Gracia first launched in 2024 as a Quest app for viewing static photorealistic objects, and, far more notably, a PC VR app for moving photorealistic scenes, otherwise describable as volumetric video.

And to be clear, this is not just simple parallax like you'd get from stereoscopic 3D video, nor limited-perspective synthetic depth like the spatial scenes of Apple's visionOS 26. Gracia goes much further, offering fully volumetric content that you can physically walk around in VR or in your room via mixed reality.

Gracia Moving Volumetric Scenes Now On Quest 3 & Pico 4

Gracia’s moving volumetric scenes, dynamic gaussian splats, are now available on Quest 3 and Pico 4 headsets standalone.

UploadVRDavid Heaney

As with almost all of the remarkable advancements in 3D reconstruction over the past few years, the technology behind Gracia is Gaussian splatting - fitting millions of semitransparent colored blobs (Gaussians) in 3D space so that arbitrary viewpoints can be rendered realistically in real-time. Moving splats are often called 4DGS, four-dimensional Gaussian splats, the fourth dimension being time.

By the end of 2024, Gracia had already launched standalone apps for Quest 3 and Pico 4, removing the requirement for a PC, with the tradeoff of some quality. But the biggest problem with this standalone flow was the need to download each scene, requiring you to stand there with the headset on watching the multi-gigabyte file arrive on your device. With the company's technology at the time, streaming would have required a 2.4 gigabit internet connection, something only a tiny fraction of people have and that most standalone headsets can't even reliably hit wirelessly anyway.

This crippled Gracia's founding ambitions of being the "YouTube of truly volumetric content" (though the company has now pivoted from this), because if YouTube required a multi-gigabyte download before each video played, it just wouldn't be a viable service. And so the standalone headset app focused on short 10-second clips, rather than longer content that would support more use cases.

At the time of the standalone app launch, Gracia told UploadVR that it was working on improving its compression by an order of magnitude. Now, a year and a half later, the startup has achieved that lofty goal.

In March of this year, Gracia launched a world-first: the ability to stream select 4DGS scenes, with no app install or full scene download required. And you don't even need to download an app; Gracia's new tech stack works entirely in WebXR, meaning you can just navigate to gracia.ai/store in your Quest 3's web browser and have a performer volumetrically rendered in your living room in seconds.

On Apple Vision Pro, since Apple still doesn't let WebXR apps use passthrough as a background, you'll instead see the captures in a featureless black void. To get around this and let Vision Pro owners display the captures in their living room, Gracia is working on an Apple Vision Pro app, currently in testing, which should be launching relatively soon.

China’s 4DV AI Releases 6DoF Volumetric Video WebXR Demo

China’s 4DV AI released a WebXR demo of volumetric 6DoF videos created from 20 camera views, and you can try it on your VR headset right now.

UploadVRDavid Heaney

There is, as far as we're aware, nothing else like Gracia's streaming in the world today. China's 4DV showed moving scenes in WebXR last year, but those were only 10 seconds long and predownloaded. Gracia is once again leading the pack when it comes to rendering moving volumetric captures in VR.

The startup says it achieved this by developing a technique for sending keyframes and motion change deltas, encoding only what parts of the capture change over time rather than sending the entire scene for each frame. Essentially, Gracia is applying a video codec style approach to Gaussian splatting. It also uses the new WebGPU graphics API in your browser to achieve the maximum possible performance, rivaling native apps, to eliminate the most frictionful step of all for any consumer app, that initial download requirement in the first place. The compression makes the stream feasible; WebGPU makes rendering the streamed splats fast enough in the browser.

As well as allowing for near-instant streaming of volumetric captures, this means captures have no hard file-size cap, in theory supporting use cases like entire concerts.

To stream Gracia's moving volumetric scenes at relatively high quality, 120K splats per frame, you'll need a constant 75 Mbps connection. A decade ago that would be a non-starter, but as of 2026 around 90% of homes in developed countries now have sufficiently fast internet for this.

Still, some don't, and sometimes the headset will be too far away from the router or on a network where other devices are hogging the bandwidth. For that, Gracia has demonstrated a 17 Mbps mode, offering 15K splats per frame, though in this mode the quality takes a significant hit.

Three scenes are currently available to stream from Gracia's website: a 36-second clip of a person working on a bicycle wheel, a 39-second clip of a doctor examining a patient's shoulder, and most impressive of all, a 4-minute performance by a musician singing with a guitar, complete with spatial audio.

Gracia is also keen to point out that while its captures are well-suited to be placed in your living room via mixed reality, they can also be placed into existing virtual Unity or Unreal environments, including for VR games, if a developer wanted to do this.

To be clear, by the way, by "stream" in this article I'm referring to watching content without having to fully download it. Gracia's technology does not support livestreaming. And the capture and processing requirements are the elephant in the room here.

Capturing these scenes requires around 60 shutter-synced and genlocked cameras, which studios typically charge at least $15K for, and Gracia charges $800 per minute for processing plus a "minimum charge per segment". iPhone 17 Pro's genlock support may allow for a lower marginal capture cost, though for best results creators will want to use professional cameras like those from Blackmagic and Sony.

Still, the capture and processing requirements aside, what Gracia has pulled off here is remarkable. I would much rather watch a musician or comedian perform as a 6DoF volume in my living room, or preferred VR environment, than a 3DoF 180° 3D video, and I suspect if you're reading this, you agree.

If you own a VR headset, head over to gracia.ai/store in your headset's web browser, or your desktop browser for PC VR, and try it out for yourself. And even if you don't, you can try a flatscreen render in your browser to get the basic idea, though without the sense of depth and scale.

The next frontier for the volumetric scenes space will be developing the technology to allow anyone to capture volumetric scenes with a couple of iPhones and to significantly reduce the processing time. As impossible as this might sound today, so did the idea of even streaming this type of content a few years ago, and the pace of progress in the 3D reconstruction scene, leveraging the rapid advancements in AI, remains staggering. The "YouTube of truly volumetric content" is not possible today, but I suspect it very much so will be by the end of this decade – and it could become a core use case of XR technology, propelling its mainstream use by the compounding advantages of a social content feed platform that truly takes advantage of it.

I'm actively writing on UploadVR again, and this article is one in a series of "catch up" pieces where I report on some of the interesting things that have been happening in the industry in recent months. And yes, VR Download is coming back very soon!

The originally planned May 21 date was revealed at the VR Games Showcase in March following the November launches on PlayStation VR2 and PC VR. Flat2VR technical designer Tsvetan explained why in this update video, along with some Quest gameplay footage:

Reading between the lines, it appears the Quest version is not quite ready and the co-op would be limited to specific platforms, something Flat2VR did not care to do.

We reviewed Roboquest VR on Steam, saying "Roboquest VR takes what was already a great flatscreen roguelite experience and transforms it into a new VR classic. Moment-to-moment gameplay feels fantastic, and the game is right at home on the platform."

Roboquest VR Review: An Instant Classic

Roboquest VR takes an already exhilarating FPS roguelite and delivers a near-flawless VR adaptation.

UploadVRJames Galizio

We have seen other titles launch on multiple VR platforms without cross platform co-op like Into Black and the community response tends to lean negative as players prefer to play with their friends without limitations. The video states that Flat2VR will provide progress updates between now and the new July date. We'll monitor these for any additional news to pass along.

Roboquest VR will be available on Meta Quest on July 23. It's available now on SteamVR and PlayStation VR2.

Rhino Rock Studios has announced that its sci-fi arcade shmup Outblast is set to release on June 4, 2026. The game promises a high-speed, neon-soaked fight for survival that can be experienced either in full VR via Meta's Quest headsets and SteamVR, or in flat-screen mode, giving players the choice between full immersion and traditional play.

The game places you in the cockpit of C11-28, humanity's last line of defense against a rogue viral intelligence known as Typhon. Corruption is spreading across Perseon-6, and your job is to shoot enemies and save the planet from collapse.

While shmups haven't enjoyed mainstream popularity since the days of 16-bit consoles, recent games like Sektori have begun to break out of their niche and reach new audiences. We'll have a full review of Outblast closer to release, and see if it captures the magic of the greatest shmups.

Outblast will launch into action on June 4, 2026 on Meta Quest and Steam VR.

We'll have full coverage of the new game announcement and any other news from the showcase after it airs this Friday.

For those unfamiliar with The Binary Mill, the independent Australian studio has been working in VR for a decade.

One of its earlier VR titles was Rush, a high-speed flightsuit racing game in 2017. Gun Club VR, a weapons firing range simulator, followed later that year. Miniature arcade racer Mini Motor Racing X dropped in 2019, followed by high flying dystopian shooter Resist in 2021 and finally, Into Black in 2024. It also released Oculus Go and Gear VR games like 2016's Gun Club 3 VR.

Into Black Review: A Sci-Fi FPS That Hits The Mark

Co-op action adventure Into Black returns this week on PlayStation VR2 and PC VR, offering an enhanced port worth considering.

UploadVRLuis Aviles

All of The Binary Mill's games are available on Meta Quest, SteamVR, and Pico. PlayStation VR2 has Into Black, Rush (a revised Apex Edition with better graphics than the original PS VR release), Resist, and Gun Club, only lacking Mini Motor Racing X.

In a post on X, Friendly Fire said the previous issue with crossplay support has been resolved for PC players, allowing that port to move forward. That issue halted the planned May 14 release after a previous delay in late April for additional polishing. Friendly Fire promises a similar short turnaround time between announcement and release for the PS VR2 port as soon as crossplay is resolved for that platform.

Check out an updated gameplay teaser for yourself:

The PC VR and PS VR2 versions of the game promise to come with 'major visual & gameplay improvements' along with a new horde system and a new map titled Atlas.

We will have a review of A Long Survive available soon. A Long Survive can be wishlisted on PS VR2 and Steam. It is available now on Quest.

The legendary adventure game Myst and its sequel Riven arrive on PlayStation VR2 today. The Myst and Riven remakes first debuted in 2020 and 2024 respectively and have previously been released on PC VR via Steam and on Meta's headsets.

This marks the first time the Myst and Riven remakes have appeared on the PlayStation ecosystem. They'll be fully playable on both flat screens, and via PlayStation VR2.

We reviewed both games when they previously debuted on Meta Quest and PC VR, and you can read those reviews here: Myst and Riven.

The original games that the remakes are based upon first released in 1993 and 1997, respectively. Myst was the best-selling PC game overall for almost a full decade, and defined PC gaming in the '90s. Its sequel, Riven, expanded the series' lore and pushed the boundaries of what PC point and click adventure games could achieve. For many PC gamers of a certain age, Myst and Riven were landmark titles and pioneers of immersion, and with the remakes playable in VR, that has never been more true.

We'll have a unified review of both games as they exist on PlayStation VR2 coming soon.

Myst and Riven are both available now via the PlayStation Store for $34.99 each.

I played Darts VR2: Bullseye right around its April release, finding the core gameplay modes addictive while being underwhelmed by the zombie mode. The former is a good sign as the darts simulator spins up its competitive League mode this week.

Darts VR2: Bullseye Impressions: Of Course There Are Zombies

Darts VR2: Bullseye, out now in Early Access, keeps it simple, making it easy to repeatedly return for one more round.

UploadVRMike Johnson

Before starting tournaments this summer, Gamitronics is hosting two test events on Friday, 22nd May and Thursday, 28th May. Both events will take place between 7pm-9pm BST/11am-1pm PT, with four-player and eight-player tournaments consisting of one set and one leg each.

Anyone interested in participating in the tests can sign up via this form. Test participants will be added to the in-game credits as a thank-you from the Darts VR2 team. Official tournaments will be open to all players with cross-platform support across Meta Quest, PlayStation VR2, and SteamVR.

Multiple VR games have dipped into the esports realm with tournament play, including Triangle Factory's Hyper Dash, Resolution Games' Blaston, Vail VR in partnership with the Virtual Reality Master League (VRML), and most recently Polyarc Games' Glassbreakers: Champions of Moss.

Darts VR2: Bullseye is available now in Early Access on Meta Quest, Steam, and PS VR2.

Free-roaming VR and XR experiences feel like a glimpse into the potential of VR beyond gaming as a tool for education or entertainment communally, beyond the solitary experience often found when putting on a headset. VR concerts and fan content, or experiences like the recent Ghost in the Shell exhibition, showcase how you can create a social experience that enhances, rather than detaches, from the real world, bringing people together. Often the thing holding them back is not ambition but practicality. Space, language and scale are all factors that make it difficult to expand these experiences beyond one country, especially if it's a larger free-roaming experience like Monster Hunter Bridge that requires a huge space to function. This space comes at a cost, for the same reason a cinema is more expensive to operate than a cafe.

Even if the software is digital, the limitations are frustratingly physical and practical.

Excurio is one of the few VR developers creating these large-scale experiences that have found the balance necessary to grow into an international force within this niche but growing market. Based in France, sub-licensing of their ambitious, deep, educational VR experiences has brought these works to over 30 venues ranging from Europe to North America to Asia, localized as necessary. The company was founded as Emissive in 2005, before launching this immersive initiative in 2020 at a time many were pulling away from the sector.

Their selling point is their ambition: these are 45 minute interactive stories that encourage players to explore and learn about a past brought to life, occasionally working with museums and cultural initiatives in various countries to find and develop these works with a focus on history and immersion. Utilizing HTC Vive headsets, players explore these universally understood landmark moments in history that transcend language as though they were really there.

In Yokohama, a city just a short train ride from Japan’s capital, Tokyo, two of their experiences have been sub-licensed to Immersive Journey for anyone to try for themselves. In Horizon of Khufu, players are encouraged to explore the Khufu pyramid, including areas closed off to the public in real life and told from both the perspective of the present day and a journey 4500 years into the past to see them at the peak of their radiance. Tonight With the Impressionists is set in the heart of France in 1874, during the origins of the Impressionist art movement, focused on key artists that shaped the era.

At the gracious invite of the Cinema Leap team in Japan that operates these Excurio-developed VR experiences, we made the trip to Yokohama to try them for ourselves.

Horizon of Khufu

When Excurio first made the leap into creating these large-scale VR experiences, they turned to the pyramids. Horizon of Khufu is a narrative walk-through explainer of the development of the pyramids, told via an exclusive night-time VIP tour that soon descends into a journey through time and space via the gods to explore the very depths of what the pyramids and Egyptian society were at their peak. At least, based on what current Egyptologists understand of its creation, which creates for both the most fascinating and frustrating aspect of an experience that, while fun, certainly feels like a lingering first attempt by a company still finding its feet at the time of its development.

The Great Pyramid of Khufu stands as the tallest of the pyramids, honoring a pharaoh whose life is relatively unknown despite being considered one of the most beloved rulers during the golden age of Ancient Egyptian society. The construction of such a monolithic structure is a wonder of the world today for a reason: the mere concept any human civilization could build something like this at that time is still awe-inspiring to consider, only heightened by how we still are yet to uncover the truth of its construction even a millennium later. Your tour guide Mona initially takes you into the pyramid, through public tunnels and into the large open space known as the Queen’s Chamber.

This is where the so-far typical tour takes a turn. The electrical lights installed in modern decades for tourist purposes suddenly go out, with Mona asking you to wait behind while they investigate the cause further. At this moment, a cat that sneaked inside the temple with you reveals themselves to be the feline goddess Bastet, who proceeds to take you beyond the physical limits to see an internal X-ray of the pyramid before taking you and Mona through time to learn not just about these colossal structures, but the ceremonies, temples and lives that existed around them during their peak.

It’s a genuine attempt to use VR to make an educational lecture about the pyramids entertaining for all ages. We start outside the pyramid and physically walk through tunnels in VR in order to explore these tunnels. The outside of the pyramid from the ground is imposing, while an impressive attention to detail reveals individual stones close enough it feels like you could touch them. When we are transported to ancient Egypt, we journey on a replica of a solar barque, a replica of the type of boat used by Khufu during his reign. VR grants a window into his embalming and mummification after his death to give us a deeper understanding of how these ceremonies were conducted, to the point of even allowing us a glimpse inside the coffin itself.

Yet the experience, for all its interesting factual elements, is very hands-off and wordy, at times to its detriment. This is truly a lecture in VR conducting an overview of Egyptian history, and the result is an experience we less interact with and more are told about as we watch on, at times not moving for minutes at a time. Over 18 months of co-operation between Excurio and Peter Der Manuelian, an Egyptologist at Harvard University, ensures even the minutiae of how the pyramids are rendered and the ancient rituals are recreated are accurate to the best of our current understanding, acknowledging that gaps in our knowledge lost to time remain. Yet compared to the shorter, more action-driven experiences offered somewhere like Tyffonium, this can feel at times exhausting by virtue of how this history is being communicated via the narrative of the experience.

Without a broad cast of characters - at most you will be joined by only Mona and Bastet, with most of the experience featuring just one of these companions talking directly at you, rather than in conversation - there are long periods that can feel like a pretty VR backdrop to a podcast that could easily be made more involved to take advantage of the medium. When it does this, such as the moment it takes you above the pyramid at sunrise before transforming the environment into a rendition of what it looked like 4500 years ago, watching these buildings restore to their glory and the Nile River grow, it’s a joy.

These other moments leave the overall experience somewhat mixed, albeit one I certainly left feeling satisfied with when I eventually took off the headset. I find the pyramids a fascinating relic of a past civilization, with VR being effective in communicating the scale and immensity of these constructions that alone makes it worth the cost of entry, especially as its free-roam nature lets you truly feel present in this ancient world. Wordy, inconsistent pacing aside, the pyramids alone are fascinating enough to justify the journey.

Tonight With the Impressionists: Paris 1874

Tonight With the Impressionists could not be more different in both structure and approach to exploring the period in which it's set. Replacing Egypt for 19th Century Paris, this is a structurally far more engaging piece as it seeks to illuminate not just the famous artworks, but the philosophical debates that consumed the art world surrounding this new style of painting.

Originally launched in 2024, it’s clear years of experience have enhanced the work and given the team an understanding for what works, these lessons implemented into this artistic lesson. Rather than being lectured, we’re invited into a journey through time and feel a part of the intimate conversations and debates of Claude Monet, Auguste Renoir, Edgar Degas and others that would go to define the era.

For all you may not be familiar with every name of the artists featured in this experience, which also includes Berthe Morisot, Paul Cézanne and Camille Pissarro, you likely know their work. Monet’s impressionist pieces capturing the Parisian sunrise or a water lily pond are often considered some of the best artistic works ever made. While you may not know Renoir’s La Grenouillère, if you’ve ever looked at older paintings from the late-1800s you likely have a faint familiarity with the park lake scene portrayed in the work, and this is true for every piece featured in this walkthrough exhibit.

A collaboration with France’s Musée d'Orsay does more than just provide historical accuracy in this case, as their direct involvement is key to bringing this work to life. We enter the streets of 1870s France and meet a model and writer named Rose, who takes us through the streets to introduce us to the social history of the period before we enter a quaint home repurposed as one of the earliest solo exhibitions for Impressionist art. As we jump through time and beyond the confines of the gallery into the minds of the artists to explore the driving ideals of a movement craving interpretation of the mundane over posed spectacle, each moment is illuminated not just by rote recreations but high-quality scans of the real art pieces that reveal every paint stroke and sketch.

The best part of this exhibition, however, is the method taken to relay the history of the era. We meet each of the six featured artists and are invited warmly into their social circle to hear the debates these artists would have amongst one another about what art is and could be, inspired by the writings of the period. The result is more dynamic and involved, like listening to friends debate a topic you can’t help but overhear, an approach that makes the information they tell us far easier to digest and retain once the headset is removed. Writing is improved, natural dialogue that makes these conversations feel dynamic even if you can’t shape their outcome.

There is somewhat of a bias, admittedly, in my preference for this work over the other - while I love the pyramids and their spectacle, I also already know a lot about their construction. For all I know of these artistic works and the era, I didn’t know as much on the questions and conversations surrounding them, or what it meant to be Impressionist at the time the movement was being pioneered. I felt like I was learning more. It’s also no coincidence, however that a more casual format stripped of the grandiosity of a god talking down from a place of omnipotence as you physically walk the galleries and stare at the walls and art like you would any other museum felt more natural than standing on floating boats, making the 45 minutes quite literally fly by without even noticing the time, despite being the second demo of the day.

Should You Visit Immersive Journey in Yokohama?

That being said, I certainly enjoyed my time in both Egypt and Paris during my visit. Compared to other public free-roaming VR demos, the space offered to these two VR exhibitions made the grandiosity of these longer-than-normal experiences apparent - some smaller-scale ones, for all their ambition, make the reality of circling a parking space-sized room inevitably apparent while this had the space to truly lose yourself in another world.

For the credit of the team at Immersive Journey, everything is set up to ensure an easy onboarding process for anyone who wishes to take part, regardless of their prior experience with VR. Each experience is available in both English and Japanese, but also other languages like Korean and Spanish. Dubs have also been produced for each language. While I imagine most readers will try these experiences in English, it should be noted the attention to detail and care taken in these experiences translates even to the multi-language dubbing. In Japanese, the voice cast for Horizon of Khufu includes the talented Fairouz Ai, the voice of Jolyne Cujoh in Jojo’s Bizarre Adventure: Stone Ocean.

There’s even accessibility considerations for those who struggle to stand and walk for long stretches of time, as each experience has been optimized to allow the entire experience to be played from the comfort of a provided wheelchair. It’s an accessibility concern I’ve never seen considered by similar experiences that typically exclude those requiring such needs, though its inclusion does make the omission of other accessibility features like subtitles for dialogue a surprising oversight.

The main critique that can be offered is less of a problem with the experience and more of a safety inevitability that can occasionally break the immersion of the worlds crafted. Considering the large space required to operate these VR experiences, as well as the time required to clear them, it would be impossible to reserve these spaces for just one group enacting one experience at a time. To avoid wandering into other players, any person not in your group that enters your field of vision is rendered as a shadow to let you know their location and to avoid bumping into them.

When you have a lot of groups and different experiences taking place at once, however, their appearances are regular and distracting, often tonally jarring to what is taking place in the virtual world you are a part of. In one sequence during Tonight With the Impressionists, I was stood on a narrow balcony watching Monet paint his famous sunrise when, floating above the sea to my right, I saw two silhouettes appear in view and walk right through the scene, including directly through Monet’s canvas. Their appearance ensured I didn’t bump into them, though seeing two labored shadows saunter through this emotional scene did take away from the impact of this genuinely beautiful recreation.

This even occurred during a quieter period with far fewer interruptions compared to my Horizon of Khufu demo. With two large groups before and after me, and other groups already moving through the space at the time I began my journey, the room appeared at capacity, which was noticed when I had shadows wander through my feline goddess guide and float through the clouds. It’s far from a dealbreaker and can be ignored (I’d certainly not recommend removing them, considering the safety risk of doing so), but it was an occasional immersion-breaking frustration.

Even with this stumbling block, though, I found both Immersive Journey experiences to be a thrilling and entertaining breeze through history, blending education and VR in ways that felt fresh and ambitious. At just 4000 yen per experience there’s a lot on offer in these 45 minutes to justify the cost, especially with friends. Beyond Yokohama, the Horizon of Khufu experience is also available in Nagoya, and both experiences can also be found in select locations in Brazil, Canada and beyond. Yokohama is a wonderful city with plenty to see, but taking a step away from it all for an hour to travel through time is far from a bad use of your time.

The technical merits and engaging reinterpretation of the past are more than worth a break from sightseeing for this innovative method of bringing the past to life. You might even learn something along the way, and at the very least experience something at a scale beyond what similar groups are attempting in the space. Considering the expense and difficulties that come with making it to Paris or Egypt, it’s also a chance to virtually travel for a far more affordable cost than the real thing.

The first time I loaded into WorldLens VR's new AI-powered 3D Street View mode, I thought the feature was broken.

When you first drop onto a street corner, you are just looking at the standard, flat imagery wrapped around your head. But if you stand still for a second, the depth layer snaps into place. It’s a strange realization when it happens: buildings suddenly separate from the sky, foreground objects take on physical weight, and the scene stops looking like wallpaper.

The developer, Stoian Eduard Andrei, has been rolling out steady optimization updates to fix blurring and edge warping around objects, but even with those fixes, the effect is understated. It isn’t a dramatic, pop-out book 3D spectacle, and it shouldn't be oversold as one.

Instead, it relies entirely on subtle, real-time parallax. I tested it in an old European square flanked by a massive church. When you shift your physical weight or move your head, the foreground elements slide against the background just enough to trick your brain. It feels like a step in the right direction rather than a total visual overhaul.

This subtle depth is most striking when you drop into high-density urban environments like Times Square. In the headset, towering digital billboards cleanly detach from the structural steel and glass skyscrapers behind them. Even chaotic, organic shapes, like a dense patch of bushes in a sidewalk planter or a clump of trees outside a restaurant, manage to pop out with satisfying depth.

The effect carries over beautifully to complex indoor spaces as well, like the Porsche Museum in Stuttgart, Germany. Standing inside the museum, the app successfully separates the reflective cars from the open, multi-level walkways behind them, turning what used to be a flat, static panorama into a believable physical hall.

Getting these flat images to warp into 3D on a mobile headset is no small feat, which is why the tech behind it is so interesting.

When I spoke with Andrei on a video call, he told me that restraint was intentional. He originally built the app under the name EarthQuest out of a personal obsession with Google's 3D Tiles API, aiming for grounded presence rather than high-concept visual tricks. "The main design goal was realism," Andrei told me. "I wanted the Street View environments to feel natural and believable in 3D, corresponding to the real scene as closely as possible."

In written follow-up questions, Andrei confirmed that because Google doesn’t provide raw LiDAR data or depth maps for third-party developers, WorldLens has to infer the entire spatial structure from a single raw 2D panorama on the fly.

Pushing that much streaming data through a standalone headset can cause performance problems. During my testing, rapidly jumping from dense city centers to narrow mountain passes sometimes overwhelmed the system, occasionally throwing a "RAM usage high" error before crashing straight back to the Quest dashboard. When I reported the issue, Andrei noted that his backend analytics show a lifetime crash rate under one percent for the build, pointing to tight Meta OS memory limits mixed with heavy streaming threads. In fairness, I was pushing the app aggressively at the time, loading multiple locations in quick succession and forcing scene reloads. Fortunately, the app's state-saving is solid, since rebooting drops you right back onto the exact street corner where it failed.

To handle the blurry ground textures common in third-party Google Earth apps, Andrei also built a proprietary 4x neural network upscaler into the preferences menu. It acts as a sharp texture filter for close-up viewing without hallucinating fake objects or inventing fictional geometry.

While a PCVR port is in the works, Andrei is holding off on estimating a release date too early given the scale of the project. However, he noted that moving to PC-tethered hardware will provide significantly more performance headroom. According to Andrei, the goal for the PCVR version is to push visual detail and caching capacity further, which should mean faster loading, near-instant 3D generations, and reduced 3D tile pop-in compared to standalone hardware.

While virtual travel remains a specific niche within the broader VR ecosystem, WorldLens VR shows why these experiences continue to resonate with some headset users. There is a massive psychological difference between looking at a flat map and getting that brief, genuine sensation that you are standing on a street corner halfway across the world. It is the kind of experience where you can easily lose yourself for hours just exploring, hopping from one random corner of the globe to the next.

For an app built by a solo developer chasing a personal obsession, that alone makes it worth a look.

Affordable handheld consumer 360° cameras have improved leaps & bounds in recent years, with $500 8K HDR options available for over a year now from Chinese startup Insta360 and drone giant DJI, as well as from the American GoPro Max2. And while professionals could mount these or an array of wide-angle cameras to drones, that wasn't practical for typical consumers and amateur creators. Insta360 also previously sold an attachment for drones, called Sphere. But any attached solution, no matter how streamlined, adds weight and thus negatively affects flight time and performance. It was also incredibly hard for these attached solutions to produce an undistorted 360° output free of any visible seams.

Last year, Insta360 spun up a new subsidiary brand called Antigravity, and in December launched Antigravity A1, the first fully integrated 360° camera drone.

As well as recording 8K 360° footage at 30FPS or 5.2K at 60FPS – footage that you can share with VR headset owners however you like – remarkably, the currently $1279 Antigravity A1 package actually comes with a headset featuring the same 2560×2560 micro-OLED panels you'd find in a Bigscreen Beyond, though a narrower field of view, around 70° horizontal and vertical.

The goggles receive a live 360° video feed from the drone via their protruding antennae, and with the headset's rotational tracking you can look around from the drone's position using your head, with very low latency. It weighs around a third less than a Quest headset, has a tethered battery to keep the weight off your head, and you can use it to watch your 360° recordings at home if you don't already own a general VR headset.

Further, Antigravity A1 has a rather unique controller, also included in the box, a tracked device that leans into the VR-like experience by having you point with your arm where you want to fly. It's essentially like being in a 3DoF VR flying game, the type you could have imagined on Oculus Go, except with photorealistic graphics and the obvious glaring difference that you're actually flying around the real world.

In fact, Antigravity has leaned so much into this gamified approach that the company even has a feature to superimpose a player object onto a traditional FPV (non-360°) view of the live feed, such as a dragon or airplane. A truly unique idea, though it would be far more impressive if it could be superimposed onto the 360° feed, not just the regular FPV view.

In late March, just under two months ago, the drone market leader DJI launched a competitor to Antigravity A1, called DJI Avata 360.

DJI Avata 360 has a lower entry price for those who already own DJI controllers or goggles, at just over $400. Further, DJI's drone can record 8K 60FPS and features a larger image sensor for superior footage, omnidirectional obstacle avoidance for easier flying, and prop guards for safety, while Antigravity A1 is meant only for outdoor use in open spaces. DJI's drone also has a traditional single-lens mode, with the cameras in a mechanically rotating block.

In other words, DJI Avata 360 is essentially the better drone – though I should note that it's around double the weight, bringing it over the threshold for FAA registration.

However, it's arguable that while DJI may have the better drone, Antigravity A1 is the better VR/MR experience, thanks to a better included headset.

The two DJI goggles that Avata 360 supports have a field of view of just 39°H×23°V and 48°H×28°V, respectively - considerably narrower than Antigravity's. The chips in the DJI Goggles are also limited to 4K 60fps decoding, while Antigravity's goggles have a more powerful chip for 8K playback.

In other words, flying the Antigravity drone will feel considerably more immersive, and you don't even necessarily need a general VR headset to immersively watch the footage you record, though the even wider field of view of something like a Quest 3 would of course be preferable.

Regardless of these differences, the real story here is that any consumer or amateur creative can now record 360° drone footage with relatively little effort. We're already starting to see the results on YouTube and Vimeo, and it's a product category we'll be tracking in coming years.

I'm actively writing on UploadVR again, and this article is one in a series of "catch up" pieces where I report on some of the interesting things that have been happening in the industry in recent months. And yes, VR Download is coming back very soon!

Polyarc has announced that the previously VR-exclusive Moss and its sequel Moss: Book II are coming to flat screens in a unified package called Moss: The Forgotten Relic. The game will launch this summer for PC, PlayStation 5, Xbox and Nintendo Switch.

Moss: The Forgotten Relic not only unifies both Moss games into one, but also includes Moss' DLC Twilight Garden. Polyarc's announcement also mentions that the new game will feature enhanced visuals, a reworked camera, new cutscenes, and an accessibility feature that will let players skip challenging combat sections.

This news follows recent turmoil at Polyarc. We reported in March that two-thirds of the studio's staff had been laid off after the studio's next "large project" lost its funding. Other studios have suffered similar setbacks in recent months. Survios, makers of Alien: Rogue Incursion and Creed: Rise to Glory, has all but shut down after a pivot to flat screen products failed to bolster the studio's coffers.

This year has seen more and more VR studios pivot to a hybrid model. Vertigo Games and their The 7th Guest Remake, ,Realities.io,'s Puzzling Places, and Resolution Games' Demeo x Dungeons and Dragons: Battlemarked are just a few of the many VR titles that have recently released or are currently being ported or remade for flat screen platforms.

The trend is one that we discuss on this week's UploadVR Gamescast. It speaks to challenges in the broader game industry, and in the VR market in particular. The games industry has always moved through similar peaks and valleys. If a hybrid model helps VR developers weather the storm and come out the other side producing new VR titles, that's the best possible outcome.

Nintendo has added five additional Virtual Boy games to their Nintendo Switch Online + Expansion Pack service. The new batch of games includes Virtual Bowling and Jack Bros., two extremely rare games that for decades have held an incredibly high value on the used market.

The full list follows:

Jack Bros. - This Atlus-developed stereoscopic 3D dungeon crawler was the first Shin Megami Tensei game released outside of Japan. Its rarity has long made it an expensive buy.

Vertical Force - A technically excellent shmup developed by Hudson which uses the Virtual Boy's 3D display to great effect (the player's ship can move into the background to avoid bullets and obstacles).

Space Invaders Virtual Collection - A Japan-only release developed by Taito, this game includes direct ports of the classic arcade game Space Invaders from 1978, and its sequel Space Invaders Part II from 1979. It also features 3D remakes that take advantage of the Virtual Boy's hardware capabilities.

V-Tetris - Another Japan-only release, V-Tetris is essentially Tetris for the Virtual Boy. A second Tetris game, 3D Tetris, was released for Virtual Boy the following year.

Virtual Bowling - Another extremely rare game originally released only in Japan, Virtual Bowling was rushed to market just prior to the Virtual Boy's discontinuation. It's a 3D bowling game.

We reviewed Nintendo's official Virtual Boy accessory headset when it launched earlier this year, and everything you need to know about Nintendo's Virtual Boy support and emulation on Switch and Switch 2 can be found in that piece (we cover the subscription cost, the pros and cons of "renting" these games via a service, and the hardware itself).

Prior to that we'd covered Virtual Boy Go, a sideloaded app that's without question the best way to play Virtual Boy games on the Meta Quest ecosystem.

Wingsuit: Romsdalen first released a playable demo in February, before launching in full three months later. It can be played with a traditional controller, but the game’s VR support puts the player right into the action as a would-be glider soaring across a massive open-world landscape.

Wingsuit: Romsdalen’s campaign features multiple starting points, each with a list of achievements you need to perform in order to gain points and advance further. These challenges include flying through a course of rings, reaching a certain score, or uncovering hidden secrets like UFOs or whale balloons.

You only need to complete a few objectives to unlock the next drop point, but you can always come back later to fulfill some of the ones you skipped the first time around. Keep in mind that many of these challenges will be incredibly difficult to complete, especially when you are starting out.

Once you initiate a dive, you hold your arms up at a neutral level (which you set during the initial start-up) to glide. To steer, you need to tilt your head to position yourself, raise and lower your arms to climb or dive, and even press one of the upper triggers for a sharp turn. Getting the hang of the VR motion controls can be tricky at first, but there is a decent sense of adrenaline as you speed across the sky.

Diving can increase your speed at the risk of plummeting to the ground, while climbing is useful for stabilizing your fall. The speedometer on your arm keeps track of how fast you are going, and beeps when you are at risk of losing control. You can also perform midair tricks by tilting your arms toward your head or raising one while lowering the other. This will earn you points, and the closer you are to the ground when you perform a trick, the better your reward will be.

Once you are ready to end your run, you can pull your parachute by pressing the lower triggers. If you end up hitting the ground too fast, your character will suffer a brutal end - one you can avoid by landing on a pile of boxes or slowing your descent with the parachute. Completing runs will also grant you Experience points, which you can use to unlock new wingsuits. Each wingsuit has its own stats that influence how fast you can go and how easily the suit can handle turns.

Wingsuit: Romsdalen has a Line Creator mode, which lets you chart your own course (literally) by gliding across a map and placing rings with the press of a button. After you wipe out, you can choose to test out your newly formed path or upload it online for other players to try out for themselves.

Graphics are pretty solid for the most part, recreating the snowy peaks and lush green valleys of Romsdalen while being accompanied by the rustling sound of wind as you glide through the air above. However, it should be pointed out that flipping and barrel rolling can be pretty disorienting. There is also a small blood splatter when your character crashes into the ground, but thankfully it isn’t too graphic. Still, your character hitting the ground with a hard thud again and again can be tough to watch at times.

It can be hard to get a handle on Wingsuit: Romsdalen's gameplay mechanics at first, and you should be prepared to grind a decent amount while unlocking new drop points. That said, the game does provide a thrilling sense of gliding through the air, though you might want to avoid it if you are particularly prone to motion sickness.

The concert joins a growing collection of immersive music performances available through Meta's Horizon TV app, including Coldplay’s concert at Wembley Stadium, Sabrina Carpenter, Arcade Fire, and several others. Apple is exploring similar territory as well through Apple Immersive Video on the Vision Pro, including a Metallica concert experience that places viewers directly inside the performance.

After spending more than an hour watching the Goo Goo Dolls show on my Meta Quest 3, I came away impressed by how naturally live music fits immersive VR180 video when the production is done well.

What immediately impressed me was the image quality. The Quest 3 delivered a consistently sharp and clear presentation in VR180 3D, with enough detail and depth to create a real sense of presence inside the theater. The Beacon Theatre itself plays a major role in that feeling. Between the lighting, stage design, and the visible crowd below, the experience captures the atmosphere of a live venue in a way traditional video simply cannot.

What makes the concert especially effective is the way it was filmed.

Several immersive cameras are positioned throughout the venue, including wide shots from the back of the theater that showcase the full scale of the stage and audience. Other cameras are placed directly on stage alongside the band, including a moving immersive rig that walks around the performers during songs.

Those moments completely change the feeling of the concert.

At times, you are standing so close to the musicians that it creates a level of intimacy that would be impossible for most fans attending the show in person. During the band’s performance of “Iris,” the combination of proximity, lighting, crowd energy, and spatial depth created moments that genuinely felt emotional in a way traditional video rarely achieves.

That may ultimately be why concerts work so well in immersive video compared to some other forms of VR entertainment.

Live music already depends heavily on atmosphere, scale, lighting, and audience energy. Viewers also naturally accept fixed camera positions during concerts in a way they may not during narrative content or interactive experiences. VR180 enhances those strengths rather than fighting against them.

There is also something compelling about being placed in positions that are normally inaccessible. One moment you are sitting behind the audience taking in the entire theater. The next, you are effectively standing beside the band on stage as they perform.

That sense of access may be one of immersive entertainment’s biggest advantages.

Meta appears to understand that potential. Horizon TV has quietly become home to a growing library of immersive entertainment experiences beyond gaming, while the company’s previously announced partnership with James Cameron suggests broader ambitions around immersive 3D media and storytelling in the future.

None of this replaces attending a real concert in person. That’s not really the point.

What experiences like the Goo Goo Dolls concert demonstrate is that immersive video can deliver something traditional media cannot: the feeling of physically being somewhere you otherwise could never be.

For a VR industry still searching for mainstream entertainment use cases beyond gaming, experiences like this feel increasingly important.

Realcast Inc., developers of Le Dino Labo, has announced that the second expansion DLC for their dinosaur-building mixed-reality experience is available now on Meta Quest. "Cretaceous Predators and Prey" introduces three new dinosaurs to the casual puzzle game, including the legendary Velociraptor, Protoceratops, and Psittacosaurus.

Like the dinosaurs previously available in the base game and the first DLC "Jurassic Giants," each new dinosaur has been carefully adapted for Le Dino Labo's hands-on game mechanics, which allow players to examine individual fossil fragments and assemble dinosaur skeletons one bone at a time.

Le Dino Labo uses full hand tracking interaction, allowing fragments of iconic dinosaurs to be examined, rotated, and assembled into complete creatures all within the player's real-world environment. When a dinosaur is completed, it springs to true life size, driving home the sheer enormity of these ancient creatures. (Can you fit a Diplodocus in your bedroom?)

A previously published Le Dino Labo roadmap for future updates included new themed packs, deeper skeletal manipulation, enhanced environmental integration, and more.

Le Dino Labo's new DLC Cretaceous Predators and Prey is available now on the Meta Horizon Store for $3.99.

Barely a month after the Dua Lipa music pack, Kluge Interactive is back with another drop, featuring five tracks from Crypt of the NecroDancer composer Danny Baranowsky.

Watch the trailer here:

Here's the full list of tracks:

• Disco Descent
• Konga Conga Kappa
• Rhythmortis
• Fungal Funk
• Styx and Stones

Each track is available for $1.99 or get the full pack as a bundle for $8.95. With this release, Synth Riders' catalog now totals 188 songs (81 free, 107 DLC).

Synth Riders is available on Meta Quest, PlayStation VR2, Apple Vision Pro, and Steam.

I reviewed Fixer Undercover when it released on Meta Quest in February, saying "The heavy emphasis on VR interactions and encouragement to think outside the box on solutions makes for a highly entertaining spy caper." My only real complaint was a heavy amount of annoying grab jank and the game updated about a month ago with a physics overhaul for smoother object interactions.

Developer Creativity AR announced it was working on a Steam port shortly after the Quest release, promising "dynamic shadows, higher resolution for textures, and post-processing to make the prison feel more grounded and immersive."

Watch the Steam trailer here:

Going the hybrid model to expand its audience is a trend we've been seeing in VR. Over a dozen developers have recently ported their VR titles to flatscreen or released a new game without VR support at all. Most recently, Moss and Glassbreakers developer Polyarc Games announced Moss: The Forgotten Relic, a combination of the two Moss games, for PC and consoles this summer.

Fixer Undercover can be wishlisted on Steam. There is a VR supported demo available to play for any interested in trying the new version first.

Beyond the visual treat, Meta moved two buried controls into quick settings, making them much more convenient: Power options and seated VR are now just a click away.

Browser Photos Pop Into 3D

The most impressive feature is browser-based 3D conversion. You can turn almost any website image into a stereoscopic 3D photo with a few clicks, or pinch when using hand tracking.

I can simply point at an image in the Quest browser, select and hold, and a new “View in 3D” option appears. After a few seconds of processing, the flat image transforms into a stereoscopic scene that floats beyond the frame with convincing depth.

Meta is playing catch-up with this capability and still lags behind in terms of video. Android XR offers a real-time 2D to 3D option for Samsung’s Galaxy XR headset, while Viture and Xreal extend real-time 3D conversion to smart glasses. XR manufacturers are increasingly leveraging the inherent 3D capability of headsets and glasses.

Upload 3D Photos From Your Phone

The Meta Horizon mobile app gained a related feature that makes it easy to upload photos from your phone and convert them into 3D images for Quest viewing.

Just open the app menu, tap Gallery, then select photos from your phone’s camera roll, and tap the upload button. Meta processes the images into stereoscopic 3D photos that can later be viewed inside your Quest headset’s gallery.

The workflow is surprisingly simple. There’s no special camera mode or export process. It feels more like uploading ordinary cloud photos, except the result has depth when viewed in VR. That matters because 3D photos simulate real depth in a VR headset, a different image to each eye. That’s not possible on phones, TVs, or movie screens.

As James Cameron has pointed out over the years, modern VR headsets solve many of the brightness and viewing-angle limitations that held back earlier waves of 3D entertainment. Meta has already been leaning into that idea through its partnership with James Cameron for Quest 3D entertainment content.

Faster Access To Useful Controls

The other additions in this PTC update are less flashy but arguably more practical. Meta added new Quick Settings toggles for both Power Options and Boost Height. When enabled, they appear on the right side of the Quick Settings panel for easy access.

Power Options opens a compact system window that shows the remaining battery level along with buttons for Sleep, Cancel, Power Off, and Restart.

Boost Height is a common need, so this addition has a bigger impact. The control acts like a switch, raising (or lowering) my virtual viewpoint by about 16 inches. One click and I feel like I’m standing even if I’m seated. I can also use it while standing to grow taller, a fun but usually impractical twist.

Some games and apps already offer accessibility height adjustments internally, but having a universal system-level shortcut is much more convenient.

While Quest headsets still receive a steady stream of new VR games each month, Meta’s recent Horizon OS updates increasingly focus on spatial media, everyday utilities, and lightweight computing features outside traditional gaming. Features like AI-generated 3D photos and quick-access system control make the Quest feel increasingly designed for everyday spatial computing instead of purely gaming.

The ports were originally scheduled to release last month on April 30 before Friendly Fire announced a two week delay to May 14.

The following is a quote from Friendly Fire's statement:

During our final testing process, we found a problem affecting the Crossplay connection between platforms. After discussing it internally, we made one thing very clear: we are not willing to launch the game without Crossplay working properly.

Crossplay is not a secondary feature for us. It is one of the main parts of the experience. A Long Survive was designed around cooperative gameplay, and releasing the game with that experience broken would simply not be right. From the beginning, our goal was always to break the barriers between platforms and let everyone play with their friends, no matter where they are playing.

The statement goes on to say that the entire team is working to resolve the issue, but there is no estimated time on when that will happen. As a result, Friendly Fire is not announcing a new release date until the problem is fixed. At that point, a new date will be announced with a short turnaround time between the announcement and actual release.

A Long Survive can be wishlisted on PS VR2 and Steam. It is available now on Quest.

As always, this is by no means a comprehensive list, and keep reading to the end for a few honorable mentions.

Hot Dogs, Horseshoes, and Hand Grenades

It only feels right to start this article with one of the two games that inspired it.

Where to start with the accolades? Over nineteen thousand reviews with a rating of 'overwhelmingly positive.' Well over one hundred updates since release. It has also never been discounted in an age where PC players (in and out of VR) buy the bulk of their games on discount. Hot Dogs, Horseshoes, and Hand Grenades (H3VR for short) stands as one of VR's earliest and most enduring success stories.

The sandbox FPS has five hundred different guns with over two hundred fifty different attachments, many of which were contributed by community members who sent Rust the actual guns to model and add to the game. H3VR has been regarded as having the most realistic gun mechanics in VR, a large part of its sustained popularity.

All this while shooting animated hot dogs, known as Sosigs, much to the chagrin & complaints of a vocal minority that creator Anton Hand merrily swats away. You have to appreciate the dogged confidence of Hand to basically say you will pay full price, you will shoot hot dogs instead of people, and you will love it anyway. It's also, as of the writing of this article, the only game on this list to have stayed on PC VR and never port to any other platform.

A sequel, Hot Dogs, Horseshoes, and Hand Grenades 2, was recently announced for Steam and Meta Quest 3/3S.

H3VR is available on Steam.

Job Simulator

Now to the other game that inspired this article.

Job Simulator, like H3VR, is a game that if one were to simply watch the trailer, especially now in 2026, it would be difficult to understand why it is special. It is special though. It sits in rarefied air, along with several other entries on this list, to have sold over a million units, a major milestone for VR games. Ten years post release, it still rarely leaves the top ten best sellers/downloads on Meta Quest and PlayStation VR2 and the top seller scroll of VR titles on Steam.

Owlchemy Labs' Andrew Eiche told me in an interview at GDC that kids, in 2026, recognize the game if he is out in public with a Job Simulator t-shirt on. In his own words, it "delivers on the promise of VR" in ways that other games do not. On its face, it is a wacky slice-of-life simulator that one would expect consumers to turn their noses up, declaring "I don't want to do real life work in a game" or "this game is for kids." Yet it still works thanks to the tone, the self aware humor, the tangible interactions that set a blueprint for countless games after it, and its accessibility as a safe game for any newcomer to VR. That was true in 2016, when very few kids, presumably its target audience, were in headsets, and it remains true today.

As an aside, Owlchemy Labs in general should be celebrated as well. It is one of the only, possibly the only, VR studios to have multiple games crest one million units sold (Job Simulator and its successor, Vacation Simulator).

Job Simulator is available on Steam, Quest, PS VR2, Pico, Apple Vision Pro, and Galaxy XR

Windlands

You can't fly or swing in VR. That will make people sick!

Don't tell that to Ilja Kivikangas and Simo Sainio.

Windlands started life as a tech demo way back in 2014 before the duo joined Psytec Games and fleshed it out into a fully realized VR title. If you peruse the 2016 VR catalog, you will find a staggering number of 'kiosk' games, where the player does not move within the world, or 'on rails' games where the game moves the player through the environment. Most of this list falls into one of those two buckets.

To make a game that foregoes all the established "safety" rules of VR, at a time where most developers were building on underpowered hardware and low resolution headsets, is incredibly bold. Windlands also dared to be cozy in the burgeoning age of wave shooters and other high-octane action titles. There was nothing like it at the time and the soothing, calming atmosphere of the high flying world is still relevant today, arguably even more so than its sequel, Windlands 2, which added combat, and action-heavy spiritual evolution Titan Isles.

Get Windlands on PlayStation VR1, Steam, and Quest.

Space Pirate Trainer

Ten years after its Early Access debut, Space Pirate Trainer remains the default answer to the question what is a great roomscale VR game to play? Those of us old enough to have played retro classics like Galaga felt right at home in this sci-fi wave shooter. SPT taps into the kid in all of us, harkening back to a time where we would bounce off the walls of our home, jumping on and off furniture ignoring the protests of our parents, shooting at an endless number of imaginary enemies.

Space Pirate Trainer makes that real. It is one of the few justifiable reasons in VR to push your tables and furniture to the far recesses of your room, opening enough space to play the game properly. Just try to play Space Pirate Trainer while standing still. It's not possible. The game begs you to move and flow with it in ways countless other VR shooters can only hope to emulate.

Get Space Pirate Trainer on Steam, Quest, PlayStation VR, and Pico.

Superhot VR

Before my job here at UploadVR, I was an active VR content creator (still active on Twitch, check my writer bio for link). Two of my most popular YouTube videos are about how to deal with motion sickness in VR. To this day, and those videos are years old, I still get comments and DMs thanking me because someone tried VR for the first time and got sick in a matter of minutes. When I reply asking what game they played, it is a first person shooter nine times out of ten. Lately it has been Ghosts of Tabor, Contractors Showdown: Exfil Zone, or Forefront. No knock against any of those games. They are just not something I would recommend for a new VR player.

All that preamble is part of why time bending FPS Superhot VR remains relevant ten years on from its December 2016 release. As fast paced and intense as it is, the game is still (relatively speaking) safe, allowing experienced VR users to put their FPS-loving friends and family into it without too much concern. Superhot's innovative enemies-move-when-you-move mechanic remains unique after a decade, with countless Superhot wannabes trying to duplicate or riff off one of the most unique movement styles in gaming.

If you ever hear a diehard VR fanatic say "VR always makes games better," Superhot is a prime example of why. The flatscreen game is great. The VR is brilliant.

Superhot VR is available on Steam, Quest, PlayStation VR, and Pico.

Arizona Sunshine

It is a bit dated by today's standards, so much so that Vertigo Games saw fit to release a remake in 2024, but the original Arizona Sunshine's legacy cannot be denied. In the late 2010s, when the average VR skeptic would be more likely to visit a VR arcade and drop $20-$30 an hour to try virtual reality than invest in a VR ready PC and HMD, Arizona Sunshine was the zombie game to play. I say this as one of those converts. Spending an afternoon killing hordes of zombies in co-op eventually led me to buy my own headset. I should note that the multiplayer for the original game (not the remake) was removed last year.

It is hard to recommend playing the OG version since the remake modernizes its controls, but there is still such a charm, no matter the version you choose, to playing an irreverent, vulgar blowhard mowing down every 'Fred' in sight. I describe the protagonist that way with love. His lines are half the fun. He is, sadly, not present in Arizona Sunshine's two DLCs, but they are still worth the price just to spend another twenty minutes per add-on in this world.

Get Arizona Sunshine on Steam, Quest, PlayStation VR, and Pico.

I Expect You To Die

The opening credits alone, a clear homage to the cinematic musical introductions to James Bond films, make the initial entry to Schell Games' signature series, worth the price of admission. Seriously, go watch them (and the two sequels) on YouTube. They are, in this writer's opinion, the best VR game intros ever made.

You play as a spy, only referred to as Agent by your delightfully voiced handler until late in the game, in a series of espionage themed escape rooms. This is another safe game, with zero artificial movement to be found. Objects are grabbed and brought to you with an easy-to-use telekinetic grab that worked flawlessly years before Half-Life: Alyx and its gravity gloves popularized the mechanic. The MacGyver-like gameplay has you using whatever tools are within reach to complete each mission.

Like any good spy thriller, the threat of death is ever present, but I Expect You To Die welcomes this, as evidenced by its title. The creative methods of death, hilariously reiterated in a memo on the game over screen, are part of the fun. Even for people who do not particularly care for puzzle games, the IEYTD games are too enjoyable to deny.

I Expect You To Die is available on Quest, PlayStation VR1, and Steam.

Thumper

Before Beat Saber, there was Thumper, a psychedelic, pulse-pounding race through a stylized void. Its rhythmic gameplay is accompanied by one of the best soundtracks you'll find in VR. Imagine futuristic sci-fi racers like F-Zero or Wipeout doused in a tsunami of neon light with a soundtrack that wouldn't be out of place at a blacklight-lit underground rave.

That's Thumper in a nutshell, another simple-but-brilliantly-executed relic of 2016 that still plays like a gem today. Its spiritual successor, Thrasher, was quite good, but if I am stuck choosing between the two, Thumper wins out almost every time.

Get Thumper on Quest, PS VR2, and Steam.

Rez Infinite - October 2016

Rez Infinite, first released on PlayStation 4, was an expansion on Sega's original rhythm wave shooter Rez. Infinite introduced both VR support and the exclusive mode Area X, a free roaming alternative to the original's on-rails gameplay.

Not to get too nerdy and technical here, but the particle rendering in the Area X mode is a technical marvel. Consider that in most rhythm-based games, the player is not in control of where they move. It is either stationary, with notes coming at you a la Beat Saber, Synth Riders, Ragnarock, and so on, or on rails like the original Rez mode or something like Pistol Whip. The arrangement, creation, and dissipation of particles that comprise the arena keep the game "on beat" despite players having free range of motion. It is terrific game design that uses the immersion of VR to its advantage while still staying true to the original game.

Get Rez Infinite on Steam, PS VR2, and Quest.

Accounting

Can a VR game be funny? More to the point, can the humor entice a player in a headset to stand still long enough for the jokes to land? Accounting, the legacy version still free to play on Steam as of this article, is an unhinged, dark humor alternative to Job Simulator. It is also the reason no trailers are included in this article, as it drops enough F-bombs inside sixty seconds to make the late, great comedian George Carlin blush. Go watch the trailer on Steam (link below) and try not to react if it's your first time watching it.

You play as an accountant trying to get back to the real world, with hysterical mishaps tripping you up along the way. Like Arizona Sunshine, Accounting's more modern version, 2017's Accounting+, is the better experience, but Accounting brought brash comedy to VR ahead of Rick and Morty: Virtual Rick-ality, Trover Saves the Universe, and most recently, Space Control.

The original, free-to-play, legacy version of Accounting is on Steam.

HONORABLE MENTIONS

These are either non-gaming applications or in one case, soon to be gone entirely.

SteamVR

SteamVR was officially announced in 2015 in collaboration with the original first-generation Vive and the software officially released in April 2016. I think it can safely be said this is the application on the list least likely to fade into obscurity anytime soon.

Despite other available platforms springing up like Meta's Oculus Rift storefront, SteamVR and PC VR are virtually synonymous with one another at this point. The platform currently has over seven thousand games available, according to SteamDB.

Rec Room

Once thought to be a social VR juggernaut, Rec Room sadly will close its doors on June 1, the date of its tenth anniversary. The wind down process has already begun, so it is hard to list it among its peers as a classic still relevant today when it is possible you are reading this article after its closure.

With that said, Rec Room was one of the first platforms in VR alongside VRChat to openly embrace user-generated content and provide proper creative tools to realize their creators' visions. It would be too easy to dismiss the social VR app as "for kids," but that does a disservice to the over one hundred fifty million users it built up to in its decade long run. To put it another way, Rec Room's user base is higher than all but eight countries on Earth.

The story of Rec Room's downfall, signposted by two sets of layoffs in 2025, is much too long to articulate here, but it really is a shame to see a legitimate titan of VR collapse under the weight of ill-fated platform expansion and a monetization model that never reportedly proved to be profitable.

Since Rec Room shuts down soon after this article will publish, we will not link where to get it. New account sign ups have already been deactivated.

Bigscreen

If nothing else, the social movie viewing application Bigscreen Beta was creator Darshan Shankar's primary impetus to create the popular small form factor Bigscreen Beyond headset. Simply put, (then) current-day headsets failed to provide the sharpness and clarity to maximize the viewing experience Shankar wanted for his virtual movie theater experience. In response, the Beyond was born and is already on its second generation.

The average cost for a movie theater ticket, at least here in America, is a hair over $16 each. That's before paying for the ludicrously overpriced popcorn, drinks, and candy. A family of four can expect to spend one hundred dollars to catch the latest release and those numbers are not far off what they were ten years ago when Bigscreen first launched. Bigscreen is an alternative option for those with headsets and was a veritable social gathering godsend during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Bigscreen Beta is on Quest and Steam.

Virtual Desktop

Considered by many to be the best way to connect a non-native SteamVR headset to Valve's PC VR dedicated platform, it is easy to forget that Guy Godin's seminal app started life in 2016 as exactly what its title suggests, a virtual way to view your PC's desktop in headset.

It has become so much more than that in its decade of existence, enduring despite reports of Meta blocking it from reaching the main store fully featured and relegating it to the underground side loading doldrums of SideQuest if players wanted to actually stream their PC games using it. Even in light of free alternatives like Meta's own Horizon Link, Valve's Steam Link, and ALVR, Virtual Desktop remains the go-to connection method for a large number of PC VR users, yours truly included. It offers a wealth of options to tailor the experience to the user's liking across multiple headsets.

Get Virtual Desktop on Quest, Steam, Pico, and Google Play Store (for Galaxy XR and Play for Dream).

Tilt Brush - April 5

Another HTC Vive launch title along with several others in this article, Tilt Brush is a creative app that lets users paint whatever their minds can conjure in a free flowing 3D space. Offered for free by Google, this is one of those "the magic of VR" apps for those of us who liked to draw on the walls of our homes with crayons, markers, and paint as kids. In addition to being the reason Magic Erasers exist now, reviews like the following from user 'Ka$h' summarize why Tilt Brush still gets play a decade post release:

Tilt Brush is VR’s “fine, I guess I’m an artist now” button. You put on the headset, grab a brush made of pure imagination, and suddenly you’re painting in mid-air like you’ve been doing it your whole life.

The experience is magical in the most immediate way possible: you draw one glowing line and your brain goes, “YES. I AM CREATIVE. I AM POWERFUL.” Then you try to write your name and it looks like a doctor’s signature on a roller coaster.

It later evolved with an open source version, Open Brush, that is available on most VR platforms.

Get the original Tilt Brush on Steam.

It also understands something many modern games studiously ignore: that mystery works best when players are allowed to feel lost. Among Giants is difficult, opaque, occasionally frustrating and sometimes mechanically abrasive. It is also one of the best, most atmospheric, and most immersive VR games I’ve played in years.

Rare Atmosphere

From its opening moments, Among Giants drops you unguided into a strange and wondrous world. You awaken in a forest clearing beside the wreckage of a smoldering ship, its hollow hull split and splayed like a cracked egg. Nearby, an inscrutable alphabet flickers on derelict tech, ancient gateways hint at a lost civilization. Now, you must explore the world, discover its secrets, and survive by any means necessary.

While this premise may not be unique in the truest sense of the word (the previously mentioned Shadow of the Colossus [2005] and Another World [1991] are just two examples of games that blazed a similar trail many years ago), in the context of modern gaming, Among Giants is a rare thing indeed.

That's because there’s virtually no signposting, no overt exposition, no yellow paint or waypoints on a map. While your robot companion does guide you generally in the direction that will advance you through the game, the overall experience of Among Giants is one of self-directed discovery. The game does not care if you live or die, if you understand its world or not. Like the planet you've awoken upon, it is indifferent to you.

It’s also hostile. Your combat abilities are limited, your weaponry only just powerful enough. Hitting your target requires deft marksmanship, continuous multitasking, and a high degree of coordination and practice. What the game asks of you is daunting, and the world is unforgiving and indifferent. You will die a lot, and you’ll only have yourself to blame.

Furthermore, the game doesn't care if you learn its story or not. The mysteries of the planet are unapologetically inscrutable. As you explore on foot, on horseback, and via grapple hooks, you continually encounter unknowns: totems of a forgotten civilization, the hulking wrecks of massive robots, or ancient portals linking the fractured lands.

Many of these call up an indecipherable language which, at the start, is totally foreign. As you explore and interface with the planet’s technology through your robotic companion, individual letters slowly become decipherable. Eventually, the game’s mysterious and surprisingly dense lore is translated into something readable.

This story is drip-fed to you in minuscule doses. For some players, this will be a tantalizing experience. You’ll be driven to explore every nook and cranny of the vast landscape, brave its hazards to find just one more letter. For others, it will be frustrating and obtuse.

Built for VR

Like so many of the best VR experiences, every action in Among Giants feels intentionally physical. The world is tactile in a way that flat-screen games can’t replicate. You smash pottery searching for supplies, rip the covers from storage bins, and manipulate ancient machinery directly with your hands (using controllers).

Summoning your horse involves pulling a horn from your hip and raising it to your lips. When the faithful steed arrives, you physically pull yourself onto the saddle and take the reins in hand, yanking left and right to steer and leaning forward or pulling back to control speed.

Combat benefits enormously from VR’s physicality as well. Your main weapon is a bow and arrow, and the archery mechanic in Among Giants is among the best I’ve experienced. It feels natural and precise, requiring a steady hand and genuine skill to hit distant targets. The game’s firearms are also satisfying, and their intentional scarcity and limited ammunition make them an emergency resource to be carefully deployed.

Traversal fares slightly less well. Grappling hooks are undeniably fun, particularly when swinging across gaps or scrambling up ancient structures, but they occasionally feel clumsy and their use is tied to a stamina system, a controversial mechanic in the best of games.

Whether running from a giant on foot, or ducking under cover in a shootout with robots, or scrambling up a cliff with your grappling hooks, there’s a constant feeling of mechanical friction. From a design perspective, I understand it, and it points clearly to Among Giants’ most obvious influence, Shadow of the Colossus. But just as this friction rubbed many of that game’s players the wrong way, I suspect the same will happen in Among Giants.

A Hostile Beauty

Technically, Among Giants is not a graphical showcase in the traditional sense. The game eschews photo realism for a more artful direction, using lower poly designs, striking lighting, scale, and color to create a world that feels beautiful, desolate, and deeply lonesome. I love the "Super FX Chip" art style, but it won’t appeal to all tastes.

The dynamic weather and day-night cycle sustain the game’s visual flair and keep things interesting. A familiar valley can feel serene during one play session only to become an ominous chasm during a thunderstorm the next. Rain, darkness, flashes of lightning, or a pastel sunrise radically alter the mood of the world.

Among Giants’ audio design is similarly evocative. In the wilderness, the beautiful soundtrack often feels contemplative, while inside hostile structures, ambient mechanical noise and oppressive musical cues transform the experience into something bordering on horror. When you encounter a giant, the music swells with tension, reinforcing the grandeur of battling creatures so impossibly massive.

Core Gameplay

Among Giants’ gameplay loop is deceptively simple: explore the world, decipher its mysteries, locate a giant, and bring it down.

These colossal battles are the undeniable highlight of the experience. Without spoiling too much, each creature is pocked with glowing crystalline weak points that must be destroyed. Accomplishing this is extraordinarily difficult. The giants are constantly moving, attacking, and repositioning while you struggle to maintain aim, manage stamina, navigate terrain, and avoid incoming attacks all at once.

These fights can be exhilarating, but also deeply frustrating. I died more than fifteen times fighting the first giant alone. Some of this difficulty feels intentional; Among Giants clearly wants players to feel overwhelmed and vulnerable. But other frustrations stem from technical roughness. At times, enemy attacks appeared to clip through environmental cover, and splash damage occasionally killed me despite being fully concealed behind rocks or walls.

And yet, when a giant finally falls, none of that frustration matters in the least. In VR, these creatures are truly enormous. Standing beneath them evokes a genuine sense of intimidation that simply would not translate the same way on a traditional screen. They are frightening in scale and overwhelming in presence. Approaching one feels dreadful. Defeating one feels unbelievable.

Between these encounters, the world is forever dangerous. Brutes hurl massive rocks from afar, ruthless droids patrol ruined facilities, and sand worms burst unexpectedly from beneath the terrain. The environment itself is just as threatening. Biomes crackle with lightning. Bitter cold and blistering heat drain your health or slow your movement. Certain tools or traversal techniques can mitigate these dangers, but you never feel wholly safe and secure.

What ultimately makes Among Giants worth discussing (and playing) is that it prioritizes emotion and experience over accessibility. Modern game design often treats friction as inherently negative. Any mechanic, any control quirk, any unusual whim inserted by the developer, any thing at all that risks confusing or frustrating players even for a moment, gets sanded away until the released game is as slick to hold as a cool river rock. Among Giants seems to reject that smoothing.

While I appreciate this deeply, it's likely true that many players will not. Some will give up after their tenth death. Some will bounce off in an hour. Some might never escape the opening scene. But there will be others, like me, who fall completely under its spell. As happened to me with Shadow of the Colossus in the early 2000s, Among Giants may very well open someone's mind to the unique possibility inherent to the medium. For some people, it might change everything.

Among Giants Review - Final Verdict

Among Giants is difficult, uncompromising, and occasionally frustrating. Its combat can feel brutal, and its refusal to guide the player will undoubtedly alienate some. But it's also one of the most atmospheric, ambitious, and immersive VR games I've played in years.

Few modern games trust players as completely as Among Giants does. Fewer still are willing to let mystery remain mysterious. Among Giants demands patience, curiosity, and perseverance, but for players willing to meet it on its terms, it offers something increasingly rare: the feeling that you've stepped into a truly new world.

UploadVR uses a 5-Star rating system for our game reviews – you can read a breakdown of each star rating in our review guidelines.

Sky Legends casts players as a young lawyer in the early 1900s investigating an air mail transport company. The investigation spans over ten years of the company's history, told through interactive scenes where players will take control of different pilots and their planes. The game supports motion controllers and hand tracking.

Watch the announcement trailer here:

Super AC featured Sky Legends at Gamescom in 2025, where we went hands-on with an early build, saying "regardless of any hand tracking issues or overly simple puzzles, Sky Legends – An Aeropostal Epic certainly piqued my interest in aviation history and lets me immerse myself in achievements I've previously taken for granted."

Sky Legends: An Aeropostal Epic can be wishlisted on Quest 3/3S and Steam.

ENVER has released the biggest update yet for its breakout VR horror title, Scary Baboon. The new "Fight Back" update introduces combat mechanics and weapons for the first time, giving players limited offensive capability in a game which had previously had them mostly fleeing in terror.

The ability to fight back against the game's monsters has been one of the most requested additions from the Scary Baboon community, which has grown significantly alongside the game's success on Meta Quest. The social multiplayer VR horror game boasts millions of downloads, a 4.6-star rating from more than 60,000 user reviews, and a Discord community exceeding 220,000 members.

Scary Baboon is a fast-paced multiplayer VR horror game where players play as failed experiments trapped inside a dark, ever-changing laboratory. Every player is a different baboon running, hiding, exploring, and trying to survive against monsters, mutants, and other failed subjects roaming the facility's halls. Built around jump scares, chaos, player reactions, and shared moments, every Scary Baboon session is a new story of panic, discovery, and escape.

“Scary Baboon works because the community keeps pushing the game forward,” said Kyle Joyce, CEO of ENVER. “Players have wanted to fight back against the monsters for a long time, and this update finally lets them do it. But we’re not ruining what makes the game work: you might be able to hit the monsters [...] but they’re not going anywhere. Take it [too] far, they come back even harder.”

Scary Baboon's Fight Back Update is now available on Meta Quest.

Smaller experiences thrive in virtual reality. As an introduction for tweens to the technology, even more so. There are a slew of cartoony titles that are aimed at a younger audience thanks to the approachable entry point of its motion controllers. From Mythic Realms to Wreckin’ Raccoon, there is no shortage of wacky, creative adventures. Swinging your arms around as if holding a sword or conjuring spells might sound more enticing for a spry crowd than for a veteran of the medium. In that sense, Crepe Master is strictly aimed at that target demographic with its simple but fun mechanics.

Taking on the role of Hana, our young protagonist suddenly becomes a Magical Girl after accidentally touching her grandmother’s Sacred Pan. This is reflected in the characteristic floating hands in VR shown with white silk gloves while grabbing her magic wand and pan in her left and right hands, respectively. A floating, sentient crepe called Mother Crepe appears in the first tutorial to guide the main character through a nonsensical plot that includes facing an organization called F.a.R.T.S. and saving the universe. As one does.

Crepe Master is quite humorous. Giving the impression that it is totally aimed at juvenile gamers, most everything else does not make much sense. Considering it can be finished within 2 hours or less, this is probably for the best. The game primarily consists of fighting your way through 15 levels against three types of monsters and smashing machines to move forward. There are no secrets or interactable objects to speak of in any level. Thankfully there is more seasoning to this dish.

Enemies like big-eyed creatures, fire-spitting worms, and tanky enemies each have a unique mechanic to make them vulnerable to damage. Because the clever creatures can defend themselves from the basic right attack, using the wand to break their stance and create an opening is necessary. More elaborate, physical moves are required when engaging with the other foes. Described as a brawler, Crepe Master’s Sailor Moon inspirations come out in full when magical abilities are introduced.

Much like the magical girls that it is emulating, Hana has several spells at her disposal that can be activated by gesturing in specific ways. For instance, the Strawbarrier move to deflect projectiles from the worms spitting fireballs is used by crossing both arms in an X position. An even sillier move called the Bananattack is used by joining both fists to destroy the bulky enemies’ armor. Not to be confused with Kpop Demon Hunters’ Honmoon, the Honeyboom attack sticks enemies in place, triggered by squatting. This attack is mostly useful for an enemy-healing bee that is hard to pin down.

All of these moves have a cooldown period, so it’s not like it is possible to spam them infinitely. More powerful versions of these attacks exist, and they are activated by positioning the right hand up and the left hand at waist level. Posing exactly like the transformations of the Sailor Guardians, this is finally the introduction to the game’s cooking mechanic. Poking fun at itself in some dialogues, this move by the name of Crepo-Trance empowers each spell to deliver devastating variations of it. The Strawbarrier Megabomb, for example, quite literally acts like a mini atomic bomb.

A silly game at its core, Crepe Master is one of those fun distractions easy to pick up and play. Thanks to its more engaging and responsive spells and commitment to the Magical Girl bit, it is able to separate itself from the competition. Quick to finish but chipper to the end, its two-hour runtime will go by quick for any type of player. Food-based puns galore abound in this otherwise surreal journey that will surely keep energetic 12-year-olds busy on a slow afternoon.

Crepe Master is out now for Quest 3.

Secret of the Mimic's initial announcement promised PS VR2 support. Its PlayStation Store listing listed compatibility with the headset. Steel Wool even had demos of the game running on PS VR2 at PAX West in 2024. Then, in early 2025 at a Sony State of Play event, the new release date trailer suspiciously removed any mention of PS VR2. The store page was updated with a new trailer, also without the PS VR2 logo, and a June 2025 release date was confirmed for PC and PS5.

Five Nights At Freddy’s: Secret Of The Mimic Available Now On PlayStation VR2

Five Nights at Freddy’s: Secret of the Mimic is playable now on PS VR2, with PC and Quest to come later.

UploadVRMike Johnson

Shortly before the flatscreen release, game director Evan Lampi, confirmed that VR support was still coming post release, with no ETA on when that would happen.

We finally have clarity courtesy of a post from Steel Wool developer Rodney Brett. Here is that post in its entirety:

The decision was largely made when the sales of HW2 rolled in. The game did not perform to expectations(not even close to HW1). In general, HW1 was released at the peak of VR's mainstream popularity. Gamers were still very intrigued by the new and exciting medium and I remember going to GDC during and after HW1's release and seeing VR everywhere and at every booth. However, by the time HW2 was close to being released, a lot has happened and the VR market really shrank to just the niche crowd of enthusiasts that love the medium. I always compared the VR gamers to people that love playing driving games with the entire steering wheel/seat + peddles setup with force feedback or people that love to go all-out on HOTAS controllers for flight games. The ones that are into VR really love it and the rest really hate it.. with no in-between. That's because the hardware requires a steep initial investment. Ever notice that there aren't any "casual fans" of VR? You're either super into it, or you hate playing games in VR.

The dev costs for HW2 was a lot more than the first game on top of this, and it's not hard to figure that out on your own just by playing the second game. Simply compare the credits of the second to the first and that team size is at least 3x the team we had with the first game. So after that stark realization, we knew that there was no way we could sustain ourselves on VR-centric titles created by a large team anymore. Thus, priority shifted to flat.. but we still didn't want to entirely abandon the VR version, thus Devoted stepped in to complete it.

FNaF: Help Wanted 2 released in December 2023 on Steam and PS VR2, with a Quest port following in May 2024. The first Help Wanted released on Meta Quest in 2020, benefitting from the COVID-19 pandemic boost that VR in general experienced in 2020 and 2021.

As of this article, Secret of the Mimic's VR support is still limited to PS VR2, though Steel Wool said in a Steam post April 30 that PC VR support is still coming.

Five Nights At Freddy's: Secret of the Mimic is available now in VR on PS VR2.

Commuter Games has announced that their simcade VR racer Downtown Club's next update will push the game out of Early Access and into full release. The update, v1.4.0, launches on Meta Quest and Pico 4 on June 11.

In addition to the full release, update v1.4.0 also brings several new features and improvements to the core game. These include voice chat, in-game rain, slipstream mechanics, AI improvements, and more.

Downtown Club is a simcade racing game that offers both traditional thumbstick controls and full virtual controls. When I reviewed the game in Early Access some two years ago, I found it to be a fun and engaging racing game that was held back by a sparse roster of cars, lack of multiplayer support, poor rival racer AI, and an appalling soundtrack.

Commuter Games has been toiling away in the garage, implementing numerous updates since 2024 that have upped the horsepower and put new tread on the tires. Since those early days, many of my complaints seem to have been addressed. We'll take the freshly polished release for a spin when it hits the road in June. I'm all out of car metaphors.

Downtown Club's full release is coming on June 11. Until then, it's available in Early Access on Meta Quest and Pico 4.

I sat down planning to spend a few minutes with Outside The Lines VR. About half an hour later, I was still there, quietly coloring on a virtual canvas while everything else around me faded into the background.

Moments like that are why I keep coming back to VR.

I first came across Outside The Lines VR through a Reddit post from developer Harvey Ball, who was looking for feedback as he continued refining the app. I reached out, spent some time with it, and ended up having a longer conversation with him about how and why he built it.

Outside The Lines VR isn’t coming from a large team or a studio trying to build the next big hit. It’s a solo project from Ball, the original developer behind VRTK, an early toolkit used during the first wave of modern VR. You can see that experience here in how clean and easy everything feels to use. The app is immediately understandable and avoids some of the friction that can turn people away from VR.

On the surface, it’s a simple idea. This isn’t a painting tool or a full creative suite. You’re not sketching something from scratch, though there are open canvases if you want to. You’re picking up a pen, marker, or crayon and working your way through pre-designed images, one section at a time.

But after spending time with it, you realize that simplicity is actually the point.

That starts with how it handles the basics. The entire experience is built around just the trigger and grip, which makes it immediately approachable. You can use the entire app with a single controller, which makes it more accessible and keeps things simple for anyone new to VR. You pick up a pen, choose a color, and start filling in the lines. There’s no menu diving, no complicated toolsets, and nothing that feels like it’s getting in the way.

The onboarding deserves a mention too. The tutorial is straightforward, easy to follow, and always available if you need to revisit it. It doesn’t assume any prior experience and walks you through exactly what you need without overcomplicating things. It’s clearly designed with non-gamers in mind, which makes a difference in an app like this.

One thing I noticed pretty quickly is that it doesn’t rely on shortcuts. There’s no color fill here. If you want to complete a section, you actually have to color it in. At first that caught me off guard, but after a few minutes it started to click. The act of slowing down and working through an image is really the whole point.

It also avoids some of the small frustrations you tend to run into in VR. Pens don’t fall out of your hand or drop to the floor if you let go. You can easily reposition the canvas to whatever angle feels comfortable. It’s all designed to keep you focused on what you’re doing instead of constantly adjusting around it.

It sounds like a small thing, but it really does make a difference. You’re not thinking about controls. You're not adjusting your angle or grip to the app. The app adjusts to you. You’re just coloring.

There’s also more flexibility here than you might expect once you start digging into it. You can switch into mixed reality, remove the desk and easel, and place the canvas wherever it feels most comfortable in your space. I found myself adjusting it frequently, tilting it or bringing it closer depending on how I was holding the pen.

You can also scale the canvas, which ends up being more useful than it sounds. Making it larger helps with finer detail, while shrinking it down lets you cover more area quickly. It’s not something you have to use, but once you realize it’s there, it becomes part of how you work through an image.

Even small things, like being able to move the menu and pen placement to the left or right side, add up. If you’re left-handed or just more comfortable approaching things a certain way, it’s easy to make the app feel like it’s set up for you without ever having to think about it.

All of that sits just under the surface. There are a lot of ways to adjust the experience, from mixed reality and easel positioning to opacity and more, but none of it gets in your way if you just want to start coloring.

Mixed reality mode was particularly enjoyable for me, since I was able to be present in my physical space and continue conversations with family members even while coloring in the app.

That said, there are a few areas where Outside The Lines VR still feels like an early effort.

The artwork is probably the first thing some people will notice. A large portion of it is AI-assisted, which may not land the same way for everyone. There’s plenty of variety, and it works for what the app is trying to do, but it doesn’t always have the same personality you’d expect from hand-drawn collections. To his credit, Ball told me he plans to bring in work from real artists over time, which would go a long way toward giving it a stronger identity.

There is a single virtual environment right now - a simple, clean indoor space that is functional and unobtrusive. It’s easy to imagine how different environments could enhance the mood, especially for an app that leans so heavily into relaxation. Think coloring on a tropical beach or on the surface of the moon.

And then there’s the broader question of audience. This is a very specific kind of experience, and not everyone is going to connect with it right away. Ball acknowledged that challenge, wondering whether the overlap between people who enjoy coloring and people who spend time in VR is as large as it seems. After spending time with it, it’s easy to see who this would appeal to, even if that audience hasn’t really been reached yet.

None of these are deal-breakers, but they do shape what the app is and who it’s really for. If you already enjoy coloring, or you’re looking for something in VR that’s more relaxed and low-pressure, this fits naturally. It’s also an easy recommendation for people who aren’t traditional gamers, or anyone who finds most VR experiences a little overwhelming.

Outside The Lines VR Review - Final Verdict

Outside The Lines VR is a simple idea, executed with a lot of care. It gives you a quiet place to spend some time and mostly stays out of your way while you do it.

If that’s what you’re looking for, it delivers exactly that.

Outside The Lines VR is available on the Meta Quest store for $9.99.

UploadVR uses a 5-Star rating system for our game reviews – you can read a breakdown of each star rating in our review guidelines.

One More Delve was previously shown off at the Spring 2026 VR Games Showcase earlier this year, impressing visitors with its striking cel-shaded art style and the fact that it was built by one student developer. It was eventually released in Early Access on April 27, with a full release planned for this summer.

One More Delve's primary draw is its physics-based combat, which has you swinging and aiming weapons to battle monsters in a dark dungeon. These weapons include a wide range of one-handed and two-handed swords and axes that medieval fantasy fans have come to expect from the genre, as well as bows, shields, and magic spells.

You have three different weapon slots: one for each hand and a third on your shoulder. To equip your weapon, you reach for one of your sides (or shoulder) and hold down the grip trigger. To use a melee weapon, you swing at your target, keeping in mind that the game takes into account how hard you swing to determine the strength of your blow. Collision detection can be dodgy if you are too close to the enemy (and enemies like to move right to you) but overall it is a satisfying experience.

Two-handed melee weapons like hammers need you to hold the triggers on both controllers to properly use, but they are just as fun as the one-handed options. Bows are a bit more cumbersome, due to the lack of a crosshair and the need to be precise with your aim. You also need to grab an arrow with the hand you aren't holding the bow with, nock it, then pull back like you would a real-life bow. Honestly I found myself sticking with magic and melee for the most part.

Speaking of magic, you have one magic spell equipped to each hand. To use them, you simply hold down on the upper triggers and reach out your hand to unleash a blast of powerful fire or lightning. There is a limited supply of Mana, and once it depletes you have to wait for the gauge to fill back up before you can use the spell again.

Health is also tracked by a gauge, and you can restore some after a grueling fight by reaching into the pouch on the middle of your belt, grabbing one of the available potions that emerge from the inventory, and dropping or throwing it to the ground to restore yourself or any other players you’re traveling with.

The enemies you will encounter run the gamut of usual dungeon crawler monsters; there are skeleton warriors, undead wizards, and poisonous scorpions looking to make you their next victim. Should you make it past them and reach the end of a dungeon (as marked by a door with a key) or your health run out completely, you choose which of your loot you want to keep and are sent back to the hub to regroup and try again.

Outside of questing, players can hang out in One More Delve’s social hub, which allows them to chat with other would-be adventurers and craft new weapons and armor using the materials they’ve gathered in their travels. To craft, you simply select the item you want in the forge, then physically hammer it from crystals you've collected on your journey. Once a weapon or armor piece is forged, you have to go to the armory section to select and equip it. You can also spend the coins you collect by defeating enemies and smashing random objects on health-restoring potions and new magic spells.

Online features are still being tested in this early access phase, but players can either invite others to their latest dungeon run or join a party to embark together from the start. If a player dies while playing online, someone else can revive them by holding out their hand at a prompt... provided they don’t get killed themselves.

Visually, One More Delve seems to draw inspiration from the likes of World of Warcraft, with dark, dreary landscapes that contrast with colorful monsters and vibrant magic. The constant blood splatter and dismemberment from defeated enemies give combat a visceral feel. The game’s music shares this ethos with a traditional medieval orchestral sound; you have peaceful harp melodies playing while you roam around the hub or in an empty dungeon, followed by more foreboding tunes when enemies emerge.

One More Delve still has a few rough edges to smooth out during this Early Access phase, such as the previously mentioned collision issues and visual glitches that cause some enemies not to vanish after being defeated. Still, there is plenty of potential here for a solid VR dungeon crawler, especially one that was made by a single person who's new to game development.

GOLF+ has revealed the "Save Muny" DLC for their golf simulator. The DLC reimagines the historically important course restored with a revived routing, restored greens, and thoughtful modern touches.

Opened in 1924, Austin’s Lions Municipal Golf Course (affectionately known as “Muny”) holds a unique place in sports history as one of the first desegregated golf courses in the American South. For decades, Muny embodied the ideals of inclusiveness and equality in sports by welcoming players from all backgrounds onto the same fairways.

Today, however, the course faces mounting pressure from Austin’s booming real estate market. Valuable land naturally attracts developers, who argue that the land on which the golf course sits could serve a broader purpose. Save Muny believes that not every acre should be viewed through the lens of profit. Public golf courses like Muny provide affordable recreation, green space, and a rare sense of community in cities which seem ever more expensive and exclusive.

More on the Save Muny initiative can be seen here.

Golf+ is out now on Quest for $29.99, while the Save Muny DLC costs $11.99.

At the time of this writing, the base game is also available as part of the Horizon+ subscription service's games catalog.

Innerspace games, like A Fisherman's Tale and Maskmaker, have always been notable for their unique mechanics and charming aesthetic, regardless of the subject matter they tackle. Spymaster, available today in Early Access, is no different. When we played a demo at GDC, even under the guise of an espionage thriller, the lighthearted appeal was palpable.

Watch the full launch trailer here:

In Spymaster, players control multiple agents in parkour and action laden espionage missions. The most unique mechanic is the C.A.S.S.E.T.T.E., a wrist mounted device that allows players to rewind time and fine-tune the agents' actions for speed, accuracy, and synchronization where needed.

Every mission also has side objectives for any completionists, additional tasks off the main path that can also be accomplished using the time rewind feature.

During a tumultuous time for VR gaming with multiple studio layoffs and closures, Spymaster Game Director Jeremy Moirano remains steadfast in his belief and explained why Innerspace went the Early Access route with its latest title.

While the VR market is navigating a transitional period, I’m convinced there is still a dedicated audience for high-quality, premium solo experiences built around unique VR mechanics and compelling narration. We’ve evolved alongside our players, choosing the self-publishing and Early Access route for the first time. Our goal is to build a community on our social channels that will help us refine the game, ensuring the final experience is the best it can be.

We will have our impressions of Spymaster published soon.

Spymaster is out today on Quest and Steam for $11.99.

The full tour is available on UploadVR's Youtube channel. This article is a full transcription of the interview.

UploadVR: "Hey, it's Mike Johnson from UploadVR. I'm here with some of the team from Mighty Coconut to talk about their new course, Blokhaven. So, I guess gentlemen, introduce yourselves and what your positions are at Mighty Coconut."

Henning: "My name's Henning. I am a lead level designer at Mighty Coconut. Hi."

Lucas: "And I'm Lucas Martell, I'm the creator of Walkabout Mini Golf."

Chris: "And I'm Chris Reyman, I make the music for Walkabout Mini Golf."

UploadVR: "Okay. So Henning, as I understand it, this was your brainchild. We just did the tour right before we sat down to do this interview, so this was kind of a course that you championed, that you wanted to put together. What was the primary driving inspiration for this, for Blokhaven?"

Henning: "The inspiration was this design movement called Bauhaus. I'm sure any designers or artists will have heard of that. In the late 19-teens, Bauhaus was a design movement that sprung out of wanting to do less with more minimalism. It was a reaction to the Victorian ornamentation and excess. Boy, I sound really nerdy right now."

UploadVR: "No, you're fine. It's a developer interview, these are meant to be nerdy."

Henning: "The primary principle of Bauhaus design would be 'form has to follow function'. In other words, the function comes first, and whatever the piece of design or art has to function as, you design the form with as little ornamentation and extra stuff as possible just to perform that function. So, it results in a minimalist look where they don't need a lot of colors, they don't need a lot of crazy intricate shapes. It's kind of back to basics: blocks, cubes, half circles, arches. And yeah, so that's the look of it, kind of through and through."

UploadVR: "Were there instances where something came back and you said, 'Okay, that's a little too detailed,' or 'We need to pull this back because it was a bit too much for this specific course,' that maybe in another course would've slid right through and made it in?"

Lucas: "I know something that you mentioned in the tour that I could even set up would be that a lot of times some of the set dec[oration] that we do, which is what we call all the extra little bits that we add on, like, I think we did a pass initially where there was ivy and a couple of things, and that was just too much. If it was too much detail that was getting added in, it really sort of fought with it. I think what helped with this course, though, was the really, really vibrant color palette kind of made it that you didn't want to have all of those extra little things cluttering up these beautiful, artfully arranged viewpoints that you're getting."

Henning: "Yeah, to look at it as we're looking at it behind us, with those bold colors that are about as far apart from each other as possible, it is very busy just to start with. Like, the blocks being arranged are busy already, so the set dec on top of that in some places ended up being too much and we had to pare down from that. And yeah, make some decisions to stick to the minimalism."

UploadVR: "Along the same lines, this feels like one of the more lived-in courses in Walkabout. A lot of the courses, it's just kind of you and whoever you're playing with on the course. This one is a fully functioning city, there's all kinds of animations here, people working in different roles. What inspired wanting to do a full-on town versus what you've done in the past, which is just kind of a beautiful space but a more empty space with not a lot of people in it?"

Henning: "My initial conception of this place was more of an art void space, like just pure design in a black or white sphere with nothing outside of it. But then, Lucas and Don convinced me that that was too nerdy, too empty, too stark... too dead. And we came up with the idea of the ship crashing and supplying this town with the blocks needed to build a fully functioning town. And then from there we had to build block people made out of the same blocks. And yeah, it just became a very busy town."

Lucas: "Yeah, this is definitely the most active course. You can probably even tell from the sounds that you might be hearing around us, but there's just a whole lot of activity, a whole lot of people moving around, there's construction on the back half of the island that you can hear off in the distance. I think one of the other things as well is that when we go more minimal with the style, it also means that then we can do some other things. And so I think that in this case, being able to build out a whole lot of the town that we normally wouldn't ever fully build to the same level became possible because we weren't as constrained trying to cram every single polygon we could get right into the area around the golf course itself.

So that's one of the benefits of when we go a little bit simpler, that then we can also go bigger. And I do think that because the design of it and just the look of those blocks and everything stacked on top of each other, it kind of became necessary to build out that entire town because even when you're at a distance like this looking back, you still need to feel like it's all functioning, like there's all stuff going on in there. And yeah, just the fact that there's so much extra stuff, I think from a distance you really feel that it's this lived-in world."

UploadVR: "Chris. So a lot of composers in video games, there's a specific tone that the game or the series might go for and it tends not to deviate from that too much. You have a very special job because this is the 40th course of Walkabout Mini Golf, and you've composed 40 very, very, very different scores for all those courses. Talk to me about the process of just trying to context switch over and over and over again. Is that a challenge for you to be going from, okay, this one is nautical jazz, and going from that to Passport Hollywood to Tokyo, having to switch your focus between those different styles as you're composing?"

Chris: "Well, I mean just in terms of there being such vastly different styles, one of the things that we've talked about is something like this course, I can imagine this expanding and being something more. I did the music for this course and thought, well, that could be a whole album. It's just like every course seems like a teaser in a way. It's like this could be expanded into a whole universe or Walkabout Mini Golf the movie or the series, right? But you know, it's really cool to be able to just immerse myself in this sort of vibe for a while and then turn around and do something else like Hollywood and be in that world.

So I mean that's just an exciting part of this work is being able to do all those different styles as opposed to like, oh, we've done this haunted house game and now everything I do is always only going to be in that sort of vibe and genre for the next four years. That would be kind of crazy-making. And in our process, I found that having a couple different courses I'm working on and bouncing back and forth from that are in vastly different styles, I find that just to be more helpful for me just in my process. It's not that it's hard to switch, it's that the switching helps reinvigorate the creativity I think, and just kind of work on one for a while and then say, you know what, I'll just focus on this other vibe for a while and get into a whole different headspace."

UploadVR: "How early in the design process do you get involved, Chris? Can you see some of the course before you start composing? How far along is the course when you get involved?"

Chris: "It really depends. It kind of depends on my schedule more than anything else, but when we started this 40-some courses ago, there was a bunch of things built out, but I was composing music based on just a one-line phrase of something, almost like a storyboard. Now, things are trucking along so efficiently at Mighty Coconut that I can go check out things that I haven't even started talking to Lucas about yet in terms of the music and get some vibes on what it is.

You know, this course I think I was able to pop in before we talked about it. And as soon as I landed here I was like, I get it. And then when we talked about it, it just kind of confirmed that, and then hearing Henning was the one that sort of came up with this idea like it should be nautical jazz, that just kind of clicked for me and made a very clear picture of what that's supposed to be. So yeah, I mean I've seen it evolve, because when we talked about it, I don't think there were any characters, there was none of the puppetry happening yet. But I think by the time I got here, there was a story with this shipwreck. Lucas would know better sort of where I end up coming in because he's part of the whole process."

Lucas: "Yeah, I mean it's usually fairly well along, and I think the main thing is that we want to make sure that everything has time to gel and we really know what the course is, and sometimes also what the music needs to bring to it. Because sometimes there will be an element like maybe there is a cozy vibe or an activeness that the music needs to help if we didn't quite get there purely on visuals alone.

Chris: "Yeah, I mean I was gonna say it does need to be very established what's going on 'cause I could be working on this as what it is, and then all of a sudden someone's like, you know what, it's supposed to be on the moon actually. So yeah, it's got to be pretty gelled, yeah."

Henning: "When I'm designing I put a temp track in just to have something to listen to that gives me the vibe of this place. How much do you hear that, Chris? And how much does that influence where you go? The temp track I chose for this one was Portico Quartet. If you want more music like this, go check them out. Portico Quartet."

Chris: "You know, temp tracks I think are always sort of a touchy subject with composers 'cause it is a tricky thing to try and capture the vibe of some music that someone's heard in its full form. And the music you shared was good! I really dig their stuff. And it does set the scene, and so it was helpful for me just to have access to that and listen to it and kind of try and piece apart what about this makes it work. Did that track have saxophone on it? Was that part of the element that sort of made it make sense?"

Lucas: "It had sax, but it didn't have any of the... I think all the other instruments were different because you leaned into a more... like when we said nautical jazz, I think the only thing that had was saxophone and sort of the six eight sort of rolling vibe, but that was really just the two elements that were similar."

Chris: "Yeah, and having something like that is super helpful. It's like, okay, saxophone, that kind of makes it sound more modern and like European I guess in the way that it was used, and more like jazz, and that gets you a long way there just having that little lift off point."

UploadVR: "Lucas, this is the 40th course in Walkabout Mini Golf. That's kind of a big number. How did you fall on this one being number 40? Was there any thought to shifting around the schedule, or is 40 not a significant number?"

Lucas: "You know, I think that we think a little less about the exact number and it's usually more how it all fits together. Generally, we tend to think in years, and throughout the year we're trying to hit a wide variety of tones. So a lot of times, it depends more what's around it, and we want to make sure that if we've got something that has similar elements that we're able to push them aside. I will say that this one was actually a bit of a schedule change because there is a course that's coming up that I think we've pushed off till October that this one swapped with because that one just needed a little bit more time, and because Henning really nailed the design and the gameplay of this one so early on, it was just in a better spot that we were able to release it earlier.

So we don't tend to do that very often, but occasionally for production reasons, we're just like, man, this one needs a little more time to cook and this one is really ready to go, so we poured gas onto this one. And I think that it worked absolutely fantastically because yeah, sometimes things just click and they come together faster, and sometimes they need another couple months."

Henning: "I didn't know I was working on number 40 when I was doing this. But nothing would have changed. It would have been a little pressure, it's true."

UploadVR: "You said it's the most animated course you guys have had. Did that extend the production time at all, or because this course was a bit simpler, did that time just get filled with the animation and it kind of balanced out?"

Henning: "The minimalism of the animation and the fact that I could just do it ended up being a boon for timing. I just knew what the characters were going to do and imagining all through the design process. And I come from animation, that was my job before Mighty Coconut, so the fact that I could just jump in and do it and not pass it around as a task for someone else saved us time."

Lucas: "I will also say that all of the timing on things goes back to the question you just asked a second ago about how we choose courses and the order that they come out in. Because we will often set the schedule not just by the tones, but also certain courses lean more heavily on certain departments. So if there's one course that is extremely animation heavy, we won't tend to put two of those back-to-back because that means that the person or two that are animating are going to be just overtasked a little bit.

Similarly, if there's something that is an extremely art heavy or extremely tech heavy course, the schedule on one doesn't... it's not like every single course has the exact same amount of time from every department allotted. And one of the other things that we say a lot internally is that we are not out to make every single course the best at every single thing. It's way better to pick the two or three things about this course that we want to be absolutely amazing and the best that we have ever done, and in this case I would say it's probably the design and the animation and how alive the course is.

So by focusing on those two things, then it wasn't as involved from a technical standpoint. So it's still doing some amazing things that we haven't done before, but it's not trying to do every single thing better than we've ever done it before because you just can't, and that's how you tend to get a lot of courses that feel the same because you're just trying to strike the same notes every single time."

UploadVR: That makes perfect sense. All right, last question, this is for each of you in turn. We'll start with Henning. Name one thing that you would like players to, like just point out to players as they're playing the course. Could be something small, could be like a specific hole, just name one thing you're saying, hey guys, look out for this.

Henning: Look out for the callback to the rideable whale out in the Santorini bay.

UploadVR: Okay. All right, Lucas?

Lucas: I will go really nerdy. I want everyone to fly around and like just, I love the water and the, the transparency that we get with that. So if you fly up to the top, check that out because it's really, really cool to see how this blocky sort of village rises up out of this really awesome ocean.

UploadVR: All right. And Chris?

Chris: Yeah, and I'll just say, I mean, I don't know if this is, you know, if I'm just coming late to the game with this, but on this course in particular, I feel like every single hole, you know, as I'm playing it, I also want to step back and just look at it and kind of take it all in, you know, from a bird's-eye view to kind of see the design of it and then, and then kind of go back in to play, play the hole. So I think I took longer to play through my round when I was playing this course because of that, 'cause there's just so much to appreciate in the design.

UploadVR: "Well gentlemen, thank you very, very much for your time today. Taking the time to do this tour and this interview, I really appreciate it.

Lucas: "Awesome. Thanks Mike."

Henning: "Thanks Mike."

Walkabout Mini Golf is available on Steam, PSVR2, Quest, Pico, and Samsung Galaxy XR. Blokhaven is out now on all listed VR platforms for $4.99.

The track veers off the paved road into a dirt side path that makes my car shake enough to consider getting the suspension looked at. Another car sideswipes me as it takes a tighter line on a turn, knocking me off course into a fence. I recover, but a part of the fence is stuck on my windshield for several seconds before falling away from the centrifugal force of the next turn. Dirt is kicking up all around my car, partially blocking my view. Just before the dirt gives way to paved road again, I look over to my passenger side, where the passenger door is damaged from the sideswipe and flapping open and closed. I can't help but smile. In terms of fun factor, FlatOut 4: Total Insanity VR delivers in spades.

The game has multiple gameplay modes, with some maps and options locked behind a points progression system earned by simply playing the game. The same goes for the vehicles. At the start, the Stunt mode only offers one car and other modes like Carnage and Beat The Bomb have a couple at the most. Be prepared for a bit of grinding to unlock more of the game, but it is so much fun it doesn't feel like a grind.

Take the Stunt mode, for instance. You drive down a ramp before ejecting your driver out of the car into either a set of giant Solo cups in an unhinged game of cup pong or staged block towers meant to be destroyed Angry Birds style. All three rounds are over in less than two minutes, followed by a look at the leaderboards, your final score, and then run it back.

Beat The Bomb is a series of ten to thirty second sprints from checkpoint to checkpoint with a bomb ready to explode if you don't make it. Unless you are really good out of the gate, this is over in maybe a minute. These are the shortest modes in the game, with the battle arena and traditional race modes lasting longer, but everything in FlatOut is designed to keep you coming back for more. I can do better than that becomes the inner monologue as you charge back in for more.

Visually, the game has a grungy grit aesthetic and moves fast enough that any visual flaws are quickly forgotten. There is some noticeable clipping and artifacting, particularly in fast, tight turns on bigger maps like the carnage races, but again, it passes so quickly that I had to be looking for it to notice. I did turn the body IK off later in my gameplay as I found the arm clipping when I looked left or right to be distracting. The sacrificed immersion was worth it, personally, since there is no way to customize the driver to look more like me. Another thing to note is everything in the cockpit, the speedometer, the rear view mirror, etc. all function.

Sound design is mostly good, though echolocating other cars from spatial audio was difficult as the sound of the other cars felt muted compared to everything else. This stood out most in the arena mode with so many cars running around that it was tough to isolate which direction an incoming hit was coming from. The soundtrack is excellent, invoking the vibes of late '90s and early '00s racers like Cruis'n USA, but with a harder rock edge.

I do not own a racing wheel, so I cannot comment on how good that support is, but there is a plethora of options to fine-tune it as needed. Analog driving was responsive and can also be refined with sensitivity options in the menu. The driver position and cockpit can all be adjusted for different types to get into the most comfortable view.

There are some Early Access issues, like menu behavior and positioning. In multiplayer, the names of other players were out of position sometimes and only rendered in one eye. I would like to see the pop up UI for the currently playing song moved as it overlaid instructions in some areas, like the Stunt mode. The 'Try Again' option by pressing the X button did not function at all, forcing me to exit the game mode back to the main menu, and reselect it. Everything I noticed is a fixable issue and hopefully will be remedied before the final release.

Overall, FlatOut 4: Total Insanity VR is a joy to play. Despite the stated issues, the core gameplay is already strong enough to make Total Insanity an easy recommendation.

Here is the full rundown of the showcase with links to individual articles for more information and trailers.

Also be sure to check out the new Humble Bundle game bundle featuring several Creature-published titles and the Creature Publishing sales Steam and Quest.

Hot Dogs, Horseshoes, & Hand Grenades 2 New Game Announcement

Rust Ltd announced a sequel to its 2016 award-winning classic VR sandbox shooter. Hot Dogs, Horseshoes, and Hand Grenades 2 promises more looting and shooting as a sentient hot dog on Quest 3/3S and SteamVR.

Hot Dogs, Horseshoes & Hand Grenades Is Getting A Sequel, With Quest 3 Support

The award-winning VR sandbox FPS Hot Dogs, Horseshoes & Hand Grenades is gettin a sequel, and as well as SteamVR, it’s coming to Quest 3 standalone.

UploadVRMike Johnson

• Store links - Steam, Quest 3/3S

Janet's Planets New Game Announcement

Intergalactic terraforming adventure Janet's Planets is the latest game from developer Really Interactive (Virtuoso), coming to Meta Quest and SteamVR.

Janet’s Planets Is A Narrative Terraforming Adventure Coming To Quest 3 & PC VR

Virtuoso’s developer has revealed its next game is an intergalactic adventure, Janet’s Planets, coming to Quest 3 and SteamVR.

UploadVRJames Tocchio

• Store links - Steam, Quest 3/3S

Creature to publish viral sensation Sock Puppet Superstar

Sock Puppet Superstar is a unique VR rhythm game whose clips garnered millions of views on TikTok. The game centers on a singing sock puppet controlled by your hands in VR to perform solos and two-handed duets. Creature announced it will be publishing the game on Quest and SteamVR.

• Store links - Quest, Steam

Compass Releases This Month on Quest and PC VR

Trebuchet's (Broken Edge) open world flight adventure Compass lands on Meta Quest and SteamVR on May 28. A PS VR2 version will follow at a later date.

Open-World Piloting Adventure Compass Coming To Quest 3 & PC VR This Month

Open-world VR flight adventure Compass has a release date, and it’s very soon.

UploadVRJames Tocchio

• Store links - Steam, PS VR2, Quest 3/3S

Language Puzzler Wordbound Confirms Steam Release

After gameplay footage of Kettle Games' Wordbound garnered ten million views across social media, the developer has scaled up its team to add a Steam version with flatscreen and VR support alongside the planned mixed reality Quest release.

Viral Language Puzzler Wordbound Confirms Hybrid Steam Release

Wordbound, a cozy mixed reality word game puzzler previously announced for Quest 3, is also getting a Steam release with VR and flatscreen support.

UploadVRMike Johnson

• Store links - Steam, Quest 3/3S

Crêpe Master! Hits Meta Quest May 7

Colorful beat 'em up adventure Crêpe Master! will release tomorrow, May 7, for Quest 3 headsets. As Hana, use your Sacred Pan to defend your world from an alien invasion.

VR Beat ’Em Up Crêpe Master Coming To Quest 3 In May

French indie developer Hallucinations Studio has revealed that its upcoming arcade beat ’em up Crêpe Master will release on Meta Quest 3 and 3S on May 7.

UploadVRJames Tocchio

• Store links - Quest 3/3S

Laser Dance Mimic Update Expected This Summer

Early Access mixed reality laser obstacle course Laser Dance will get a new update soon. The Mimic update adds six new levels and a new green laser that only moves when the player moves.

Laser Dance Mimic Update Adds New Levels & Challenges This Summer

A new update for Laser Dance will bring six new levels to the game and introduce a new green laser that only moves when you move.

UploadVRJames Tocchio

• Store links - Quest 3/3S

Deadly Delivery Goldmoon Update Available Now

VR horror co-op Deadly Delivery dropped a new update today adding the titular Goldmoon dungeons with new map events, enemies, cosmetics, and rewards.

New Deadly Delivery Update Is Out Now With A New Map Event, Enemies, And Rewards

Deadly Delivery dropped its latest update today with bigger lobbies, new enemy encounters, and more.

UploadVRMike Johnson

• Store links - Quest, Steam

Crossings Developer Interview

The developers of Norse mythology roguelike Crossings appeared to say they have released a new patch to improve the multiplayer and other quality of life fixes.

Crossings Review: A Gritty Rogue In Need Of Polish

Crossings is a visceral and engaging roguelike, but it has rough edges that show the more you play it.

UploadVRMike Johnson

• Store links - Quest, Steam

Sweet Surrender Update 16

The latest update for frenetic roguelike FPS Sweet Surrender adds a third weapon chip slot and over fifty new chips for increased run customization.

VR Roguelike FPS Sweet Surrender’s Latest Update, Out Today, Adds 55 New Upgrades

Sweet Surrender’s Update 16, out now, brings 55 new upgrade chips to the VR roguelike.

UploadVRMike Johnson

• Store links - Quest, Steam, PS VR2

Forefront 1.0 Feature

Forefront exited Early Access last month, moving to full release with a brand new map, progression unlocks, and weapon unlocks. Check out our full review below.

Forefront’s New Map Makes It Feel More Like Battlefield VR Than Ever

Large-scale VR shooter Forefront launches in full tomorrow. We tried out the new Clearwater map, which makes it feel more like Battlefield VR than ever.

UploadVRJames Tocchio

• Store links - Steam, Quest, Pico

Beat The Beats Gets A Level Editor Soon

High-impact boxing rhythm game Beat The Beats will get a level editor soon on Steam Workshop.

Beat The Beats Level Editor Coming Soon To Steam Workshop

VR rhythm boxing game Beat the Beats is getting a level editor on Steam Workshop.

UploadVRJames Tocchio

• Store links - Steam, Quest, PS VR2, Pico

Spymaster Releases May 7

Innerspace, best known for the A Fisherman's Tale games, releases time-warping spy adventure Spymaster in Early Access on Quest and SteamVR on May 7.

Spymaster Confirms May Release Date And We Played It Early

Time-bending espionage adventure Spymaster gets a release date and we went hands on with it at GDC.

UploadVRMike Johnson

• Store links - Quest, Steam

Prison Boss Prohibition Name Change & New Game Announcement

Trebuchet's 2025 Prison Boss follow up, Prison Boss Prohibition, has a new name: Crime Shop Simulator: A Prison Boss Game. Additionally, a new game in the Prison Boss universe, Project Heist Boss, was announced.

Trebuchet Reveals New Game, New Name & Big Discounts

Trebuchet announces a new game, new name, and discounts on Prison Boss Prohibition-related games.

UploadVRJames Tocchio

Flat2VR Studios Rundown

Flat2VR Studios had a developer feature covering their multitude of projects like the recently released Wrath: Aeon of Ruin and Trombone Champ Unflattened. Trombone Champ has new environments and custom trombones coming soon.

Also, Todd Jackson, the head of the Impact Labs playtesting team, announced that the team is taking testing sign ups for Flat2VR's new project, R.A.I.D. in F2VR's Discord.

The full Creature showcase can be watched on YouTube.

Trebuchet has made a number of Prison Boss-related announcements during today's Creature Feature & Friends game showcase. To start, they've teased a new game called Project Heist Boss (which we know little about). From the 30-second video announcing the new game, it looks to be a co-operative heist game with a tagline "Why craft when you can snatch?"

Closed alphas will be playable this summer via the Prison Boss Discord server.

Trebuchet also announced that their popular job simulator Prison Boss Prohibition has a new name. The game is now known as Crime Shop Simulator. In Crime Shop Simulator your job is to run an illegal merchandise stand to satisfy the needs of the locals after the Mayor has gone mad with power. The game's DLCs are also on sale for just 99 cents each for the next two weeks.

We reviewed Crime Shop Simulator (under its previous name) last year, and found it to be "a hilarious opportunity to test your criminal prowess in VR."

Crime Shop Simulator is out now on SteamVR and Quest.

The new game was revealed during the Creature Feature and Friends Showcase today.

Hot Dogs, Horseshoes, and Hand Grenades 2 (nicknamed H3VR2) promises to continue the physics-based gunplay of its predecessor with tons of weapons, daily run challenges, gameplay modes, and leaderboards.

Watch the full announcement trailer here:

The game will feature multiple gameplay modes to accommodate a wide range of players. H3VR2's core mode, the extraction campaign 'Facility' mode, lets players battle enemies and loot resources for subsequent runs in a procedurally generated megastructure. Facility can also be played in a more casual, arcade-like setting.

The first H3VR has been lauded for having the best, most realistic gun handling in VR, which has been a point of friction for newer players. To address this, H3VR2 will also have a Learning mode for players unfamiliar with proper firearm usage. Weapons can be taken out to ranges for testing before diving into a run.

Hot Dogs, Horseshoes, and Hand Grenades 2 can be wishlisted now on Steam and Quest 3/3S.

Announced during today's Creature Feature & Friends Showcase, Janet's Planets is a new VR terraforming space adventure in which your job is to transform dying planets and make them fit for new life. You'll meet all sorts of strange aliens, learn what makes them tick, and tailor worlds to fit their needs, all while a charming sci-fi story unfolds over a six hour play time.

You'll also be able to use Janet's "Sweetview" to instantly travel to a planet's surface, experiment in Sandbox mode, and take on daily challenges with global leaderboards.

Janet's Planets is being developed by Really Interactive, an indie developer based in Stockholm, Sweden that had previously created the original VR titles Toran (a short, and fantastic sci-fi puzzle game) and Virtuoso (a musical sandbox).

Janet's Planets is coming to Meta Quest 3 and SteamVR.

Wordbound imagines a world where every object is made of words. Players pull these objects apart to reveal letter tiles of their spelling, then remix those letters to spell and create new objects. The Quest version will support hand tracking at launch.

A new gameplay video, first revealed at the Creature Feature and Friends Showcase, can be seen here:

Alongside the already planned Meta Quest 3/3S version, Kettle Games has added a Steam release to its plans. From lead developer Andy Bacon:

After Wordbound's positive reception last year, we grew the team and our vision has become more ambitious. We're excited to tease this glow up of the game and bring it to a wider audience with the flatscreen version on Steam.

Wordbound can be wishlisted now on Quest and Steam.

As part of today's Creature Feature & Friends Showcase, Thomas Van Bouwel has announced an update for his mixed reality game Laser Dance. The Mimic Update, as it's called, will add six new levels to Laser Dance, and introduce new green lasers which only move when you do.

The update is coming to Laser Dance later this summer. Players who are interested in trying the update early may get the opportunity by joining the game's Discord.

Laser Dance turns your living space into a challenging maze full of lasers, where the goal of the game is to navigate the maze and reach certain places throughout the room. We reviewed the game when it debuted late last year, noting "it belongs in most libraries and should be a go-to party game."

Laser Dance is available now on Quest 3 and 3S. The Mimic Update will be coming later this summer.

Game studio Parallel Circles has announced that their rhythm boxing game Beat the Beats will be getting a level editor in an upcoming update. The level editor will be coming to Steam Workshop.

Beat the Beats is a VR rhythm boxing game on Quest, SteamVR, Pico 4 and PlayStation VR2, in which you get a workout throwing jabs, hooks, and uppercuts in time with an energetic soundtrack of over 45 tracks, plus challenging B-sides across 90+ levels.

Beat the Beats Review: Heavy Hitting VR Rhythm Action

Beat the Beats could become one of the best VR rhythm games. Our full review.

UploadVRHenry Stockdale

We reviewed Beat the Beats when it debuted on PlayStation VR2 in 2024, comparing it favorably to the wildly popular Beat Saber, and calling it "one of VR's best new rhythm games."

We also more recently covered the game's release on expanded VR platforms, where we found it to be "a well-designed, music-driven experience that keeps you moving and engaged."

Beat the Beats is out now on PlayStation VR2, Quest, SteamVR, and Pico 4.

Developed by Trebuchet, Compass is an open-world flight exploration game in which you play as a "scout" piloting an upgradable cargo ship through pastel skies full of beautiful clouds, floating islands, and incredible danger. You'll scout ahead of a roving airborne Caravan, charting a safe course through turbulent skies, solving puzzles, delivering cargo, and completing missions.

A new trailer has been revealed as part of today's Creature Feature & Friends showcase, and you can see that below.

In addition to high flying action, you'll also leave the cockpit, where movement mechanics will play a massive role in gameplay as you navigate hazardous floating landscapes and solve puzzles with your handheld grapples. The brief glimpses of Compass that we've had so far point to a vast adventure and an overworld ripe with quests.

We'll have a full review posted as soon as possible.

Compass is coming May 28 to Meta Quest and SteamVR. It will be coming to PlayStation VR2 as well, though an exact release date has not been announced.

Developer Salmi Games first released roguelike shooter Sweet Surrender in 2021 and has steadily updated the game since then, including a PlayStation VR2 port in October 2025.

Sweet Surrender Review: A Rock-Solid Roguelite With Room To Grow

Sweet Surrender delivers core roguelite thrills with room to grow. Read on for our full Sweet Surrender review! That thing happened with Sweet Surrender. I played it for a few hours and came to what I thought would be my final conclusion. I’d confidently decided it was a simple,

UploadVRJamie Feltham

Update 16 dropped today during the Creature Feature and Friends Showcase, bringing the aforementioned 55 new chips, including medical precision, cross contamination, and aftershocks. A third chip slot has also been added, lessening the requirement to continually discard chips in favor of new ones and offering up far more variety during runs.

Sweet Surrender is out now on PS VR2, Steam, and Quest.

Announced during the Creature Feature and Friends Showcase, Goldmoon adds a new special map event that emerges during gameplay, offering new encounters and rewards for those who survive. Flat Head (We Are One) has also added two new enemies to the game with unique mechanics for players to navigate.

Watch the trailer here:

Deadly Delivery has never lacked for cosmetics and this latest update brings new options for players to customize their characters. Both Quest and Steam also get a new set of achievements for players to chase. Finally, lobby sizes have been increased from four to six.

Deadly Delivery Review: Hilarious Horror Best Played With Friends

Deadly Delivery is a fun and funny horror co-op game that makes the most of VR.

UploadVRJames Tocchio

Deadly Delivery is out now on Quest and Steam. The Goldmoon update released during the Creature Feature showcase and is available now on both platforms.

Cyan Worlds, developers of the legendary adventure game Myst and its sequel Riven, announced today via the PlayStation Blog that ports of the remakes of both games are coming to PlayStation VR2 on May 19. The Myst and Riven remakes first debuted in 2020 and 2024 respectively, and have previously been released on PC VR via Steam and on Meta's headsets.

The upcoming release marks the first time the remade games have appeared on the PlayStation ecosystem. They'll be fully playable on both flat screens, and via PlayStation VR2.

We reviewed both games when they previously debuted on Quest and PC VR. Check out those reviews here: Myst and Riven.

The original games that these remakes are based upon first released in 1993 and 1997. Myst was the best-selling PC game overall for nearly a decade, and a phenomenon that defined PC gaming in the '90s. Its sequel, Riven, expanded the series' lore and pushed the storytelling boundaries of what PC gaming could achieve. For many gamers of the era, Myst and Riven were landmark titles and pioneers of immersion through imagination. With the remakes playable in VR, total immersion has never been closer.

The Myst and Riven remakes will be available on May 19 via the PlayStation Store for $34.99 each.

Patient 8 Games announced in a social media post yesterday that the price of their sci-fi survival horror shooter Memoreum has been cut by 50% on Meta Quest. The price has been slashed from $29.99 to just $14.99, a phenomenal value for one of VR's most ambitious narrative shooters.

The premise is simple but enticing: a colony ship flees a dying Earth. You awaken from cryo-sleep to find the ship overrun by horrible monsters. Only you can stand against the tide of mutants and a dogmatic military general, and save yourself, your child, and possibly humanity.

Memoreum Review: Ambitious But Imperfect Specimen

Memoreum is an ambitious survival horror game that has the right ideas, though it doesn’t always land.

UploadVRElijah Beahm

Memoreum originally released in October last year, to mostly favorable reviews. Our review described it as an exciting and sometimes terrifying sci-fi shooter.

Memoreum is available now on Quest, and coming soon to Steam. A PlayStation VR2 port has been announced, but no release date has been revealed.

For May 2026, Meta is bringing seven new games to its Games Catalog, as well as discounts on some really excellent VR and MR experiences. Starting with the Monthly Games, players can explore the narrative journey of A Fisherman's Tale 2 and delve into voxel-powered dungeons in Ancient Dungeon.

The Games Catalog is also bolstered by five new games. Players can become a deadly juicer with the classic Fruit Ninja, become a world-class barber in Shave & Stuff, shoot through mutant hordes in a post-apocalyptic Los Angeles in After the Fall, wage tabletop war in Table Troopers, and venture down the rabbit hole in Escaping Wonderland.

Meta Horizon+ subscribers also get exclusive deals. May’s deals include:

• Townsmen VR, a city builder in which you’ll build towns, take care of its citizens, and expand your territory. Get it for 75% off this month.
• Cubism, a mixed reality puzzle game (one of my personal favorites) has you using colorful blocks to construct 3D puzzles. It’s available for 60% off.
• Red Matter, a dystopian Cold War, sci-fi tale puts you in the boots of an astronaut, exploring Saturn’s moon Rhea, where you’ll make your way through an abandoned base and uncover a mysterious story. Grab it for 50% off.

And now, here's a closer look at the Monthly Games for May.

A Fisherman's Tale 2

A Fisherman's Tale 2 is a mind-bending puzzle adventure game, and the sequel to the award-winning A Fisherman's Tale, in which you'll explore incredibly immersive miniature puzzles, alter your body, and bend your mind. A poetic story unfolds as your perspective shifts, revealing hidden truths about your past.

We recommended people play A Fisherman's Tale 2 when it originally debuted, with our review describing it as "a game that [experiments] with unique mechanics that engage with virtual reality in exciting new ways."

Ancient Dungeon

Ancient Dungeon throws players into a vivid voxel underworld, where old-school visuals meet modern replayability. With more than 200 power-ups to discover, the game is designed to keep every run feeling fresh. Whether you play solo or team up in four-player co-op, it's the kind of game that rewards both curiosity and persistence.

We reviewed this roguelike game when it first released, and found that its satisfying combat and ever-changing dungeons, combined with its beautiful visual style, make for a very good time indeed.

Horizon+ Games Catalog Games

Horizon+ continues offering a Games Catalog of Quest titles that any subscriber can access. New games this month include Fruit Ninja and Escaping Wonderland. Meta can add new games to and remove games from the catalog at any time.

Here is the current Horizon+ Games Catalog in the US:

• After the Fall
• Angry Birds VR: Isle of Pigs
• Asgard's Wrath 2
• Beat Saber
• Blacktop Hoops
• Breachers
• Deisim
• Demeo
• Demeo Battles
• Dungeons of Eternity
• Escaping Wonderland
• Fruit Ninja
• Ghosts of Tabor
• GOLF+
• Green Hell VR
• I Expect You To Die 3
• iB Cricket
• In Death: Unchained
• Into Black
• Into the Radius
• Job Simulator
• Les Mills BodyCombat
• Maestro
• Medieval Dynasty New Settlement
• Moss
• Onward
• Pets & Stuff
• Pistol Whip
• Premium Bowling
• Prison Boss Prohibition
• Project Demigod
• Puzzling Places
• Racket Club
• Real VR Fishing
• Red Matter 2
• Shave & Stuff
• Spatial Ops
• Starship Home
• Synth Riders
• Table Troopers
• The 7th Guest VR
• The Climb 2
• The Light Brigade
• The Thrill of the Fight
• Thief Simulator VR
• Titans Clinic
• Vacation Simulator
• Walkabout Mini Golf
• War of Wizards
• Zero Caliber: Reloaded

Escaping Wonderland Review: A Curiously Wonderful Dream

Escaping Wonderland is an inventive, well-crafted VR adventure puzzle game that successfully builds upon Down The Rabbit Hole. Our full review.

UploadVRJames Tocchio

Horizon+ Indie Catalog Games

Meta continues to add new games to the separate Indie Games Catalog, and you can see the entire list here.

Meta Horizon+ is a subscription service that gives players access to a monthly selection of games for $7.99 USD per month, or $59.99 USD a year. New Horizon+ users can enjoy a one-month free trial.

April was a busy month for virtual reality gaming. Early Access hits like Forefront and Into the Radius 2 moved to their 1.0 full releases. Highly anticipated titles like Wrath: Aeon of Ruin VR Brutal Edition, Little Nightmares VR: Altered Echoes arrived and VR support was added for popular titles Five Nights at Freddy's: Secret of the Mimic and Microsoft Flight Simulator '24 on PS VR2.

This list is subject to change as new announcements are made by developers and at events like the Creature Feature and Friends Showcase on May 6.

Note that this article only lists titles with firm, publicly announced dates, so any titles with a [month][year] distinction for May or that are rumored to release this month will not be included.

Proton VR - May 1 (PC VR)

Proton VR is a solo-developed retro shooter inspired by the boomer shooters of the 90s. A playable demo is available now.

• Store links - Steam

*FlatOut 4: Total Insanity VR - May 7 (PC VR)

A product of Flat2VR Studios' Spark initiative, FlatOut 4's long-awaited VR port arrives after a two week delay from its original April date. The reckless driving action game promises multiple game modes and vehicles, with vehicle interiors built from scratch for VR.

• Store links - Steam

*Spymaster - May 7 (PC VR, Quest)

The latest from A Fisherman's Tale developer Innerspace, Spymaster is a charming espionage adventure. Read our preliminary thoughts from the Game Developers Conference in March here:

Spymaster Confirms May Release Date And We Played It Early

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• Store links - Steam, Quest

Walkabout Mini Golf Blokhaven DLC - May 7 (Quest, PC VR, PS VR2, Pico)

Blokhaven, Mighty Coconut's 40th course for Walkabout Mini Golf is set on the docks of a charming island town constructed from discarded toys.

• Store links - Steam, PSVR2, Quest, Pico, Samsung Galaxy XR, Apple App Store

Crêpe Master - May 7 (Quest)

Arcade beat 'em up Crêpe Master from French developer Hallucinations Studio stars Hana, a magical girl who embodies the reincarnated form of the Crêpe Goddess. You'll wield a "Sacred Pan" to defend your home, Earth, and France's favorite pancake against a ruthless tyrant bent on destroying crêpes once and for all!

• Store links - Quest 3/3S

Evil Inside VR - May 7 (Quest, PS VR2)

Evil Inside is a P.T.-like psychological horror game originally released in 2021 for Steam and all major gaming consoles. It is being redesigned specifically for VR, with a revamped sound system, motion controls, and lighting for a more immersive experience. The narrative and puzzle designs will also be updated for VR.

• Store links - PS VR2, Quest 3/3S

Wingsuit: Romsdalen - May 13 (PC VR)

Pilot a high performance wingsuit through mountain landscapes in Norway's Romsdalen Valley in this high speed sports title. A demo is available now on Steam.

• Store links - Steam

King Crab - May 14 (PC VR)

King Crab is a hybrid, lighthearted, physics-driven defense game where players dig trenches, build up walls, and try to otherwise redirect waves to protect sand castles.

• Store links - Steam

A Long Survive - May 21 (PC VR)

Co-op horde shooter A Long Survive comes to PlayStation VR2 and PC VR following a short delay from its original April target. The Friendly Fire Studios-developed title released on Meta Quest in October 2025 and promises improved visuals.

• Store links - PS VR2, Steam

Roboquest VR - May 21 (Quest)

Flat2VR Studios' hit roguelite Roboquest drops on Meta Quest after its initial PC VR and PS VR2 release.

Roboquest VR Review: An Instant Classic

Roboquest VR takes an already exhilarating FPS roguelite and delivers a near-flawless VR adaptation.

UploadVRJames Galizio

• Store links - Quest

Virtual Hunter - May 27 (PS VR2, Quest)

Another delayed game, animal hunting sim Virtual Hunter arrives on PS VR2 and Meta Quest in late May. It is already available on SteamVR.

• Store links - Quest, PS VR2

Compass - May 28 (PC VR, Quest)

High flying adventure Compass announced its late May release date at May's Creature Feature and Friends Showcase. Developed by Trebuchet (Prison Boss, Broken Edge), Compass is an open-world flight exploration game in which you play as a "scout" piloting an upgradable cargo ship through pastel skies full of beautiful clouds, floating islands, and incredible danger.

The game releases May 28 on Meta Quest and SteamVR, with a PlayStation VR2 version to come later.

• Store links - Quest, Steam

This article will be updated with any new announcements or delays throughout the month of May.

Here are all of the Star Wars VR games with prices and discounts for SteamVR, PlayStation VR, Meta Quest, and Pico.

Vader Immortal (Quest, PS VR)

Vader Immortal is a three-episode narrative adventure set after the events of Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith. You play as a smuggler whose ship is intercepted by Darth Vader himself above the fiery planet Mustafar. A journey of self discovery alongside a wisecracking droid leads to learning the ways of the Force and extensive lightsaber action, culminating with a duel with Vader. It's wish fulfillment of the highest order for any Star Wars fan.

All three episodes also feature the lightsaber dojo, an escalating gauntlet mode separate from the story campaign to test your Jedi mastery. In keeping with the abilities learned in each game, Episode 1 just focuses on usage of a lightsaber, Episode 2 adds the Force, and Episode 3 incorporates weapons from stormtroopers.

Vader Immortal is sold as a complete bundle on the original PlayStation VR, currently on sale for $7.49, a whopping 75% off. On Meta Quest, Episode 1, Episode 2, and Episode 3 are all 50% off, $4.99 each.

Meta also has all three episodes in a special May The Fourth bundle along with Tales From the Galaxy's Edge and Beyond Victory for $29.99.

Star Wars: Vader Immortal Trilogy Review - A Splendid Early Exercise In Story-Living

I don’t really like to echo a company’s marketing slogans, especially not in reviews, but in the case of Star Wars: Vader Immortal, you kind of have to. Note: This review is for the entire Vader Immortal trilogy. You can see our individual reviews for each episode below.

UploadVRJamie Feltham

Star Wars Pinball VR (PC VR, PS VR, Quest)

Play pinball on officially licensed tables based on films and series in the Star Wars universe. Star Wars Pinball VR is 60% on PS VR1 ($9.99) and 50% off on Quest and Steam ($12.49).

Available tables include:

• The Mandalorian
• Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope
• Star Wars Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back
• Star Wars Episode VI: Return of the Jedi
• Rogue One: A Star Wars Story
• Star Wars Rebels
• Masters of the Force
• Classic Collectibles

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Is this latest addition to the Star Wars VR library worth your time? Find out in our Star Wars Pinball VR review!

UploadVRJoshua Broadwell

Star Wars: Squadrons (PC VR, PS VR)

Star Wars: Squadrons is the game that kids like me, who grew up playing the Lucasarts-made flight sims X-wing and TIE Fighter, had waited our whole lives for. Squadrons puts you in the cockpit of the franchise's most legendary fighter ships and plunges you into a sprawling dual perspective story of pilots flying for both the New Republic (the good guys) and the reeling Empire (the baddies). There's also a full-fledged competitive multiplayer mode.

Originally released for PlayStation 4, Xbox One, and on PC, the game can be played entirely in VR via Steam VR and PlayStation VR (a port to PS VR2 never came, but you can play using Sony's newest headset via the PS VR2 PC adapter). The game has full HOTAS support, making for one of the most immersive Star Wars flight games ever made.

For Star Wars Day, it's 90% off on Steam ($3.99). Unfortunately, it is not on sale for PlayStation VR, still listed for $39.99.

Star Wars: Squadrons VR Review - The Galaxy’s Finest Space Combat

Star Wars: Squadrons is finally here and it absolutely delivers. From the incredible set piece moments, excellent new characters, and fantastic VR space combat, this is an adrenaline-fueled blast in the galaxy far, far away that you won’t want to miss. Here’s our Star Wars: Squadrons VR review

UploadVRDavid Jagneaux

Star Wars: Tales From The Galaxy's Edge (Quest, PS VR2)

Star Wars: Tales from the Galaxy's Edge is an interactive VR adventure set on Batuu, the Outer Rim planet most known as the fictional setting of the real-world Star Wars theme parks at Disneyland in California, and Walt Disney World in Florida.

In Tales from the Galaxy's Edge, you'll play as a droid repair tech who crash lands on Batuu, take on missions in the Batuu wilds, face off against the Guavian Death Gang, infiltrate a First Order facility and travel to other eras in the galaxy, in your own unforgettable Star Wars story.

On PlayStation VR2, Tales has enhanced graphics, sounds, and haptics compared to the original version designed for Oculus Quest. It also includes all the DLC, while on Quest it's a separate purchase.

Tales from the Galaxy's Edge Enhanced Edition is on sale for $9.99 on PlayStation VR2, 75% off the normal price. On Quest, Tales and the game's DLC, Last Call, are included for a limited time in the ILM May the 4th Bundle for $29.99. Separately, the base game and Last Call DLC are both 50% off, $12.49 & $4.99 respectively.

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With the launch of the Last Call DLC, balance is almost fully restored to Star Wars: Tales From The Galaxy’s Edge. Read on for our Star Wars: Tales From The Galaxy’s Edge full Review. At the risk of enraging seemingly all of the internet, let me recall a

UploadVRJamie Feltham

Star Wars: Beyond Victory (Quest 3/3S)

Set during the reign of the Empire, and featuring an original story involving the notorious podracing legend, Sebulba, Beyond Victory blends immersive VR storytelling with mixed reality play in which your real-world space is transformed into a holotable arena. Here, fast-paced, top-down podracing plays out, while a sandbox mode turns your living room into a playset environment.

Beyond Victory is half-off on the Meta Horizon store today, discounted to $9.99 from the usual $19.99.

Star Wars: Beyond Victory Review - Not The Podracer We’re Looking For

Star Wars: Beyond Victory brings third-person mixed reality podracing and a digital toy set to Quest 3 & 3S today.

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Jedi Knight: Jedi Academy & Jedi Knight II: Jedi Outcast (Quest, Pico, PC VR)

Longtime modders Team Beef brought two classic Star Wars games to VR with full motion controls. Jedi Academy casts you as a student under Jedi Master Luke Skywalker. In Jedi Outcast, you are Kyle Katarn, a now former Jedi who has severed their tie to the Force. Team Beef has instructions to get the game running on your platform of choice.

Note that you must own a copy of these games to use the mods. The mods simply add VR support to each game. Jedi Academy and Jedi Outcast are 75% off on Steam right now, just $2.49 each.

Links: Quest, Pico, PC VR

Survios' first VR game was a sci-fi action shooter for the HTC Vive in 2016, called Raw Data, considered one of the headset's best launch-window titles and one of the first truly great action VR shooters. After two more original IP VR titles over the following two years, Sprint Vector and Electronauts, the studio secured major licensed VR titles, including Creed: Rise to Glory and Alien: Rogue Incursion.

• Raw Data (2016): a sci-fi action wave shooter where you infiltrate a dystopian corporation and fight off hordes of their killer androids using both firearms and energy katanas.
• Sprint Vector (2018): a competitive racing platformer, one of the first major VR titles to use arm-swinging locomotion for fast-paced movement.
• Electronauts (2018): a gamified music creation sandbox that makes you feel like a DJ, a truly made-for-VR take on the music game genre.
• Creed: Rise to Glory (2018): the studio's first major IP title, a boxing game in the Rocky universe with both a cinematic campaign and PvP multiplayer.
• Westworld Awakening (2019): a narrative-driven stealth horror game based on the HBO sci-fi series wherein you solve puzzles and hide from a killer host.
• Battlewake (2019): a VR naval combat game where you act as a mythical pirate lord, directly interacting with the ship's wheel and aiming cannons while casting elemental magic like whirlpools and the kraken to take on enemies.
• The Walking Dead: Onslaught (2020): the "other" Walking Dead VR game, Onslaught was both overshadowed by Saints & Sinners and considered the weakest of Survios' catalog.
• Puzzle Bobble VR (2021): a VR take on the classic arcade game Puzzle Bobble, adapted to 3D and first person.
• Alien: Rogue Incursion (2024): the studio's biggest, and perhaps final, title, a singleplayer action-horror survival game where you play as a Colonial Marine to take on Xenomorphs.

According to multiple posts from employees on LinkedIn, the studio has now undergone sweeping layoffs that could effectively halt its operations.

“I was informed today that Survios as it currently stands will be essentially shuttered,” wrote one combat designer. A senior game designer confirmed that “the majority of the development team” had been affected, while another employee suggested the cuts were not entirely unexpected.

Alien: Rogue Incursion Review - A Promising Yet Imperfect Entry

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UploadVRDon Hopper

The reported downsizing follows efforts by Survios to expand beyond its VR roots. In 2025, the studio launched an expanded version of Alien: Rogue Incursion across PC and consoles, in an effort clearly intended to diversify revenue streams.

The VR version had recently claimed the top spot on Sony’s PlayStation VR2 sales charts as recently as February, while Creed: Rise to Glory had sold over a million copies as far back as 2021, and remained a consistent presence on sales charts month after month. Despite these strong indicators of performance and the company’s move into traditional platforms, the studio has apparently failed to maintain stability.

Survios has not publicly commented on the situation, and the full scope of the layoffs remains uncertain.

Job Simulator recently celebrated its tenth anniversary and to this day remains a mainstay in the top sales categories for its VR platforms. When I first played DDS' Sporelando and chatted with Owlchemy Labs 'CEOwl' Andrew Eiche at the Game Developers Conference, one of the things we spoke about was getting back to basics with DDS.

Job Simulator’s Developer On Evolving In VR with Dimensional Double Shift

We talked with Andrew Eiche of Job Simulator’s Owlchemy Labs at GDC about how the company stays relevant in an ever-changing VR landscape.

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Owlchemy Labs has evolved its winning formula as VR itself has evolved, with more sophisticated movement systems and improvements in alternative control methods like hand tracking.

Dimensional Double Shift represents the next step forward in that evolution. Eiche has been outspoken about his support for hand tracking and sees it as a necessity for mainstream adoption. Conversely, he talked to us about pulling back the free movement systems introduced in Vacation Simulator and Cosmonious High as they hindered the gameplay loop.

I kept all that in mind when I recruited three friends to join me in DDS' latest paid add-on, Sporelando. Dimensional Double Shift's fourth world riffs on the retirement golf community vibes of central Florida after similar send ups of other cultures in Treeatle (world coffee capital Seattle), Hexas (cowboy-inspired Texas), and New Joysey (New Jersey). The latter two, along with Sporelando, are available as a $4.99 add-on to the base free-to-play experience in Treeatle. In a move for wider adoption and replayability, only one player needs to own any of the add-ons for a full group to play.

Treeatle remains the base experience and I was on a review build, so I did need to run through the two Treeatle modules before Sporelando opened up to me. Bear in mind, I had already played the DLC with Eiche who, for the sake of time, gave clear direction to our media group on completing the various tasks. This is a fairly common practice in demo sessions where time is limited and we want to experience as much of the game as possible.

For this new session, I sat back and watched the learning process of my three friends with minimal intervention, just to see how intuitive it is. DDS's core gameplay loop consists of choosing from two different jobs: a vehicle repair shop and a diner. My father's side of the family is based in east-central Florida, so loading into Sporelando felt like a trip to a region I'm all too familiar with. The environment is populated with satirical billboards and a general atmosphere that nails central Florida. We started in the repair shop and I immediately picked up on the difference between DDS and other co-op experiences in VR.

A clunker of a golf cart driven by a cantankerous mushroom-like golfer eager to get back on the course pulled in to our repair bay. Everyone on the team immediately grabbed the handles in front of us and tried to lift it, independent of one another. It didn't budge at first, and this was the first of many lessons DDS teaches. It's not simply that all four of us exist in the same space. Teamwork is a key part of this game. This runs counter to many other co-op experiences where teamwork is optional. In shooters like Forefront or dungeon crawlers like Dungeons of Eternity, it helps to communicate, but players are fine to go rogue and do their own thing with only the possibility of failure.

DDS is different. Here, failure is guaranteed if you do not communicate with your team. This led to a few moments of frustration amongst the team as this lesson was made painfully apparent. Resolution Games' Cook-Out: A Sandwich Tale is the best comparison to DDS' gameplay.

After we lifted the hood, all four of us were presented with small mini-game like 'repairs' to make. I watched as all three other players started speaking to themselves trying to figure out how to solve each riddle. I myself was presented with one side of a map location puzzle that had me confused until I remembered that most of these modules have two sides to them and require two players to complete. One by one, everyone figured this concept out.

• "Hey, we need to both pull this crank to power up the engine."
• "Okay, I get it. I can see where the slider needs to be on my side. Turn it to the left until I say stop. Wait, not your left, my left! Your right. I mean turn to your right."
• "Okay, put marker at the valley. I have the map here. It's in the upper left. Oh, my slider controls up and down. Yours controls left and right. I get it."

Ten minutes or so later, the fungal cart owner was off to the links. We did another vehicle, this time much faster, then moved into the diner.

Here, orders come in on a carousel with ingredients to prepare and serve. Again, products and equipment have to be shared here. I shared a chargrill with one player and a meat grinder with another. Ingredients needed to be passed from one station to another. The lessons from the cart repair shop had to be relearned here. After grabbing our tickets, there were brief moments of confusion when the necessary ingredients to complete a ticket were not available in that player's station. Again, the cycle of confusion to frustration to understanding to completion played itself out.

This module worked less well because it requires more precision from the hand tracking to properly place items. Players in VR are used to moving relatively quickly with controllers, so the lesson here was to slow down. Even with this, the hand tracking lets down a few interactions. Getting a product into the grinder was painful and passing the chunks of fish or cooked meat to another player did not work several times. Sometimes an item would just blast off into orbit, a la the janky physics of some sandbox games.

Eventually we just placed the needed items closer to the other player, who picked them up from the counter. This was easier than a direct hand off, something that has never felt great in VR, but when using hand tracking, it was a natural feeling interaction. Like "I am using my hands, so I should be able to just hand this to him/her." Unfortunately, as far as hand tracking has come, it's not quite there yet. Handing an item off was hit and miss. Movements have to be more precise and that feels like it hampers a player who knows what to do and wants to move faster than the hand tracking will allow for.

This is not necessarily Dimensional Double Shift's fault. It felt more like a technical failure of the system more so than DDS' usage of it. More than once, my friends lamented the lack of controllers, a common refrain I've heard in hand tracked games like Silhouette and Grokit. As hand tracking continues to improve, I would imagine this friction just fades away. Time and experience will benefit games like Dimensional Double Shift that can continue to experiment and iterate with different interactions as the technology itself continues to improve.

After our two shifts, we were rewarded with new cosmetics and funny superlative certificates, a nice touch that elicited a humorous reaction when one player did not get the moniker she was expecting. We wrapped up our time in Sporelando roasting hot dogs and marshmallows over a campfire adjacent to the job selector board, recapping what we had just done and laughing about a few interactions that went off the rails. By the end, it felt less like a game and more like four friends just hanging out in VR. The social aspect of Dimensional Double Shift is spot on and even with the moments of frustration, we were all laughing by the end.

This is where DDS delivers on, to use Eiche's phrase, "the promise of VR." That is, meeting the expectations of the player with minimal friction. Hand tracking jank aside, DDS gets the job done, with room to improve just from hardware and tracking advancements alone.

Dimensional Double Shift is available free to play on Quest and Android XR, with the Sporelando and other add-ons available for $4.99 each.

The full release of the comical birdwatching and photography game Birdseed VR has left the nest, spread its wings, and come to roost on Meta Quest 3 headsets. With our quota for questionable avian metaphors met, let's get on with the news.

For those not familiar, Birdseed VR is a cozy birdwatching and photography game in which you hang out in a forest and photograph silly and cute birds. It's been out in Early Access for a few months, and I wrote my impressions of the game when it originally released in EA (you can read about it here).

In short, it's a chill and charming little game where collecting birds, photographs of birds, and gear to better photograph birds is the core loop. You'll listen to music, wait for new feathered friends to arrive, laugh at their silly behavior, and take 12 pictures a day with your limited stock of film.

The release of version 1.0 brings quite a few major updates to the game. To start, it patches the game's multiplayer, allowing for birdwatching with up to three friends.

Then there's the inclusion of Scout's Store, a shop where you can spend in-game currency to buy new camera skins, lenses, and charms, as well as new frames, more film, and other cosmetics. You can also buy in-game currency with real-world money, though this is not required.

The full release doubles the number of birds in the game, as well as adding Super and Ultra Telephoto lenses, new field guides, and more.

Birdseed VR is out now on Quest 3 and 3S. It's also coming to Steam VR sometime later this year.

Alta (A Township Tale) detailed the news in Discord with the following message:

Like many teams across the games industry, and especially within the VR space, we have faced increasingly difficult market conditions alongside the rising cost of development. Despite every effort, we have reached the difficult decision to end development of Reave at Alta.

While this may appear as though Reave is being left behind, that could not be further from the truth. If circumstances had allowed, we would have continued building and expanding Reave alongside all of you for years to come.

The current playtest will be the final opportunity for anyone interested to play the game before it shuts down on May 4.

Reave Is The New Dark Fantasy VR Action Game From A Township Tale’s Studio

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Reave was formally announced during the March 2025 VR Games Showcase after Alta spent the better part of a year posting developer vlogs about the game under the name 'Project 2.' Alta has run multiple playtests on Quest and PC VR since then.

Some disclosures upfront: I am a lifelong Ninja Turtles fan. From the comics to the 1980s cartoon whose theme song I can still sing to this day to the spotty history of the films and Vanilla Ice's hit "Ninja Rap." This review is also the third time I've played the game. I played a demo during Steam Next Fest and had a session with publisher Beyond Frames' CEO, Ace St. Germain, at the Game Developers Conference in March.

So I already knew Cortopia nailed the characters, particularly the turtles. I also knew the exterior sections of New York played out like a semi open world akin to something like Asgard's Wrath 2, albeit on a much smaller scale. This comes with enemy outposts to shut down and random crimes to prevent, with a crime level ever present throughout the game. The question I had coming into the full game was whether all of this holds up over an extended playtime.

Empire City starts with a tutorial level that lets you sample all four turtles. They each have different skill sets and a special 'focus' attribute that varies among the four. When fully charged by attacking and defeating enemies, this focus ability triggers, granting temporary perks like increased damage, faster focus building, and so on, depending on which turtle you select to play as. The sewer lair also houses a separate lab that serves as a physical skill tree of sorts. Here scrap that is collected throughout the game can be used to buy items, additional perks, and level up to unlock higher health and more perk or inventory slots.

With this system and the design of New York's exterior, TMNT: Empire City straddles the line between simple adventure and full-blown role playing game. There are a lot of choices here, allowing any player to cater their preferred turtle to their preferred playstyle. That is also before getting to the multitude of collectibles through the game. Artifacts can be turned into purchasable perks. Blueprints add to the list of craftable items. The lair has a full chess board with its pieces scattered all over the city. Multiple cassette tape recordings that expand on the storyline. Completionists will have plenty to keep them occupied.

Also, Empire City's campaign is fully playable in co-op for up to four players, so you can bring your friends in to help track everything down. In co-op, the host player is the only player whose storyline progresses, so a word of caution to anyone hoping to play part of the main campaign alone and part with friends. If this is you, then be sure to host the session or those co-op stretches of gameplay will have to be repeated solo. That said, running around the city with a buddy, wrecking outposts and stopping crime, is a shell of a good time. Another word of caution, there is a heavy amount of dialogue in Empire City, so be prepared to get interrupted often when talking to friends.

The story follows the remnants of the Foot clan in the aftermath of the death of the Shredder, the most infamous TMNT villain. The turtles find themselves caught between two ideologically opposite sides of a Foot clan power struggle. It is a good story and easy enough to keep up with if you are not familiar with the source material, with enough exposition delivered by the other characters to make sure newer fans are not left behind.

The combat in Empire City has a lot of complexity to it, with a parry system, unblockable attacks, items, and the aforementioned focus system. Unfortunately, these complexities don't really shine when fully engaged in combat. The Foot clan, an ancient group of ninjas, comprise the bulk of the rogues gallery with multiple variants, all of which can be fairly quickly dispatched. I didn't use a single smoke bomb after the tutorial level. Midway through the game, I didn't even think about the focus system anymore. I just kept jumping, dashing, and swinging. With so many character customizations and skills to choose from, the combat difficulty doesn't really befit the plethora of choices in builds.

Other than combat, the other flaw in the game is a few odd glitches. Enemies were able to hit me through walls from adjacent rooms with melee attacks. My 'strategic retreats' to single out each member of a squad backfired when the AI wouldn't come through the door and instead just knew where I was on the other side and hit me. Towards the end of the game, there's a timed sequence I failed, but because I had a 'rebirth' perk where I revived once if I died, I could continue. Everything in the building was "locked down" because time had run out and all I could do was reload my save and reenter the building to complete the sequence. I also had to start a new save file after a co-op session with a friend because I could not complete the crafting tutorial. Thankfully, this only set me back about fifteen minutes.

Visually, Cortopia leans into the comic-book art style with cel shading and sharply defined black edges that looks straight out of a panel of a TMNT comic. This aesthetic, closely resembling Men In Black: Most Wanted and Deadpool VR, is not for everyone, but everything is sharp with as much detail as this visual style will allow for. I did notice a lot of the collectible scrap would sometimes just float in midair for no reason, but that is the only visual flaw to bring up. The sound design generally gets the job done and the sound effects are particularly good during combat. The musical score is fine, but nothing memorable. The voice acting is excellent, even if a tad overbearing on coms at times.

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Empire City Final Verdict

Any issues I had with TMNT: Empire City were overcome by just how fun and breezy the game is to play. If I bumped into anything I didn't care for, seconds later I was on to something else and did not care enough to dwell on it. The glitches I experienced were a nuisance, but easily overcome.

Cortopia never forgets that this property is based on a comic book that across forty years has not taken itself too seriously while entertaining fans of all ages. Empire City lives up to that standard. Longtime TMNT fans and newcomers alike will find something to like in Empire City.

UploadVR uses a 5-Star rating system for our game reviews – you can read a breakdown of each star rating in our review guidelines.

Publisher Microsoft and developer Asobo Studio have announced that the update to bring the PlayStation 5 release of Microsoft Flight Simulator 2024 to PlayStation VR2 headsets is now live. Players who own the game can download the free update and experience flight on Sony's headset right now.

Alongside the news came a new launch trailer, which can be seen just below:

Bringing the game to Sony's headset was no simple task. In a PlayStation Blog post published in March, Asobo detailed the challenges and benefits of bringing their game to PlayStation VR2, which received redesigned cockpit interactions specifically tailored to the PS VR2's controllers, technical tuning to maintain smooth performance, and a major push to eke out the best visuals possible from the powerful headset. More on this can be seen in our previous reporting.

Initially launched in November 2024 on Xbox and PC, with optional PC VR support, and then on Sony's PlayStation 5 as a flat screen experience in December 2025, the game is landing on Sony's VR ecosystem for the first time.

You can hop aboard Microsoft Flight Simulator 2024 on PlayStation 5 and PlayStation VR2 today.

With room for up to six guests at a time, full-body tracking, haptics, wind effects, and an interactive guided story, it taps into the strengths of location-based VR without relying on novelty or overcomplicating the experience.

The Right Mix of Story and Interaction

In an attraction with set timeslots, there is little room for delays in completing it. But often, attractions can feel so on-the-rails that it spoils the illusion of presence. Age of Dinosaurs offers the perfect mix of storytelling and interaction that helps you believe you are a part of the story world. 

A pre-recorded guide hosts the adventure, taking guests back in time aboard a ship that transports them between eras and scenes, while naturally sharing how to make the most of the journey. The pacing never feels rushed. Interactive moments and free-roam exploration give guests time to engage with the world before the narrative progresses. Each scene lasts long enough for memorable experiences like feeding large-scale dinosaurs or rescuing recently hatched babies, and then moves on while the excitement is still high. 

Guests can interact with the environments while using an intuitive multitool. Its functions change from scene to scene and are introduced by the host as the adventure unfolds, so there is little to learn or remember. It simply works when needed, keeping attention on the world rather than the controls. What remains consistent throughout the experience is the ability to capture photos of the world or selfies. Points are awarded for exploring more of what is around you. They reward curiosity, guide attention, and add another reason to stay engaged with each new scene. Good edutainment should feel like discovery, not homework. Here, information is woven into the adventure through the host and through exploration itself. It is also a multiplayer experience, making shared presence another part of the story guests create together.

Why This Adventure Needs a Venue

Some immersive experiences become more compelling when they can take advantage of the unique benefits of a physical space. Age of Dinosaurs is one of them. 

While the story and ship travel moments keep the timed experience moving forward, free-roam movement within each scene preserves the natural feeling of exploring prehistoric worlds rather than being pushed through them or relying on less natural locomotion systems.

Full-body tracking helps the illusion of presence as well. Looking down and seeing your and other players’ feet in another era, watching others react beside you, and moving through the world together creates a stronger sense of being there.

In addition, physical effects push the experience further. The haptic vest adds a sense of physical connection to movement in the world. Controller haptics enhance the feeling of moments like feeding dinosaurs. Wind effects make travel sequences feel more convincing. Small details. Big payoff.

Location-based VR also opens the door to more people who do not yet own an XR headset. Sandbox VR is a global leader that has mastered making its growing lineup of experiences intuitive and enjoyable for first-time VR guests through to VR veterans. The only downside I experienced is that the group pods in the venue I visited did not have ceilings, so noise from guests in the horror experience next door could be heard near the end of my session.

How the Journey Adds Value

The value of immersive experiences is measured by more than what happens when the headset is on. The full customer journey matters, and Sandbox VR benefits from understanding that. From the smooth reservation, check-in, and suiting-up process, through to the private group pods and what happens after the Age of Dinosaurs adventure ends - the overall experience feels premium.

After the session ends, guests are shown a personalized group video recap that is also sent to them alongside each guest’s selfie video. They highlight their unique moments in the prehistoric journey. These custom videos give guests something to revisit later, helping turn a fun outing into a memory that lasts beyond the day itself. They are also highly shareable content for friends’ timelines that clearly conveys the offering. Once shared, they can inspire others to book an adventure of their own and even spark a return visit for another Sandbox VR experience.

Ray-Ban Meta Optics Styles Promise “All-Day Comfort” For Prescriptions

The new Ray-Ban Meta Optics Styles promise “all-day comfort” for prescription wearers, with overextension hinges, interchangeable nose pads, and optician-adjustable temple tips.

UploadVRDavid Heaney

For years I have been preaching the requirement of accommodating visual impairments in VR and smart glasses – the need for technology companies to make sure their offerings can be utilized by the general masses, the majority of the population. As so many of my optically challenged colleagues will attest, the immediate burden of early virtual reality headsets was the complete lack of ability to adjust for your prescription glasses. The Oculus Rift DK1 and DK2 attempted to accommodate with several swappable lenses, but this generalized “one size fits most” solution would never work for someone like me who has such an atypical prescription. This led me to no alternative but to jam an old scratched pair of prescription “Harry Potter” style glasses into whatever headset I was using at the time. 


Eventually, the industry coalesced around a solution: prescription lens inserts as a paid accessory, every one a unique size to fit each headset’s specific lens dimensions. Imagine my horror when my prescription changed after my third set of custom headset lenses. Prescription lens inserts, in my opinion, are only a stop gap until headset manufacturers figure out a better solution, such as tunable lenses.



Then smart glasses entered the ring. Immediately I was excited for the aspect of a lens-first technology. It’s a pair of glasses, so obviously the focus would be on comfort and style rather than prioritizing packing them with bulky tech. Some companies focused on comfort, some focused on style, and some focused on bulk tech. Nobody seems to have gotten the recipe quite right yet.

Meta Ray-Ban Display Prescription Lenses: What You Need To Know

Looking to use Meta Ray-Ban Display as your everyday prescription glasses? Here’s a rundown of what prescriptions it supports, and how that works.

UploadVRDavid Heaney

I was disappointed that the Meta Ray-Ban Display has a limitation in its prescription support, which is handled at manufacturing time to support the waveguide, of +/-4.00. My own prescription is -4.25 in both eyes, so that fun new product just wasn’t for me. I am the poster child of the target audience, and I cannot use them. Bummer.

This month, Meta launched new styles of its displayless Ray-Ban smart glasses that it says are "optimized for prescriptions". That includes overextension hinges that open 10 degrees wider than standard, for less pressure on the side of your head, interchangeable nose pads to suit various nose shapes and sizes, and optician-adjustable temple tips that Meta says "can be shaped to a perfect fit".

I was a proud owner of the Ray-Ban Meta Wayfarers, both Gen 1 and currently Gen 2. My Ray-Ban Meta Blayzers are on their way, and I am looking forward to assessing whether Meta truly is focusing on the right things to capture that over 50% of bespectacled individuals who would love to have a seamless transition from their tried and true prescription glasses to the smart glasses future that Meta is promising. Stay tuned for my review.

Out now on Quest and Steam, Beat Saber's The Prodigy Music Pack brings one of the most recognizable and influential electronic acts to your favorite VR headset. The pack features six tracks defined by high-tempo breakbeats, distorted synths, and heavy percussive drops, including the breakout global hits "Firestarter" and "Breathe" from their 1997 album The Fat of the Land.

The songs can be purchased individually or as a bundle.

Track List

• Breathe
• Firestarter
• Invaders Must Die
• Omen
• Poison
• Spitfire

The Prodigy Music Pack also brings a new The Prodigy Environment to the game, as well as the usual smattering of bug fixes.

The Prodigy Music Pack will not be coming to PlayStation VR headsets. In June of last year, Beat Games announced that it was ending support for both PlayStation VR and PlayStation VR2 headsets, and Beat Saber on PlayStation has not received OST 8, nor any of the recent shock drops. In addition, multiplayer support for the PS VR platform ended in early 2026. Despite this, Beat Saber remained the most downloaded PlayStation VR2 game as recently as March 2026.

Beat Saber: The Prodigy Music Pack is out now on Quest and Steam.

Last week we initially reported that PlayStation VR2 support would be added today, but we were not sure about PC. After confirming that PC VR support was indeed coming, we amended that article.

Steel Wool announced in a blog post today that PS VR2 players can jump in today, while SteamVR will get VR added "like very soon." Additionally, a Quest version is in development and expected sometime in 2026.

The PS VR2 release comes with a list of known bugs that will be patched in the near future. Here's a list of said bugs and features to be added, per Steel Wool:

• A Save State issue with the star in the Moon maze
• Distractable mice are not displaying in the Inventory Station
• Wardrobe hiding places not having the correct view point from inside
• Some ending credits are displayed only for one eye
• Various missing audio cue issues
• Adding teleport as a movement style

Five Nights At Freddy's: Secret of the Mimic is available now in VR on PS VR2.

The original April date was revealed during the VR Games Showcase in March with a new trailer and the promise of improved graphics and character models, more advanced lighting, new weapons, and better combat.

A Long Survive Coming To PlayStation VR2 & PC VR Next Month

Survival shooter A Long Survive is coming to PlayStation VR2 and SteamVR in April, alongside a major update.

UploadVRJames Tocchio

Per developer Friendly Fire Studios, the late-stage delay is due to internal playtesting:

Over the past weeks, we’ve been running internal playtests and reviewing feedback carefully. Based on what we’ve seen, we’ve made the decision to take a few more days to improve key systems and ensure the experience meets the level of quality we want to deliver.

Friendly Fire promised a launch discount on PlayStation and Steam accompanied by a discount code for Quest.

A Long Survive can be wishlisted on PS VR2 and Steam. It is available now on Quest.

Yet I can't help but recognize craftsmanship when I see it, and Extra Dimensional is certainly a well-crafted game that knows exactly what it wants to be. Aside from a handful of shortcomings, it's a mostly successful take on the grim fantasy combat genre.

Developed over four years by Lords of Illusion, a small Italian dev studio, EXD - Extra Dimensional is a narrative-driven fantasy adventure game with physics-based combat and light puzzle elements. You’ll stab, slash, shoot, and solve your way through a story told across approximately 7 hours of play.

EXD's three pillars are its story, combat, and puzzles, and how effective it is at each of these facets is mixed. It doesn’t have the most original or engrossing story, nor is it told with total success, and its combat isn’t the most interesting or engaging, nor are its puzzles the cleverest I’ve ever solved. But EXD ends up being more than the sum of its parts, and much of this comes down to the game’s solid foundations and generally high level of presentation.

The Story

You play as Max Ventura, a middle-aged delivery driver working at the Megazon warehouse, balancing long shifts with being a good dad to your daughter, Julia.

The game opens on a morning like any other. You’re moving packages around the warehouse when a phone call from your daughter is suddenly interrupted by a calamity. Julia’s in trouble, but before you can react, an inter-dimensional portal rips through the fabric of reality and you’re pulled from your normal life into a nightmarish fantasy world of dragons, demons, zombies and monsters.

In this strange dimension, Megazon shipments have miraculously appeared for centuries, giving birth to a religious cult who worship a non-stick frying pan, an umbrella, a sneaker, and other everyday objects as sacred relics. This cult has long been tormented by a genocidal oppressor and sees your sudden arrival as a sign of their salvation. They call you The Chosen One, bestow upon you a sword, an energy drink, and a protein bar, and implore you to save their world. Easy peasy.

While some of the narrative's offbeat details provide some original personality, the story is fundamentally familiar. An unlikely hero is pulled into a grand adventure against their will, and the only way out is forward. By the end, we’ll solve some mysteries and answer some questions, but ultimately, the tall tale is delivered without major innovation or novelty.

While some of the exposition comes through first-person cutscenes, which are fine despite the occasional poor line delivery, much of the lore and background are experienced through written notes scattered throughout the world. Again, this is fine, but nothing new. What's worse, however, is that the story never really goes anywhere. No spoilers here, but if you’re playing EXD for its story, you’ll end up (at least temporarily) unfulfilled.

The Combat

It's a similar story with the game's combat. It's serviceable but rarely thrilling, challenging, or interesting. The physics-based system gives weight to your weapons and there's a massive variety of destructive tools available (swords, daggers, maces, axes, and giant hammers, for example), but using one weapon over another is somewhat meaningless and combat seldom requires any thought or strategy.

Additional tools like telekinesis and casting spells are neat, but you'll quickly realize there's no real need to use them when you have an axe or sword with which to settle every fight.

The crux of the problem is that enemy encounters never really evolve. Most fights, even endgame battles, boil down to an incredibly simple loop: smash or slash enemies until they fall over, then keep hitting them on the ground until they stop getting up. While certain powerful tools make things slightly more interesting (such as the object that slows time, or the elemental casting wands), there's no avoiding the truth that EXD's combat lacks depth.

You spend the final act of the game in part working your way through a gauntlet of enemies, which should feel intense and engaging. Instead, it feels repetitive. I wouldn't go so far as to say that combat feels bad; it's actually quite satisfying to smash a zombie or a dragon, for a little while. It just feels under-developed. Like much of EXD, it feels like we're 80% of the way to a great game.

The Puzzles

Progression in EXD is often tied to environmental interaction, finding hidden switches, activating ancient mechanisms, and solving light puzzles. There are plenty of rewarding discoveries, plus optional areas that hide useful gear, collectibles, or powerful weapons. But the game's puzzles fall short of feeling meaningful.

Many puzzles are just dead simple and there are very few "A-ha!" moments that leave you feeling clever. Instead, they feel more like simple chores you must perform to get to the next hallway or dungeon. Use your fire ability to shoot the button marked with a fire emblem, for example, or press a button before a spike trap skewers you, or use your telekinesis to move a stone or switch this way or that. The overall simplicity of the game's puzzling moments doesn't ruin the experience of playing EXD, but they don't really elevate it either.

The only memorable puzzle, really, occurred in the final act. The game funnels you into a sort of subterranean central hub where you reroute power through conduits to unlock new sections and activate machinery. But by the standards of something like a Zelda game, even this, the most complicated puzzle in the game, is rudimentary.

The Horror

There were many moments during my playthrough of EXD that I made a mental note to ask my colleagues at Upload why they keep asking me to review spooky games. Because it's scary. And this is the aspect of the game that is surely most effective.

The atmosphere is extremely oppressive, the dungeons dark and foreboding. Even in moments of relative calm, even in places where nothing is happening, it's a deeply uncomfortable place to be. Places like the catacombs are claustrophobic, filled with fog and flickering candles emitting just enough light to let your imagination run wild. The prison area, with the distant and unrelenting screams of the tormented captives, left me legitimately unsettled.

The enemies are universally repulsive, too. Gooey, crunchy, and dripping with filth, they lurch at you from the shadows with grotesque snarls and glowing eyes. Everyone looks wet in the worst possible way.

And then there are the spiders. So hard does the game lean into these multi-legged menaces that there's an arachnophobia warning at the outset. Indeed, a couple of set pieces starring the arachnids led to genuine distress, a testament to the effectiveness of EXD's dev team, and the power of VR.

EXD - Extra Dimensional: Final Verdict

Though EXD - Extra Dimensional is a truly stunning showcase for VR graphics, and an amazing auditory experience in dread and fear, it's also a game that doesn't quite reach its full potential. The combat is fun but shallow, the puzzles are functional but far from inspired, and the story shows glimmers of greatness but ends up feeling incomplete. Nearly every major aspect of the game feels like it's sitting at 80% completion.

And yet it works. EXD - Extra Dimensional is one of the most unique, engaging, and captivating games I've played this year in VR or not. The atmosphere is strong, the world is memorable, the voice acting, though stilted at times, is incredibly charming. It's a visual and audible feast for the senses, even if the meal leaves you feeling shaky, scared, and hungry for more.

UploadVR uses a 5-Star rating system for our game reviews – you can read a breakdown of each star rating in our review guidelines.

With its exit from Early Access, ports for PlayStation VR2 and Meta Quest, and the Dawn of History DLC, Legendary Tales has had a busy couple of years. Urban Wolf Games said in a recent developer post that it has realized most of the ideas initially planned for the game when it was still in Early Access.

Now the team is looking to the future with a tentative roadmap charting out future content. You can see the roadmap image here:

A sandbox mode has been a highly requested update from the game's fans, but Urban Wolf has always resisted, stating that its "desire to create a deep game felt at odds with the sandbox genre." The path is now clear for a sandbox mode since the main campaign and features of the game have already been completed. Sandbox is currently expected to enter beta this summer with a full release in the fall.

Regarding a friendly fire feature, Urban Wolf said this:

The goal is to create more entertaining and unpredictable situations during co-op play. While we expect some players might use this for PvP, I want to be clear: this is not being developed as a dedicated PvP feature. 

Friendly fire is expected to release this summer.

Additionally, Urban Wolf is currently mulling adding mod support, a roguelite DLC add-on, and a boss rush mode if they are deemed 'feasible.'

Possible mod support will only be pursued as a minimal single player feature to start. The game was not built with mod support in mind and retrofitting it to do so will be "time-consuming and may even prove impossible."

A roguelite mode has been in the research and development stage for six months, claims Urban Wolf. The initial plan was to offer this as a free update, but the complexity in development may necessitate it being a paid expansion. If a roguelite mode moves forward, expect it in late 2026 or early 2027.

Finally, the boss rush mode is also eyed as a free update, but resource workload may move it to being a part of the possible roguelite DLC.

Legendary Tales is out now on PlayStation VR2, Steam, and Meta Quest.

This is Walkabout's third DLC course in 2026 after Tiki à Coco in January and Passport Hollywood in March. We will have a full course tour of Blokhaven and interviews with Mighty Coconut developers detailing how the course was built next week.

Mighty Coconut CEO Lucas Martell recently told us that the team already has all of its 2026 and 2027 courses planned and is already planning for 2028.

How Lucas Martell Brings Hollywood Production & Storytelling To Walkabout Mini Golf

We sat down with Lucas Martell from Mighty Coconut at GDC 2026 to talk about bringing Hollywood principles to the design of Walkabout Mini Golf.

UploadVRMike Johnson

Despite recent layoffs, the team looks poised to continue adding content to Walkabout for years to come.

Walkabout Mini Golf is available on Steam, PSVR2, Quest, Pico, Samsung Galaxy XR, and Apple App Store. The game is also available as part of Meta's Horizon+ subscription service.

This roughly one-hour location-based immersive experience combines memorable pre- and post-show elements with a free-roam VR journey through a stylized life-sized version of the International Space Station. There, visitors can explore inside and outside the ISS and step into real 360-degree moments with astronauts working and living in space. These real immersive moments captured aboard the ISS come from The Space Explorers series, created and produced by Felix & Paul Studios in collaboration with TIME Studios, and currently available for Meta Quest. The out-of-home experience of Space Explorers: The Infinite makes these real captures of astronauts' life in space accessible to a wider audience. Over half a million guests have visited so far as it pops up in different cities. I recently tried the experience in Mississauga, Ontario, and it is also currently running in Atlanta, Georgia.

There was a moment I experienced while virtually exploring the ISS that stopped me in my tracks and became my favorite moment in Space Explorers: The Infinite. In a station module directly ahead of me, I noticed a family gathered around something. I could tell they were a family because their avatars appeared as life-sized human forms made of stars - two adults and a child. Together, they were visiting a live capture inside the ISS from the recent past where NASA astronauts were present with them, sharing what life is like roughly 250 miles from Earth.

Designed For Memorable Moments

What stood out most for me was how naturally the experience creates a connection with life on the ISS while also bringing people together. If you are visiting on your own, the experience does not feel overcrowded. Other guests appear as distant lights from afar, then as star-filled avatar outlines only when you get close in order to avoid walking into each other. If you are visiting as part of a group, your avatars appear in gold for each other while other guests appear in blue, making it easier to recognize one another in the station. That design choice matters because Space Explorers: The Infinite is not just an opportunity to view space. It creates opportunities for real memorable moments in a place most people will never experience firsthand.

The full experience feels thoughtfully designed for all visitors, including those new to VR. Before entering full immersion, guests move through a short pre-show area with elements like astronaut bios and one of Felix & Paul Studios’ cameras used in space. This is followed by an audiovisual installation where the immersive audio introduces the experience as “a tribute to light and space and a thirst for knowledge that drives all of humanity.” After the main VR experience, it closes with looping video footage from Artemis I, the first mission in NASA’s Artemis program. This expands the story beyond life aboard the ISS and inspires guests to engage more with space exploration.

Transitions between the headset-free spaces and VR portion are smooth, without logistical interruptions distracting from the sense of being on a journey. Even getting tracked headsets onto guests was the fastest I have seen in any location-based VR experience to date. My one exception to that flow was the instructional onboarding video, which felt better suited before the short Lightroom narrative.

Once inside VR, the artistic rendition of the ISS is easy and natural to move through at your own pace, whether walking or in a wheelchair like one guest in my group. From selecting orbs that transport visitors into real 360-degree moments captured aboard the ISS to moving between modules or even outside the station, the interactions feel intuitive and the design empowers natural exploration.

Real Footage & Physical Exploration

Space Explorers: The Infinite integrates segments from the Adapt, Advance, Unite, and Expand episodes into its free-roam ISS layer, letting visitors explore the station and step into real 360-degree moments with astronauts. The VR component unfolds across these chapters covering life in orbit, deep space exploration, and shared human progress.

What makes it especially memorable is how the video captures feel more real because of their proximity to where you place yourself on the ISS, both inside and outside the station. You can learn about life on the ISS, float outside to find the Canadarm, or even encounter a real spacewalk unfolding in front of you. Because you choose where to go next, those moments can feel more like personal discoveries than something passively delivered to you. You can choose to pop into moments with astronauts and simply enjoy the virtual station. As I overheard one child passing me by say to someone during my visit, “Let’s keep exploring the ship”, referring to the ISS.

Interaction is mostly driven by physical movement and content selection. Outside of a few objects you can engage with, like buttons that trigger audio clips or some floating items to play with, I would have liked to see more hands-on moments aboard the ISS to deepen the sense of presence already created here. Still, there is already more to see than most visitors will have time for in one visit.

Lots To See With Limited Guidance

The real footage in the Space Explorers series adds up to roughly a couple hours, making it impossible to see every segment placed in and around the ISS during a timed visit. That also inspires rapid exploration and creates opportunities for groups to compare moments afterward, since friends or family may have seen and learned different things. But while interested guests can return for a new visit to try to see it all, there is no easy way to remember which orbs they previously selected as they all appear the same. They would need to remember which orb they chose, in which module, during which chapter.

I appreciate the ethereal look of the orbs, which fits the overall design of the ISS, but I would have liked visual cues such as icons or floating images pulled from the footage to hint at what was inside and help guide my next choice.

Once viewed, the orbs disappear, which helps avoid repeated selections during the same visit and usher along the learning. But it also means you cannot revisit a moment even if you want to.

With so much to discover, Space Explorers: The Infinite offers more than a visit to the ISS. It can leave visitors with a deeper appreciation for space exploration, our shared Earth, and what humanity can achieve together.

The game first released in August 2017 for Steam and PlayStation VR. A Quest port followed in September 2021. It is currently on sale on Steam and Humble Bundle, with sales on its other platforms to follow soon.

While VRWERX originally planned to add more content to the game, it says it could not financially afford to do so, saying the following in the post on X:

We always wished we had the budget and runway to continue expanding the game with new updates and content. But without the license and the financial support required to sustain it long-term, this chapter has to close.

We have seen similar situations before with games like Tarzan VR also being delisted while other titles like The Twilight Zone VR and The Exorcist: Legion VR simply changed their names after their respective licenses expired.

Paranormal Activity is available (for now) on Steam, Meta Quest, and PS VR1.

Pluto TV is a FAST service, meaning Free Ad Supported Television. It offers a wide range of live and on-demand content in exchange for ads. Pluto previously had a 2D app on Quest, originally released in late 2022, which has since been deprecated. You can still access Pluto through the Quest browser.

What’s interesting is that this immersive version isn’t brand new. It first appeared in beta back in 2022 and only reached full release in November 2025. That gives it a longer runway than most VR media apps, and it shows in the design.

After a short tutorial, you’re dropped into a series of fully built environments. The art style leans colorful with a light sci-fi feel. There’s a beach setting on Earth, several spaces on what the app calls “Pluto TV Planet,” and a handful of environments themed around the SS Charon, named for one of the planet Pluto's moons. There’s also a completely black “void” environment if you just want to focus on the screen.

Some of these spaces are surprisingly large, with a real sense of scale. Others are tighter and more enclosed, closer to a personal media room. Across the board, they’re well done. Not just as backdrops, but as places you can actually sit in for a while.

The control design shows a similar level of thought.

Tapping the left controller button brings up a floating menu that arrives on small hovering “drone” elements in front of you. From there, you can browse channels using a standard 2D list or switch to a 3D globe-style interface.

The globe looks cool and fits the theme, but I didn’t spend much time with it. It’s more crowded and harder to move through quickly. I kept going back to the 2D list because it’s just easier. Still, I’d rather see them try something like that than play it safe.

One of the more subtle features ended up being one of my favorites. In indoor environments, you can dim or fully turn off the lights. Once you do, the space fades back and the screen becomes the focus. It starts to feel less like testing something and more like actually sitting down to watch.

Screen control is another area where they got it right.

You can grab the screen off the wall, pull it toward you, and adjust size and distance with the thumb stick. It’s quick and precise, and it doesn’t take long to dial it in exactly how you want it. When you’re done, you just place it back on the wall surface.

The Space Feels More Considered Than The Content

Spending more time in the app, the contrast between the environments and the content becomes hard to ignore.

The spaces feel intentional. Some are built like large social theaters, with rows of seating and wide layouts that clearly point everyone toward the screen. Others are more intimate. Across all of them, the design holds up. These are spaces you can spend time in.

But they also raise a question: Who are these spaces actually for?

A number of them feel like they’re meant to be shared. Rows of seats, open layouts, the kind of setup you’d expect other people to be in. And yet every time I used the app, I was alone.

Sitting in a large virtual theater with dozens of empty seats starts to feel a little strange after a while. It almost feels like the room is waiting for people who never show up. It even made me miss the kind of shared viewing you get in Bigscreen.

What makes that stand out more is that earlier versions of this app did experiment with social viewing. During its beta period, there were signs that shared experiences were part of the plan. In the current release, that layer is gone.

So these environments end up in an odd place. They still feel like shared spaces, but function as single-user ones, with no way to bring anyone else in.

At the same time, the content itself doesn’t change.

No matter which environment you pick, you’re still watching standard 2D streams. A live tennis match plays inside a massive theater. A sitcom runs against a sci-fi backdrop. The space changes. The lighting changes. The scale changes. The content doesn’t.

That creates a disconnect. The environments add something to it. I just don’t think the content has caught up yet.

Is Immersion Actually The Point?

This is where the Pluto TV Immersive app gets more interesting. It doesn’t really settle what TV in VR is supposed to be. If anything, it shows how open that question still is.

Pluto TV is built around browsing. You jump in, see what’s available, and move around until something catches your attention.

VR isn’t quite like that.

Even in its most relaxed form, putting on a headset is still a decision. You’re stepping into a space and tuning out what’s around you, at least for a while.

The app does a lot to make that feel comfortable. Adjustable screens, easy repositioning, lighting controls that let the environment fall away when you want it to.

But it doesn’t fully bridge that gap. At times, the space stands out more than what you’re watching.

There’s Still Something Here That Works

For all of that, I do enjoy spending time in these environments.

I’m a sucker for sci-fi spaces, and Pluto leans into that in a way that works. The lighting, the scale, the overall feel. It’s easy to settle in, especially once the lights are down and the screen becomes the focus.

There’s real care here. These environments don’t feel like an afterthought.

And in the right moments, it clicks.

More importantly, I keep coming back to it. When I want to put something on, zone out for a bit, and just sit in a different kind of space, this is one of the apps I open. Even without the social layer, it works surprisingly well as a solo viewing experience.

One thing that would help is a better bridge back to the real world. A simple mixed reality portal where you can check your phone or glance at your surroundings without leaving the space entirely. Right now it’s all or nothing.

Where This Actually Lands

There’s something here worth paying attention to.

The interaction model is solid. The environments are well designed. The lighting controls and screen handling are better than most apps in this category.

But it still feels like an incomplete version of a bigger idea.

This has been in development for a while, and that makes the missing pieces stand out more. The absence of social viewing, especially after it was explored during beta, leaves a noticeable gap.

Right now, Pluto TV Immersive places familiar TV inside spaces that often do more of the work than the content itself. What it hasn’t fully figured out yet is whether those spaces meaningfully change the experience, or how people actually want to use it.

For now, it sits somewhere in between, more engaging than watching on a 2D panel, and often a genuinely enjoyable place to spend time, even if it doesn’t fully change how or why you watch. And if they do eventually add a social component, you will likely find me there.

The Pluto TV Immersive app is available for free on the Meta Quest store and supports Quest 2, Quest Pro, and Quest 3/3s.