Redemption arcs rarely last this long, but No Man’s Sky (2016) hasn’t given up on going above and beyond with its latest update, which finally fixes the visuals on PSVR 2.

The game’s initial release on PSVR earlier this year 2 wasn’t great, with users noting that visual quality simply wasn’t up to snuff. Players and reviewers alike decried the much beloved game’s blurriness on PSVR 2, which became an unfortunate fixture since the February 2023 update.

Now Hello Games has released its Echoes 4.4 patch which has completely overhauled visuals on PSVR 2 thanks to the inclusion of foveated rendering, an eye-tracking-driven rendering technique that only displays the area in the center of your eye’s gaze at max quality. Your peripheral vision isn’t that great at seeing detail anyway, so why waste precious resources to render where it matters the least? That’s foveated rendering in a nutshell; learn more about how eye-tracking goes way beyond foveated rendering here.

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Echoes also brings a new race to the game, the Autophage, a long-hidden civilization of robotic beings. You’ll also encounter Pirate Dreadnoughts, which cruise between the stars and terrorise merchant fleets, and some more detailed ship controls that let you divert power to boost shields, move faster, or increase your firepower. Hell, there’s even a trench run in Dreadnoughts, which—terrible ship design flaw notwithstanding—sounds like a blast.

Checkout the Echoes update trailer below to see it all, or also read the game’s release log for the full rundown of recent updates.

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Scott Hayden
Well before the first modern XR products hit the market, Scott recognized the potential of the technology and set out to understand and document its growth. He has been professionally reporting on the space for nearly a decade as Editor at Road to VR, authoring more than 4,000 articles on the topic. Scott brings that seasoned insight to his reporting from major industry events across the globe.
  • impurekind

    Nice.

  • Pab

    so, is this simple to add it to any game?

    • Tanix Tx3

      Highly doubt it. Also the benefits will differ for any game.
      The poor performance of NMS is an advantage here. Performant games will need graphic upgrades to take advantage from the extra power.

      • Daniel Whitmer

        The easiest way to do foveated rendering is hardware Variable Rate shading , something the ps5 doesn’t have, despite having the best use case for it. So people have to recode their graphics engines to build their own software version, and it is not a one size fits all solution so people are going to have spend time figuring out how to make it work.

        • Pab

          So, since you know the tech, do you expect that as usual, this technology will multiply in PC before?

          • Daniel Whitmer

            Yes and No, descriptive aint it. The latest UE5 build has expirimental support for VRS based foveated rendering with OpenXR gaze tracking. But the number of PC headsets that support gaze tracking are extremely limited. I think only really the Vive headsets have it, and for most you need to buy an attachment for it. Also you have to be able to track the eye movements quickly enough to know where they will be looking before you render the frame, that used to be an issue in the PC space though Sony figured out the trick. Perhaps it is just throwing more CPU at it. Main thing is that till more Headsets have eye tracking it isn’t going to be a developer focus. and more headsets are not going to add it unless software is for it. Good old chicken and Egg.

          • Pab

            Right, but given the software availability, one could expect to get a PCVR headset with this tech in 2-4 years, which is way less than what the PSVR2 is expected to last in the market.

          • Daniel Whitmer

            I am not here to participate in platform warring and your expectations of the market dude

          • Pab

            What? I´m just talking. You take this very seriously.

    • Chris Meeks

      It apparently took 4 months.

  • ApocalypseShadow

    PS VR 2 just keeps rolling along and improving daily. That eye tracking and foveated rendering will keep getting better and better for games.

    PS5 power, super fast SSD, haptics not found anywhere else and next level 3D sound. It’s a recipe for great potential. Glad hello improved the game as it was a blurry mess on PSVR. This update ought to wow those playing it.

  • gothicvillas

    I’m going to get the game on psvr2 for the 1st time :) is it worth it?

  • lordbeavis

    with the release of fsr 3.0 we should see info on the ps5 graphics update 3.0 coming soon. xbox already announced it will support it and unreal is producing a plugin that replaces fsr 2.1

  • I might have to start a new game on the PCVR version soon, there’s been so many patches since the last time I played 3 years ago.

    Also, I’m so jelous of PSVR’s eye tracking. Here’s hoping the Quest Pro continues it’s slow price drop. lol

    • CrusaderCaracal

      Eye tracking is cool but in PSVR’s case it’s just something to distract from the other issues

  • xyzs

    This amazing support is rare and generally only seen with the long term platforms such as simulators.
    They deserve their success now.

  • CrusaderCaracal

    Sweet. I love this game honestly, I haven’t had the chance to play it in vr but it’s so sick even on console