launched in 2003, well before the advent of consumer-grade virtual reality headsets. My answer is always the same: Second Life is the perfect model of a mature, fully-evolved virtual world, with a vibrant ecosystem and a still-thriving community, which many newer metaverse companies would be wise to study, learn lessons from, and (in some cases) emulate.

Recently, Linden Lab (the company which makes Second Life) announced a long-overdue overhaul to the Second Life Destination Guide:

The latest version of the Destination Guide offers a modern design refresh (the first since 2010!), while also adding some useful new features that enable easier discovery of Second Life events and experiences. Web visitors may welcome the addition of a much-requested Search bar so that you can better seek and find the places that interest you, while category and search result pages now also have a “Sort by” option in the upper-right corner that allows users to filter the directory by “Newest” entries and alphabetically (A-Z or Z-A). Mobile users will notice that the Destination Guide is now much easier to browse and explore while on the go – which may come in handy to accompany our forthcoming Mobile Viewer.

The new Second Life Destination Guide features keyword searching and results sorting

Of course, there’s not just an external directory on the Second Life website; there’s also in-world search tools as well. (They need a bit of improvement too, but that’s the subject for another blogpost!)

Which brings me to the topic of today’s editorial: the vital importance of discoverability in the metaverse. I believe that this is something which many metaverse-building companies tend to neglect, or treat as an afterthought, to the detriment of their platforms’ communities—and to their corporate bottom line.

Let’s take VRChat as an example. In February 2021, I blogged:

Since I have upgraded my Oculus Rift to a Valve Index, I have been spending more and more time in VRChat lately. VRChat in 2021 reminds me of nothing so much as Second Life circa 2007, when I first joined: the wonderful sense of exploration and adventure, never quite knowing where you were going to land up and who you would encounter!

However, there is still one problem that I encounter in VRChat, and that is the topic for today’s blogpost: the need to set up a better in-world directory of worlds to explore. I have written about this topic before, but the need has now become acute. Finding cool worlds in VRChat has become something of a crapshoot, a time-consuming, trial-and-error process.

And since then, the problem has only gotten worse! It is an exercise in frustration to try and find worlds by topic, or by searching for keywords which might (or more often, might not!) appear in the world’s name. VRChat badly needs an official, external directory website of created worlds which is better curated and has more than just the broadest of categories.

VRChat’s Discover Worlds features basically mimics the in-headset directory, with its unhelpful, overly broad categorization

There is a keyword search feature, but it lumps in user profiles, meaning you have to scroll down to the worlds whose titles and/or tags match what you typed in:

There is a desperate need for some sort of directory of VRChat worlds which offers the ability for people to describe their worlds in much more detail, and allows them to browse with more nuance (for example, sleep worlds). The closest thing to the utility of the Second Life Destination Guide is the volunteer-run Worlds on VRChat website, which seems to be mainly focused on Japanese-language worlds.

Why is this important? It’s vital, because social VR is, by its very nature, all about the community. A metaverse platform fails or succeeds by its ability to attract an audience, and making it easier for like-minded people to find each other, form communities, and build things together. It is a factor in whether a user visits your metaverse once, wanders around lost, gives up and logs out—or finds a friendly space catering to her interests, and comes back again and again!

For example, I just love visiting 1029Chris’ delightful bird sanctuary in VRChat. Now, let’s assume that I am a user is a newbie, who has heard through the grapevine that there’s this cool place in VRChat where you can feel bread to geese, but doesn’t know how to find it. She doesn’t know the name of the place. Even worse, she doesn’t know the username of the person who created it.

She puts on her headset and goes to the in-headset Worlds directory, or perhaps instead she goes to the VRChat Discover Worlds page on the VRChat website, and starts hunting. She enters “geese”, and finds three worlds, none of which are what she is looking for (while Chris has helpfully added the word “ducks” as a tag to her bird sanctuary, “geese” or “goose” are neither in the world’s title, nor its tags).

The poor newbie doesn’t know Chris’ username (1029chris), so she can’t search by the name of the world’s creator, to find it via Chris’ profile. After a frustrating couple of minutes, she gives up. She loses out on an experience that would have engaged her, and perhaps brought her back time and again, and perhaps would have led to further good word-of-mouth among other people, including other people new to social VR and virtual reality—leading to potentially more business for VRChat!

And that’s a simple example. How about this one: you want to find this cool place that you heard about in VRChat, where all you know is that you can change the backgrounds to all kinds of cool animated patterns—but you don’t know that it was created by 1001, or that the name of the world is Treehouse in the Shade, or any of the keywords used to describe it? It’s like finding a needle in a haystack!

You could argue that it’s too expensive for a company like VRChat to devote resources to build and maintain such a detailed and helpful directory of worlds for its user base. I would argue that it is a cost of doing business, a cost of investing in your community. At the very least, VRChat should be working with its community to enhance the discoverability of the insanely creative spaces its users are creating!

OK, end of rant. I am now getting down off my soapbox!

Executive summary: discoverability is a key factor in the success of any metaverse. Build it into your product. Make it easy for people to find cool worlds that match their interests, find each other, and build communities.

UPDATE 12:42 p.m.: I just had an experience that underscores the importance of discoverability! My Second Life avatar was exploring the cafés listed under the Cafés and Hangouts subsection of the new Destination Guide:

She teleported into Little Whiskeria, and while she was looking around the café/bar, the owner Lizzy showed up, and we got to talking. Lizzy invited me to an event that is taking place at 11:00 a.m. SLT/Pacific Time, so I am now making plans to catch a live performance (singing/guitar/piano) at Little Whiskeria!

That’s exactly why discoverability is so important: it took me from my interest (coffee houses) and immediately met that need in a very satisfying way, which will probably lead me to tell my friends about this place and come back for return visits!

UPDATE 1:13 p.m.: Here’s a snapshot of the live show at Little Whiskeria, a really good German/English band is on stage and the summer folk music café ambiance is wonderful, just what I needed on a wintry Winnipeg day!

Live show at the Little Whiskeria café/bar

UPDATE April 8th, 2023: My friend Rainwolf told me about another website directory of VRChat worlds, called VRC List, which has a variety of search and sort options:

Thanks, Rainwolf!

Come to the VRCon Film Festival in VRChat Today, December 17th, 2022!

This evening in VRChat, the VRCon 2022 Film Festival will be celebrating 30 VRChat films made by filmmakers from across the world! The event takes place today, Saturday, Dec 17th, 2022, from 6:00-8:00 p.m. Eastern Time, with an after-party.

You can check out the details on all of the films on the VRCon website. Here’s the trailer for the VRCon Film Festival:

If you wish to attend this evening’s film festival, please fill out this Google form. The organizers have made it easy to attend, even if you are a newbie! If you’re new to VRChat, you can follow this helping getting-started guide from the VRCon website (there’s also this detailed Google document, titled VRCon 2022 Film Festival Instructions). They’ve also posted a three-minute How To Guide video to YouTube:

See you there!