John Carmack, former CTO of Oculus and key player in the VR startup’s genesis story, says Sony’s upcoming PSVR 2 headset may be see a bumpy road to adoption based on its high price and potential for scattershot geographic distribution.

Carmack seems to really like PSVR 2’s hardware from a technical standpoint, saying that the unique combination of a tethered OLED display and PS5’s ray-tracing performance could hypothetically allow for a novel VR rendering approach with extremely low latency. As a legendary programmer and the former CTO of Oculus, it’s just the sort of thing Carmack thinks about when it comes to virtual reality headsets.

And though he lauded that unique technical potential, Carmack says he actually doesn’t expect PSVR 2 to be “very successful at $600”:

Releasing on February 22nd, PSVR 2 carries a price tag of $550, which after sales tax puts it somewhere close to $600 out-the-door in most states. That’s a fair jump past Quest 2’s $400/$500 price tag, depending on whether you buy the 128GB or 256GB version.

Former Oculus CTO John Carmack | Photo courtesy Meta

Still, this doesn’t take into account the all-in price to actually play PSVR 2, which at $400 for the PS5 Digital Edition and $500 for Console with disc drive, puts it somewhere north of $1,000 for everything required. But what about Sony’s impressive global reach with PS5?

In a follow-up tweet, Carmack mentions that PS5’s admittedly large global footprint, now tallying 30 million consoles worldwide, isn’t nearly as important as having a higher concentration of devices spanning a smaller geographic area.

“Addressable market size matters much more to developers than global coverage. A 5M market size distributed across every country is much less attractive than a 10M market in a smaller set of countries. In fact, equal sized markets would favor fewer countries — less work.”

SEE ALSO
Meta Acquired 9 Leading VR Studios Starting in 2019: Here’s What's Happened Since

Carmack doesn’t appear to be playing favorites either; he similarly critiqued Meta Quest Pro recently for its “dubious price point,” something which has skewed Meta’s latest and greatest away from consumers and positioning the mixed reality headset more as a work productivity device.

Doubts about PSVR 2 seem to be mounting the in few weeks preceding its February launch. Public perception was recently injected with a heavy measure of uncertainty about its pre-order performance. A Bloomberg report earlier this week claimed Sony had slashed production forecasts of PSVR 2 by half to just one million units expected in the first quarter, something Sony has now refuted.

Looking to learn all about PSVR 2 before it launches this month? Check out our top articles covering games, hardware previews and more:

Newsletter graphic

This article may contain affiliate links. If you click an affiliate link and buy a product we may receive a small commission which helps support the publication. More information.


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.
  • Leave poor PSVR2 alone

    Ease off on the negativity… at least until the headset is in the hands of the public… I personally have my preorder in and will be playing gt7 as soon as the headset in on my head… it is going to be amazing!!!!!!

    • Doughboy

      I can’t wait to play it

    • JakeDunnegan

      I don’t think saying that the PSVR2 is overpriced is being negative. If enough people say that, maybe Sony will lower their price and more people will then play VR.

      That’s actually GOOD for gamers and for VR as type of gameplay.

      • Cless

        For what it is, it ISN’T overpriced, like at all. People are mixing up expensive with overpriced.

        • JakeDunnegan

          And you’re mixing up price and value.

          Something’s value is what someone is willing to pay for something. It’s entirely relative.

          Overpriced and expensive are literally synonyms. You might say that people are undervaluing the PSVR2. Still subjective, but it least the word choice is correct.

          • Cless

            I am not though.
            Some things can be expensive and yet not be overpriced, because their high value matches their high price.

            And yes, you are correct, I could say people are undervaluing the PSVR2 too, that would also be a correct interpretation of what I was saying.

            What I don’t get is why you brought up the point about what is someone willing to pay. I think its kind of a moot point.
            We could literally say that about everything and never finish this conversation.
            Gold? PSHH just a shiny rock. CPU? That’s just a rock they tricked into thinking!

          • JakeDunnegan

            You were correcting my use of the word “overpriced.” My use was not incorrect, at least, not in an economics discussion or in the dictionary.

            Feel free to google “overpriced synonym” and you will find “expensive” listed as a synonym, and Merriam-Webster actually lists it as the first one.

            So, no, people are NOT “mixing up the definitions” – you are.

          • Cless

            Dude, going the grammar route of discussion is useless and unproductive let’s leave that, okay? Are they synonyms? Yes, yes they are. Overpriced happens to have another main meaning as well though, “costing more than it is worth”, which is what most people mean when using it in this context.

            But again, who cares? I was talking about the content of your argument, not your wording.

            Let’s try this again:
            >>I don’t think saying that the PSVR2 is overpriced is being negative. If enough people say that, maybe Sony will lower their price and more people will then play VR.

            Sony will not lower its price because of people saying that, that will never happen. If people bitch enough, they will just make the PSVR3 shittier and cut more corners to make it cheaper, and thus also worse. At which point people will bitch about it not being good enough, and we will go around the merry go round again.

            They have done good this time, and hopefully, enough people buy it so Sony makes a bunch of money, and maybe, economy of scale allows them to eventually lower the price, or flat out make a PSVR2 ¨slim¨ with a smaller price like they’ve done with other devices in the past that sold good.

          • JakeDunnegan

            FWIW, I was talking about the content of YOUR argument, but sure, let’s leave it at that.

            As for the rest of it, I guess we’ll see. Personally, I’d love to see the PSVR2 succeed, but I think they made a mistake at pricing as they have.

            For the PS5, the VR set is a peripheral, and asking people to double the price of their console for a peripheral is going to be a hard sell. We’ll see if it works.

            If it doesn’t sell b/c people consider it overpriced, they won’t just make the PSVR3 “shittier” – they won’t make it at all.

            How many Sony Vitas are being sold these days?

          • Cless

            We can’t seem to understand eachother then!

            You do bring good points. We still don’t know how people will react once its for sale, hopefully it will be good!
            I’m sure Sony would have made it cheaper if they could, but that would have meant pretty big compromises, like putting terrible LCD displays on it…

          • JakeDunnegan

            Yeah, and after a few months, I’ll probably go ahead and buy one myself. Despite having three kids, two Quest 2s, and the other stuff and the PSVR, the VRs just don’t get utilized all that much in my house. :/ I keep promising myself to use them for exercise, if nothing else, and even I don’t use it as much as I want to!

            Anyway – cheers, and I here’s to hoping the PSVR2 knocks it out of the park. ;)

          • Cless

            Oh man, that’s a lot of headsets indeed! Its amazing to thing the little ones in your house are growing up with this tech. I wish I had this kind of stuff when growing up hahaha

            And yeah! Everyone wins if headsets like these sell well!

          • Dan Vincent

            Let me help. The new C8 corvette to most would be considered expensive. But anyone that knows anything about cars knows that car is a steal for the performance and technology it offers. End of discussion. That said I can’t wait for my expensive PSVR2 to arrive!!

          • namekuseijin

            Imagine buying a Corvette to drive in short suburban streets loaded with indie traffic… that’s a waste of potential, which is exactly the current situation with psvr2. I hope they can snap out of it by leaving Quest suburbs and taking the highway to more exciting game landscapes…

        • Here here! An intelligent statement.

      • kool

        The only way it can be overpriced is if you can get it somewhere cheaper. Saying its over priced wont bring down the price not buying it will.

        • JakeDunnegan

          Sure, supply and demand and all that.

          It’s possible Sony will be getting feedback, but ultimately, it’s the sales of the thing that will make a possible change. However, the console makers seem to be a lot slower in implementing a change like that, so who knows?

          I mean, the PSVR2 could be so good, that VR sales help drive console sales. Stranger things have happened, though I doubt that will. (If you’re new to VR, the Quest 2 is a much more obvious choice, as there’s no additional hardware needed, and it’s wireless…)

          But, it’s possible! We’ll be finding out in a month just how popular the device is…

    • Kenny Thompson

      You can play iRacing on PCVR right now…. a far better simulation. It takes to much practice for most though.

      • NotMikeD

        There are some excellent racing sims on PCVR to be true. As someone who OWNS most of them, but haven’t really played them much, the upcoming Gran Turismo 7 VR mode entices me more because A.) I expect the game to be more accessible to those of us who like the idea of driving fast cars but aren’t hardcore simmers, and B.) I feel like the game is also a very specific love letter to cars themselves–like I’m probably more excited about the VR showroom aspect, to stand in the presence of these cars at scale and to mess around in the cockpits. That’s a very underappreciated aspect of VR to me, the experential aspect of it.

        • BillyBumbler

          I think the biggest selling point would be ease of use and setup. It’s not the smoothest experience to set up VR on some of these PC racing games. The game UI isn’t the greatest for VR headsets, and you have to spend the time to tweak graphics settings so you can achieve a decent framerate.

        • namekuseijin

          > stand in the presence of these cars at scale and to mess around in the cockpits. That’s a very underappreciated aspect of VR to me

          totally. As is simply taking a test drive in one of those cars in any location, no racing involved. In games lacking some cruise mode like that, I just use time trial…

      • namekuseijin

        iRacing is just boring multiplayer, plus only 150 cars or so. GT has more than 400, it’s sheer motorsports porn… plus the driving feels insanely good.

  • Peter vasseur

    Carnac made a junk hmd who is he to talk l. Ge oversaw the junk pro for $1500 . Psvr2 is going to be very successful

    • Cl

      Quest pro is $1100. Psvr2+ps5 is $1050.

      • PSVR2 is going to be HUGE

        And way less if you already own the PS5… I have owned all of the Oculus headsets with the exception of the Pro… I just can not justify the price difference from my Quest 2 (and I have almost pulled the trigger twice), however PSVR2 was pretty much an instant preorder. It is also sad to say that most of my best experiences have been in the PSVR… Come on Feb 23rd!

        • vancleefmustache

          The whole “but I have to buy a PS5 to play these” excuse I find puzzling. Are the majority of us not already gamers? Are users who are complaining about this brand new at gaming in general? “Wha wha…What is this Sony Playstation you speak of that is going on in the gaming world and why haven’t I heard of it” No one is asking you to go out and buy an old 3DO or some other system. I do want to inform others that you can use it to play flat screen games as well. I have played several of those games. They are great. Maybe, if we don’t all kill PSVR2 before it even launches, we can see some of those great games being in VR as well.

          Before anyone mentions it, I know PS5 has been hard to track down the last year but it’s getting much much easier. You can get one if you really want it. I know there are also people who only do PC gaming. From what I have seen, they have been mostly positive and have shown interest in PSVR2 which makes sense since a lot of these users have the same wants from VR. Large and better looking VR games. It’s just this exclusive Meta crowd.

          • vancleefmustache

            Did I get an actual thumbs up from ViRGin on this? Come join our side! We need your troll energy.

          • Cl

            Lots of downvotes for facts.. I’d rather have a quest pro since I don’t have a ps5, I don’t like wires and I game on pc. Psvr would make 0 sense for me. I’m not saying psvr is bad, just the comment I was replying to was saying quest pro is bad cuz of the price so I made a comparison.

            What I’m actually going to get is a pimax crystal as long as the reviews say it has good fov.

          • Tommy

            I understand for you personally but for someone getting into VR, the price comparison you chose if off.

            If you are buying the Quest Pro and using it on PC to compare to buying a PSVR2 and PS5 combo, you now have to add in the coat of a VR ready PC.
            Now it looks like this:
            PS5+PSVR2=$1050
            Quest Pro+PC=$3000+

            If you are comparing PSVR2+PS5 directly to Quest Pro standalone,. it’s not even really comparable gamewise as one is mobile VR and the other is akin to PCVR. :)

        • FrankB

          I agree, some of my best VR experiences on PSVR also, Wipeout, Astrobot and RE7 alone blows away anything on Quest, and that was all on an underpowered PS4 and hacked together VR solution. Alyx is the only thing on PC that can truly be described as a AAA experience.

          • Tommy

            and Asgards Wrath and From Other Suns and Hellblade and Subnautica and HL2 :)

          • Sven Viking

            A while back I heard From Other Suns was no longer playable as its servers were shut down?

          • Tommy

            That sucks. That was a great game. It was like Star Trek Bridge Crew if you could actually leave your seat and go do battle.

          • Sven Viking

            I actually bought it but didn’t get around to trying it before I heard it shut down :(. Really enjoyed Bridge crew too.

            It’d be impractical but I kind of wish there was some sort of requirement to release the server backend for games that shut down. Or just return to allowing people to run their own servers in the first place — it’s not like From Other Suns was a highly competitive game with a lot of microtransactions to keep secure, in cases like that it’d actually save the developers money.

          • Tommy

            I think you would have loved it. The only issue I had is when a random person would join your crew and would fire on an allied ship. It was pretty much total annihilation after that. If you could even beam back to your ship before it was destroyed you rarely had time to make a hyperspace jump before they disabled your engines or blew a hundred holes in your hull. Then you’d be running around patching holes and re-cloning crew members. Was an amazing game though. Loved playing it! I wonder if you can play without the server since you could have AI crew members.

          • NotMikeD

            Are you sure about that? I played it online in co-op only a few months ago and it worked great–on an Index via Revive too!

          • Tommy

            I’m not sure about it at all. I did try to join an existing game buy had no luck after about 10 minutes. I also had no one join my play session so I am only assuming. The co-op is great as long as you don’t have some noob fire on an allied ship.

          • NotMikeD

            I played From Other Suns a few months ago with someone in multiplayer, it worked great. AND that was via Revive on an Index mind you. So I think (and hope) rumors of its death are greatly exaggerated.

          • Sven Viking

            Oh, thanks! I’ll check it out. Maybe the servers went down for a while and people assumed it was permanent, or something. (Or hopefully they didn’t just shut down shortly after you played.)

          • Rob

            ????? I think you somehow lost the connection to reality here. I own all systems including Psvr1. And psvr1 has some good games. But to say it blows away the quest is like saying my old T ford blows away the latest Tesla model. Looks like fanboyism. And to say half life alyx is the only AAA experience on pcvr is even further away from reality. Asgards wrath, flight simulator, hit man, skyrim, serious sam, assetto corsa, green hell etc. etc. And dont say that are flat screen ports, because that is also the case with psvr1 games like RE7 that you name yourself.

          • FrankB

            I’m not dissing the Quest, I have one and I like it. There are some games that are obviously better on quest than psvr, mostly games that rely heavily on tracking. Beat saber, Superhot and Pistol Whip being obvious examples. But I still stand by my comment about Astro Bot , Wipeout and RE7 being way better experiences than anything I’ve played on Quest despite being ds4 only. I didn’t actually say that PSVR blows away the quest as a device , I said those 3 specific experiences blew away anything I’ve played in the quest.

          • david vincent

            There a tons of AAA experiences on PCVR, thanks to VR mods.
            With the next Universal UE VR injector to come, there will be thousands of new PCVR games, with some AAA games among them.

          • ViRGiN

            PCVR mods are mouse and keyboard 3D TV type of gaming.
            Go to hell.

            Even when it supports 6DOF controls, they are not true VR games lol, no holsters, no reloading, it’s the same lame flat screen press R to reload shit. You praydog koksukers are really out of touch.

      • GrabtharzHammer

        So you’re telling me that the ps5 and headset together costs less than a quest pro. The quest pro which shouldn’t even be in the conversation when talking about VR. It’s like comparing console gaming to smart phone games. It’s not even a question as to which is better, in terms of….well everything.

        • shadow9d9

          The Switch is nearly the same chip, butnolder. 3rd best selling console of all time. You are grossly out of touch.

          • Peter vasseur

            Actually your really don’t understand how stuff works. Vr required two tenders at Min 90 frames without projection. Flat gaming renders 1 time, which if you really understand the tech and what it takes to work. Shows your credibility is lacking.

          • GrabtharzHammer

            Looks like Peter already got you. Who’s grossly out of touch? Lmao

      • Peter vasseur

        Not at launch, it wasn’t it was $1500.00 it’s only $1100 now because it’s not selling and vive has a system for that price. Even at the lower price it’s still inferior to psvr2.

        • Tommy

          It’s only $1100 for a limited time.

      • NotMikeD

        Quest Pro is $1100 *for a limited time*

    • david vincent

      Sony fanboys are even more toxic than Steam fanboys…

      • ViRGiN

        I don’t think that’s a real species anymore.
        Steam fanboys have been multiplying for 20 years now.
        They have been collecting digital games for two decades, and see no wrong in it. Haven’t launched 99% of those titles ever since, but hey – YoU gEt To KeEp iT fOrEvEr

  • Darshan

    PSVR2 may get flying colors success, pre-booking isn’t only parameter. With power of PS5 and kind of technologies PSVR2 packs in (First consumer eye tracking, Foveated Rendering, HDR, Adaptive Triggers, Sense motion etc) . There is no reason why it can’t be supper dope. release lineup of games is also promising. unless all PS5 owners who appreciate new technology magically become so ‘hand-to-mouth’ that they can’t buy it, I see no reason for PSVR2 not to be super hit.

    • All the positive press and enticing technology in the world won’t mean anything if people can’t afford it. Especially in the aftermath of the lucrative holiday season when their wallets have already been bled dry by presents, travel and the all important global financial crisis.

      Don’t blame the news outlets for telling those cash-strapped consumers what they already know and likely, have already decided.

  • Vda

    That wasn’t the point of his tweet… Sometimes we do that ” I don’t want to be in a relationship, but I really like the girl”. We tend to start with something negative in order to make the main point. Cognitive dissonance.
    Maybe other means could use this like you use it in order to spread nonsense negativity, but road to Vr? Why?

    I would like from you to analyse his actual point of this tweet, which is pretty interesting.

  • Chad Smalley

    I would guess it depends on Sony’s definition of successful. I don’t have any problem with the price, however I will not buy it at launch. I think the launch titles are pretty disappointing. Mostly just a rehash of quest games. I will wait until Sony announces some higher end titles, hopefully that happens sooner than later.

    • FrankB

      If it turns a profit, it’s successful. PSVR turned a profit for Sony. It’s a small profit in a small market but it’s a market that Xbox has no access to.

  • vancleefmustache

    Yep, these negative ad campaigns are getting a bit tiresome. It’s baffling how much PSVR2 is being negatively framed recently. I am not for sure what subsidies sites like this are getting from Meta but I really want to encourage everyone who is making VR content to reconsider this strategy. I feel turning your website into, what is essentially, a Meta Ad hub website is extremely myopic. I am fine if you want to focus on Meta specifically but please stop pretending to be an impartial VR enthusiast. I have already seen the PCVR market gutted from negatively framed articles such as these.

    I want VR to be successful and having a monopoly over it is going to be one pot-hole filled cracked road to VR. At this point, I think it is in Meta’s best interest to help VR in everyway they can while they continue on with their R&D. Sorry, dude, but no one wants to go to your crappy VR office to have meetings. We are not there yet and one of the best ways to get wide adoption is through games. Who makes what is probably considered the best video games anywhere, at least according to a large majority of gamers? Sony. Don’t you want them to succeed? I think the Quest is great at what it does and I think it can continue and have a symbiotic relationship with their competitors. I honestly wish they could port some of their Oculus Studio games over like Asgards Wrath, the Lone Echos…etc. Those games are not cheap to make and for them to just having them die in the Oculus store seems to be a huge waste and just bad business.

    I think it is up to us in the VR community to help all VR be successful. I’m worried this is going to get uglier but we all need to fight for this.

    • shadow9d9

      It wasn’t this site that made the comments, so no, no conspiracy.

      • vancleefmustache

        I didn’t see a top story about how Luckey Palmer was “blown away” by PSVR2 on this site. Let me check. Nope not a single story about that. Weird how they would decide to highlight this story but not that one. Then we had the story yesterday that was posted immediately when it was “reported” but it took all day for an update with Sony denying this.

        I’m not wanting to come off as some unhinged Playstation fanboy but I find the reporting and types of stories related to PSVR2 extremely odd for sites like this and other places especially with stories from users who have actually tried the headset and say nothing but great things about this. Huge events like this should be huge for VR news content creators. People are excited for this or should be at least. I have played Resident Evil Village on flat screen. I hear it looks even better in VR. If that statement is accurate, this means that this will be better than HL: Alyx and I love HL:Alyx. This should be exciting for everyone and I would think a site like this would be hyped for this not just for VR but to drive views over to their site. Instead we get “John Carmack says PSVR2 will be a giant failure hmm hmm!!”

        Let’s do some pizza bets as to what the headline is going to be on this site Feb 22. I’m going with “Meta Store has “”What the Bat for sale for 10 percent off”” Meanwhile buried further down “While PSVR2 has some beautiful cutting edge games, the beige outer color is a deal breaker.” Companies can and will pay other sites to write and produce stories that are essentially just paid advertisement. Sometimes they will even write the article themselves and have someone put their name on it as the author. There is a great story about this where Exxon will have someone in PR write up an article and then they an outlet to post it. It’s essentially getting ahead of media in general and controlling the narrative, which is, unfortunately, becoming more and more common.

        • ViRGiN

          Did you see UploadVR posting about Palmer Luckey suicide headset? No? Because they are getting paid by him.

    • Jonathan Winters III

      This!

    • david vincent

      “It’s baffling how much PSVR2 is being negatively framed recently”
      It was the same for Rift CV1 and for the same reason : $600 is too much.

      • ViRGiN

        I remember the initial “shock” back then.
        Now dropping 600 + PS5 is not a real issue for me, but the same thing is lacking now as was lacking back then – content. 99% titles are OUYA-grade compared to flat gaming from the past 13 years or even more. Shovelware everywhere, and “family friendly” titles.

  • ICBM1982

    I have a PS5 and I’m so tempted to purchase a PSVR2, but I am wondering how the cord affects the ergonomics of playing. I’ve only ever had a Quest 1 in the past. Playing Super Hot and being able to actually roll on the floor was cool. I’m half tempted to wait for Meta Quest 3 as I do have a Meta account with games.

    The graphical fidelity on the PSVR 2 sounds amazing though… I’m torn. The comfort sounds good as well; the Quest one was so front heavy.

    • vancleefmustache

      Do it! Pull the trigger and buy PSVR2 right now!

      In all seriousness, I think a lot of users tie in their experience with the PSVR1 and the cord with the tracking which is an external camera that you mount on top of your tv. Keep in mind, with PSVR2, you won’t have that same tracking issues since the camera is in the headset. So even though you will have a cable (about 5 m) you won’t have all the tracking issues that came with the. You can duck and move around and you won’t get the “out of range” screen that pops up when you are too far away from the camera.

      I guess it depends on how much you want to move around. I also have just the Quest 1 and while on some games, I enjoyed having more freedom to twist and move around, I found that I much prefer having a more comfortable and lighter headset that isn’t gripping my head so hard. And also, and this is true with most Quest games I have played before, after the initial thrill of being able to physically move around anywhere you want, I still prefer to know that I am facing in one direction and have a general idea of where I am at when I am in a room. It would be a matter of what type of VR games you want. Superhot is definitely better suited for Meta but with longer games that you can choose to play standing up or sitting down, I think you would be better suited with PSVR2 since you are going to get the better visuals and longer games, not to mention more hybrid AAA games.

      • ICBM1982

        Thanks for the feedback!

    • Pyroth3093

      The cord limits your 360 turning some and also doing all the crazy rolling around but it’s not bad. You get used to it. I own Both Quests and they’re my least favorite HMD’s I own for numerous reasons. I much prefer being able to supersample to a clear crisp image and avoiding the extra latency and compression artifacts of Air Link. But definite pros and cons. I’m excited for PSVR2 namely for the high resolution OLED panels. There’s negatives with that too but the colors and darks should be great.

      • ICBM1982

        Thanks for the feeback!

      • Andrew Jakobs

        Sorry, but I never got used to the cable of my HTC Vive Pro, not even when suspended throught kiwi pulleys (it did improve it). Now I have tye wireless module for my Pro and I never want to go back to cable, even if it means a very slight decrease in sharpness. I even get annoyed now by tge cable between the wireless module and its battery. So I certainly don’t agree with “you get used to it”.

    • Tommy

      Check out some of the reviews on YouTube. Not a single person I’ve listened to has mention the cord being an issue. This may be due to the limited demos and not the broader list of games but so far, it doesn’t seem to be an issue.
      I don’t expect PSVR2 to trying to run something like Space Pirate Arena either.

      • vancleefmustache

        I always felt like the wireless option was a manufactured need that Meta put out there so people thought that they had to have it for the most part. I liked the aspect of being able to roam around a little but the novelty wore off mostly and even when I play Quest games now, I tend to only face in one direction. Even most of their sporty and more active games only require you to face one direction. It’s not like I am spinning around when playing Eleven Table Tennis.

        To me, the weight and comfort is the most crucial piece. You can take the wire away from me, but none of that is going to matter if after thirty minutes, my head feels like it is in a vice grip. I actually find I prefer playing a lot of the more rhythm type games on the PSVR, especially with the ones that require a lot more ducking and bending like Synth Riders and Pistol Whip. Nothing more emersion breaking than having some clunky piece of hardware on your head as you are dodging objects coming your way. Playing with the much much lighter PSVR headset feels like you are soaring compared to the Quest.

        • TalonOne

          I can’t tell you how many times I’ve stepped on the damn wire while playing Asgards Wrath. The wire SUCKS, hard… Airlink on Q2 is awesome and I really don’t want to go back to wires.

        • Christopher Barnhouse

          So happy to play Q2 wireless ! Much better than constantly being aware of and managing a cord.

          • vancleefmustache

            I should clarify. I haven’t had much issues with the PSVR1 cord in the past. It was more of the camera, controls and tracking that I had the main issue with and those are issues that will be resolved with PSVR2

            The Quest cord that I have to put in after a little more than an hour of play so that it doesn’t die is not all that great so I can totally understand where some of you are coming from. Airlink is okay. I much prefer Virtual Desktop but even then, I have issues like losing connection or my computer freezing up.

        • ViRGiN

          it doesn’t matter what you do in vr – wireless will always be a better experience and anyone who even bothers to have different opinion is a nutjob lol.

          imagine swinging in table tennis with a cable, lol.

          • vancleefmustache

            No. But I would much rather have a wire if it means I don’t have to wear a computer on my head that gives me subpar graphics.

          • ViRGiN

            Enjoy being in the 0.01% of customers. Kickstarter startups are waiting for your dollars. And you will never get anything anyway.

          • vancleefmustache

            Let me share what my schedule for Feb 22 looks like. I will be starting with some Horizon Call of the Mountain. Then I will start with Resident Evil 8. I have a racing wheel and will be ready to go into Gran Turismo 8 after that. You know, those small indie games that were made by indie game companies like Capcom doing their Kickstarter scams. If I have anytime afterwards then I might hop on to one of the free games that go updated that I owned from PSVR1, like Song in the Smoke. I hear it’s the best version of the game, even better than PC. I’m hearing about that with all of those damn Quest ports coming over as well. Fun fact. Did you know 100 percent of the games that came out for Quest 2 on launch were Quest 1 ports. True story. Out of curiosity, what games will you be playing Feb 22?

          • ViRGiN

            Feb 22 I’ll be already on tropical islands and will have zero interest in pursuing any digital entertainment. But you do you.
            Sounds like two games, and masturbating about the fact of rumored simplistic game being a slightly “better” version on PSVR2. You know what, even Job Simulator can be “better” on PSVR2. But it’s not the sort of “better” I am craving for.

          • vancleefmustache

            Awesome for you! You could definitely use some vitamin D. Will this be a permanent move to these tropical islands you speak of and will this mean you are retiring from commenting on VR in general?

          • ViRGiN

            That’s all in your hands. You can extend my holidays starting from $299 a week! Low price to pay to stop getting triggered weekly!

          • vancleefmustache

            Sweet! So you are kind of like a Beetlejuice for hire. Do you also have a really tiny head?

          • ViRGiN

            No, I’m a big feet guy and everything that follows with it.

          • shadow9d9

            Imagine thinking graphics in a small play space with breakable objects is better than wireleas freedom in a massive room. Graphics will never define whether a game is good.

        • Ookami

          When the OG VR headsets released, I was worried about the wire, but it’s very manageable. If you use software like VRFPS and stick-turn, you can easily avoid twisting it. I rarely have any issue stepping on it, unless I crouch in a shooter. Once I set up a pulley system, it’ll eliminate most of the issues I’ve had.
          I imagine wireless will still be more freeing though, since you won’t have to even think about wire management.

        • shadow9d9

          Psvr2 weighs more than quest 2…You sound like someone that has never used wireless vr.

      • shadow9d9

        These people aren’t vr people. They are mainstream people with no vr knowledge that will go back to ignoring VR now that the big coverage and clicks are gone.

    • Rob

      That depends on the game. In sports games like mini golf, table tennis and beat saber the cords will kill the entire experience. On other games where you stay seated (like resident evil 7) the cords wont matter.

      • NotMikeD

        I’m with you on mini golf, but how does a cable ruin the Beat Saber experience? outside of the 360 mode, Beat Saber’s one game where you’re most certainly rooted to one position facing a single direction. The most you’d really want to do is a little bit of lateral movement to get those extra-tricky-to-reach blocks. I have a Quest 2 and an Index, and the Index provides a FAR better Beat Saber experience.

      • Chris Meeks

        What’s the battery limit on wireless? 2 hours?

        • shadow9d9

          4 with strap and battery.

    • MOT

      I’ve had numerous headsets with cables. You dont notice them mate. The increased graphics are well worth the trade off.

      • shadow9d9

        Oh yes you do. They pull and tangle and force you to plau in a room with breakable objects. Playing in a huge room with wireless freedom of movement is next level.

  • My Thoughts

    Meta does not want them to succeed. It is just that simple. Sony is going to change the world again. Get ready for it.

    • shadow9d9

      He is not with meta anymore.

    • david vincent

      You didn’t read the article ?

  • ApocalypseShadow

    Websites are running with the negativity quick but it can’t be denied. GT7 is making the rounds and is blowing journalists away. That’s a fact.

    All Sony has to do is outsell PSVR 1 and make a profit on it while releasing amazing VR games. They aren’t targeting mainstream gamers. That’s what Facebook is trying to do. Sony are targeting PS5 owners and those interested in console VR that waited for better hardware than the first. And PS VR 2 is that better console VR experience.

    We all knew that there would be negative campaigns before release. It still won’t stop it from selling.

  • Manuel Schernthaner

    There was someone pissy that he not was invited to a pre view of the headset. Today news of Gt7 previews is a positive light but still 20 days to go lads.

  • FrankB

    If you already have a ps5 It isn’t really isn’t that much more expensive than a 256gb Quest 2. The games will blow away what a Quest can do.

    • Andrew Jakobs

      Unless you have a gaming PC, then the games you play through the Quest 2 might blow away the PS5 games.

      • Hivemind9000

        So… a $2-3k PC plus a $400 Quest 2 *might* be better than a $1k PS5+PSVR2…. I’m shocked! (and somewhat dubious given the hands-on reviews I’ve seen already).

        • Tommy

          Like Andrew said though is that for a lot of people it will depend on what you already own. I have PCVR, standalone and very excited for PSVR2. There’s room for all interests. However, if I only had a PC and not a PS5, there is definitely less reason for me to get PSVR2.
          I’m a sucker for VR though and like to own it all…well, what I can afford to.

          • Andrew Jakobs

            Yep, that’s the point, if you already own a PS5 it will be a great experience (except for the wire which I really hate now), but I don’t own a PS5, and except for VR I don’t see a reason to buy a PS5, unless it could replace my PS3(phat) as a (3D)bluray player which also could still play my PS3 discbased games.

          • Tommy

            Yeah, the lack of Blu-ray support on PS5 is disheartening but the game exclusives are top notch and will have me always interested in Playstations :)

        • Andrew Jakobs

          So a $1k PS5+PSVR2 might be better then a $400 quest, I’m shocked……..

      • A lot of Meta Quest owners don’t have high end PCs. Some don’t even know it can be plugged into one.

      • neodraig

        And to play what games ???
        On pc there’s nothing left but releases of barely enhanced Quest games :(

        • MeowMix

          games that support mods – SkyrimVR, Fallout4VR, many Flat-to-VR ports (Half Life 2). Point being, games that allows mods won’t be a thing on PS5.

          As a Bethesda Games mod author myself (40 mods authored, spreads across Nexus, STEAM, Bethnet), that’s just something that doesn’t impress me. If only Xbox/PC and Starfield had an official way to play VR.

          PSVR2 will still be fine for high fidelity, curated experiences.

        • NotMikeD

          Other posters have it right here; PCVR is rapidly becoming about the flatscreen mods and conversions. I understand that’s polarizing, not for everyone, and probably not a great look for VR’s growth and mainstream adoption. BUT for the players who don’t mind putting in a bit of effort, games like Alien Isolation, The Outer Wilds, and the modern Resident Evil games modded to run in VR have provided some of the best all-time gaming experiences I’ve ever had. Truly next-level stuff you’re just not going to get anywhere else.

          • Andrew Jakobs

            At least PC can have those flatscreengame mods.

          • Tommy

            Couldn’t have said it better.

        • ApocalypticSwampFunk

          PCVR has litterally hundreds of exclusives that you’ll always own. Not like PSVR where all the best exclusives from PSVR1 have been lost to history. Those PCVR exclusives tange from 10/10 to average. So far PSVR2 has about half a dozen exclusives which also vary in quality. PSVR2 is basically all PCVR ports so far.

          • ApocalypseShadow

            How were they lost to history when PSVR 1 runs on PS5 through BC with PS4 games?

            The only thing is PS VR 2 is not running them because of different tech. Still doesn’t change that the previous headset works on PS5. Don’t spread misinformation.

          • Andrew Jakobs

            But you can’t play PSVR1 games (without updates) on a PSVR2.

          • ApocalypseShadow

            Sony made PSVR BC on PS5. Who cares if PS VR 2 doesn’t play games with different headset tech.

            Quest doesn’t play Oculus Go games. Did you have a problem with that when John Carmack made that official? I bet you you didn’t. You’re probably playing your Quest 2 like it’s not even an issue. But act like it’s a problem with Sony’s headset.

            Many games are getting updated to be even better than the owner versions with many of them free if you owned the original. If that’s not enough to have BC and many PSVR games being updated for free, then that’s a YOU problem.

          • Andrew Jakobs

            It’s not like a PSVR1 headset can break, so being able to play PSVR1 games that haven’t had a free update to run on PSVR2 on the PS5 would be great. No real BC (PS1, PS2, PS3) of the PS5 is exactly why I still haven’t bought it.

            I don’t have a Quest, nor did I ever buy a GO (as it didn’t have 6-DOF).
            At least with a Quest 2 you can play Quest 1 games that didn’t have updates for the extra features of the Q2). It shouldn’t be hard for sony to add an extra emulation layer for PSVR2 headset to be able to play PSVR1 games.

            People don’t care about BC? Then why are the original ports of many older games still so popular?

          • Christian Schildwaechter

            People want ports and don’t really care about BC. They loudly demand it, but they don’t actually use it. Sony gave that reason for not bothering in 2017, so Ars Technica went and tried to verify on the Xbox One, where they had access to the data. Xbox users spend about 55% of their time with Xbox One games, about 30% with Netflix, Youtube and the TV app, about 14% with other apps and only 1.5% with Xbox 360 games.

            And of these 360 games, “Call of Duty: Black Ops” was by far the dominant title, being played more than four times as much as the second placed. If “Call of Duty: Black Ops” had ever seen an Xbox One version, the use of 360 titles would have been complete negligible.

          • ApocalypseShadow

            That’s besides the point. Did you make it a big deal with Facebook and Quest that it doesn’t have full BC of past games? You picked Quest 1 games but totally ignore that Quest 2 doesn’t play Go games. Just deflecting. You probably didn’t make a sound to Facebook about it. But gamers such as yourself make BC a big deal with Sony. PCs don’t play floppy disk games unless someone transferred them to digital. Bet you don’t have any problem there either that modern PCs don’t play floppy games.

            Sure it would be nice to have BC. As a gamer, there’s no question if they offer it. But having played games for decades, it’s not a big deal when new games keep flowing down stream. And I don’t sell old hardware. You’ll never have 100 percent BC. Even Android updated to 12 doesn’t play a lot of the old apps. But you’ll deflect on that too. Do I like it? No. But my old tablets and phones still work to play those few games.

            Plus, it would confuse new users in playing old games with the new headset. With old games only in 180 with limited movement and tracking compared to full movement playing PS VR 2 without those limitations.

            And as Christian said which I knew as well, BC only is used initially if there’s a low amount of games. But is gradually not used as new games come in. But Sony has many games. They don’t need to rely on BC. Microsoft supposedly has better BC. But it’s a non factor in sales as Microsoft can’t keep up with Sony or Nintendo.

            As I said, good to have but not as important as you think it is.

          • Andrew Jakobs

            Pc’s perfectly still play floppydisc games, if you own a floppydisc reader whichvis just a couple of bucks. Well your point for buying a new console might be to only play new games, I know a lot of people who want to keep playing the old games without needing a gazillion consoles under their TV. And the PS5 is more than capable to run the PS1, PS2 and even PS3 games. That’s one advantage of the xbox series, it can run homebrew emulators and with it, it can even play PS1 and PS2 games.

          • ApocalypseShadow

            Sure PS5 could emulate the older systems. But it’s not about playing older systems when new games come out. BC is not used in high numbers on any console. No matter how nice it is, the percentage of users is low. Look it up.

            PC only plays older games from hacking or emulating older systems. And you shouldn’t have to buy a floppy disc reader. Now you’re cheating. BC should just work. Right? RIGHT? I should be able to run any Windows OS on newer Windows 11 PCs right? RIGHT? Just add a layer right?

            But the biggest problem of that on PC is theft of older games with the majority of users not even owning the games they emulate. They aren’t buying these games. You mentioned Xbox emulation. Those gamers are running illegal software on their consoles. Not the emulator. The games. Way to promote theft buddy.

            Also you totally slipped over Quest 2 not running Oculus Go games. Why isn’t 3dof games from Go not running on a 6dof headset? Should just work work. Right? RIGHT? Shouldn’t be that hard for Facebook and all that money to add an extra emulation layer for 3dof games right?

            Not as big as you think. But keep trying.

          • Andrew Jakobs

            If it were up to Carmack the Quest would have had the emulation of the Go, he had written it already and it worked already with most Go applications (according to Carmack), but sadly f-ing suits decided not to go forward with it. And it’s the same f-ing suits over at Sony that made the awful decision not to include BC, and that is one of the reasons why I still don’t have a PS5 (next to still not supporting 3d blurays).

          • Tommy

            I’ll play PSVR ports all day with the new kick ass headset :)

        • Tommy

          This is SO far from the truth. Don’t make me post a my PCVR game list with native and modded VR games. It will dwarf Quest and PSVR combined.

          • neodraig

            I’m talking about official releases of native PCVR games.
            Of course mods are awesome, and it’s the only reason that made me keep playing VR these past few years, but if you don’t take that in account, officially in new releases we have almost nothing but Quest ports :-/

      • NotMikeD

        I understand your point here, but as someone who plays on a relatively high end PCVR setup (3090 5800x3d w/ a Valve Index) I actually expect to have a better VR experience with PSVR2 due to the higher res HDR display and foveated rendering paired with loads of optimization. I love PCVR more than most, but I won’t pretend there isn’t endless tinkering involved and performance hitches even on beastly PC’s that you just don’t see on Sony’s consoles.

        • BillyBumbler

          I won’t miss all the time I’ve spent dealing with unoptimized game UI, and having to tweak graphics settings on PCVR.

        • Ookami

          My man says he has a “relatively” high-end GPU, and he’s rocking a 3090. Nothing relative about that. It’s just high-end

      • FrankB

        Well I hope there’s some PCVR content in the pipeline because all the PC really has that is proper AAA is Alyx. Apart from some excellent user made flat to VR mods pcvr seems to be pretty dormant.

    • shadow9d9

      Graphics don’t make a game. And you are comparing 2.5 year old hardware that is being replaced this year…

  • shadow9d9

    So, you are comparing one with sales tax included and one without? Brilliant.

    • Jonathan Winters III

      Exactly. I think we know what’s going on here.

  • Phoonzang

    All these negative-hype articles leading up to the release are baffling. I know there are people out there that want VR to fail but I don’t come to a VR news site like this one to see the same negative speculations regurgitated. Do better.

    • david vincent

      Deluded fanboys are deluded

    • Christian Schildwaechter

      A lot of the people complaining actually want VR to succeed, and had high hopes that the PSVR 2 would revitalize higher end VR by creating a large enough user base for AAA developers to start investing into VR. And these people feel similar to Carmack that the high price point compared to the price of the PS5 itself will significantly reduce the number of buyers and thereby market size and developer engagement, which will be bad for all of VR. VR enthusiasts may not be deterred by the price due to how much of an improvement the PSVR 2 experience will provide. But we don’t need to convince the 2.5% of Steam users that actively use VR or the 5% of PS4 owners that bought a PSVR 1, we need to convince the 97.5% and 95% who don’t and didn’t.

      My perspective is somewhat the opposite: I really hoped that PSVR 2 would give VR a huge push, and the specs of the headset all pointed to a rather low production price. So Sony pricing it so high for most likely not technical reasons kind of crushed that hope. And now we see tons of people pretty much demanding the critical discussion to stop, thereby blatantly ignoring that Sony carefully avoided contradicting the claims Bloomberg made about disappointing pre-orders and reduced shipment projections for the future. I am somewhat reminded of all the people who for years claimed that VR usage was growing at an exponential rate, and that it would finally become mainstream in just a few months. Insisting that the long term VR usage on Steam wasn’t representative and that whatever just changed would cause a revolution, shouting down anyone that argued that the numbers simply did not support this.

      Yes, we will have to see how well the PSVR 2 sells, and yes, it could still be a hit, but nobody can seriously assume that the high price will not have a huge impact on how many are sold, even if they personally think that the price is justified. There is a lot of blissful ignorance and wishful thinking going on regarding the PSVR 2 launch, based mostly on hope and not on a lot of arguments. People claiming Carmack doesn’t understand the VR market after he was for years considered the sole remaining reason to watch any Oculus Connect keynote is a pretty heavy twisting of reality to make it match a somewhat utopian market view where people only decide by quality and not by price.

  • paul cleenti

    Everyone that was at CES was blown away by the graphics of the PSVR2. A year ago price was never the determining factor for someone to get into VR. With the Quest everyone is now concerned with price. The quality of the PSVR2 will be the new high bar for at least a year. Because the quality of the graphics will be twice as good as the stand alones it will only be a short amount of time before the headset base explodes.

    • ApocalypticSwampFunk

      I’m definitely not buying a PSVR2 if the base of the headset is going to explode

      • Tommy

        Incoming class action lawsuit, lol

    • ViRGiN

      PSVR2 games are largely PCVR ports, and PCVR ports are largely Quest 2 ports.
      So the same shitty low-effort games, just rendered in higher resolutions and better shaders. That doesn’t make it a real “new high bar”.

      Real games, real hardware. There is a single hand-ful of titles so far.

  • A Clay Lamb

    Keep in mind, I’m sure the man has a little bit of bittersweet feelings on the subject due in large part to how poorly Meta leadership listened to him internally in his own attempts to help further this market himself.

  • Rico S Mario Melchert

    Preorder is in.
    That said. As a VR enthusiast (this will be my 8th headset) I have to admit that I share Carmack’s take.
    The price is good for the tech but not good enough to pull in new adopters in mass.

    And the lack of 3D blu-ray support is a huge bummer.
    Heard from several PSVR owners who won’t upgrade until this is fixed.

    Here’s hoping for a great launch in… omg 3 weeks?!?

  • Hivemind9000

    I really don’t think Carmack understands that this headset is serving a different market and need than the Quest 2. There’s a big chasm between the Quest 2 and high-end PC VR (with a high-end graphics card alone costing over $1k), and the PSVR2 should fill it nicely. I also think for a lot of non-VR people, the quality of VR on the Quest 2 is not going to convert them over, but the PSVR2 just might with AAA quality graphics and games at a price point that’s not too unreasonable (esp. if they already have a PS5).

    Anyway, time will tell…

    • MeowMix

      he does understand that…..

      But the VR market (consumers!!) significantly drops after the $400 pricepoint (hence why that pricepoint is such a stickler for Meta). This has been reiterated by Oculus Execs before on several occasions.

      PSVR2 will be a success, like the Valve Index was a success. But it will still pale in comparison to a mass market device like the Quest.

      Of course, PSVR2 will have high fidelity graphics, but once you get into that more niche market, then ppl like myself will just go all in with PCVR, which allows us to customize our games/experiences.

      I still plan to buy a PSVR2, but only after the PS5Slim releases (so it’ll be a ~$1000 purchase for me; so more than double of what an entry Quest2/3 will cost). That said, I’m more excited for Quest3, Apple and Samsung’s XR headsets, and whatever Microsoft may do to allow us to play Starfield VR. Been playing VR since 2016, I’m ready for VR to take that next leap that goes beyond just gaming.

      • Christian Schildwaechter

        The USD 400 price point was due to this being the limit for impulse purchases for most people, anything above that will be considered an investment and thus has to check a lot more boxes. Losing less than USD 400 on an experiment doesn’t hurt too much. Interestingly lowering the price further didn’t increase sales, as both the Go and Gear VR sold more of their more expensive versions. So once a device fits within the spontaneous fun budget, people care more about the fun part than saving more money.

        I’d expect the same to apply to PSVR 2 in principle, but we can’t know yet for sure. In the recent past many proved to be willing to pay significantly more for PS5s or GPUs, and swallowed prices for PS5 games rising to USD 70. We now also have a significant worldwide inflation, so the general perception of what is too expensive may have changed.

        And we don’t know yet how big the impact of the PSVR 2 experience itself will be. In 2018 Palmer Luckey famously wrote that “Free isn’t cheap enough”, referring to Oculus internal research showing that (PC)VR was still so cumbersome and the quality of the experience so lacking that most people outside a core of enthusiasts wouldn’t use it even if it was free. But the PSVR 2 could provide a significant leap in comfort, ease of use and overall quality of the experience over anything we had so far, so maybe it passes a threshold where even non-enthusiasts see it as a worthy investment rather than a fun experiment, and the market research Oculus did in the past doesn’t really apply anymore.

        Maybe. It will have to. On the PS4 using VR added about 60% on top of the lifetime costs compared to typical console use incl. all game purchases. That had quite an impact on the fun budget, contributing to the limited 5% market share. I really hope the PSVR 2 can convince people that a similar premium on top of an already higher level is worth it, because we all need the PSVR 2 to be a success to grow VR out of a tiny niche and entice more software investments. Or even to prevent it from slipping further down into the niche. Apple and Samsung won’t help here with their focus on AR, and the 150% Quest 3 performance increase will not be enough to provide the level of experiences required to escape the “free isn’t cheap enough” dilemma and establish VR extensively beyond the existing Quest 2 user base.

    • david vincent

      “I really don’t think Carmack understands…”
      Haha

  • Tommy

    I don’t think Carmac is being as negative about the PSVR2 as he is being negative about the VR buying market and economy in general.

    Leaving out all other choices, the PS5/PSVR2 is pretty expensive for most people to get into, less so for people that already own a PS5.
    The way I see it is that it’s not very different from the PSVR1 launch. You still had to pay about the same amount. However, this time we are getting twice the tech and better game offerings.

    • BillyBumbler

      His criticism of the PSVR 2 is fair from a market share perspective.

      The price point and adoption rate of Meta headsets was one of his reasons for leaving the company. Carmack wanted the company to lower the price, not go the opposite direction.

    • namekuseijin

      I’m seeing much the same offerings really. I need assurance that psvr2 will be more than just a handful of select ports and mostly shovelware…

      • What if most of the popular Unreal Engine games get ported to VR even with motion control support?

        • namekuseijin

          yeah, I suspect Sony minions will shutdown the project or hire praydog…

  • gothicvillas

    GT7 on Psvr2 or Grid on Quest? I cant decide.

    • ViRGiN

      Can I play 2022 Need for Speed Unbound on PCVR? No?
      How about WRC Generations? No?

      Looks like 28 years of PCVR on the market, and games are still unsupported as ever.

  • Meta, Microsoft and many other VR and game companies are afraid Sony will dominate the VR gaming space and have a massive hit with PSVR2 (Microsoft especially since they couldn’t even be bothered with Xbox). Lots of these negative articles (like reports on pre-sales) have been generated by the competition to dampen enthusiasm. The wired aspect of the PSVR2 is actually a massive benefit (something that Carmack has never been a fan of). They’ll be able to offer a much better visual experience than Meta’s standalone experiences. People are sick of cartoon graphics. Many Meta Quest owners, without access to a decent PC to plug it into, don’t even know how good the PC VR visual experience is. Sony’s PS5 is not a high end PC, but compared to a stand alone device, it is miles ahead. Once people realise how much better it looks than standard wireless VR, Sony will have a massive hit on their hands – even at that price.

    • david vincent

      “Once people realise…”
      People are broke because of hyperinflation.
      As Carmack said, a 600€ headset won’t do it.

    • NL_VR

      No competition is not afraid of Sony PSVR2.
      The negativity towards PSVR2 and VR in general comes from stupid fanboys and people who is outside of VR and just want to hate on it because of Meta, High price etc.
      Dont be “that Sony Fanboy” we know which community you come from

    • MeowMix

      lol, you can’t dominate when the entire system costs ~$1000.
      I’m sure PSVR2 will do well, like Valve Index well. But that’s not mainstream, nor does it make other companies scared.

    • Andrey

      “People are put off by cartoon graphics.”
      Ironicly, the most popular and successful game of the last years is Genshin Impact and it a) has “cartoon graphics” (that leave in the dust 70% of modern realistic and stylized games just because of the design, style and atmosphere it delivers); b) it works on mobile hardware (Snapdragon 870 is enough to play it comfortably).
      What I am trying to say is that when someone – like Pico (chinese company) – will finally be able to make MiHoYo (another chinese company) create either a VR version of Genshin or a separate VR game in the franchise, it will boost the sales of any headset it will be [exclusively] availible on by thousands or even dozens of thousands procents that day in weeks/month after. And, if it will be a paid game, it probably will have much more sales than even HL:Alyx ever had and will earn both more money and bring much more new people to VR than anything else before that.
      I will never buy Pico right now, because, imo, it’s just a “poor” chinese copy of Quest devices (both by hardware and software). But if it will have Genshin as an exclusive (even for the time being, just like Sony likes to buy exclusivity from publishers for their platform (hello Final Fantasy XVI!)), I will buy it immediately. As well as hundreds of thousands of other people all over the world. Becuase Genshin is a masterpiece of both gamedesign, sound, graphics (yeah-yeah, that “cartoon graphics” that looks that great and works even on mobile hardware), gameplay and everything else.
      That will happen sooner or later, but it will happen. And VR industry will change forever because of the “cartoon graphics” game that will be able to work on “weak mobile hardware”. Because you just need a good game with a nice gameplay loop and not just AAA Crysis-level ultrarealistic graphics.

  • JB1968

    Mr. Carmack had already chance to show his VR abilities besides being great “Doom programmer”. Sadly he failed big time and his results on the VR field were only killing the PCVR by crappy mobile phone grade hardware sold at price loss. This subsidized price even more crippled the whole VR market and whats worse – it crippled consumer brains of many “vr enthusiasts” including RoadToVR, UploadVR and other tabloid VR websites which are nowadays also paid by former employer of MR. Carmack.

    • NL_VR

      No you are wrong

    • ViRGiN

      I bet you watch some MRTV or other “PCVR kings” cringetubers

    • MeowMix

      rofl, Carmack was the main driver behind Meta going all in on standalone. Carmack also was behind the initial development of pivotal VR software techniques – like Asynchronous Time Warp, which lead to more sophisticated reprojection like Asynchronous Space Warp. Pretty much all companies followed Oculus’ lead in developing their own Reprojection tech.

      Lastly, Carmack was right; his standalone model is far and away the most successful VR platform yet (Quest2 at around ~15M-20M units).

      You call Carmack a failure just shows how ignorant you are w/ respect to the VR field. Typical SONY PONY mentality.

      • JB1968

        Sorry but nothing you said contradicts my arguments. The Quest experiment with agressively subsidized almost socialistic hw pricing crippled VR software quality in general for many years. Mr. Carmack failed and moreover he realized to be abused by Meta corp in the end. Thats why he is not in VR business anymore – just being bitter now.

  • neodraig

    I find it ridiculous to compare the price of the Quest 2 with the PSVR 2 + PS5.
    If technically it’s true (if your only wish is to play VR games), if you are a gamer there are high chances that you already own a PS5.
    Also if you have a PS5 you can play all those great and beautiful AAA games (God of War, The Last of US, Returnal, Ratchet & Clank….) when with the Quest you’re stuck with ugly looking (because of the hardware) indie games.
    I’m not hyped at all for the Quest 3 as Meta don’t give a shit about gaming anymore. They didn’t fund a single AAA game for their successful Quest 2, and they seem too busy/focused with their metaverse and AR.
    And PCVR is dead at the moment as all we get are ports of those kiddy looking Quest games (luckily we have the modding community).
    So if you’re a gamer and you wish to play great and beautiful games in VR, the choice is obvious and it’s the PSVR 2.

    • david vincent

      “if you are a gamer there are high chances that you already own a PS5”
      Only 33M PS5 were sold when you have 132M active PC gamers on Steam.
      Don’t think your situation is the norm…

    • NL_VR

      You are both wrong.
      Why beeing a triggered Sony fanboy.
      Enjoy PSVR2 instead of beeing triggered that others dont care about it.

      Quest will live on, have millions of users. Quest 3 will be big release.

      PCVR is not dead, have same big library as all other platforms and have alls mods.

      VR is good, Sony, Meta, PC fanboys are bad.

      • ViRGiN

        PC apologists are cringe.
        PCVR has been a thing for 28 years and it disappoints as much now as it did back then in 1995.

        • NL_VR

          And you as always drinking and writing BS on these forums, just go away.

          • ViRGiN

            Cope harder, beating half life alyx again cause it’s such a great game.

          • NL_VR

            keep drinking

      • neodraig

        Yes I’m a fanboy, but a fanboy of VR.
        I had numerous PCVR headsets, I have the Quest 2 and I’m getting the PSVR 2, and my only interest is playing good games in VR.
        And the last one was Lone Echo 2 and just before that HL Alyx, but since then nothing but mediocre games.
        I’ve been playing VR since 2016, I had big hopes for VR with games that would look incredible, but everything went to shit with the release of the Quest.
        So, disregarding mods (which are really great), my only hope to play beautiful, well made, full fledge, story driven, native VR games is the PSVR 2. But that’s it, I’m not a Sony fanboy, it just happen that I love VR and I’m craving to play great games in VR again (as we used to have during the Rift CV1 era).

        • NL_VR

          Graphics isnt everything.
          There are alot of games with “good looking” graphics that isnt good.
          There is alot of games with “simple” graphics that are phenomenal.

          It does sounds like you are only into games with good graphics or big marketing budgets and have been waiting for that to come and forgot to look what actually got released.

          • ViRGiN

            are you one of those pcvr fanboys who says ‘i have big backlog of games and already spent more than i can realistically play; there is definietly a ton of pcvr content’?

            lmao, what a cope

          • NL_VR

            Are you one of those ridiculous that like to write lmao all over the boards to make some kind of point.

          • ViRGiN

            sounds like you

          • NL_VR

            Out of lmao?

          • ViRGiN

            out of touch for you

          • NL_VR

            Stop beeing ridiculous

    • ViRGiN

      > when with the Quest you’re stuck with ugly looking (because of the hardware) indie games.

      Replace Quest with PCVR, and hardware with software, and that statement would be 1000% accurate.
      There is no “PC” in PCVR. It’s PCVR running Android emulator 98% of the time.

  • MOT

    The original psvr blew his oculus rift out of the water when it came to sales.

    • MeowMix

      Carmack has always been a mobile/standalone guy (contrary to what the circlejerkers tend to think). Yes, he was the brainchild behind the initial Oculus SDK, but he’s been in the standalone camp for a long time (GearVR, remember that?).

      The devices he was pioneering obliterated the PSVR1 w/ respect to sales and that trend will continue even with the PSVR2 now releasing.

    • david vincent

      PSVR1 tracking was a joke. Sony fans are always deluded…

  • Mike

    He is just a programmer, but tries to give opinions on topics he has no clue about. Those at Sony know better what is profitable for them and they have access to their financial data. Mr. Carmack, go back to your monitor and C++.

    • Cless

      Dude, he is “just a programmer” isn’t cutting it.
      I’m pretty sure he knows how things work after being the CTO of Meta for years… Its not like those issues didn’t come up when he was working.

    • Ben Jacobs

      Him giving opinions on things outside of his expertise is what resulted in the VR industry employing more people now than there were consumers in 2012.

      Sony made and discontinued the PS Vita because it didn’t sell as well as they’d hoped.

      Your opinion is just bad, irrespective of skills.

    • Ookami

      I mean, he’s probably more knowledgeable than you, since he’s been a big player in the industry. Unless you’re a professional market analyst or something

    • Mike

      My point is this guy is a typical programming nerd, not marketing/ intellectual person (different personality). Look at him how he behaves, how he looks, how he looks and his facial expressions when he speaks to the audience. He has more persecution manias than sand on beach. This is overgrown programming kid. Not a visionary like Jobs, not a speaker. So he better go back to coding C++. He is good at it.

    • MOT

      You are very much correct. Sony have been a giant in the gaming industry for years.

      The original psvr1 outsold the original oculus by miles.

      Psvr2 is launching now and oculus is a thing of the past.

  • Bleedele

    It’s insane to me. Want a PSVR2 quality PCVR experience?

    That’s gonna be a PC that’s AT LEAST 1k and then a headset at an additional 1k. And then you have specs that pale in comparison to what we’re seeing out of the PSVR2 right now.

    Who are all these people claiming the pricing on the psvr2 is outrageous? Have they never VR’d? And if so, why do they care? Just wait until the price drops since you had no previous interest. I can’t wrap my head around all the pearl clutching over this release.

    • MOT

      It’s a fantastic headset for the price. You can get a ps5 and psvr2 for less than a valve index.

  • FrankB

    If it does fail massively (I don’t think it will, I’m pretty excited for it, it will do at least as well as the first one) do you think they’ll release an official update to make it work on PC?

  • CyberVR

    Oculus team was always jelous of PSVR. Yes, it had a bit lower res, but it was always much comfortable, perfect lenses and black levels, etc. Carmack needed to tell this infact for the Quest Pro, which is still very expennsice at 1100 for what it is. Now, I believe PSVR 2 will be a perfect match with the PS5 and in the coming years I believe the price will go down a bit and it will make so much sense to invest into Playstation ecosystem if you want a have decent graphics compared to Quest 2.

  • (if someone can hack it to work with the PC they wouldn’t be able to make enough of them)

    • ViRGiN

      they could make enough for every single steamvr user, and still won’t sell more than a handful.
      you guys represent 95% of the vr internet voice, and less than 0.1% of vr market. pcvr elitism is so lol.

  • Richard R Garabedian

    this is why psv2 games need another outlet

  • kool

    I think it’ll have a snowball effect i think sales will puck up around quest2 launch.

  • Mike EY

    The Headset costs about $100 too much, and the games are anti-social and immature…

    Could legit have a Jumanji VR experience…

  • Chris Meeks

    You keep pushing VR click-bait bad press, and eventually, this place will have to be renamed, “Road to Obscurity”.

  • MosBen

    I get that there’s a second definition in some places that means “deny”, but in general refute tends to mean that someone has disproved something beyond merely denying it. Dispute or deny would be better. Yes, this is a pedantic grammar comment, so apologies in advance. It’s just a usage that gets used a lot online and boy, is it a pet peeve.

  • M0rph3u5

    Looking at other available VR alternatives, they are all “overpriced” including the dated Valve Index (which I won and love), HP reverb (for a discontinued product), and don’t even get me started with HTC products.

    I would’ve considered PSVR2 tbh if it was PC compatible especially since I own also a PS5, but no way am I getting it only for PS5.

    IMH, it would’ve been a smart move to make PSVR2 compatible with PCs especially during this climate where the focus on the gimmicky XR that PC most PC gamers and simmers won’t give a crap about. A period for people like me where there is nothing that justifies upgrading from Index (especially for flight sim):
    – HP Reverb G2: discontinued, out of stock and LCD
    – Pico 4: stupidly doesn’t come with a DP
    – Varjo Aero: stupidly overpriced especially considering no audio input and not even base stations or controllers
    Better wait for Valve’s next HMD (if applicable) or may be Vive Pro 3, or hopefully special edition or revised pico 4 with DP
    (P.S. you would’ve guessed the facebook, meta or whatever the heck they will call themselves in the future are out of the question)

    • MOT

      Do you already have a pcvr headset?

      • M0rph3u5

        Yup, Valve Index and PSVR

  • Charles Latch

    Why wouldn’t the D bag who wrote this article not just use John Carracks name in the titoe instead of relegating him to “former oculus CTO” bs? What a tool…