Initially, it had just one: toggling passthrough. Pressing it conveniently switches between an immersive view for VR gaming and a paused passthrough mode where you can see your actual room. Still, more customization is always welcome, and since v85 PTC, Meta has been rolling out the ability to choose between 5 options:

• Passthrough (the default)
• Meta AI
• Capture picture
• Capture video
• Mute microphone

I can also pick an action for long presses, doubling up the usefulness.

Quest 3 v85 PTC Can Turn Any Surface Into A Virtual Keyboard

With Horizon OS v85 PTC, Quest 3 can turn any surface into a virtual keyboard and touchpad, and Meta says you can remap the Quest 3S action button.

UploadVRDavid Heaney

Since I’ve been using Quest 3 for years, I’m used to double-tapping the side to enter passthrough, and that muscle memory often overrides the action button. By the time I remember it, I’ve already switched the outside camera view. That’s why this action button customization makes it much more powerful. I can use it for other purposes.

Quicker Captures

When I set the action button to Capture picture, I can quickly snap a well-timed screenshot while using hand-tracking. The awkward combination of the Meta button and trigger failed me often, but the action button works reliably every time.

The same is true for screen recording. I set the action button’s Long press to Capture video, so I don’t have to deal with a finicky button combination or navigate menus to start recording.

Meta AI On Tap

The default way to activate Meta AI, other than awkwardly saying "Hey Meta", is by holding the Meta button and squeezing the grip button on your right controller. That works but feels slow. Maybe that’s why I use Meta AI with my Ray-Ban Meta Smart Glasses, but I rarely do so in VR. Still, it’s nice to have the option.

If you do use Meta AI in your Quest 3S, it’s just a tap away if you select Meta AI in action button settings. A single press speeds up activation so you can prompt and get an answer faster. Meta AI’s arrival on Quest already hinted at how much more central voice interaction could become in Horizon OS, and this makes it feel a bit more practical.

Meta AI Is Coming To Quest Headsets In The US & Canada

Meta AI is coming to Quest headsets in the US & Canada in August, and it can answer questions about what you’re looking at on Quest 3.

UploadVRDavid Heaney

Cut The Chatter

If you’ve ever been startled to find your mic is active in a shared space, you might want to set your action button to Mute microphone. It’s nice to click to silence a cough or cut background sounds bleeding in from real life.

Waiting For Roll Out

My Quest 3S is on the Public Test Channel (PTC) and I’m on v2.1, but I just received the action button customization setting that was described in v85 PTC. As is typical with Meta, it could take months before action button customization rolls out to you, or it could arrive tomorrow.

This feels like a great addition to the platform, so I hope it goes live for all Quest 3S owners soon. The action button is found only on the Quest 3S, so you’ll need to rely on the older screen capture, Meta AI, and mic controls if you own a Quest 3 or older models.

As a concept, Space Control is instantly intriguing: a part-game, part-animated series inspired by the irreverent tone of Rick and Morty and Futurama. On paper, that sounds like a fantastic fit for VR. A comedic space adventure where you can physically interact with the world around you while a story unfolds has all the ingredients for something genuinely fresh.

Unfortunately, while the premise is good, the actual delivery falls well short of its potential.

Welcome to Glorpo

Space Control is structured like an interactive cartoon series. The 'game' includes three episodes, each roughly an hour long, that follow a ragtag crew of interstellar oddballs as they work off their debt to a sinister corporation called Glorpo Inc.

The setup is preposterous enough to work. You play an unnamed human (referred to as “Newbie”) who has been inadvertently abducted by Glorpo as part of a shady debt collection scheme, in which indebted aliens are forcibly recruited into indentured service. Despite being harvested from a planet designated as “just for laughs”, Glorpo’s strict no-refund policy means that like it or not, you’re stuck.

It’s a funny enough hook and one that immediately sets the tone for the game’s blend of sci-fi absurdity and workplace satire. You’re quickly assigned to Crew 68, a group of lovable weirdos that includes Melody, the highly strung team leader; Zorgle, a giant softie with more heart than brains; and Widget, a wisecracking engineer-slug who easily emerges as the standout personality of the bunch.

As a setup for an episodic comedy, it’s a reasonable start.

In Space, No One Can Hear You Fart

The story begins in your crew quarters, where you spend time getting to know your new teammates while the game establishes its world and tone. From this point on you’re free to roam around and fiddle with the various novelty gadgets scattered throughout the various game environments.

At first, this is encouraging. There’s enough charm in the setting and enough visual gags in the environments to make poking around the area mildly entertaining. The problem is that there simply isn’t much meaningful interaction to be had. Most objects can be picked up, squeezed, whacked or moved around, but little else.

That quickly becomes a problem because Space Control asks you to spend a lot of time simply standing around while dialogue unfolds. If you happen to gel with the writing, that may be enough. But if you don’t (and I largely didn’t) then the game’s long passive stretches start to feel sluggish very quickly.

The writing clearly wants to channel the chaotic energy of Rick and Morty and Futurama, but it rarely lands with the same wit or nuance. Instead, much of the humor feels crass and oddly juvenile, despite (or perhaps because of) the adult content and language, with a surprising number of jokes revolving around bodily functions. Basically, be warned: there will be butts.

That creates a strange tonal mismatch. The writing is too infantile to consistently entertain adults, but too adult to recommend to younger players. By the time the credits rolled, I was left with one overriding question: who exactly is this game for?

Working Hard? Hardly Working...

Once the introductory setup is complete, Space Control splits into three episodes, each built around a different job or scenario for Crew 68. These range from abducting new recruits to the Glorpo empire to operating an intergalactic daycare center, right through to concocting bizarre gaseous enhancements for performers at a Eurovision-inspired song contest.

Again, on paper, this all sounds great; whacky, irreverent premises that should allow for mad-cap adventures and amusing interactions.

The issue is that the gameplay underpinning these scenarios is extremely shallow. The trailers suggest something closer to a chaotic time-management game; fast-paced multitasking with over-the-top humor layered… over the top. In reality, what you get is a series of very basic, Job Simulator-lite interactions with no time pressure, no fail state and no meaningful sense of challenge.

You are essentially just repeating simple actions to trigger the next story beat.

Take the first episode as an example. You’re tasked with retrieving new recruits using a claw machine-style grabber, dragging them around a processing station where you shave them, stamp them, and make sure their more sensitive areas are appropriately... investigated.

There’s an absurdity to the setup that should be funny. But the actual flow goes something like this: a few minutes of dialogue plays out, a control panel unlocks, you complete one simple task, another minute of dialogue follows until another task unlocks.

That rhythm, as well as the tasks that you perform in between dialogue, then repeats for about 20 minutes.

The result is that the interactive elements never feel meaningfully integrated into the experience. They don’t create tension, they don’t encourage experimentation, and they don’t really add much beyond giving your hands something to do while waiting for the next punchline.

More disappointing still, your actions have no bearing whatsoever on the story. There’s no room for creativity, alternative approaches or consequences based on how well you perform. The game simply pauses progression until you do the exact thing it wants you to do. That makes the whole experience feel oddly static and interactive only in the loosest possible sense.

This is perhaps Space Control’s biggest missed opportunity. Had these sequences been truly gamified - with real fail conditions, time pressure, or branching outcomes based on performance - there’s every chance this could have been a genuinely entertaining hybrid of narrative comedy and VR time management. The characters are engaging enough and the potential for pithy dialogue as you foul up a task under pressure would have been immense. Instead, the gameplay rarely rises above being vaguely functional.

That said, not everything falls flat. The final interactive segment, in which you [SPOILER] was a surprising amount of fun. It was the one point in the game where the interaction actually felt naturally tied to the scenario, and it was easily the highlight of the entire experience.

Don't Quit Your Day Job

Visually, Space Control gets the job done without ever truly impressing.

The universe has a coherent visual identity, and there’s a certain charm to inhabiting what feels like an episode of an animated sci-fi show; artistically something that sits in the broad orbit of Final Space. There is also a decent physics system in place. Being able to mess around with objects while dialogue unfolds helps inject some mild engagement into otherwise passive scenes.

Still, the game feels rough around the edges. There are small but noticeable technical blemishes, from clipping assets to awkward model interactions. These aren’t game-breaking, but in a game that is essentially an interactive animation, one would hope that the focus on the animation itself would have been a little better.

The sound design is perfectly serviceable. The voice cast actually do a commendable job with the material they’ve been given. For the most part they hit the tonal balance that an ensemble ‘show’ like this needs to hit, and the actors play off each other well enough within the limitations of the script. This is somewhat of a relief given how much weight their performances bear on the success of the experience.

Final Verdict

Space Control is an underwhelming experience, not least because the seeds of a genuinely cool VR concept are clearly there. The premise is decent, the setup works well enough and the idea of blending episodic animated storytelling with interactive VR gameplay feels like something that absolutely should work.

As a narrative comedy the writing lacks the sharpness and consistency needed to sustain so much passive listening, and as a game, the interactive elements are too limited and too consequence-free to feel genuinely engaging. Unfortunately, Space Control never fully commits to either side of that equation, and as a result fails to deliver on either.

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

I have to start with the movement because that was my primary issue when I played The Amusement's demo during February 2026's Steam Next Fest. I played in a very large open room with more space than I needed for the game, and it wasn't until I watched developer Curvature Games' excellent developer video that I realized that I created my own issue. The Amusement is meant to be played in a relatively small space. Curvature Games' redirected roomscale style, once understood, is the optimal way to play the game for maximum immersion and presence.

The final release adds (slow) smooth turn and stick-based locomotion options that seasoned VR gamers will welcome. After finishing the game, I went back and played two chapters again with stick-based movement and teleport separately. Both lose some of the game's charm and luster, though admittedly, they do allow for seated play, so points for accessibility and player choice.

The Amusement stars Samantha, a young woman dispatched by her mother to her late father's amusement park in the 1920s. Samantha is tasked with inspecting the abandoned park's attractions in preparation to sell it off.

The Amusement's story is told via hand-drawn stop-motion interludes between chapters and intermittent conversations, including a younger Samantha, her parents, and some of her father's coworkers, depicted by marionette-like shadow puppets throughout the park. These scenes never overstay their welcome thanks to strong voice acting and a concise, snappy pace.

The Amusement's story is its strongest element and arguably the selling point for the game. You can feel the uneasy tension between Samantha and her mother in all of their conversations, a relationship clearly strained by grief from the absence of their father/husband. This game also takes place post-World War I, with references throughout that history buffs will appreciate. VR storytelling can sometimes be perfunctory at best, only serving to get the characters from one stretch of action to the next with shallow or impersonal characterization. Curvature Games tells a moving family story with confidence in a way that works for VR.

The story is strong enough to carry the game to the finish line as the puzzle elements start to run out of steam. By the game's midway point, you will have been introduced to every tool, traversal method, and environmental interaction available. The backend simply repackages all of these in different scenarios.

These are not complicated mechanics either. Figure out a way to return power to a dead control panel, deploy ladders (with a creatively used yo-yo), maneuver across chasms using wooden platforms, elevators, and a fun grappling gun. Everything is grounded in real-world interactions that pair nicely with the redirected roomscale movement. There's just not enough of them.

I finished The Amusement in three hours, and the back half of the game, when I knew what metaphorical signs to look for, went much faster than the front half. There's a lot more hand-over-hand midair movement in the second half, which can border on tedious depending on how quickly you figure out what needs to be done. Compared to other recent puzzle games like Fixer Undercover and Ghost Town that continually change things up all the way to the end, The Amusement comes up short on variety.

Hans, Samantha's father, is omnipresent throughout the game as a voice offering navigational guidance and filling in the blanks after story points that Samantha was too young at the time to understand. Hans also serves as the game's hint system and this is one of the issues with the game. He often gives a clue less than a minute after approaching a new obstacle, totally unsolicited. Hint systems in puzzle games are fine, even welcome, but the player should choose if they want a hint or not. It comes off like unnecessary hand-holding.

Visually, at least on PC (I have not played the Quest version yet), The Amusement gets the job done with sharp visuals and a general look of grimy rust and decay that befits an abandoned park. It does show clear signs of concessions for a standalone port that holds it back visually, but just barely. The sound design is strong. Every creaky turn of a rusty wheel or groan from an elevator that hasn't been used in ages resonates. I do wish the game made more effective use of controller haptics, particularly during the climbing and pulling mechanics.

The Amusement Review: Final Verdict

The Amusement's affecting story about a broken family is some of the finest storytelling I've experienced in a VR game. The redirected roomscale movement, once properly understood and embraced, adds a sense of immersion and presence few other games can match. Unfortunately, even with a short runtime, its limited number of environmental puzzle mechanics hold it back from being truly exceptional. It still remains an excellent entry into any VR puzzle lover's library.

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

Lucent VR looks amazing on Quest 3, and it's instantly become my personal showcase for the heights that standalone VR graphics can reach.

In Lucent VR, you explore seven scenes, interact with your environment, and enjoy the sights and sounds of these wonderfully crafted virtual spaces. When you begin, only one scene is available, but hidden artifacts found scattered throughout the experience gradually unlock the rest.

There's an island, grassland, a snowy vista, a rainy house, a crackling mountainside campfire under a gorgeous night sky, an undersea area, and an interplanetary romp upon one of Saturn's moons, and each of these scenes is beautiful in its own way.

From a technical perspective, the game is exceptional, presenting some of the best graphics that I've seen in a Quest experience. The water physics are phenomenal, the lighting exceptional, the overall fidelity fairly awe-inspiring, especially considering we're playing on standalone VR.

But artful design is not just about technical performance or visuals. It's about creating an environment that speaks to something deeper. Lucent VR brings that too, for example, when in the campfire scene we're visited by an unexpected guest, or when a gargantuan whale appears from out of the blue in the underwater zone. These fun or awesome moments are worth experiencing (without spoilers).

Lucent VR's less grand moments are thoughtfully designed, too. There's something surreal about the environments, and something lovely, too, about wiping the steam from a window, and peering through the mist to the rainy mountain valley below, and watching the clouds drift and reshape themselves endlessly, and the way that water droplets bead off your goggles when you emerge from the sea into the sunshine.

These artful touches coalesce around Lucent VR's broader audio design. Consisting mostly of relaxing ambient noises of rustling plants, ebbing tides, and gentle breezes, the game's soundscape puts you in a slow-down state of mind. There's the realistic sound of water filtering into your ears as you descend beneath the surface, and the muffled echo of submerged eardrums, and the crunch of snow beneath your boots, and the patter of rain on window panes.

Not all of Lucent VR's scenes are perfect. Some aren't as interactive, or as vast, while some are inherently less impressive than others. It's hard for a cozy house to feel as epic as bouncing around on a moon in space, after all. And while I personally adore the relaxing vibe, simply existing and enjoying the sights and sounds of a cool technical showcase, some players might become bored pretty quickly. At a leisurely pace, you'll run through the currently offered seven scenes in about two hours.

And though I've called Lucent VR a game several times in this writing, Lucent VR is not really a game in the usual sense. It's something else. I can appreciate it for what it is, but maybe you can't. Neither perspective is right or wrong.

What I do know is that I keep returning to Lucent VR's windswept grassland, an experience that feels as striking to me as ThatGameCompany's Flower did when I first played it on PlayStation 3 back in 2009. And while Lucent VR is even less a traditional game than the unconventional Flower, it's no less impactful.

Wherever people talk about games as art, they almost always mention Flower. I get the feeling that those of us who "play" Lucent VR will still be talking about it years from now.

Lucent VR is now available on Quest 3 headsets via the Meta Horizon Store.

After the Steam release date for Echoes of Mora was changed on April 9 from 'April 29' to 'Q3 2026,' Selkies posted a clarifying statement in its Discord.

We've adjusted the release date on Steam because we're currently in discussions with publishers. This is incredibly exciting for us as you can imagine with our debut title. When you release a game on Steam, you have a small window of time to make updates to release dates, so given the potential outcome of talks with publishers, we decided to get ahead of it and adjust now. If we do decide to move forward with a publisher, it would give us some extra runway to really polish the game further before we set a new launch date.

We played the demo for Echoes of Mora last year, saying "the approachability doesn’t take away from the sense of achievement, especially as the reward of precious lore adds to the process. However, those looking for a testing, enigma-filled VR experience... might not be satisfied here."

Echoes of Mora Hands On: Approachable Underwater Puzzler With An Emotional Heart

Echoes of Mora sees you solve a mythical missing persons case in a dreamy aquatic puzzler.

UploadVRSarah Thwaites

Echoes of Mora can be wishlisted now on Steam. The VR-supported demo is still available to play.

"Vibe coding", if you're unaware, refers to building an application by conversing with an AI that generates the code for you, rather than writing the code yourself.

While Gemini can already tackle this out of the box, the XR Blocks Gem – Google's name for extensions that give Gemini custom instructions and resources to better suit specific tasks – provides the AI with context about how to use the company's XR Blocks WebXR SDK, including code examples in the context window for it to learn from.

After providing it with a text prompt detailing what kind of experience you want, in less than 60 seconds, after performing its reasoning step, Gemini will produce the necessary HTML, CSS, and JavaScript, populating it into the Canvas feature, a view that appears beside the chat thread and gets updated as you request changes.

The generated WebXR experiences can include a user interface, hand interactions, and physics, with Google claiming that Gemini itself is "physics-aware". Google calls the entire workflow "Vibe Coding XR".

Because XR Blocks has a built-in flatscreen desktop simulator feature, complete with a virtual home environment to substitute for passthrough. If you preview your generation on a PC web browser, you can use the WASD keys and your mouse in three modes: User Mode, Navigation Mode, and Hands Mode. It's a rather complex way to map the limited inputs of flatscreen mouse and keyboard to the high-bandwidth input dynamic inherent to XR, but useful for testing without needing to be in a headset.

How "Vibe Coding XR" is really meant to be used, though, is in a headset. Google, naturally, recommends the Samsung Galaxy XR, but I found it works just as well in a Meta Quest 3 or Apple Vision Pro. In your headset's web browser, you can instantly launch into the created WebXR experience with no need to compile anything. It's the lowest friction path for building and developing truly custom interactive XR experiences yet, letting people with little or no coding experience build them in seconds.

Of course, from your headset's web browser, typing isn't exactly convenient by default. Vibe coding with the floating virtual keyboard would be a pain. Instead, make sure to connect a Bluetooth keyboard, Quest 3's Surface Keyboard feature, or speech-to-text.

Here are some examples Google provided of what's possible with some example prompts. You can click the name of each to bring up a hosted demo.

An important note is that the quality of the WebXR result, and how long it takes, will depend on which model you select, and therefore whether or not you have a paid Gemini subscription.

In Gemini, as of the time of writing, there are three 'modes' available to select from the dropdown: Fast, Thinking, and Pro. Fast uses Gemini 3 Flash with reasoning set to 'Minimal', Thinking uses it with a higher reasoning budget, and Pro, as you might expect, uses the vastly more intelligent Gemini 3.1 Pro. Google recommends only using Pro for Vibe Coding XR, stating that it produces an error-free result around 95% of the time, compared to around 87% for Thinking. How many Thinking and Pro requests you can use depends on your Google AI plan, so you'll need to subscribe to get the best results.

You can try out Google's XR Blocks Gem in Gemini here. For the best experience, do so inside a headset.

Exoshock has been one of the most hotly anticipated VR shooters on my radar for quite some time. Originally announced back in March 2025, PolarityOne’s sci-fi shooter immediately caught my attention thanks to its intense first-person combat, visceral visual effects and an intensity that felt unlike much of what was being shown in VR at the time.

Those early trailers had a kinetic energy that was hard to ignore. Camera shake, heavy weapon feedback and chaotic firefights all suggested something that could finally scratch that elusive big-budget sci-fi shooter itch many VR players have been craving.

In late 2025, PolarityOne made the decision to delay Exoshock beyond its originally planned Fall 2025 launch. That delay not only gives the developers room to work on the core VR experience, but to focus on the game's flat screen version as well. Far from being a last minute pivot amidst the uncertainty of the current market, the developers had planned for a hybrid game all along.

Nicholas Bechen, Lead Developer (one of the two developers that make up PolarityOne) says "From the beginning, the goal was to build an intense, satisfying cooperative shooter that could work in both VR and flatscreen, while helping bridge the gap between those player bases through cross-play. Very few games have seriously attempted that, and even fewer have designed around both formats from the start."

Pushing Forward

Following a successful open testing period, PolarityOne have announced a new way to access the game during the final stages of development. Dubbed ‘The Founders Edition’, players can now purchase access to the development version of Exoshock at the ‘lowest price it will ever be’.

At $12.99, the Founders Edition essentially functions as a kind of ‘early early access’ for players eager to jump in before the Early Access launch later this year. Buying-in grants access to every build released between now and launch, while also guaranteeing ownership of the game on your chosen platform once it officially enters Early Access.

For players who like to follow a game’s development and see systems evolve in real time, it’s a compelling proposition.

That said, it’s worth being clear about what is and isn’t currently present. Right now, the Founders Edition offers a complete and engaging set of mechanics but is still missing some key elements that bring these together into a finished gameplay loop. PolarityOne are upfront about this, though.

Access to a new map, a new objective type, co-op multiplayer and a progression system are already on the roadmap, set to be implemented first in the Founders Edition before arriving in the broader Early Access release.

Contact!

At its core, Exoshock is a visceral first-person sci-fi shooter built around tactical mercenary-style missions. When it launches into Early Access, the full experience is set to revolve around four-player co-op missions fueled by tactical decision making and intense combat. Missions are available in a range of difficulty options, and these options make a world of difference in how the scenario will play out.

Once selected from a job board in a central hub world, players will deploy into a variety of industrial-looking sci-fi environments with objectives that range from assassinating key targets and stealing access cards to sabotaging systems and extracting defectors.

The setup feels smart. Rather than simply throwing players into wave-based firefights, Exoshock appears to be aiming for something with a little more structure and tension. Before each mission, players choose their loadout from four item slots and three weapon slots, covering a main weapon, sidearm and special weapon. Even in the current build, that level of choice already adds a welcome tactical edge.

Good Bones

The strongest thing I can say about Exoshock right now is that the core mechanics already feel fantastic.

Gunplay is excellent. Every weapon I used felt satisfying, punchy and weighty in the hand. There’s a real sense of impact to firefights, with every encounter carrying an intensity that made me want to push forward and see what was around the next corner.

Loadout flexibility also adds a nice tactical layer. Choosing the right combination of weapons and items before heading out makes a tangible difference, and there’s enough variety in how you can approach encounters to make experimentation feel worthwhile. You can already tell that once multiplayer goes live squads will be able to designate roles and choose the gear to match.

Even in its current single-player-only state, missions are consistently engaging. One thing that helps immensely is the quality of the AI squadmates. In many games, AI companions are little more than background noise - shambling around, blocking doorways and occasionally getting themselves killed. That’s very much not the case here.

Across the missions I played, my three AI teammates were genuinely useful. They took sensible positions in firefights, laid down suppressing fire when needed, and more than once got me out of trouble when things started to go south.

That level of competence goes a long way toward making the solo experience feel worthwhile, rather than like a stopgap while waiting for co-op.

If Looks Could Kill

Probably the most impressive and original thing about Exoshock right now is the atmosphere it creates.

Visually, the game is already excellent. PolarityOne’s use of lighting is particularly strong, creating an oppressive sense of tension as you move through dark corridors, expansive hangars and industrial ship interiors.

Some of the most memorable moments I had came in lower-lit sections where visibility dropped significantly and I was forced to rely almost entirely on the flashlight mounted to my weapon. Those moments were genuinely tense in a way that surprised me. For a straight shooter, Exoshock already does an outstanding job of building suspense.

The sound design is equally impressive. The soundtrack does an excellent job of shifting between quiet, tension-building ambience and full adrenaline-fueled intensity once firefights erupt. It’s dynamic in exactly the way that games like this need.

Weapon effects are also great. Every gun has the right amount of crunch and punch, making firefights feel almost overwhelming in their intensity at times. Combined with the visual effects and strong environmental audio, it all works together to create a cohesive and immersive experience.

Last Merc Standing

Based on what I’ve played so far, Exoshock is shaping up to be one of the most exciting shooters VR has seen in a long time. The foundations are incredibly strong; the gunplay is satisfying, the atmosphere is excellent and the overall presentation already feels polished in all the areas that matter most.

For those who just can’t wait, the Founders Edition offers a chance to look behind the curtain as the last gameplay elements are implemented. For those who prefer to hold out until things are finished, the good news is that Exoshock already has enough going for it to make it one to keep an eye on.

I know I’ll certainly be there for every major update - and when Exoshock properly launches into Early Access, you can guarantee I’ll be in those servers on day one.

Developer Incuvo released its 2026 roadmap for Green Hell VR in a post on its social channels. Among the listed updates is a long-awaited update to the SteamVR version of the game.

Here is the image:

In the post, Incuvo wrote the following:

We know the PCVR version has been missing out on updates and co-op, and we hear you.
As a small team, we pour everything we have into making Green Hell VR the best it can be. The Meta Quest and PSVR2 versions share a similar codebase, but the PCVR build was a completely different story under the hood.
Maintaining it alongside the others meant we simply couldn't give any version the attention it deserved.

This summer, it’s about to change! We’ve decided to add a port of the PSVR2 version to Steam, bringing co-op and all the content updates to PC VR players to unify the experience.
If you already own Green Hell VR on PCVR, you'll automatically get the new version.

The Quest port of Green Hell was a scaled-back, streamlined experience, a necessary move to get the game to run on standalone hardware at the time. Despite the PC VR edition being more of a 1:1 translation of the original, more open-world game, the Quest (and later PlayStation VR2) edition saw more regular updates, including a co-op feature in December 2024.

Green Hell VR: Quest Edition Review - Streamlined But Engrossing VR Survival

Green Hell on Quest isn’t the same game as the flatscreen original, but look past the changes and you’ll find a great VR survival game. Here’s our Green Hell VR: Quest Edition Review. Let’s get this out of the way first: Green Hell VR’s Quest

UploadVRJamie Feltham

This update will bring the PC VR version in line with the other two, which seems to indicate all versions of the game will be the streamlined edition originally brought to Meta Quest. The PlayStation VR2 port was a visually upscaled version of the limited Quest game instead of the more open PC original.

The roadmap also includes character customization, new structures for base building, a new storage place, and the ability to paint your base.

Green Hell VR is available on Quest, Steam, and PS VR2.

When Google Glass was first announced in 2012, smartphones were relatively new, and video recording glasses were unheard of. Early adopters faced a strong backlash, regardless of their intentions. Now the term is back, and so is the argument behind it. As Meta Smart Glasses sales accelerate, a broader privacy debate is growing at the same time.

Meta & EssilorLuxottica Sold 7 Million Smart Glasses In 2025

Meta and EssilorLuxottica sold more than 7 million smart glasses in 2025, and they were the “dominant driver” of the Ray-Ban owner’s wholesale growth in H2.

UploadVRDavid Heaney

The argument is that a wearable camera makes it easier to record others without their knowledge that it’s happening. That’s a valid concern that deserves consideration. However, there’s also a contradiction here that’s getting harder to ignore. The same people who recoil at cameras on glasses often think nothing of the smartphones in their own hands and everyone else’s pockets, even though phone cameras are more powerful, less socially constrained, and often better equipped for invasive recording.

Why The Label Still Lands

Google Glass left a cultural scar that continues to challenge modern smart glasses that have cameras. While the product itself was limited to 720p recordings, much shorter and lower resolution than the latest devices, the backlash stuck. Glasshole became shorthand for someone socially oblivious, outpacing tech acceptance, and maybe a little too interested in other people’s lives.

Once a technology gets branded as creepy, every product that follows has to fight through that stigma to reach a point where people will even consider its value. The label is powerful but also problematic because it’s not just criticism of a device. It unfairly defines anyone that wears such a device.

The old accusations are resurfacing at a moment when this technology is becoming harder to dismiss. Since virtually everyone is making smart glasses now, this category is starting to look less like a novelty and more like a real consumer product. That’s exactly why the old glasshole stigma matters. If smart glasses are finally gaining momentum, the social backlash that haunted Google Glass could still slow them down.

The Privacy Concerns Are Real

It’s not that people are overreacting. A phone usually has to be raised, aimed, and held in a way that could signal what’s happening. Glasses are different, staying on your face while you talk, shop, walk, and make eye contact. Even when they’re not recording, they can create uncertainty, and that uncertainty changes the social atmosphere.

Critics are right about one important thing. Holding up a phone is a clearer social signal than wearing glasses. If someone points a phone at you, the message is obvious. With glasses, the ambiguity is part of what unsettles people.

Meta knows this, which is why its glasses use a front-facing LED to indicate when photos or video are being captured. If the LED is fully blocked, the glasses won’t record. That doesn’t settle the debate. It just means the company recognizes the potential problem. The issue could get bigger as smart glasses gain more features and stay on people’s faces longer. We’ve already seen Meta add new listening features and even make plans for environmental scans.

The privacy issue isn’t only about bystanders. It can also affect the wearer. Recent reports about Meta AI have raised questions about how visual queries are handled and when they’re reviewed to improve the model. Meta’s privacy worries continue.

What About Smartphones?

This is where the glasshole debate starts to weaken. The smartphone in your hand can be a surprisingly capable surveillance device.

The average phone has better cameras than smart glasses. Many models feature zoom lenses, better low-light capabilities, and advanced computational photography that enhance small details. A phone can be held casually in a hand, placed on a table, leaned against a cup, or made to look like texting while it records. You probably wouldn’t give a second thought to someone standing across the street, but a phone’s 20x zoom can bring them close and personal, filling the screen with your face.

Pictures matter, but a phone’s built-in microphone can be more invasive than you might realize. Smartphones have trained us to tolerate microphones everywhere. We carry them into restaurants, waiting rooms, workplaces, and private conversations. We put them face-up on tables and barely think about it. If privacy concerns are serious, it’s strange to reserve our strongest fears for glasses while treating phones as socially neutral.

Despite concerns, smart glasses aren’t the first portable recorders to enter our public lives. This is just a new form. We normalized pocket computers with premium cameras and ever-present microphones long ago. Given a little more time, smart glasses could find that same acceptance instead of being seen as a blatant attack on privacy.

Spy Tech Is Creepier

Another practical point that gets lost in this debate is that truly covert camera tech already exists, and it doesn’t announce itself with a familiar frame on someone’s face. Hidden cameras have long been sold in things like pens, hats, clocks, and chargers. That’s the category that deserves the word creepy.

By comparison, Meta’s glasses aren’t exactly invisible. Even if the recording light isn’t immediately apparent, the hardware is still visible on your face. There’s a noticeable difference at the corners, a lens for the camera in the top left of the frame, and another for the warning LED on the right. Meta smart glasses aren’t meant to be spyware and most users simply want to capture hands-free video to share on social media or explore wearable AI technology.

Meta built in some privacy features and most users have good intentions, but that doesn’t prevent abuse. With a quick search, it’s easy to find LED covers for smart glasses that claim to block the alert light from the front while leaving the sides open so the light sensor won’t stop video recording. The LED is better than nothing, but it’s not a magic solution.

It’s The People, Not The Devices

The temptation with a word like glasshole is to treat the device itself as the problem, but that doesn’t really fit the situation. A person can wear smart glasses thoughtfully or obnoxiously and the same applies to any other recording device.

Someone filming strangers through glasses for prank content can absolutely be acting like a glasshole. So can someone shoving a phone into a stranger’s face for TikTok, or leaving a phone on the table to covertly record a private conversation. The behavior is what deserves judgment, not the tool.

The label rushes to accusations that are rarely consistent with the behavior of most smart glasses users. Shouting glasshole is an easy way to condemn a futuristic gadget while giving a pass to the potential of the covert device in the pocket.

If smart glasses really are the next phase of consumer computing, a more productive conversation is how social norms, design choices, and legal boundaries should govern ambient recording tech of all kinds. That is becoming more urgent as companies push toward face recognition and more persistent AI features.

So, Do Meta Glasses Make You A Glasshole?

Meta smart glasses don’t make you a glasshole by default, but the cameras can be used for spying. The same will be true of competing smart glasses from Google, Samsung, and others. Smart glasses users should be considerate of who and what they’re recording.

Everyone Is Making Smart Glasses Now

Most coverage focuses on Meta, but a surprising number of startups and established companies alike are making smart glasses too. Read our full roundup here.

UploadVRDavid Heaney

Some public concern is reasonable, but the automatic panic around smart glasses is too selective to be fully convincing. Meta glasses don’t automatically make you a glasshole, but acting like one still does.

In TaVRn's Takedown - Naheulbeuk, your job is simple: beat the snot out of taverns-full of orcs, goblins, and humans, and restore peace to the watering holes of the land of Mliuej. You'll do this with your fists, with powerful weapons and gear collected throughout your quest, and with whatever blunt objects you have on hand.

Smash skulls, drink booze, save the day. What could be simpler?

Presentation

The most immediately striking aspect of TaVRn's Takedown is that it's simply gorgeous. Visually, the game's art style lands in that delightful zone of cartoonish fantasy epitomized by games like World of Warcraft, where characters are more like caricatures and the world is rendered as if it were a lovingly crafted theme park.

And then there's the audio. TaVRn's Takedown features talented voice actors that have appeared in media such as Baldur's Gate 3, Kingdom Come: Deliverance, Stargate SG-1, and Hearthstone, and their pedigree shines through in Takedown's script and delivery.

The animations are smooth, the lighting is nice, and everything looks and sounds lovely.

Gameplay and Combat

The gameplay loop of TaVRn's Takedown is fairly succinct. You begin the game in a small base which contains a friendly host named Margaux, a training dummy, an upgrade station for inspecting and equipping your card-based gear, and a diorama-like world map which shows fifteen-or-so orc-infested taverns (missions) that are available to visit. You select one of these taverns to liberate, and the beatdowns begin.

Each mission takes place in a tavern, and each tavern is overrun by malevolent creatures who are ready to attack you on sight. You'll use your fists and any nearby weapons (barstools, goblets, trophies, brooms, buckets, mops, etc.) to knock out wave after wave of onrushing goons. This is the meat of the gameplay; punching your way to victory.

Combat feels great. There's definite weight to every landed punch, while blocking and dodging adds (light) strategy to each encounter. Some enemies are small, some are tall; some have more or less health than others, and some wear armor that requires special attention. Hit detection is perfect. Scooping up nearby bludgeoning weapons is simple and reliable. And the physics engine does well to ensure that everything behaves the way you might expect (toss a knocked out goblin into an onrushing orc and everyone takes damage).

When you smash enough enemies and clear the room, another room unlocks and you repeat the smashing. Do this a handful of times, and you clear the tavern. Clearing a tavern unlocks the next, and you repeat the process until you clear all the major taverns and reach the final boss.

I'd like to say it's a complicated system, but it's simply not. You smash the faces of your foes until they're no longer conscious, and then you move on and do it again. What makes it all compelling is that it just feels perfectly honed. It's just fun to smash stuff, especially in a VR world that's so well crafted.

During your runs, you have access to magical brews and special abilities acquired and equipped via cards earned in the natural course of play. These are varied and interesting, for example, some might imbue your fists with a charge-up shockwave ability while others allow you to shoot water in a ranged attack, or leave a slug trail of acid whenever you dash, or pull objects toward you from a distance (there are many, many more). Cards can also give you status buffs or gear with special attributes, like upgraded defense or increased damage against a certain enemy type.

Health is acquired by eating food scattered around the levels. While the game isn't necessarily difficult, you'll need to top up your HP fairly often.

Boss fights are a mixed experience, mostly coming off as uninspired. While bosses have their own unique attacks and motifs, for example, one has a penchant for poisons and another has a minor rage problem, they're all pretty much dispatched the same way: avoid their attack and clobber them a lot.

You'll move around a lot, you'll flail your fists a lot, and while you won't necessarily be challenged too deeply or have any sort of transcendent experience, you'll at least come away from a session of TaVRn's Takedown feeling like you achieved a light workout and saved a fantasy world in the process. The entire game takes about four or five hours to complete, while collecting all the upgrades and clearing optional taverns will add some time to the campaign.

What limits the game from being a truly amazing experience are the uninspired boss fights and the general lack of variety of both enemy types and combat. There's just not enough strategy, not enough variety, and after a few taverns, everything starts to feel repetitive. You'll dodge, close in, swing for the fences, without ever really changing tactics or behaviors.

I solved for this problem by taking breaks from the land of Mliuej, putting the headset down for a few hours until the urge to punch orcs cropped up again. And, don't forget, it's sometimes nice to mindlessly punch stuff.

What's important, though, is that the urge always came back. I think that has a lot to do with the fact that the game is technically well-made and very artfully crafted. It's a fun place to visit, and a fast and satisfying arcade-like brawler.

TaVRn's Takedown - Naheulbeuk: Final Verdict

Despite a lack of familiarity with TaVRn's Takedown's source material, I enjoyed almost every minute I spent in its cartoonish fantasy world. I was captivated by the game's high production value, its gorgeous art direction, and exceptional voice acting. While some boss fights were bland and I sometimes wished for more variety in TaVRn's enemies and their tactics, its combat is immediately satisfying, and it's a gorgeous and charming game.

TaVRn's Takedown is available now on Meta Quest and SteamVR.

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

After Onward's development ended, the VR tactical milsim category was left decidedly thin. Tactical Assault VR, still in Early Access, is the most popular current option for players at the moment.

When developer XReal Games announced Zero Caliber: Frostbite last week, it also teased a second game announcement to come this week. Here is the full text of the post from X:

"Alongside FROSTBITE, we’re also working on COVR - a hardcore tactical VR milsim.

Zero Caliber sits between arcade and realism. This does not. COVR is built around deliberate pacing, consequence, and proper CQB execution.

Expect high-stakes solo and co-op missions across tightly designed environments, with a focus on realistic weapon handling, dynamic enemies, and systemic gameplay where your decisions actually matter."

XReal included a link to a playtest sign-up form with the announcement. Both titles are said to be in 'early development' and are expected to release sometime in 2026. XReal did not offer any specificity about planned platforms.

Zero Caliber 2 first released on Meta Quest in August 2024. A 'Remastered' edition hit PC VR in October 2025 and a PlayStation VR2 version is reportedly in development. Time will tell if XReal follows a similar staggered release schedule for Frostbite and COVR.

Zero Caliber: Frostbite can be wishlisted now on Quest.

It's clear as day that Plasmaborne took its cues from id Software's classic FPS, Doom. The font selection, usage of a DoomSlayer-like character in the marketing artwork, and the game's pulse-pounding soundtrack all evoke the thirty-plus- year-old pioneer shooter. The danger in doing this is when a game fails to answer a very simple question: why would I not simply play the brilliant game this is based on rather than this game? The appeal of playing a Doom-like in VR only works if the gameplay holds up and in that respect, Plasmaborne is a mixed bag.

Each room in a run has to be completely cleared of enemies before moving forward. Pretty standard arena-based roguelite stuff here, similar to games like Hellsweeper VR and Street Gods. The aforementioned drones will occasionally beam in support items and weapon upgrades. After clearing a room, you get your choice of three perks to carry forward to the next room. Roguelite players will feel right at home in Plasmaborne.

Visually, Plasmaborne has a heavy cel-shaded look like Sweet Surrender that looks fine in the headset, though the aggressively burnt-orange look of the first world wore thin fairly quickly. The music and sound design screams Doom, but no sense in trying to reinvent the wheel. It effectively got my heart rate up as I moved around the room taking down mobs. The teleporter movement doubles as a dash to get out of trouble. The game would be nearly impossible without it because the walking speed is comparatively slow. It is the only thing in the game that doesn't adhere to the boomer shooter tropes Doom helped to popularize.

The perks are where the game stumbles. On my second run, these are the first five perks I got: an infinite ammo upgrade for my pistols, a bomber drone assistant, a sniper drone assistant, a healer drone, and a laser sight for my pistols that added damage when trained on an enemy. With this loadout, even with the underpowered starter pistols, I was borderline invincible. If I took damage, all I had to do was simply teleport away from the horde and allow a few seconds for my healer drone to restore my health and shield.

This run likely would've carried me to the end of the game, but I voluntarily quit shortly before reaching the second boss. Using the underpowered pistols for the entire run, the enemies in the last few rooms of the first stage of the game were absolute bullet sponges. I spent several minutes in there, simply teleporting around, healing and holding my triggers down without any worries about having to stop and reload. I got the distinct impression these rooms were meant to kill new players without the upgrades and new weapons to quickly dispatch these tougher enemies, but I had no such issue. It simply took a long time to take them all down.

This extended to the first boss, a near fifteen minute long slog of a fight spent dodging its area of effect attacks while avoiding more of the bullet-sponge enemies that spawned in. My pistols felt like mosquitos stinging a mountain as I chip damaged this hulking monstrosity into submission.

I continued through the next few arenas in the second stage before letting myself die and ending the run with over one hundred thousand dollars to buy whatever weapons and upgrades I wanted for my next run. Again, I feel like I was meant to die in that fight before the pistols could rack up enough damage, but that simply didn't happen and the longer the fight wore on, the more tedious it became.

The enemy AI also needs some fine tuning. Some enemies appeared to be proximity triggered, such that if I moved far enough away, they never attacked me and were easily picked off from afar. Other enemies simply could not reach me when I stayed on a raised platform, allowing me to sit and shoot them for upwards of a minute straight until they died, as shown in this clip:

Thankfully, all of these can be fixed with patches. Checks and balances on the spawn of certain perks, tweaks to the enemy recognition range, and Plasmaborne can be a serviceable roguelite. It already is, really, but your luck with the randomly selected perks can wildly change the course of your run.

Plasmaborne is available on Meta Quest for $9.99

March's Jigsaw Nationals in downtown Atlanta, Georgia was the largest event the USA Jigsaw Puzzle Association has ever put on. 1,800 competitors and 3,000 people in total visited the event over the late March weekend. When I arrived to the event, I made a beeline for the second floor where jigsaw puzzle exhibitors were selling their work. Tucked in the back left corner of the floor was VR Villa's setup, a VR free play station with dozens of Quest headsets, battery backups, and wide-eyed jigsaw puzzle enthusiasts discovering VR for the first time through their existing shared passion. This is where I met Steve Lukas from ContractXR, the developer of Jigsaw Night, and Jeff Basladynski, the owner of VR Villa.

Over the years, Jeff has amassed over two hundred Quest headsets and a roster of paid employees and volunteers to help realize his vision of introducing people outside of the VR bubble to the medium. If you have been to a gaming convention anytime in the last few years and seen a bunch of people in headsets playing games like Walkabout Mini Golf and Puzzling Places, chances are it was Jeff's team. VR Villa services upwards of seventy events across the country, all fueled by sponsorships and Jeff's other company, Baz LLC, an artisan chopstick business. VR Villa has conducted sessions for tens of thousands of people and Jeff has set a goal of one hundred thousand unique users in 2026.

For this particular event, the star experience was Steve Lukas's Jigsaw Night. We've covered Jigsaw Night in depth before, so to summarize, it is a social VR jigsaw puzzle game currently in Early Access on Meta Quest. After introductions and pleasantries, Steve asked me to take a photo in front of the Jigsaw Night banner before putting me in a headset to play the game. Jigsaw Night is playable in virtual or mixed reality with controllers or hand tracking. Given the public setting, I opted for passthrough and hand tracking.

I completed a quick twenty-five piece introductory puzzle, then Steve joined my lobby and showed me one of Jigsaw Night's special features. He had taken the picture I took in front of the banner less than five minutes before, scanned it, and used Jigsaw Night to turn it into a customized puzzle. Incredible. While working on that puzzle, he walked me through Jigsaw Night's feature set, including scaling the size of the pieces up or down to accommodate any user, a gesture-tracked 'capture bubble' to grab multiple pieces at once, and the custom avatar system.

During my time there, I watched dozens of jigsaw competitors experience Jigsaw Night (and VR) for the first time, competing in speed competitions, working together, and most importantly, smiling and having fun. Some of the comments I overheard:

• "I was always afraid VR would make me sick, but this is great. I feel fine."
• "I could do puzzles with my dad. He lives out on the West Coast and can't travel, so we never see each other."
• "It's so responsive and seeing all the pieces in the air around me is just... wow!"

Steve Lukas barely slept that weekend, working the station from sunrise to well past sunset. He flew back home with pages of first-hand feedback from the true jigsaw experts and the priceless experience of seeing live people having the time of their lives in his application. He told me the experience was more than worth the time and money he invested into the VR Villa partnership and traveling to the event. If ever there were a target consumer for Jigsaw Night, Steve had a direct line to them for three days, all enthusiastic to play and help make the game better. For any game developer, that is an invaluable level of access.

After the weekend, Jeff's team announced on LinkedIn that they serviced 229 unique players across 286 sessions. Do the quick math and see that this means people were coming back for more VR at an event that had nothing to do with gaming, VR or otherwise. Fifty-five percent of the users had never used VR before that weekend. Sixty-three percent of them were aged thirty-five and older. Jigsaw Night, unsurprisingly, saw the highest usage at 106 total play hours across the weekend, all in fifteen to thirty minute sessions.

Bear in mind, this is one of VR Villa's smallest events with maybe a couple dozen headsets sent to the show. Jeff's team has serviced New York Comic Con, Anime NYC, MAGFest, and Lvl Up Expo, among others. Huge events with tens or hundreds of thousands of attendees. So take those numbers I listed above and extend them ten or a hundred fold.

Most VR fans would agree that VR has to be experienced to be fully appreciated. Jeff's vision is exactly that. A grass roots passion project grown into the largest free-to-play VR gaming entity in the country. Every VR Villa worker is trained on proper new user onboarding. Jeff's partnerships with developers like Mighty Coconut, Resolution Games, Realities IO, and now ContractXR ensure these new users have safe, accessible experiences in a controlled space with no worries of physical harm or motion sickness. Jeff's team conducts entry and exit surveys from willing participants about their experience. The conversion rate, the number of people who were unsure about VR coming in and walked away prepared to buy a headset is over fifty percent.

Before we parted ways, Steve gave me some insight into the future of Jigsaw Night. Long term, Steve envisions following the same model as other successful premium titles like Puzzling Places, Golf+, and Walkabout Mini Golf. The initial purchase gives players access to a starting set of eighteen puzzles, a puzzle builder with double-sided puzzle capabilities, and customizable avatars utilizing the Quest's inside-out body tracking (IOBT). A Jigsaw Night shop is on the roadmap with in-app purchases for additional puzzles and other content.

Jigsaw Night also will lean heavily on its social interactions. It already has a working Facebook integration, allowing users to pull from their existing photos to create new puzzles personalized to their lives and families. This is what he used to convert the photo he took of me into a puzzle in a matter of minutes. It also has fully functional co-op for up to five players with voice chat and colocation support. The press kit I was sent for this article has videos of Steve playing Jigsaw Night while traveling on a plane and with his son on a train, indicating travel mode support.

UploadVR thanks Jeff, Steve, and their teams for taking the time to speak with us during a busy event weekend.

You can learn more about VR Villa's upcoming events on its official website. Jigsaw Night is available on Quest in Early Access for $17.99.

I had a sinking feeling when I booted up Darts VR2: Bullseye because, well, this is darts. Then the electrifying zombie-grasped dartboard logo splash screen smashed into view and I snapped to attention. This is not just darts. It is darts.

After the surprisingly aggressive logo, the main menu loaded and for the first time in a while, I was greeted with a 360 degree menu in a VR game. I tried to turn with my right controller, only to find out that wasn't allowed. I had to physically turn. Somehow, this made me smile. I felt like I was back in a VR arcade in the late '10s, playing stationary VR experiences on an OG Vive headset and having a blast with the simplest of games.

The Party Mode is not yet available in this Early Access period, but the other modes, avatar customization, and leaderboards are all up and running. The avatars are just heads and hands, adding to the old-school VR design. You also get your choice of darts skinned with country flags.

Darts VR2: Bullseye, the sequel to the now delisted 2017 original, has four gameplay modes: 501, Around the World, Killstreak, and Zombies.

501 is the more traditional, 'professional' way to play darts. It starts you with a score of 501 points with a goal to get said score down to exactly zero. That is a level of precision that will require skill and mastery, neither of which I have. Throwing mechanics in VR rarely feel great, and this was one of my concerns coming into the game. Thankfully, Bullseye gets that right. I was terrible, but I felt my hand arcing down at the release point and knew I was going to miss. It felt true to form.

Killstreak quickly became addictive. The goal is to hit the same zone on the board with consecutive darts. You have five lives and lose one each time you fail at this simple task. I was one and done in my first run, never hitting the same zone twice. This was mildly triggering. So when the UI popped asking me if I wanted to restart, it was an instant yes. Next try, I only got a streak of two, but that second dart literally electrified the board, giving me a dopamine hit I instantly wanted more of. Restart. Two again. Restart. This time, on the third hit, the board increased in size, making the zone easier to hit. Later, another dart lands, turning the zone from blue to purple. Another hits, changes the board color. Then I missed and fought the urge to hit restart again. I could have played Killstreak all day. That leaderboard will be interesting to see in the future.

The same cannot be said for the Zombie mode. It is a stationary wave shooter (darter?) with points awarded for hitting different zombie body parts. A headshot, of course, is the Holy Grail one-shot kill. VR has had scores of zombie wave shooters in the years between the first game and Bullseye. Everything in this mode, the map layout, the zombie models, the sounds, all of it feels very dated. Also, the physics-based throwing mechanics that work so great when throwing at a board fall apart when trying to hit slow-approaching zombies from clear across the room. Gravity really takes over at long distance. There are explosive darts that are periodically earned, but overall, there are much better zombie wave shooters out there and the novelty of killing zombies with darts was not enough to overcome the been-there-done-that feeling.

Around the World requires hitting every zone on the board in numerical sequence from 1 to 20, followed by the bullseye. After a few embarrassing throws that missed the board entirely, I caught fire and hit three numbers in a row a couple of times. When I finished, I looked at how many darts it took me to get to the bullseye and thought "I can do better than that."

This is ultimately the charm of Darts VR2. Unless you are really good, and I am not, rounds are over so quickly that it is very tempting to run it back one more time. This is how games become rabbit holes and one loses track of time when in VR. Darts VR2: Bullseye's simplicity is its strength.

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

An uproar of grief and dismay resulted; Meta then clarified that "existing games" would remain available on headsets after the closure date. That still means that many Horizon Worlds will lose VR access entirely, though, effectively splitting the platform according to how players are able to access it.

What becomes of a userbase that has managed to persist in a platform that, while plagued with issues, has still managed to gain its own unique community?

Log in to Horizon Worlds now and you might see signs like this at mainstay bars such as Gatsby's. It's one of the many ways Horizon communities are planning ahead. While some groups are deciding to remain where they are, others are moving altogether or building twin maps on rival platforms.

I took a look at the people who run venues within Horizon Worlds, their take on the impending closure date for VR access, and what they intend to do afterwards.

Hoping For The Best

Nikki goes by Thickaz24 online and runs the venue Mirage On The Water. Mirage is a late-night urban club; when I enter the map to speak with its owner, a game of spades is in play in the back lounge. The world is awash in animated ocean life, underwater foliage, and neon colors that throw everything under a blacklight filter.

Mirage is one of the many venues Nikki runs in Horizon Worlds with the architectural help of community member Tone2tymes. Her entertainment network is part of a larger cluster of party spaces that Horizon users flock to for hip-hop, reggae, soul, and slow classics. "I’ve always believed that creating moments for people to come together, have fun, and feel seen is something that comes from the heart," Nikki explained in an interview. "For me, being a party promoter in Horizon Worlds felt like a natural extension of who I already am."

She notes some of her friends are moving to VRChat as Horizon Worlds shifts its attention to mobile. For now, she's waiting to see what happens. "I put so much time and effort and money into Horizon, I can only be optimistic. It's a revolving door in Meta Horizon Worlds, so new people circulate all the time."

Relocating And Reinventing

For European Horizon users, The White Lotus was a mainstay for lowkey events and casual conversation. Bar owner 3 Eyed Tiger has run the virtual establishment for three years and held a higher minimum age than most (25+) to ensure mature patronage. Where Mirage On The Water is an after-hours daydream, The White Lotus was a lounge fashioned as a pantheon featuring a large pool and balconies overlooking its courtyard.

By the time she heard of Horizon's closure, 3 Eyed Tiger was already running bar nights on more than one platform. She's less than impressed with Horizon's recent announcement that certain experiences would remain available for VR.

"The news from Boz feels like a very glossed-over way of saying the platform is still being sunsetted," she wrote to UploadVR. "By the time we face the lack of updates, the inability to build or change anything, and the disappearing monetization incentives in April, there will be no one left to run communities or build VR-focused games by the June 15th cutoff."

Nowadays she runs a Twitch stream while working to reassemble The White Lotus in VRChat. Until then, she hosts social events while playing games such as Fish! or relaxing in crowd-friendly worlds. "I think this will be a telling time. Many are realizing that a strong, well-built community is now the only factor that truly matters. Most of the biggest social communities don't even have their own dedicated worlds in VRChat—it’s a completely different angle altogether."

Not All Is Lost

The news of Horizon Worlds sounds familiar to another group who's suffered a similar fate. Altspace veteran SereneLiminal has been in VRChat since her favorite immersive platform was shuttered 3 years ago by Microsoft.

She recalls when the news hit and how the feeling of loss soon transformed into a need for action. "It was a shock to everyone, and people quickly united to save worlds hosted in Altspace, tried to figure out how to clone avatars. People came together to help each other, people who didn’t know each other, people who previously didn’t get along, we all came together. It was a unified grief for all of us."

The last moments of Altspace are explicitly something that sticks out in Serene's mind. "We remember the last minutes before Altspace Servers shut down. Gathering with friends in our favorite worlds, singing, talking or just being near each other. Then at the moment of shut down everyone’s avatars freezing, disappearing and then you were in the room by yourself then the sad and awful last message from the Altspace team."

Since 2023, SereneLiminal and others have come together to retain their identity while settling into new virtual lands. One example of how they've kept their memories alive is the Altspace Legacy Venue. The space serves as both a small museum of Altspace avatars and photos, a stage for gatherings, and a memorial for Altspacers who have passed away.

Losing a beloved platform hurts. When you're online, your favorite place in cyberspace is like a second home. You form memories of that world and soon enough, those memories sit in your heart right alongside the important moments of your physical life. Having a community to help transition from one platform to another can not only ease the grief, but provide hope for building anew.

As Horizon veterans look for new places online to settle, SereneLiminal hopes they'll find a light at the end of the tunnel the same way her community has. "We may all be expats or digital refugees from Altspace," she says, "but it’s the people that make a platform, not the platform itself."

Released in full in 2024, Wrath: Aeon of Ruin set itself apart from other examples in this emerging genre by building its foundation using the Quake-1 Tech. The retro look is a given, of course, while the moment-to-moment gameplay blends tradition with modernity. The VR version is a valiant effort in terms of adapting its greatness — even if some of its weakest elements are more noticeable when experienced through a headset.

If you're here for the story, you're not in the right place. And that's deliberate. Like the '90s shooters that Wrath: Aeon of Ruin so clearly reveres, the setup is quick and to the point. You play as the Outlander, who finds himself on the shores of a strange place plagued by the Guardians of the Old World, who will be your targets. There's a total of 15 maps scattered throughout three hub worlds, meaning that you can plunge through them in any order the moment you enter a hub.

The levels themselves tick all the necessary boxes, and then some. Moody, labyrinthine graveyards, catacombs, forests, and ancient ruins are a common occurrence, but they're also filled with secrets to find, from enemy encounters to powerful items. Foes will make use of every turn of a corner and elevators being activated to jump at you, but the moments in which I felt out of traversal options were few and far between. Levels can be a weapon used against you as much as they can be another weapon in your arsenal.

Speaking of which, the VR rendition of Wrath: Aeon of Ruin allows you to dual-wield weapons, as well as use both hands on a singular one to improve stability when aiming, as well as enabling a powerful secondary shot in most weapons. The signature blade, which is present in the protagonist's wrist, can be used in any direction as if you were playing a game designed with sword combat in mind. It's intuitive and extremely deadly for enemies, and this VR version also has some specific features, such as positioning both blades as a cross in front of you to protect you from projectiles, and charging an attack that can push you forward, which pairs perfectly with a well-timed jump.

There's a vast assortment of VR-specific tweaks, which are appreciated. Reloading is done with gestures, as you'd expect from a VR shooter worth its salt, and there's also a ground slide that you can perform when running. I found the latter to not be super effective, as it can be slower than what you'd expect, and far from the grandiose acrobatics that games like Hellsweeper have come to offer over the years.

Still, even if some of the new additions aren't that surprising or lack some polish, the overall experience feels substantially different than playing the flat-screen version on PC or console. With this, however, comes other complications, as Wrath: Aeon of Ruin is a tough game to fully immerse yourself in VR. Boomer shooters, by definition, are quite fast-paced. Even if you're like me and have decent VR legs, however, the issue is less about the pacing itself and more about the fact that it's harder to keep up with everything on screen when the original experience wasn't initially designed for VR.

Even with three difficulty settings to choose from, Wrath: Aeon of Ruin is a tough shooter. By default, saving your game consists of using an item that is found in levels sparsely, which allows you to create a save point wherever you're standing. If you meet your demise, you'll be sent back to that checkpoint. Since you never know what will come next, this item becomes quite precious, and it adds pressure to your strategy in how you navigate through a level.

While the level design is quite strong, it's the shooting aspect that doesn't quite gel together. Aiming and successfully landing a projectile on enemies that are far away from you can be a hassle, depending on your weapon of choice. The reload animations, while novel and immersive, aren't as snappy as they could be, which can be the difference between life and death during intense encounters.

Most notable were the moments in which I found myself hiding behind corners to try and avoid enemy projectiles and slowly chipping away at their life from afar, luring them in to finish them with a shotgun blast or a quick slice from the blade. For a shooter that pays tribute to titles that excelled at keeping you moving at all times, I felt like Wrath was constantly slowing me down. When some of the cumbersome VR additions got into the mix, the overall experience began to feel detracted, not really allowing me to fully buy into the power fantasy as games like Doom and Quake always managed to achieve.

Wrath: Aeon of Ruin VR - Brutal Edition - Final Verdict

The additions of Wrath: Aeon of Ruin VR - Brutal Edition are substantial enough to set it apart from its original rendition. The adaptation of the overall experience isn't without its faults, often showing the hardships of translating a shooter that wasn't initially designed for VR. Yet, its robust campaign and retro feel through a modern lens are worth seeing through — just don't expect the fast-paced rhythm that others in the boomer shooter wave are known for.

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

Star rating updated after publication to better reflect the text.

Wave shooters have never been in short supply in VR gaming. In the 2010s when developers were still figuring out how to let players move around without getting sick, we got trendsetters like the still relevant Space Pirate Trainer, Raw Data, and Serious Sam VR: The Last Hope. This type of gameplay quickly spread to melee combat with arena games like Gorn and Hellsplit Arena. To this day, 'horde' modes are still a go-to feature for many VR shooters and melee combat games.

I mention this because anyone familiar with the concept will feel right at home in Skytail, the latest title from Coatsink (Men In Black: Most Wanted, Augmented Empire). The premise is quite simple and Coatsink gets it out of the way in a matter of minutes. You live on an island in the sky with your giant pet skytail, a sweet-natured winged creature guarding its unhatched eggs. After learning how to use telekinesis to light a fire and cook snacks for it, a literal dark cloud comes over the island. A grotesque creature attacks, wrecks the island, steals the eggs, and the two of you set off to get them back.

From there, the game falls into a basic formula. Explore the current island, telekinetically gripping clumps of purple blight polluting the land and squeezing them until they pop and disperse. Somewhere on the island is a portal that warps you to what could aptly be called tutorial limbo, a void where you learn about your powers. The first ability is how to perform the aforementioned telekinetic squeeze and pop. After the stint in limbo, you feed the skytail, hop on, and fly off to the next island.

Between the islands is where the action lies. Flying imps attack you and your skytail as you soar, with your travel progress and health visible on the skytail's collar. Imps can be dispatched with your telekinetic powers while either grabbing or dodging the imps' projectile attacks. Things veer into bullet hell territory if the imps are allowed to pile up on the screen. Health is restored by popping food that randomly appears during battle. Survive and you'll arrive on another island with more blight clusters to pop, a hungry skytail to feed, and a new skill to learn.

Skytail feels very safe. The gameplay is well executed and the combination of riding a flying creature and the telekinetic abilities offers a different aesthetic, but it starts to get formulaic inside an hour. It does ramp quite well, offering new imp variants requiring a bit more skill to dispatch and new abilities early and often, but I found the formula wearing thin very quickly.

However, it does feel satisfying to crush imps. The telekinetic powers are very responsive and accurate. Petting and feeding the skytail is genuinely heart warming. Nothing here is bad per se, but the telekinesis and flight barely do enough to liven up a well-trodden road in VR.

Visually, Skytail feels a bit dated and this is disappointing. Coatsink has previously shipped titles with a distinct visual flair, like the comic book art style in Men In Black & Jurassic World: Aftermath and Augmented Empire's sci-fi setting. Skytail is bright and colorful, but its simplicity makes the islands dull to explore. The design of the imps makes them all blend together, even with the variants in later battles. Skytail plays much better than it looks.

Wave shooters have endured in VR for good reason. They are generally accessible and intuitive to play, easy for VR newcomers, and still fun in the right context for VR vets. Skytail is no different. Its presentation lets it down, but the cozy atmosphere and gratifying telekinetic powers can be a nice change of pace for the right player.

That is, anyone looking for a different, more pleasant outing than shooting/cutting down scores of the undead in one of any dozens (and dozens) of VR zombie games or a younger player in need of a more approachable adventure. If either of those descriptions fit, you could do worse than Skytail and it is priced affordably enough for what it offers.

Skytail is available now on Meta Quest for $11.99.

Maze Theory has announced that the immersive mixed reality game Project Hail Mary: Journey Among the Stars will be launching late this year on major MR and VR platforms. Developed in collaboration with Andy Weir, author of The Martian and Project Hail Mary, Journey Among the Stars is a completely new chapter in the Project Hail Mary story.

You'll step into the role of Ryland Grace, the main protagonist of Weir's novel and the character played by Ryan Gosling in the just-released film adaptation. You'll experience a critical moment in the Hail Mary mission. The ship's systems are failing, and it's up to you to diagnose and solve the problem with the help of your friend Rocky, the alien intelligence whose partnership with Grace defines the story's emotional core.

You'll build a relationship with Rocky, bond over the course of the experience, and use your scientific and engineering training to save the day.

Project Hail Mary: Journey Among the Stars will launch on major mixed reality and VR platforms in late 2026. We'll have further info on gameplay, platforms, and our impressions in the coming months.

Hello Games' Sean Murray has made a habit of tweeting out emojis shortly before a new No Man's Sky update, subsequently sending the NMS community into a speculation-filled tizzy. This past Monday, the emoji was a stadium and now we have clarity on the new content.

Citing Pokémon, Palworld, and World of Warcraft's pet battles as inspiration, Xeno Arena allows players to take any creatures they have tamed and added to their companion index into an arena to battle against other players and their creatures. The multiplayer arenas can be found in space stations and the Nexus on the Space Anomaly. The Xeno Arena itself is also available as a new structure that players can build and host competitions with other players. Players can earn rewards, complete daily challenges, and participate in organized tournaments. In essence, Xeno Arena is an entirely self-contained multiplayer game within No Man's Sky.

Watch the Xeno Arena update trailer here.

Companion creatures have been a part of No Man's Sky since the v3.20 update in 2021. That update allowed creatures to be adopted and stored in the companion index, able to be summoned on any planet. Creatures can also lay eggs that can be genetically modified from a hatchery in the Anomaly.

The Xeno Arena update expands on this system. Creatures now have elemental affinities based on their xeno species and home worlds. Their abilities can be checked before testing them in battle. This also opens up a new avenue for exploration and encourages players to seek out new biomes and planet types in the hopes of snagging a rare creature to take into the arena.

Hello Games also noted the existence of extremely rare 'legendary' variants of creatures with highly elevated stats and abilities.

Just as before, creatures can be genetically modified, now opening up the ability to create new variants and special colors. Creatures' abilities can be raised by keeping them well fed, bonding with them, and successfully winning battles. The full patch notes can be read here.

No Man's Sky is available on Steam and PS VR2. The Xeno update is free to all players.

VR puzzle games tend to fall into two types: escape rooms like Fixer Undercover and the I Expect You To Die series or 'stare and experiment until you figure it out' scenarios like House of Da Vinci VR. Tammuz: Blood & Sand falls in the latter category, centered on a single pillar in the middle of a desert that produces new challenges to work through.

From a mechanics standpoint, Tammuz is fairly straightforward. You are in the middle of a desert with a pillar in front of you. This pillar can be raised, lowered, and rotated to a preferred viewing angle to solve puzzles. Some are external objects like a tablet with a piece arrangement challenge or a dial with individual turning rings like in this clip:

There's a story of gods at strife interspersed between puzzles, with the titular Tammuz seemingly playing the villain. The game breaks up into five separate trials (chapters) with generous autosaves allowing you to step away mid-puzzle and return to it later. The story is delivered through still images of the gods that appear periodically with serviceable voice acting. Admittedly, most of the interplay between the gods went over my head as I was already looking at the new puzzle opening in front of me when they spoke. There were also glitches where two gods would be speaking at once, with their audio and subtitles piling on top of one another.

The puzzles themselves are not too difficult and are only hamstrung by some unstable interactions. Hovering over interactable objects gives a helpful blue outline, but if two objects are too close together, it was too easy to grab or trigger the wrong one. This happens quite often and made a few puzzles in the game frustrating to complete. One puzzle involving two marbles on the top of the pillar stands out as an early game example of this. It's the same sort of grab jank you would experience in a physics-based game, but when a puzzle requires any sort of precision, those mistakes are more annoying. Turning small knobs and dials was equally shaky. Everything works, but the interactions can use some fine tuning.

Visually, Tammuz looks fine, albeit in a limited capacity. The desert is, as expected, very brown along with the main pillar, so the pops of color in certain puzzles were a welcome change. Being that this is a mostly stationary game that takes place in one area, there's not a lot to look at, but everything is clean with a fair amount of detail. Sound design is functional and gets the job done, though I was looking for a more satisfying 'completion' sound when clearing a puzzle to accentuate the sense of accomplishment.

Tammuz is a puzzle game that challenges your logic and reasoning rather than your creativity and ability to think outside the box. Trial and error (and luck) will lead to some solutions, but this is not a game with multiple avenues to get the job done like the I Expect You To Die games. I appreciate its simplicity, but the lack of different environments may be off-putting to those looking for a more dynamic experience.

Tammuz: Blood & Sand is out now on Quest and Steam for $19.99.

The very first episode of The Original Series, “The Man Trap” (1966), featured a monster-of-the-week vampiric shapeshifter that left its victims horribly mutilated. Decades later, The Next Generation delivered all sorts of horror in episodes that delved into cosmic dread, body horror, ghost stories, and many other unsettling concepts.

Star Trek: Infection on Meta Quest 3 and PC VR takes these horrors which have always lurked on the fringes of Trek and centers the fear in a way that feels especially potent in virtual reality. From the moment you step into the game, Infection is designed to unnerve you, to upset you, and even to scare you.

Story

Star Trek: Infection begins aboard a space station where you, a Vulcan Starfleet engineer, live and work. We learn that years earlier, you were held in a Cardassian prison overseen by the notorious commander Tarel Mharutt, a fugitive wanted by Starfleet for torturing prisoners. When the Federation starship U.S.S. Lumen detains a Cardassian merchant named Daryal, suspected to be Mharutt in disguise, you are beamed aboard to confirm his identity.

The plan goes horribly wrong when a brain scan detects an unknown infection in your cerebral cortex. You’re sedated and rushed to sickbay, awakening later to find the ship is in ruin and the captain dead. The crew are mutated into monsters, and something is changing you from the inside out.

You’ll spend the next six to eight hours of gameplay unraveling a complicated plot of shifting identities, while battling the infection that’s both all around you and inside of you. You won’t visit beautiful planets or comfortably stroll down pristine starship corridors. Instead, you’ll creep and crawl through the wreckage of a doomed vessel, relive the traumatic memories of time spent in a Cardassian torture cell, and evade former Starfleet crewmates who have been twisted into grotesque monsters. It all culminates in a finale truly befitting of the best episodes of Trek.

Gameplay

At its core, Star Trek: Infection is a stealth-driven survival horror game with elements of the Metroidvania genre layered atop. You'll spend much of your time navigating throughout the U.S.S. Lumen, following clues, scanning things with your Tricorder, solving environmental puzzles, and upgrading your toolkit and abilities so that you can reach formerly unreachable areas and advance the plot.

Puzzles mostly leverage your engineering background. You'll use tools like electric spanners to trace conduits from point A to point B in complicated circuit mazes. You'll swap modules into and out of computer terminals. You'll brave deep space to repair the outer hull of the ship. There's even a tense and memorable moment in which you must defuse a ticking photon torpedo timebomb.

There's enough variety in the puzzles that, even if they're not technically the most sophisticated or interesting thing you've played in a game, they at least never become tiresome or predictable.

When not roaming the ship, exploring, or solving puzzles, you'll mostly try to avoid patrolling monsters by any means necessary. To do this, you’ll have to move carefully and think tactically. You can distract enemies with tossed objects or wait for them to pass, slinking unnoticed. When necessary, you may dispatch them with a Vulcan nerve pinch, your phaser, or traps and weapons you eventually learn to craft.

However, you are not a powerful character. Your phaser’s “Kill” mode is extremely limited, can only hold five shots, and is charged one shot at a time by consoles which are depleted after a single use. Your “Stun” mode operates as a knockback only, and it has a cooldown after each shot. There are also enemies that cannot be killed, and these you must simply avoid.

If you have one major weapon in your fight against the infection, it is ironically the infection itself.

By eating infected "fruit" or plunging your hand into "goblets" (mutated nodes growing from the walls of the ship), you can enter a sort of powerful infection phase that allows you to shoot monstrous tentacles out of your mutated hands. These can be used offensively to kill enemies, or to grapple and pull yourself to otherwise inaccessible areas of the ship.

Of course, this ability is balanced by the fact that utilizing your infection in this way will eventually kill you. Use your new powers too often and you simply die. This reinforces the inescapable idea that even at your most powerful, you never really feel in control, you never feel like you’re out of danger.

Vibe

You'll do everything in the game almost entirely alone. While there are (very few) other characters in the game, without spoiling anything, they are little comfort. Infection replicates the oppressive isolation and dread that has long been the defining feature of many of the best survival horror games.

That said, Star Trek: Infection strikes a balance between being scary and being playable. It’s not relentlessly terrifying, and there aren't an overwhelming number of enemies. Nor does it over-rely on cheap jump scares or excessive gore. Instead, Infection depends on psychological tension, slow-building dread, a deeply unsettling environment, and a persistent feeling that something is very wrong both around you, and inside of you. The U.S.S. Lumen is a terrible place to be, but it's at least bearable.

Technical Stuff

When I first played Star Trek: Infection, I was disappointed. Played on my Quest 3S, there were fairly significant performance issues, stuttering, and occasional bugs. Luckily, the devs quickly released an update that solved all of my issues, and I was able to carry on. As it stands, Star Trek: Infection is now technically solid. It runs beautifully and plays smooth.

The visuals are solid, too. On Quest 3S, it's a good looking game. On PC VR, it's naturally even better, with some truly stunning lighting effects that amp up the oppressive atmosphere and omnipresent dread.

Audio design is impeccable, too, with all the right noises happening at all the right times. The voice acting is almost universally excellent, with an occasional oddly-delivered line. Our main character's voice actor, in particular, is phenomenal.

In short, it's a good-looking, nice-sounding game that plays well and doesn't break.

The Trouble With...

But not all is perfect. Star Trek: Infection has been billed as a horror game. I'm generally a coward, and I enjoy Infection, which may be an indicator that the team has missed the mark for players who want a truly terrifying experience. If you're looking for a game that makes you recoil from its visceral horrors, or jump scares to trick your smartwatch into thinking you're doing cardio, Infection may be a disappointment.

The difficulty level isn't very high either. Monsters are fairly lenient in their detection of the player, and dying in-game isn't all that traumatic either. The screen simply fades to black and you start again at the nearest checkpoint, which is often very kindly placed at the entry point of the very room in which you died. While this leniency is nice for a casual horror game player like me, I can also imagine some hardcore survival horror fans finding Infection to be too simplistic.

And while the team's hotfix did indeed fix all of my issues with the game at launch, I still encountered a game-breaking bug that required me to reload a previous save state from about a half-hour earlier. For the record, this occurred when the Holodeck's one and only door failed to unlock after a scripted event, locking me in the room forever.

Star Trek: Infection - Final Verdict

Despite a lighter touch on outright terror than some horror fans might wish for, Star Trek: Infection succeeds as both a survival horror game and a Star Trek experience. It captures the unsettling horror that has occasionally appeared within Trek and centers it to great effect in VR. It's a tonally perfect fit for fans of the franchise, and an atmospheric sci-fi scare for everyone else.

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

Game developers in and out of VR have been struggling through a general downturn in the gaming ecosystem. Just last week, Moss and Glassbreakers developer Polyarc Games laid off two-thirds of its staff and Rec Room announced its pending shutdown in June.

Now we know that Synth Riders developer Kluge Interactive quietly underwent a staff reduction as well.

In a post on Twitter/X, XR analyst SadlyItsBradley wrote the following message:

I’ve been told that Kluge Interactive, makers of Synth Riders, also had major layoffs recently. Primarily due to Meta stopping VR support entirely for Horizon Worlds. Which Kluge was funded to build games in.

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Roughly three hours later, Kluge Interactive CEO Arturo Perez replied with a confirmation:

I can confirm that we had major rounds of layoffs in December and January. Synth Riders remains steady but not enough to support our full studio. We are currently a team of 50 from a peak of 100 last year (we also had a major round last December).

Perez responded to additional comments in the thread as well, but notably did not confirm or deny that Meta ending VR support for Horizon Worlds contributed to the layoffs.

Kluge announced a partnership with Meta to build games in Horizon Worlds on a blog post in November 2023. Since then, it has published two worlds: Chicken Tag and Slimoshi. It also released BeatBlocks, its first Roblox game, last year.

Kluge's most recent standalone VR project is Final Fury, a fighting game inspired by classic fighting games from the '90s and '00s.

Peanut Button, the studio behind the Retropolis games, has announced that their latest VR adventure is out now in Early Access on Quest. Riddlewood Manor is a hand-drawn, spooky dive into a haunted house where every room holds a dark secret, and everything's trying to kill you.

Gameplay in Riddlewood Manor comes from exploring a haunted estate, solving absurd and terrifying logic puzzles, and surviving the seemingly endless series of escape rooms that make up the titular manor. There are monsters, spirits, possessed dolls, and jump scares... plenty of jump scares. Luckily, for cowards like me, there's a "jump scare warning" option which lets you know when you're about to wet yourself.

Riddlewood Manor was released late last year as a flat screen game on Steam, where it holds a Very Positive rating from over 100 reviews. While it's very early days for Riddlewood Manor on Quest (the game came out just days ago), it thus far holds a perfect 5 star rating on the Meta Horizon store. We'll post our impressions soon.

The VR version is available in Early Access on Meta Quest for just $4.99.

Beat Saber has been a top ten title on PS VR2 since its arrival, seemingly unaffected by the loss of multiplayer support and content updates. Beat Games announced that it was ending support for both PlayStation VR headsets in June 2025. The game has not received OST 8 or any of the recent shock drops since and multiplayer support ended in January 2026. The last DLC added to the game for PSVR headsets was Lady Gaga's Abracadabra shock drop.

Despite that, Beat Saber continues to thrive on the platform. It was number one in overall PS VR2 downloads in 2025 and its lowest position in 2026 thus far was seventh place in the EU in February.

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The full chart from the PlayStation blog can be seen here, mostly filled out by other mainstays like Pavlov, Job Simulator, The Walking Dead: Saints & Sinners, and Among Us 3D: VR.

Alien: Rogue Incursion's reign at the top of the monthly top ten PS VR2 download charts was short-lived, while recent PS VR2 releases like Rager, Iron Guard Salvation, Maid of Sker VR, and Titan Isles failed to crack into the top ten this month.

With the current PlayStation Spring Sale running through April 22 and highly-anticipated titles like Wrath: Aeon of Ruin VR Brutal Edition and Little Nightmares VR: Altered Echoes scheduled to release this month, May's charts will be interesting to watch.

One title we know we won't see is another long-awaited release, the PS VR2 support for Microsoft Flight Simulator 2024. VR add-on support for games like MSFS, Gran Turismo, and Resident Evil 4 Remake does not appear on the PS VR2 downloads list since they are classed as PlayStation 5 titles.

Nutrition Tracking

Meta says it's "soon" adding a food log to the Meta AI smartphone app, and that with "a simple voice prompt or quick photo" from any of its smart glasses you can add to it.

Meta AI will "extract key nutrition details" from your prompt or photo, the company says, updating the food log.

"Over time, your food log powers increasingly personalized insights that get more useful, helping you make healthier, more informed choices", Meta proclaims.

The company says the feature will soon roll out to users aged 18+ in the US, and will come to Meta Ray-Ban Display "later this summer".

WhatsApp Summaries

Meta's displayless glasses can read out WhatsApp messages, if you want, and you can send a WhatsApp message by asking Meta AI. This can be a text message, transcribed, a voice message, or a captured image. On Meta Ray-Ban Display there's also an app to visually scroll and read WhatsApp messages, and you'll see message notifications pop up in your view, if you want.

This is all fine for the occasional message, but is too much for fast-moving group chats as you go about your day.

Meta says it's soon rolling out a Meta AI feature called WhatsApp Summaries to the Early Access program. By asking “Hey Meta, catch me up on my messages” you can get a summary of your chats, or you can ask specific questions like “What did Jamie suggest for dinner?”.

The company claims this is all "processed on device" and that chats "remain private with end-to-end encryption".

New Live Translation Languages – Without Downloads?

For around a year now, Meta's smart glasses have been able to translate speech between English, French, Italian, and Spanish. To activate the feature, you say “Hey Meta, start live translation.”

On displayless glasses you hear the spoken words of people nearby, translated to your own language, through the speakers via text-to-speech. On Ray-Ban Meta Display, you see it as text on the display instead. Simultaneously, the person you're conversing with can see your words translated into their language as text on the Meta View smartphone app.

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Now, Meta has added Hindi, Arabic, Russian, Swedish and Finnish for users enrolled in the Early Access program, and says that it will support 20 languages by summer, including Mandarin, Korean, and Japanese.

The company also suggests that you will no longer need to download language packs in advance. Currently, you must download the specific language pair you want to your glasses in advance. This change would be a significant reduction to the friction involved in the translation experience today.

Display Recording

A major issue I faced when reviewing Meta Ray-Ban Display was the inability to show you, our readers, what I was seeing. Sure, you can stick a camera up to the lens, but the waveguide is designed for a human eye, not a sensor, and I've never seen any attempt at this accurately depict what I saw. These camera capture techniques also preclude actually wearing the glasses.

Meta says that in a coming update this spring, Meta Ray-Ban Display owners will finally be able to record the display, with the output showing it superimposed on the camera view, and including any playing audio.

This should make it a lot easier for journalists and influencers to demonstrate Meta Ray-Ban Display to their audiences, and for regular buyers to tell friends what it's like too.

On-Foot Navigation In Any US City

In our review of Meta Ray-Ban Display, we harshly criticized the fact that the on-foot navigation feature only worked within the urban area of 28 specific cities.

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Meta says that in May, the feature will expand to "every city across the US". The US government doesn't officially define what makes a "city", so it's unclear what Meta means by this. It's also unclear whether this only refers to the urban area or the metropolitan area. I, for example, was unable to use on-foot navigation near JFK airport, despite New York being listed, with the feature only becoming available in Manhattan. We'll find out in May.

The expansion of navigation being US-only makes sense, given that the company indefinitely delayed its plans to launch Meta Ray-Ban Display internationally in January, citing unexpectedly high demand and supply limitations.

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Neural Handwriting Wide Rollout

In January, Meta started rolling out Neural Handwriting to the Early Access program for Meta Ray-Ban Display owners in the US.

The feature lets you enter text letter-by-letter by using your index finger to trace letters on a surface, such as a desk or your thigh, sensed by the surface electromyography (sEMG) sensors of the Meta Neural Band.

At the Early Access launch, it was limited to WhatsApp and Messenger. Now, Meta says it's rolling out to "everyone in the coming weeks", and that it will support Instagram and native iOS and Android messaging too.

Further International Expansion

Meta and EssilorLuxottica say they'll start selling their Ray-Ban Meta and Oakley Meta smart glasses in new countries "in the coming months", including Japan, South Korea, Singapore, Chile, Colombia, and Peru.

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This will bring the total number of countries where the Ray-Ban Meta and Oakley Meta glasses are sold to 24:

• Australia
• Austria
• Belgium
• Canada
• Chile
• Colombia
• Denmark
• Finland
• France
• Germany
• India
• Ireland
• Italy
• Japan
• Mexico
• Norway
• Peru
• Singapore
• South Korea
• Spain
• Sweden
• United Arab Emirates
• United Kingdom
• United States of America

The latest addition to the Golf+ catalog of over forty courses is available now for $11.99. This new DLC accompanies a new 2026 Azalea Collection with new clubs, headcovers, golf ball, golf bag, and putter grip.

"Towering high above the clouds, Dynasty weaves through ancient terraces, stone temples, and dramatic cliffs. Serene, otherworldly, and rich with history, it blends calm beauty with bold elevation and unforgettable views." - Developer GolfScope

Watch the full trailer for Dynasty here.

Golf+ DLCs can range in price, depending on each course's length and complexity, going as low as $4.99 and as high as $14.99. Players can also subscribe to the Golf+ Pass service for $9.99 a month (or $99.99 per year) to get access to all courses.

GOLF+ is out now on Quest for $29.99 and comes with three original courses. The developers have also confirmed the long-awaited PC VR release for sometime this summer.

In a short developer post, Vertigo stated that the servers for RTS arena battler Skyworld: Kingdom Brawl will be switched off on July 11, rendering the game unplayable. This follows multiplayer support being dropped in July 2025 due to the discontinuation of its multiplayer service, UNET.

Kingdom Brawl first released in March 2019 on Viveport before a Steam release the following month and an Oculus Quest 1 port that September. In the April 2 statement, Vertigo said the game has already been delisted from all platforms and is no longer available for purchase. At the time of this article, that does not appear to be the case just yet. The game remains on sale for $9.99 though this may be a simple matter of platforms processing the delisting request.

The original Skyworld, which also lost multiplayer with the UNET shutdown in 2025, is also still available for $14.99 on Steam and the original PlayStation VR.

Vertigo Games, makers of the upcoming The 7th Guest Remake for Switch, PlayStation 5, Xbox and PC, have announced that players who have already purchased The 7th Guest VR on SteamVR or PlayStation VR2 will instantly gain access to the flat screen Remake when it launches later this year.

In addition, people who buy the flat screen remake when it releases will also gain access to the SteamVR or PlayStation VR2 version.

The 7th Guest VR is a VR remake of one of the most chilling and atmospheric PC puzzle games from the early 1990s. In The 7th Guest, six guests have been summoned to a foreboding mansion, where the wealthy recluse and toymaker Henry Stauf hides in the shadows. You'll explore the eerie mansion, solve puzzles and uncover secrets while battling mysterious horrors for your sanity and your life.

We reviewed The 7th Guest VR when it debuted, concluding that "Vertigo Games has summoned the particular 90s adventure game charm of The 7th Guest in this VR adaptation, reinterpreting it as a spooky, nuanced mystery that feels like a good fit for the medium."

Buy The 7th Guest Remake for flat screens on Steam and the PlayStation Store, or find The 7th Guest VR on SteamVR and PlayStation VR2.

For April 2026, Meta is bringing three games to its Games Catalog, as well as two Monthly Games for Horizon+ subscribers. Starting with the Games Catalog, players can team up in ballistic battles with Breachers, relax with Vacation Simulator, and stick it to the fuzz with Prison Boss Prohibition.

Here's everything you need to know about this eclectic trio.

Breachers

Breachers is a tactical multiplayer shooter that lets you team up with other players in competitive matches where strategy is as important as reflexes. Similar to flat screen games like Rainbow Six Siege, in Breachers, the defending team fortifies their position and tries to protect their asset while the offensive team storms the building to plant and detonate a bomb. It's a classic shooter mechanic made even better in VR.

Vacation Simulator

By the makers of Job Simulator, Vacation Simulator is a wacky approximation of what humans call "relaxation." In Vacation Simulator you'll chill at the Vacation Island poolside cabana, and take part in plenty of authentic, interactive holiday activities with a vast cast of robot pals.

Prison Boss Prohibition

Set in a bird-themed approximation of New York called "New Yolk City," Prison Boss Prohibition is a physics-based business simulator where your job is to run an illegal merchandise stand. You'll craft illicit goods, upgrade your shack, and unlock new crafting trees, all while avoiding the scrutiny of The Law. Our review described the game as "a hilarious opportunity to test your criminal prowess in VR."

Horizon+ Monthly Games

In addition, April's Horizon+ Monthly Games are the action shooter Vendetta Forever and puzzler The House of Da Vinci VR. As always, previously redeemed games will remain in your library while subscribed to the service.

Vendetta Forever

Vendetta Forever is an action shooter that's all about fast reflexes and rapid planning. You'll shoot your way through rooms full of enemies, and you can only move forward when you take down a baddie, zooming forward to catch their falling weapons to use against the next foe. We reviewed Vendetta Forever when it debuted, calling it "a clever puzzle game disguised as a shooter with great replayability."

The House of Da Vinci VR

The House of Da Vinci VR is a captivating puzzle adventure that immerses you in the world and time of famed inventor Leonardo Da Vinci. As Leonardo's most promising pupil, you'll travel to Florence only to find that Leo has mysteriously disappeared. What follows is an adventure full of puzzles, inventions, and hidden secrets. Our reviewer called The House of Da Vinci VR "one of the best VR puzzle games I've ever played, delivering an experience that's been lovingly created with reverence to its historical inspiration."

Horizon+ Games Catalog Games

Horizon+ continues offering a Games Catalog of Quest titles that any subscriber can access. 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:

• Angry Birds VR: Isle of Pigs
• Asgard's Wrath 2
• Beat Saber
• Blacktop Hoops
• Breachers
• Cubism
• Deisim
• Demeo
• Demeo Battles
• Dungeons Of Eternity
• Fruit Ninja 2
• GOLF+
• Ghosts of Tabor
• Green Hell VR
• Grimlord
• I Expect You To Die 3
• iB Cricket
• In Death: Unchained
• Into Black
• Into the Radius
• Job Simulator
• LES MILLS BODYCOMBAT: Fitness workouts
• 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
• Spatial Ops
• Starship Home
• The 7th Guest VR
• The Climb 2
• The Light Brigade
• The Thrill of the Fight
• Thief Simulator VR: Greenview Street
• Titans Clinic
• Townsmen VR
• Vacation Simulator
• Walkabout Mini Golf
• War of Wizards
• Zero Caliber: Reloaded

Horizon+ Indie Catalog Games

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

• Alvo
• Apex Construct
• Arcade Paradise VR
• Audio Trip
• Barbaria
• Barbershop Simulator VR
• Cactus Cowboy - Desert Warfare
• Chess Club
• Coffee Quest VR
• Crumbling
• Cybrix
• Darksword: Battle Eternity
• DIG VR
• Espire 1: VR Operative
• Final Overs - VR Cricket
• Galaxy Kart
• Ghost Signal: A Stellaris Game
• Grill on Wheels
• I Am Hamster - Simulator
• Innkeeper VR
• IRON GUARD
• Ironlights
• Killer Frequency
• Laser Thief
• Motion Soccer PRO
• Mythic Realms
• Operation Serpens
• Retropolis 2: Never Say Goodbye
• Rogue Ascent VR
• Rogue Piñatas: VRmageddon
• RUNNER
• Shooty Fruity
• Slot Car VR
• Squingle
• Stupid Cars
• Sushi Ben
• Taiko Frenzy
• The Curious Tale of the Stolen Pets
• The Pirate Queen with Lucy Liu
• The Secret of Retropolis
• The Wizards
• Tiny Archers
• Towers and Powers
• ULTIMATE SWING GOLF by Clap Hanz
• Underworld Overseer
• Vibe Punch
• We Are One
• Windlands 2

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 users can give Meta Horizon+ a try for a month.

XReal Games, the team behind the Zero Caliber series, announced it is developing two new titles with both expected to release sometime in 2026. The first is Zero Caliber: Frostbite, a solo and co-op adventure inspired by Ubisoft's Far Cry series. Per XReal, this entails drivable vehicles, a huge open-world island with open-ended objectives, and giving players the freedom to tackle the campaign however they want.

XReal Games says the Far Cry inspired game will include "open-ended missions, full freedom of approach, and a dynamic world filled with enemy soldiers, zombies, and unexpected encounters".

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UploadVRPete Austin

The second, as yet unnamed title, is described as a "hardcore tactical milsim" and will be revealed next week. Both titles are said to still be in 'early development.'

XReal Games is planning regular playtests for Zero Caliber: Frostbite. Anyone interested can sign up using this form.

Realcast Inc., developers of Le Dino Labo, has announced that the first expansion for their dinosaur-building mixed-reality experience is available now on Meta Quest. "Jurassic Giants" introduces three new dinosaurs to the casual puzzle game, including Allosaurus, Stegosaurus, and Diplodocus.

Like the dinosaurs previously available in the base game, 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.

In addition to the new dinosaurs, Jurassic Giants introduces new assembly challenges with varied bone complexity, multiple difficulty levels, scientific insights revealed during skeleton construction, and full mixed-reality integration for a life-sized display.

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 Jurassic Giants DLC is available now on the Meta Horizon Store for $3.99.

Action Hero, best described as a blockbuster summer film series come to life in VR, released in December 2024 for $19.99. Players 'film' a series of increasingly over-the-top action parodies in a campy adventure that never takes itself too seriously. We played Action Hero at release, saying it "successfully walks that fine line between being approachable for VR newcomers while offering a thrilling campaign for more established players."

Fast Travel Games announced in a post on X that Action Hero's new permanent price is $9.99, half of its original cost. This is not the first time Fast Travel has reduced the price of its games. Sci-fi roguelite Ghost Signal: A Stellaris Game was cut from $19.99 to $9.99 in early 2025. Futuristic action-adventure Apex Construct dropped from $29.99 at release in 2018 to $9.99 in 2021. Cozy puzzler The Curious Tale of the Stolen Pets started at $14.99 in 2019 and was cut twice, first to $9.99 and later to its current $6.99 price.

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Fast Travel Games recently announced its latest title, Payday: Aces High, at the Spring 2026 VR Games Showcase earlier this month. The co-op heist shooter comes to PC VR and Meta Quest later this year.

Action Hero is available now on Quest for $9.99.

Game Info And Release Date

After multiple informative developer diaries and a tantalizing Steam Next Fest demo in February, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Empire City releases on April 30 for PC VR, Pico, and Meta Quest 3 headsets for $24.99. Developer Cortopia (Escaping Wonderland) and publisher Beyond Frames have also released a new trailer:

If you're somehow not familiar with the source material, TMNT follows four teenage turtles and their surrogate father, a rat named Splinter; all of whom were mutated into anthropomorphic forms by a mysterious ooze found in the sewers of New York. Splinter names the turtles after famous artists: Leonardo, Michelangelo, Donatello, and Raphael. He also trains them in the art of ninjitsu so they can defend New York and sometimes the entire world (and other worlds) against the forces of evil. That's the basics in a half-shell.

Empire City is a VR hack and slash (and kick) action-adventure that supports co-op for up to four players. We have now been hands-on with the game three different times: a brief tour of the turtles' sewer lair, the aforementioned Next Fest demo, and a private session with Beyond Frames CEO, Ace St. Germain, at March's Game Developers Conference.

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Empire City Demo Leaves Us Wanting More

The Steam Next Fest Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Empire City demo leaves us wanting the full release ASAP.

UploadVRMike Johnson

Our Impressions From GDC

Note: All video and screenshots were provided by Beyond Frames. We were not allowed to film our actual gameplay.

Ace was aware I had already played the Next Fest demo when I arrived for our session, so we quickly selected our preferred turtles, Leonardo for me, and jumped right into a co-op session. There is very little friction to get into co-op with a simple terminal at the lair's exit doubling as the lobby setup UI. He and I were connected and out of the sewers in less than two minutes. After emerging from the sewer lair, Ace pointed out a previously unknown tidbit about the game: its open world adjacent exploration of New York.

We were on a mission to take down infamous TMNT villainous mutant rhino, Rocksteady, indicated by a marker off in the distance. A signal came in over coms, indicating a crime happening somewhere in the city. Players have the option of springing into action to thwart whatever crime is taking place and earning points to be used later or staying on mission. None of these side missions are intended to be long, a few minutes at most, but they randomly respawn as you play, consistently offering new diversions that fans of open world games will be very familiar with.

Before we could get to Rocksteady, we had to parkour around the surrounding buildings to dispatch the Foot clan ninjas guarding him from the rooftops, with some of them carrying sniper rifles. The parkour was just as intuitive and fluid as I recalled from my Next Fest session. I was scaling buildings and moving with ease, even if I overshot my jumps a time or two.

With the Foot ninjas out of the way, we dropped into an alley to fight Rocksteady. An invincibility debug mode was turned on for this fight so I could take it all in without worrying about dying. Rocksteady's attacks were varied, but not too difficult to understand. He swings a hammer, tries to gore you on his horn, and tosses explosives, all while constantly talking smack in a heavy New York accent. It's a fast paced, kinetic fight that felt ripped straight from the comics or any of the numerous Ninja Turtles cartoons over the years. After this, we returned to the lair where I discovered, for the first time, a crafting station built by Donatello where health syringes and other items can be acquired to take out on missions.

When we were done, Ace further explained that Cortopia took cues from other open world games like Skyrim and the flatscreen Batman Arkham games as inspiration, albeit on a smaller AA scale. For the co-op, it drew from successful VR multiplayer experiences like Dungeons of Eternity and Walkabout, games that have successfully become a common activity of choice for groups of VR gamers. These are great examples to work from and Empire City combines elements of them all in a package I can see myself spending dozens of hours in with friends.

For me, Empire City is also reminiscent of the now-defunct studio Twisted Pixel's Path of the Warrior and Deadpool VR, both of which featured breezy, easy-to-understand combat and a sense that the game does not take itself too seriously. They're just plain fun and that's what Empire City has been each time I played it. Fun. Check back for our full review of the game when it releases at the end of this month.

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Empire City releases on April 30 for Meta Quest 3 headsets, Steam, and Pico. The Meta Quest version can be pre-ordered with a 20% discount.

Normal VR, makers of the incredibly inventive games Half & Half and Nock, have revealed a new trailer and release date for their upcoming solo / 3-player co-op campaign shooter Flag Games. Launching on Meta Quest on April 9, Flag Games is billed as "VR's fastest shooter," and if the trailer is anything to go by, we may be in for an extremely stylish and interesting FPS.

Check out the trailer for yourself.

In Flag Games, you and up to two of your pals will work your way through a campaign in which your goal is simple: infiltrate hostile facilities, capture the flag, and get out. Enemies are fast, and so are you as you battle through baking solar fields, coastal hydraulic stations, high-altitude wind farms, and more. Expect battles to be intense and unpredictable, packed with intense moments and outrageous weapons.

Flag Games uses both joystick movement, and the award-winning movement system from Normal's earlier game Nock.

Flag Games is currently available at a 25% discount pre-order price of $14.99 on the Meta Horizon store.

Neat Corp announced on BlueSky today that it has permanently reduced the cost of several of its games on select platforms.

The original stealth thrillers Budget Cuts and Budget Cuts 2: Mission Insolvency are both $14.99, half of their original $29.99 price point. 2023's Budget Cuts Ultimate, a combination of both games with updated mechanics, was lowered from $29.99 to $19.99. Cozy gardening sim Garden of the Sea drops to $9.99 for both VR and flatscreen on Steam.

Neat Corp's latest title, Norse roguelite Crossings, remains at its launch price of $9.99.

It should be noted these price changes currently only apply on the Steam and Meta platforms, including the Rift Store versions for Budget Cuts 1 and 2.

Budget Cuts 1 is available on the original PlayStation VR and Budget Cuts Ultimate has a PS VR2 port. Garden of the Sea is also available on Pico, PS VR2, and Nintendo Switch. At the time of this article, all of those platforms show the original price for each game.

Doug North Cook from Creature, who works with Neat Corp on marketing, confirmed that the PlayStation VR prices will also be lowered soon.

Developer and publisher CM Immersive announced today that Into the Radius 2 will leave Early Access on PC VR on April 23 with a fully playable story campaign added to the game.

In addition to the new plotline, the 1.0 update also adds new weapons, anomalies, mission types, and gear (including a flare rocket and night vision goggles). Players can also expect updates to the location travel & discovery system, gun paint system, and the return of grenades, melee weapons, and a playable guitar in the base, from the first game.

Into the Radius 2 Early Access Review: Barebones Survival

Into the Radius 2 lays a solid foundation for a sequel, but an onslaught of bugs, glitches, and various issues makes it hard to currently recommend.

UploadVRCallum Self

Into the Radius 2 started in Early Access in July 2024 on Steam for $39.99, introducing two-player co-op to the series. A port for Meta Quest 3 headsets followed in May 2025. CM Immersive previously stated it does not plan to adjust the price for the full release.

Into the Radius 2 is available in Early Access on Steam and Quest 3/3S.

Bomb the Hill was born out of a prototype built for the Oculus Publishing Ignition program, a funding initiative for Quest games announced by Meta in 2024. This program offered a path to funding projects targeting 'midcore' players with a particular interest in simulation, sports, and social projects.

Bomb the Hill promises downhill speeds of over seventy miles per hour across fifteen tracks spanning ten square miles each. Developer Pokodzima Studio worked with professional downhill riders to develop the game's mechanics to ensure its jumps, tucks, spins, and overall movement feel intuitive and true to life.

The game features multiple gameplay modes and a career mode with a story focusing on skateboarding pioneers. The original prototype of Bomb the Hill was showcased during Chris Pruett’s session “The Past, Present, and Future of VR and MR Development" at 2025's Game Developers Conference.

Bomb the Hill can be wishlisted now on Quest. It is expected to release sometime this spring with a planned price of $19.99.

Flow Studio brings a familiar format to the platform. Users move through rhythm-based sequences, smashing balloon-like targets with handheld bats while crouching and lunging under incoming obstacles set at different heights and angles.

But this isn’t just another workout mode.

FitXR co-founder and CEO Sam Cole told me the decision to build Flow Studio came together quickly following changes in the VR fitness landscape, particularly around uncertainty with Supernatural’s future.

“After obviously hearing the news of Supernatural… we felt like you just had to go visit their Facebook page to see how much it means to that community,” Cole told me.

That reaction is hard to miss. For many users, flow-style workouts weren’t just another option. They were the routine. And within that community, the concern was palpable.

These aren’t casual users. Many rely on these workouts as their primary form of exercise, and even the possibility of that changing creates real uncertainty.

For users who have built long-term routines around VR fitness, stability matters as much as innovation.

Rather than guessing what users wanted, FitXR went directly to them. Cole said the team spoke with “loads and loads of Supernatural members… power users” to understand what they valued most and what they would miss if the experience went away. One answer kept coming up. “The Flow Studio just came out so, so clearly as one of the top things that they wanted,” he said.

The speed of the rollout is notable. While the concept had been prototyped internally for years, the decision to bring it to market was driven by the moment.

I’m part of the exact group FitXR is targeting here. My weekly routine has been split across multiple apps, including Supernatural, FitXR, and others. Flow workouts were always the one thing I couldn’t really replace. Boxing exists everywhere. Flow doesn’t.

The timing makes sense. Given the uncertainty around Supernatural, FitXR is stepping in at a moment when users are actively looking for what comes next. Rather than trying to convince new users that VR fitness works, it’s focused on giving existing users a way to continue something they were already doing.

Flow Studio is launching as a starting point, not a finished system. Cole emphasized that the goal was to move quickly, even if that meant shipping without every feature users might expect on day one.

“We wanted to get something out there fast and then we will treat it as iterative,” he said.

That approach follows a pattern for FitXR, which has leaned on continuous updates and user feedback since its initial launch as BoxVR in 2017.

“This has been the journey of FitXR since we launched… just evolving and evolving and evolving,” Cole said.

Flow Studio also lands as part of a broader shift inside the app. Cole pointed to upcoming changes in visual design, including a move toward more realistic environments while still keeping some of the stylized elements FitXR is known for.

At the same time, the company is thinking beyond headsets, with plans to support users across devices and future form factors. “We really want to be able to serve the customer that we know so well… wherever they are,” he said.

Underneath all of this is a bigger bet on VR fitness itself. Cole doesn’t see the space as saturated, but still early. “It’s definitely a rising tide at the moment… we’re growing the size of the pie,” he said.

That thinking shows up in how FitXR is approaching Flow Studio. This isn’t just about adding a feature or competing for users. It’s about keeping people engaged in VR fitness at all.

Because once that habit breaks, it’s hard to replace. When FitXR asks users what would happen if VR fitness disappeared, Cole said “the vast majority say I’d go back to sitting on the couch.”

After spending some time with a pre-release version of Flow Studio, it’s clearly built around the established flow workout formula.

The core mechanics will feel familiar. Targets follow FitXR’s existing color system, with blue on the left and yellow on the right, paired with matching bats in each hand. That continuity helps the mode settle in quickly, especially for existing FitXR users.

The choreography isn’t as refined or intricate as what Supernatural built at its peak, but it doesn’t need to be. The sessions I tried were more than enough to elevate my heart rate into the red zone and sustain it. From a fitness standpoint, it delivers. And like much of FitXR, it feels positioned to improve over time as the team refines what makes flow workouts work.

What matters more is that the full-body movement is there. Flow workouts work because they force you to move through space, not just hit targets. Squatting, lunging, and shifting laterally are all part of the experience, and Flow Studio captures that foundation.

One area where FitXR may have an advantage is in how it handles obstacles. Instead of the triangular shapes used in Supernatural, Flow Studio uses arches that you duck under or move around. They’re easier to read at a glance, which helps keep you in rhythm without hesitation.

That could make a difference, particularly for newer users who may have struggled with interpreting movement cues in other apps. More importantly, it ties directly to the bigger challenge Cole kept coming back to. Not just getting people into VR fitness, but keeping them there.

If Flow Studio does what it’s aiming to do, it won’t just feel familiar. It’ll be something users return to daily or weekly as part of their routine.

The technical side of installing VR mods can be a daunting task, especially for users who may not be the most tech savvy among us. It recently came to my attention that someone had released several all-in-one VR Mod Installers for every Resident Evil game currently playable in VR. These installers simplify the process of installing custom VR mods for various Resident Evils, allowing you to play your Steam copies of Resident Evils in VR with full 6DoF motion controls.

I reached out to the person who made the installers, a VR content creator known as MrSurviv0r, to ask about the process and motivation for bringing such a wonderful solution to the VR community.

"The whole thing started because I watched videos from GamertagVR and Beardo Benjo about Resident Evil 4 VR, and both of them talked about how long and difficult it was to get the mod installed and running," said MrSurviv0r. "After seeing that, it became obvious that a lot of people were struggling to get the mods working correctly. Despite having good luck with the instructions myself, I figured I could lean on my programming background and see if I could help."

After developing an RE4VR Mod Installer for Talemann1982's RE4 VR motion-controlled mod, MrSurviv0r thought his work was done.

"Then a few weeks later [Talemann1982] released the RE9 VR motion-controlled mod," he tells us. "Its instructions were simpler, but people were still hitting a wall. One of the features I had built for RE4 was a small app called RE4VR-Runtime-Switcher.exe, which lets users switch runtimes without renaming files or copying things around by hand. That was a hit with the RE4 installer, so I made the same kind of tool for Resident Evil Requiem."

But his work didn't end there.

"After that, I started getting requests for a Resident Evil Village installer. That was when it really hit me that Praydog updates REFramework nightly, so I came up with the REFramework Nightly Updater. It detects your Steam installs, lets you check Praydog’s nightly GitHub builds, and gives you the option to update to the latest nightly. Before it updates anything, it scans the files in the nightly zip and backs up those exact files."

"I posted a screenshot on X talking about how I had finished all the installers. By about 5:45 the next morning it was over 160,000. I had no idea that many people were waiting on something like this.

"I hated the thought of people walking away from all the hard work Praydog has done with REFramework, or from what Talemann has done with the RE4 and RE9 VR motion-controlled mods, just because setup felt intimidating. I wanted to help remove that barrier. It has been about giving back to a community that welcomed me from the start and has treated me really well."

The really slick thing about MrSurviv0r's installers is that they're an all-in-one solution. That means if you download them and have a legitimate copy of the Steam version of RE2, RE3, RE4, RE7, RE8, or RE9, you are good to go. No file fetching, just download the installer, adjust some in-game settings, and play.

You can download the installers on MrSurviv0r's site here.

Zero Latency VR has announced a partnership with CD Projekt Red, makers of The Witcher and Cyberpunk 2077, to bring the universe of Cyberpunk 2077 to their warehouse-scale VR locations all around the world.

The brand-new in-person experience is built specifically for Zero Latency VR's untethered free-roam VR technology, which allows players to physically move together through a shared space. This self-contained experience will allow players to explore Cyberpunk 2077's iconic Night City "at a human scale," according to Zero Latency VR's CEO Tim Ruse.

Zero Latency VR is the largest free-roam VR "arcade" operator in the world, with over 150 venues in 30 countries. A full list of locations can be seen here. The brand has previously partnered with Ubisoft on a Far Cry VR experience, and brought Warhammer 40k to their large-scale VR locations. The full offering of Zero Latency VR experiences can be seen here.

The Cyberpunk 2077 immersive VR experience will launch at Zero Latency VR locations worldwide. Additional details and a more defined release date will be revealed at a later time.

JollyCo has released a new trailer for their upcoming VR shooter Sugar Madness. Coming to the Meta Horizon Store in spring 2026, Sugar Madness is a fast-paced VR first-person shooter where quick reactions, smart decisions, and precise aim are the keys to survival.

Check out the new gameplay trailer just below.

In addition to the gameplay trailer, JollyCo has announced that players will soon be able to play the game ahead of release in an open playtest set to start toward the end of April. To join the open playtest, players should join the game's Discord server here.

Sugar Madness is a fast-paced, immersive first-person shooter set in a candy-themed world. Dr. Sour, a mad genius, has experimented one too many times, turning the once-sweet confections of the world into rabid "candymorphs." You'll battle through an absurd candy-coated landscape, shooting a vast arsenal of wild weapons at a bizarre gauntlet of enemies. There are on-rails sections, boss fights, mini games, multiplayer, and more.

Sugar Madness will be launching soon on Meta Quest. Interested players can wishlist the game now.

Game Information & Release Date

Hot off releasing a new gameplay trailer at the VR Games Showcase, Innerspace's Spymaster will come to Meta Quest and PC VR as an Early Access release on May 7. The game can be wishlisted now on your platform of choice.

Spymaster is a quirky spy adventure where players race against time to complete high stakes espionage missions using multiple secret agents and tools. The 'quirk' is the time element. Using a device called a C.A.S.S.E.T.T.E., time can be rewound or moved forward to make corrections during a run and hand items off between agents.

Our Demo Impressions

We had the chance to play Spymaster for about thirty minutes at the Game Developers Conference earlier this month. We were not allowed to film our gameplay and all of the footage and screenshots in this article were provided by Innerspace. I played the tutorial and the first mission of the game.

The game opens with a tutorial level explaining its movement system, including jumping, climbing, and physically pumping my arms to run. Two agents start on opposite ends of an obstacle course. Upon selecting an agent, the game shifts from an overhead third person view to the first person view of that agent. Then it was a simple matter of navigating obstacles to reach the center and hit a button.

After completing this for the first agent, I was introduced to the aforementioned C.A.S.S.E.T.T.E. device, a wristwatch on my left arm that I simply turned left or right to move time backwards and forward. I rewound time, selected the second agent, and completed his run to the center. In terms of mechanics, everything felt smooth and anyone with experience running around in a VR game will feel comfortable here.

After the tutorial, I was off to my first true mission, preventing a bomb from blowing up a train. This level opens with the train being destroyed before I went back into time using the C.A.S.S.E.T.T.E. to save the day. This mission also introduced the concept of secondary objectives. Each agent has their own objectives and I would imagine these will differ more and more as the game progresses. The most interesting thing was how death is handled. When you die, the recording of the mission simply stops and lets me rewind to any point during my run to 'fix' it, as opposed to respawning from a predetermined save point.

The 'left' agent, Tic, starts on a cliffside overlooking a tunnel before hopping down to the train emerging from said tunnel. I died immediately here, not dodging quickly enough to avoid a rail sign. Then I simply rewound to just before the sign, successfully avoided it, and made it to my objective point.

The second agent, a robot, simply moves through train cars to the center. This run was less interesting and I think that was on purpose because this agent had two secondary objectives: high five Tic and photograph a document. Even after successfully completing the mission, I could still rewind to get the secondary objectives done. Completionists will love this mechanic as it will save time replaying entire missions repeatedly to get everything done.

Visually, Spymaster has the same vibrant low poly look of The Fisherman's Tale games and Maskmaker, so there's not a lot of detail to admire, but everything looked sharp. The voice acting was fine too. Overall, I walked away wanting to play more and that's all a good demo needs to accomplish.

It does lack the immediate charm both Fisherman's Tales, Maskmaker, and One True Path presented, but this is a different, decidedly more high stakes scenario than any of those games. I did, however, find myself wishing there was some banter between the two agents on the mission, just to introduce a bit of personality to them. Innerspace's strength is in its quirky gameplay mechanics and characterization and I felt like I only got half of that equation. This is something I hope to get in the full game.

Spymaster can be wishlisted now on Steam and Quest ahead of its May 7 Early Access release.

You are a Vulcan Starfleet officer on a covert mission aboard the Federation starship U.S.S. Lumen. Once aboard, you find that the crew is missing or killed, and a deadly entity has infested the ship. Before long, you are infected, and as the entity mutates your body and warps your mind, you gain dangerous new abilities but lose your grip on reality.

That's the narrative backdrop of Star Trek: Infection by Played With Fire (Mixture), a VR development studio based out of Poland that recently sent a number of its team all the way to Boston, Massachusetts to demo Star Trek: Infection at PAX East, one of the largest yearly game conventions in the USA.

I was there too, and I played twenty minutes of Star Trek: Infection while thousands of con attendees swarmed somewhere outside the scope of my Meta Quest 3. I was distracted, overwhelmed, and unnerved, and that was before I ever fired up the game. Once I'd beamed aboard the U.S.S. Lumen, things spiraled even further out of control.

I was launched into a segment of the game that the devs described as "slightly further along" than the typical demo, and my play session instantly took a sinister turn.

A mutated corpse sat slumped in the captain's chair, while monstrous zombie-like crew members lurched in the shadows. My goal was to make it to a computer terminal to activate something-or-other (the con was very loud and I was dropped into a mission without much preamble). But while I didn't really have much context for what I was doing or why, the vertical slice of the game they let me demo was still an effective and engrossing experience.

You have a bevy of tools at your disposal: the communicator lights a path for your next objective, a head-mounted flashlight shines at the flick of a switch, the iconic Tricorder allows for scanning the environment, unlocking doors, and managing basically everything, and the equally iconic Phaser (gun) sits on your hip, ready to Stun or Kill when needed.

What impressed me about these tools is that each works beautifully and intuitively. Actuating any of these items or pulling them from your holsters is effortless and fast. Furthermore, much thought has clearly gone into their implementation. For example, the Phaser is not all-powerful. While it can stun enemies, this is not super effective, being more like a knockback and having a cooldown timer after every use. The Phaser can be switched to Kill, but this mode is charged by consoles throughout the ship, and often these consoles can only charge one shot into the Phaser at a time. This keeps the player teetering on the brink of powerlessness.

As I explored the ship's decrepit hallways and ominously vacant crew quarters, my Tricorder scanned the environment for danger and, to my delight, collectables. These I gathered to learn the lore of the game and to bolster the story through environmental narrative.

I stealthily made my way through the ship, crawling along hallways swarming with enemies, staying quiet and low to avoid them. I tossed objects to distract them, and held my breath (in real life) as I crept by out of sight.

Meanwhile, the devs explained the game's greater systems as best they could through the fog of my fear. The takeaway is that there's a lot going on in Star Trek: Infection.

The major feature of the game is the way the player character changes over the course of the 5-8 hour campaign. While you start off as a pretty standard member of Starfleet, the titular infection will quickly begin to change your body. Where you once used your hands as any Vulcan would, soon you're sprouting infected digits with terrifying abilities. You'll monitor your health condition with the Tricorder, choose to fight the infection or embrace it, and use your mutation to unlock powerful abilities.

You'll do the Vulcan nerve pinch, mind meld, and craft weapons and tools essential to survival. You'll interact with the ship's LCARS computer panels, and explore four distinct biomes aboard the U.S.S. Lumen. You can hide in cocoons, snap the necks of enemies, or fight your enemies head on (scary, don't recommend).

Some enemies are blind, some have physiological weak points that must be exploited, and some are best dispatched through crafted traps or environmental hazards. I learned pretty quickly to take these foes seriously.

After distracting a few of the mutated crew with a tossed object and managing to traverse a maze-like room of horror, I got a little distracted myself, and failed to notice the monster crewman creeping up from behind. By the time I noticed, it was too late. I fired my Phaser on stun, which knocked him back, but the noise of it brought other monsters scampering. I ran, but within a few moments, I was dead.

The devs describe Star Trek: Infection as a story-driven horror survival game, but one that leans closer to the psychological than to jump scares and gore. That said, I was plenty nervous playing Infection. As far as horror games go, it looks gruesome, sounds terrifying, and feels utterly unsettling.

Star Trek: Infection VR is out now on Quest 3 and PC VR via SteamVR. We will have a full review in the coming days.

Ray-Ban Meta Optics Styles

The two 'Optics Styles' are Blayzer Optics and Scriber Optics. Blayzer Optics has a rectangular style and is available in Standard and Large size, while Scriber Optics has a more rounded look and is only available in one size.

Compared to the rest of the Ray-Ban Meta Gen 2 lineup, both Optics Styles feature:

• 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.
• Optician-adjustable temple tips that Meta claims "can be shaped to a perfect fit".

Meta claims these improvements make Blayzer Optics and Scriber Optics more suitable for "all-day wear". The idea here is that the company wants people to use them as their regular everyday prescription eyewear, not just as sunglasses. The existing Ray-Ban Meta glasses already support prescriptions, to be clear, but arguably aren't comfortable enough for that use case for many people. It remains to be seen whether the new Optics Styles are.

Other than these ergonomic improvements, from a technology perspective they're almost identical to the rest of the Ray-Ban Meta Gen 2 lineup, with the same 8 hours of battery life. The only difference we're aware of is that they have an extra microphone near the nose pads, making the total number of microphones 6 instead of 5. The case is also dark brown, but otherwise has the same 6 full recharges.

Ray-Ban Meta Blayzer Optics and Ray-Ban Meta Scriber Optics are available to preorder in the US today, starting at $500, and will ship on April 14, when they will also be available in "select international markets" too.

Ray-Ban Meta Blayzer Optics colors:

• Matte Black
• Shiny Transparent Black
• Matte Transparent Ice Grey
• Shiny Transparent Dark Olive

Ray-Ban Meta Scriber Optics colors:

• Matte Black
• Shiny Transparent Black
• Transparent Shiny Stone Beige
• Transparent Shiny Umber

UploadVR's Kyle Riesenbeck is a self-described "bespectacled individual", and has preordered Blayzer Optics. We'll be curious to see whether Meta's first effort at a prescription-focused product is good enough to tempt him to adopt smart glasses for his everyday eyewear.

New Colors For Oakley Meta Glasses

Additionally, Meta and EssilorLuxottica are also launching new colors for Oakley Meta glasses – 4 new colors for Oakley Meta Vanguard and 2 new ones for Oakley Meta HSTN.

New Oakley Meta Vanguard colors:

• Black with Prizm Black Lenses
• White with Prizm Rose Gold Lenses
• Black with Prizm Transitions Ember Lenses
• Prizm Transitions Cobalt Lenses

New Oakley Meta HSTN colors:

• Black with Prizm Dark Golf Lenses
• Light Curry with Clear to Brown Transitions Lenses

The two new Transitions models of Vanguard are the first time that particular product has had Transitions lenses, and they'll be arriving "later this Spring".

The developers of GOLF+ have announced that their immensely popular golf sim game will be coming to PC VR via Steam sometime this year. Though an exact date has not yet been announced, the team is targeting a late summer release.

Alongside the planned Steam launch, GOLF+ is also continuing to develop a previously announced mixed-reality golf simulator experience that's innovative for the way it simultaneously allows a combined long game and accurate, nuanced putting experience.

GOLF+ is currently available through the Meta PC VR Store, as well as on Meta Quest, where it has sold over 1.5 million copies (as reported in February 2025). It currently sits at 15th on Meta's all-time best-selling list. We previously reported that the team are targeting a "unified experience" with "shared physics, multiplayer, and cross-play" across all platforms.

GOLF+ is $30 on the Meta Horizon Store for Quest headsets. The game comes with three selectable courses, while over 40 paid DLC courses are also offered, or you can access them all for $10/month with GOLF+ Pass.

GOLF+ will be swinging onto Steam in Summer 2026. You can wish list the game now.

Update

Alex Holodak, Polyarc Games' former DevOps Director, confirmed on LinkedIn that two-thirds of its staff were let go. The 'large project' mentioned in this article lost its funding in December 2025 while in mid-development and a third party publishing 'hail mary' to secure alternative funding did not go through.

Original Article

The Seattle, Washington-based studio says it had to reduce the size of the company after the cancellation of a major project and lack of funding.

In a statement on its LinkedIn company page, Polyarc Games, the makers of the Moss games and most recently Glassbreakers: Champions of Moss, announced it has to reduce its staff. The specific passage in the statement reads as follows:

After an unsuccessful team-wide effort to secure funding following the cancellation of a major project, we had to make the decision to significantly reduce the size of the company. This means we’re saying goodbye to many talented people who have been a meaningful part of what we’ve built.

The statement goes on to say that Polyarc will facilitate introductions between those affected by the layoffs and any companies who are hiring and share a spreadsheet of talent available.

Polyarc joins a growing list of VR developers in 2026 laying off employees, following Meta (Deadpool VR) shutting down several of its first party studios, nDreams (Reach) closing two of its studios, Mighty Coconut (Walkabout Mini Golf) letting go of a fourth of its team, Cloudhead Games (Pistol Whip) cutting its team by seventy percent, and most recently the pending closure of Rec Room.

Coming off of last week's VR Games Showcase, April will bring some highly anticipated VR releases from developers like Triangle Factory and Flat2VR Studios.

These dates were sourced from a combination of developer posts, store listings, direct communication with developers, and press releases and are subject to change. We will update this article if and when any dates are changed.

If we've missed new titles, be sure to let us know. We do know that Microsoft Flight Simulator is due sometime this month for PlayStation VR2, but do not have a firm date for that update yet.

Note: Titles marked with an asterisk (*) will be Early Access releases

Space Control - April 1 (Quest, PC VR)

Take Job Simulator, set it in space, add a copious amount of adult humor and you get Space Control. We played a demo during Steam Next Fest in February and at the time of this article, that demo is still available for those curious to check it out before purchasing.

Sci-Fi Job Sim Space Control Is Equal Parts Charm & Cringe

Drawing inspiration from Rick & Morty and Futurama, Space Control is an absurd adult-oriented VR job simulator that makes some players laugh, and others cringe.

UploadVRJames Tocchio

Store links: Quest, Steam

Beat the Beats VR - April 2 (PC VR, Quest, Pico)

Boxing VR rhythm game Beat the Beats expands to new platforms after its initial PS VR2 release. You can play a free demo on Quest and Steam. The Quest version will support 120fps at launch, matching the 120Hz mode on PS VR2.

Store Links: Quest, SteamVR, Pico 4

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

Among Us 3D VR Definitive Edition (PC VR, Quest, PS VR2, Pico)

As Schell Games steps away from Among Us 3D and returns development back to Innersloth, it leaves us with a Definitive Edition, returning limited-time game modes and crewmate roles to the game as permanent additions.

Store Links: Steam, Quest, Pico, PS VR2.

Wrath: Aeon of Ruin VR - Brutal Edition - April 9 (Quest, PC VR, PS VR2)

Flat2VR's long-awaited boomer shooter Wrath: Aeon of Ruin Brutal Edition finally arrives on April 9. Team Beef, who previously did VR mods for classic titles like Quake and Star Wars: Jedi Knight II, took on the conversion for this dark fantasy throwback first person shooter.

Wrath: Aeon Of Ruin VR: Brutal Edition Is A Throwback Boomer Shooter In All The Best Ways

Wrath: Aeon of Ruin finally has a release date for April. We played it at GDC earlier this month.

UploadVRMike Johnson

Store links: Quest, Steam, PS VR2

Puzzling Places - 3D Jigsaw Sim - April 9 (PC VR)

Cozy 3D jigsaw puzzle app Puzzling Places finally lands on Steam with both VR and flatscreen support with a free VR-supported demo already available.

Store links: Steam

Darts VR2: Bullseye - April 9 (Quest, PC VR, PS VR2)

Darts VR2: Bullseye, the follow up to the 2017 PC VR original, is a physics-based competitive darts game with online leaderboards and multiple gameplay modes.

Store links: Quest, Steam, PS VR2

Flag Games - April 9 (Quest)

Flag Games is a solo / three-player co-op campaign shooter from Normal VR, the team behind Nock and Half & Half. Normal is claiming Flag Games to be "VR's fastest shooter."

Store links: Quest

Catjinni Survivors - Apr 14 (PC VR, Quest)

Catjinni Survivors is a Vampire Survivors-inspired roguelite auto shooter. This is a hybrid title with VR and flatscreen support on Steam and a dedicated VR version for Meta Quest.

Store Links: Steam, Quest

*Just One Man - April 16 (PC VR, Quest)

Stylized hack and slash action game Just One Man follows its demo rollout in February's Steam Next Fest with an Early Access release. The demo is still available to play on Steam.

Store links: Quest, Steam

The Amusement - April 16 (PC VR, Quest)

The Amusement is a roomscale story-based puzzle adventure set in the 1920s. We played its demo during February's Steam Next Fest and the developers offered a deeper look at its "redirected" roomscale movement system in last week's VR Games Showcase.

The Amusement Demo Impressions: An A-Maze-ing Premise With Weak Roomscale

The Amusement shows a lot of potential as a narrative puzzler, but its implementation of roomscale movement may push players away early in the demo.

UploadVRMike Johnson

Store links: Quest, Steam

Extra Dimensional - April 16 (PC VR)

Extra Dimensional is a physics-based fantasy adventure that was pushed back from its planned February release so the developers could ensure a stable experience across all headset and PC configurations.

Store links: Steam

Marrow Marrow - April 16 (Quest, PC VR)

Marrow Marrow is an arena shooter with high speed parkour movement. The game had a featured demo in February's Steam Next Fest that is still available to play at the time of this article.

Store Links: Steam, Quest

*FlatOut 4 VR: Total Insanity - April 23 (PC VR Early Access)

We learned more about FlatOut 4 VR: Total Insanity at the VR Games Showcase. Longtime VR modder Mutar is bringing the racing title to VR as part of Flat2VR Studios' Spark program.

Store links: Steam

Little Nightmares VR: Altered Echoes - April 24 (Quest, PC VR, PS VR2)

Little Nightmares VR: Altered Echoes brings the acclaimed horror franchise into VR with a story based on the events of the first two entries in the series. You play as Dark Six on a quest to reunite with Six, the lead character from the first game.

Little Nightmares VR: Altered Echoes Is Disturbing In All The Right Ways

We went hands on with Bandai Namco’s Little Nightmares VR: Altered Echoes on PlayStation VR2 at GDC 2026.

UploadVRMike Johnson

Store links: Quest, PS VR2, Steam

Dimensional Double Shift Sporelando DLC - April 23 (Quest)

Sporelando is the fourth world for Owlchemy Labs' hand tracked multiplayer lighthearted job simulator. We had a chance to play the new dimension and speak with Owlchemy's 'CEOwl' Andrew Eiche this month at the Game Developer's Conference.

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.

UploadVRMike Johnson

Store links: Quest

Forefront [1.0 Release] - April 23 (Quest, PC VR, Pico)

Triangle Factory's large-scale, thirty-two-player Battlefield-style first person shooter leaves Early Access with a planned visual update for PC VR. A new map, Fjord, just released last week in conjunction with the VR Games Showcase. The PS VR2 version is still in development.

Forefront Hands-On: The Battlefield Multiplayer Experience In VR

Forefront in early access brings excitingly tense, large-scale multiplayer warfare reminiscent of Battlefield to VR.

UploadVRJames Tocchio

Store links: Quest, Steam, Pico

Into The Radius 2 [1.0 Release] - April 23 (PC VR)

After nearly two years of Early Access, Into The Radius 2 will leave Early Access on PC VR this month. The 1.0 update will include a fully playable story campaign, new weapons, tools, and updates to existing systems. ItR2 is also on Quest, but there is no news about that version leaving Early Access at this time.

Into the Radius 2 Early Access Review: Barebones Survival

Into the Radius 2 lays a solid foundation for a sequel, but an onslaught of bugs, glitches, and various issues makes it hard to currently recommend.

UploadVRCallum Self

Store Links: Steam

*Beyond Sandbox - Apr 23 (PC VR, Quest)

Beyond Sandbox is a physics-based, multiplayer sandbox modding platform coming to Early Access this month. The base game will have three modes: a competitive shooter, zombie horde mode, and sandbox.

Store Links: Steam, Quest

Evil Inside VR - Apr 23 (PS VR2, Quest)

Evil Inside is a first person psychological horror game that first released in 2021 on PC and all major gaming consoles. The VR conversion is being developed by Bowl of Tentacles and published by original developer JanduSoft.

Store Links: PS VR2, Quest

PROTON VR - April 24 (PC VR)

Proton is a Doom-inspired retro roguelite first person shooter in the same vein of titles like Compound VR built by a single developer. A free demo is available now on Steam.

Store links: Steam

One More Delve - April 27 (Quest, PC VR)

One More Delve is a co-op dungeon crawler for up to three players. Built by a single student developer, it showed off a new gameplay trailer at the last VR Games Showcase.

Store links: Steam, Quest

Echoes of Mora - April 29 (PC VR)

Echoes of Mora is an underwater story-based puzzler with a time travel element. The Steam version also supports flatscreen gameplay and has a free demo available to try. Read our early impressions at the link below.

Echoes of Mora Hands On: Approachable Underwater Puzzler With An Emotional Heart

Echoes of Mora sees you solve a mythical missing persons case in a dreamy aquatic puzzler.

UploadVRSarah Thwaites

Store links: Steam

A Long Survive - April 30 (PS VR2, PC VR)

A Long Survive is a co-op survival first person shooter claiming to have "the largest enemy waves ever seen in a VR game." It moves to PS VR2 and PC VR after an initial Quest release. The PS VR2 version utilizes headset haptics and adaptive triggers for added immersion.

Store links: Steam, PS VR2

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Empire City -Apr 30 (PC VR, Quest, Pico)

The heroes in a half shell four-player co-op beat 'em up closes out April. We've been hands on with this game three different times, always coming away impressed and wanting to play more.

Store Links: Quest, Steam, Pico

Rec Room originally launched in 2016 as a VR-only platform for the HTC Vive on SteamVR, with teleport-only locomotion. Later that year it came to the Oculus Rift with Touch controllers, then the original PSVR the year after. By 2018 it had shifted focus to flatscreen, launching on PC and PlayStation, and in subsequent years it came to iOS, Xbox, Android, and Nintendo Switch. Thus, Rec Room grew far beyond its VR roots.

In a blog post on Rec Room's official website, the company broke the news that it will be closing its doors on June 1, 2026. The post goes on to say "despite this popularity, we never quite figured out how to make Rec Room a sustainably profitable business. Our costs always ended up overwhelming the revenue we brought in."

"We spent a long time trying to find a way to make the numbers work. But with the recent shift in the VR market, along with broader headwinds in gaming, the path to profitability has gotten tough enough that we've made the difficult decision to shut things down."

Rec Room has been showing signs of struggle in the last year, going so far as to lay off fifty percent of its staff after a failed expansion of its user generated tools to consoles and mobile became too much for the team to handle. In that blog post, Rec Room admitted that the bulk of its "most impactful creation comes almost entirely from creators on PC and VR". That fifty percent staff reduction was the second round of layoffs in 2025 after a sixteen percent reduction in March.

Rec Room Halves Staff After ‘Pushing A Giant Vision We Couldn’t Realistically Deliver’

Rec Room’s co-founders said they let go roughly half the team today.

UploadVRIan Hamilton

The post details how the Rec Room team will wind down its services. I'll quote the full list here:

1. You can no longer create new accounts
2. You can no longer add someone as a friend
3. You can no longer sign up for Rec Room+ (RR+)
   1. If you have an active RR+ membership, that membership is extended to June 1st.
4. We have removed the RR+ requirement from Partnered Creator. Anyone with sufficient tokens can choose to cash them out.
   1. New registrations for Partnered Creator will be halted on May 1st.
5. You will no longer receive token rewards (e.g., at the end of an RRO)
6. You can no longer create new monetized UGC content, including:
   1. Room inventory items and offers
   2. Room keys, consumables, and currencies
   3. Avatar items (in-game and Avatar Studio)
7. The Room Rewards program has ended. March Room Rewards will be paid out in early April.
8. You can no longer purchase or receive new Roomie Energy

Additionally, all first party content in the Rec Room store will be discounted eighty percent. Starting in May, users will no longer be able to purchase or redeem gift cards for tokens. Creators will no longer be able to earn tokens after May 18. All tokens can be spent until June 1 when servers will go offline permanently.

You can read the full blog here, which also details the specifics of what happens to prepaid RR+ memberships and instructions for creators on how to download their content.

Journalist Janko Roettgers first spotted two new smart glasses from Meta pass US FCC certification. The models are identified as Scriber and Blazer, though it's unclear whether these are codenames or the actual product names.

Then, Bloomberg's Mark Gurman released a report with claimed details of what Scriber and Blazer will be. According to Gurman, both models will be intended for prescription wearers, come in rectangular and rounded styles, and be sold "primarily through traditional prescription eyewear channels".

There is no suggestion that Scriber and Blazer will have a display. They'll almost certainly be displayless, like all Meta's other smart glasses except for Meta Ray-Ban Display.

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

All Meta's existing smart glasses already support prescription lenses, including Meta Ray-Ban Display, with EssilorLuxottica's Ray-Ban and Sunglass Hut stores providing official options and dozens of third-parties offering cheaper alternatives.

Their design and marketing is primarily as sunglasses, though, and they're significantly heavier than most regular prescription glasses.

While Bloomberg's report doesn't say anything about a weight reduction, this would be the most obvious way for Meta and EssilorLuxottica to distinguish new smart glasses from what they already sell. That might mean trading off some battery life, or using a newer more efficient chip. Could we be in store for a Snapdragon AR1 Gen 2 from Qualcomm? Or is it too early for that?

Apparent Renders Of Next-Gen Ray-Ban Meta Glasses Leak

Apparent renders of next-gen Ray-Ban Meta glasses have leaked on Chinese social media, showing distinct designs for optical glasses and sunglasses.

UploadVRDavid Heaney

As to what Scriber and Blazer may look like, we should note that last year apparent renders of new Meta smart glasses leaked on Chinese social media, and one of the designs was labeled "Ray-Ban Meta 3 Optical". It was said to be codenamed Bellini.

We'll keep an eye on Meta and EssilorLuxottica this week for any sign of an official announcement, and bring you all the details when or if it comes.

UploadVR's Kyle Riesenbeck is a self-described "bespectacled individual", and we'll be curious to see whether Meta's first effort at a prescription-focused product is good enough to tempt him to adopt smart glasses for his everyday eyewear.

UPDATE March 31: Meta officially announced Ray-Ban Meta Blayzer Optics and Ray-Ban Meta Scriber Optics.

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

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

UploadVRDavid Heaney

The following price increases will take effect on Thursday:

• PS5 Digital Edition: $500 –> $600
• PS5: $550 –> $650
• PS5 Pro: $750 –> $900

This is the second time in less than a year that Sony has increased the price of its consoles, required to power the PlayStation VR2 headset if you don't own a gaming PC, or if you want to access PS VR2's exclusive titles.

The price hike will take place globally, with all regions seeing similar increases.

Sony Increases PS5 Console Prices In The US

From tomorrow, the Digital Edition will be $500, the version with a disc drive $550, and the PS5 Pro $750.

UploadVRDavid Heaney

Sony ascribes the new price hikes to "continued pressures in the global economic landscape", without giving a more specific reason. It's likely driven by the global memory shortage caused by AI datacenter buildouts, as well as factors like trade tariffs and war-related disruption to Qatar's export of helium, an essential element for semiconductor manufacturing.

It's the first time in gaming history that a mainstream console has gotten significantly more expensive over time rather than less. The PS5 Digital Edition launched almost six years ago at $400, yet will now cost $200 more.

That more than offsets the $150 price cut the PlayStation VR2 headset saw last year, meaning the minimum total cost of a PS VR2 system with a PS5 console is now $1000, up from $950 at the headset's launch.

PlayStation VR2’s Price Has Now Been Cut To $400

The price of PlayStation VR2 has now been cut to $400, following the announcement last week, and this includes Horizon Call of the Mountain.

UploadVRDavid Heaney

Of course, Sony isn't uniquely affected by worsening global macroeconomic conditions. Last month Valve announced that it needs to "revisit" its "exact shipping schedule and pricing" for Steam Frame and Steam Machine, though the company said its goal is still to ship in the first half of this year.

The situation will likely also affect Meta's plans. While The Wall Street Journal reported last year that Meta was targeting $1000 for its next headset, that seems increasingly unlikely.

Legendary Tales is, first and foremost, a classic dungeon crawler in virtual reality. Its obtuse RPG systems and nonexistent story mean, as our less-than-enthused reviewer wrote, “you have to grit your teeth to enjoy it all.” Fortunately, the reception to feedback from developer Urban Wolf Games means that Dawn of History, its first full-fledged expansion, addresses many of the issues of that first outing. Delivering an incredibly robust variety of builds, friendlier onboarding, and dangerous areas to explore, this DLC fundamentally changes the game for the better.

The narrative serves as an excuse for players to hack and slash their way through underground mazes. An alarmed goblin has arrived in the town, your hub area, explaining that trouble is brewing in the depths of a cathedral’s ruins. The game smartly stays out of its own way by adding simple but clear objectives in your quest to face the darkness below: destroy a magic crystal, eliminate ten enemies in a certain area, break a cursed tablet.

What is clearly impressive from the get-go is how expansive these areas are. Depending on how effective you are at clearing each enemy-filled room, each level could take about one to two hours. Although not fundamentally changing the objective of the quests, the level layout changes per player; I found out as I played what I thought would be the exact same maps in multiplayer. While this is mostly an aesthetic choice, it adds to the replayability.

Dawn of History is sinisterly playful in the way these levels are presented. The starting areas might be straightforward, with the familiar skeletons and new hellraiders assaulting you as you explore for loot. Soon you will find that it is in fact riddled with traps. Buzzsaws hanging from ceilings will end your journey short if you are not careful. Mimics, or fake chests, will bite the hand of greedy adventurers. At one point, I was in front of three doors to choose from, two of which were deadly traps as well.

Commonly criticized in the original release, there is still no map to speak of. As expected, this resulted in getting lost in these mazes often. Thankfully, this is circumvented by using wisps that show the correct path called “Guide Spirits,” found by breaking wooden boxes or vases. Advancing each floor by falling down further into the caves signals the increase in danger.

An approachable design choice, Dawn of History can be accessed in two ways: through a quest in town with your longtime character or by simply creating a level 50 character ready for the action from the main menu. This allows returning players who would want to play the fresh content to easily get there. Not only that, but it also gives players 100 thousand gold to flexibly customize and try their hand at the various builds on deck.

Quite clearly made for veterans of the game—there are no difficulty settings—I found it better to play with others. Luckily granted a legendary hammer by a crystal spawning random weapons bought in the main hub, I decided to go for a tank build, focusing mainly on blunt strength and vitality. This worked surprisingly well when I ventured with a powerful mage who had a legendary wand in turn. Its special skill to levitate powerful enemies while I beat them like a piñata meant we had a type of fun I did not know this otherwise gritty game had.

Our collaboration worked in more ways than one. He could enchant my hammer to cause frost elemental damage, enhancing each hit. With his divine build, he was able to heal and revive me. It is clear Legendary Tales harkens back to the days of olden RPGs such as EverQuest or Tibia, where the synergy between builds instilled a winning formula. Playable online with up to four players, I can definitely imagine a group of seasoned warriors with two tanks, an archer, and a mage obliterating everything in their way.

Preset builds are saved from the menu to face every scenario depending on what is required. This makes respeccing, or changing your character stats, quick and easy. Swinging your arms around for extended periods is tiring, so to be able to change your skill tree and ability points from warrior to mage is useful. Its physics-based combat allows for precision parries that sometimes stun the enemy, which the punch build, famous among the community, can make short work of.

This helps plenty since Dawn of History is not messing around. There is only one boss in this expansion, and he is at the end of the four available dungeons. Teleporting on a whim behind players’ backs, every player needs to be at the top of their game to be able to defeat him. To even reach it, there are so-called Champions found randomly in every level. Boasting a greater health pool, these swift subbosses require great effort to be defeated with no casualties.

The last but most important improvement that I noticed compared to the base game was the improved tutorials. Everything needs to be done manually, so even though it enhances the immersion, it used to be confusing. From creating potions with alchemy to grinding sharp weapons, it all requires an exact gesture that the game now implements a short video and written explanation for. The novel Seal system that buffs weapons is comfortably applied because of it.

Legendary Tales: Dawn of History – Final Verdict

Legendary Tales was a solid dark fantasy akin to Dark Souls, but it failed in many aspects to be crowned a true classic RPG in VR. The hostile onboarding, the flimsy hitboxes, the lack of reliable multiplayer. Two years on, Dawn of History course corrects to offer one of the richest role-playing experiences on the medium. With new and revamped systems, it can now be recognized as a best-in-class dungeon crawler. The frankly baffling amount of builds alone makes for an equally cutthroat and entertaining sandbox to create your own legendary tale.

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

It's developed by Incuvo Inc, the studio behind titles like Pirates VR: Jolly Roger, TRACKED: Shoot to Survive, and VR versions of such existing games as Green Hell and Bulletstorm.

As the description above suggests, Bloxer’s core gameplay is immediately familiar to anyone who’s ever played Tetris or its many clones: colored blocks fall down across a vertical field, and you have to arrange them into matching rows in order to clear up room for more blocks and prevent the screen from being filled. The twist, of course, is how you go about moving those falling blocks: by punching a robot control box in front of you.

Blocks are moved left and right by performing hooks, uppercuts rotate them, and punching down makes them fall faster once you’ve got the position right. There is also an alternate control scheme that has you jab with your left and right hands to move the blocks and perform hooks to rotate them, but I mainly just stuck with the default setting. Just like in regular Tetris, games can get increasingly frantic as the falling speed increases, with the added element of punching making gameplay feel more like a genuine workout as the game goes on.

There are two single-player modes: Endless, where the game keeps going until the blocks reach the top, and Time Attack, in which you try to build up a High Score before the clock runs out. You can check your scores and compare them with those of other players around the world from the menu screen.

Users can also compete online in 9-player matches to see who can rack up a high enough score. In addition to all the usual punches and combos, players can sabotage their opponents by placing "Garbage Blocks" on their field, hindering their ability to avoid a game over. Players can also counterattack, adding another layer of strategy to the fast-paced action.

If you want to take a break, there is a VR hub outside the main game filled with physical objects to pick up and minigames like a punching speedbag, a basketball net, whack-a-mole, and even dart guns. These have nothing really to do with the primary game, but they are a fun distraction nonetheless. It's a pleasant surprise just how much detail and effort went into something like this, when a simple menu screen would have sufficed.

Bloxer’s visual and audio presentation is decisively retro, with neon colors and a synthesized announcer voice that fits the idea of this being an updated version of the Tetris games that have been a staple of arcades and other platforms since the 1980s. You can also hear the control box react in pain when it's being hit, which is a cute novelty.

For the most part, Bloxer is a solid, motion-controlled take on the classic Tetris formula that most gamers are already familiar with, with the added element of punching to move or rotate the falling blocks making it as much of a physical challenge as it is a mental one. Fitness-focused players might find some use for Bloxer in their next VR workout, and there is plenty of nostalgic charm for people of any age.

The 35-minute performance takes you through multiple perspectives, from various points on stage with pianist Lukas Sternath and the BBC Symphony Orchestra, led by Sakari Oramo, to sitting among the audience inside the Royal Albert Hall in London.

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The opening moments place you backstage as a narrator introduces the experience and you hear some commentary from Sternath as he walks to his performance. He doesn’t speak directly to you or to anyone in the scene, but with his back to you as he’s walking it’s still clear that it is him and it complements the narrator in setting the scene. Despite some slightly speedy camera movement that carries you forward as you follow Sternath, I found this introduction enjoyable because of the story that was starting, and interesting access to be able to feel what it's like to enter a show from a performer's view.

But then, the story ended. I would have liked to spend more time ahead of the performance to understand the compelling stories behind it. The focus shifted to the experience for the rest of the immersive video. I would not expect a narration to interrupt a performance, but this is where elements like views that increase my connection to Sternath, Oramo, members of the BBC Symphony Orchestra or a shared experience with the audience could have worked harder.

Edits that Compete with the Performance

Debut at the BBC Proms places visitors in multiple views throughout the performance. The beautiful resolution of each shot helps create a sense of presence within the 180-degree view. You can see details in the sheet music through to the shine of Sternath’s shoes. At the end of the performance, you can even see the sparkle in his eyes which creates a deeper sense of connection to the moment.

The experience frequently shifts between positions on stage and in the concert hall - From multiple points at the front of the stage where you are up close with Sternath, Oramo and several symphony members who are within the frame, to behind the orchestra facing the audience, to several points at different levels as if you were a part of the crowd.

While the views themselves are interesting, the frequency and speed of the edits often end up competing with the performance. Just as you begin to take something in, you’re moved again. Returning briefly to the same positions doesn’t help either, as it takes a moment to reorient before being pulled away once more. Over time, it starts to feel less like a continuous presence within the space and more like being moved between camera placements. That becomes even more apparent when you can spot other cameras in certain shots, including a camera operator near the front of the stage, which helps explain some of the unnatural horizontal movement experienced moments earlier. I appreciated the different views but not the frequency of the changes.

Audio That Sounds Beautiful but Feels Disjointed

The Spatial Audio enhances the experience and it of course sounds beautiful throughout. But it also remains consistent no matter where you’re placed. Whether near the piano, behind the orchestra, or further back with the audience, my ear didn’t pick up a meaningful change in how it behaved.

That consistency keeps things stable, but it also makes the experience feel disjointed. The visuals shift frequently, but the audio does not follow those changes. I closed my eyes at one point just to focus on it, and that contrast became even clearer.

Being able to stay in one position for an extended period of time to hear how it changes from that perspective would add more to the experience.

Apple Immersive presents a rich opportunity to give visitors access to experiences that would otherwise be out of reach. The strongest ones go beyond impressive views and create a sense of presence, with a clear sense of who you are in the experience, strong storytelling, and a feeling of agency even when you’re not in control of where you move.

With ongoing updates, Version 3.0 of Museas adds support for the widgets system introduced in visionOS 26, letting you virtually place selected priceless art around your home, along with new exhibitions, environments and ways to explore the works. The exhibitions and environments can also be downloaded and stored for off-line use.

Whether you enjoy galleries and museums or not, Museas offers a way to experience art, artifacts, and their stories that made me feel more connected to them, even after seeing some of the works in person before. While nothing compares to viewing the real thing in person with its historical significance and detail in a shared space, this offers something different. It’s complementary because of how close you can get to each work and how free you are to explore and spend as much time as you like, with an optional audio guide adding context along the way, all without lineups, glass cases, travel, or in some cases any ticket at all.

Exploring and Experiencing the Art

Museas offers multiple ways to explore the art itself. You can move through works by artist, movement, institution, or even color palette, following what naturally draws your attention rather than a fixed path. The options feel considered, supporting curiosity instead of directing it, while also drawing attention to different aspects of the story behind each work.

As you spend time with a piece, you can choose how much context to bring in. An optional audio guide can speak through background on the work, either automatically or when you’re ready. Additional details reveal information like its origin, time period, and where it’s currently held. Curated music can also accompany your exploration.

There is no barrier or risk of a security intervention preventing you from getting as close to the work as you’d like. You can move in to examine brushstrokes, fine details, and even elements like written marks or subtle textures, along with the techniques used by the artist to create realism and light. You can intuitively expand the work to reveal details that would be difficult, if not impossible, to access in a gallery setting.

The way you experience the art is also up to your preference at the moment. The immersive view option available for some works places you within a somewhat matching immersive environment instead of your living room (or wherever you are experiencing Museas) but not within the painting itself. If you prefer being fully immersed in an environment while viewing any of the art, there are some selections to choose from although they will not necessarily pair perfectly. I prefer seeing the art in my living room as the details I can view on the Apple Vision Pro appear to match the details of my reality surrounding it, supporting the illusion that the experience is actually authentic. Several paintings currently offer spatial view options but those seem to only be for select portraits at the moment. This option adds an interesting depth to the art that makes the subjects feel slightly more alive as if captured with an iPhone Spatial Photo. Toggling between this and the standard view, however, showcases the mastery of the original works that already create illusions of depth without the magic of technology.

Picking Up What You Normally Can’t Touch

The app also includes high resolution digital reconstructions of ancient artifacts in 3D. The surface detail is so clear that I could almost feel the textures.

Sculptures and objects appear in your space as fully formed 3D pieces that you can scroll through and select for closer inspection and to learn their story. They rotate, can be picked up and even expanded. However, the objects do not stay locked in a size that you may prefer, and unlike the artworks, these artifacts aren’t yet integrated into widgets, which leaves room for how they might be experienced next.

Bringing Masterpieces Home without Spending Millions

Thanks to Museas, my condo decor now includes several priceless works, without spending a dime or pulling off a heist.

Placing artworks directly into your space as visionOS widgets lets them remain there even when the app is closed, adding an ongoing sense of presence and experience with the art of your choice. You’re not navigating an app to view your favorites. You’re simply spending time with the work between other moments in your Apple Vision Pro. Seeing the art in your own environment creates a sense of familiarity, and as you move around, you naturally view it from different vantage points, expanding your perspective of it.

Having these works persist in your space also acts as a subtle reminder to return, whether to revisit what’s already there or explore more within Museas, including both the free works and paid exhibitions. That's a benefit of visionOS widgets both for users and developers.

Free Access and Paid Exhibitions

Museas includes a substantial amount of content for free, with additional exhibitions available through paid admission currently ranging from $5.99 USD to $8.99 USD. These group together a small number of artworks, artifacts, audio guides and sometimes immersive art. While the cost is lower than typical in-person exhibition tickets, so is the number of works included although you’re able to get much access to them. A bundled or loyalty-style offering over time could be beneficial as the catalogue continues to expand across institutions.

Exhibitions can be downloaded for offline use, and selected works can be saved as widgets in your space, extending their presence beyond the app. As more content is added, it continues to build on a format that gives you more access, time and freedom to engage with priceless art and artifacts in ways that aren’t possible otherwise.

Foveated Streaming

The key new feature, foveated streaming, was announced last month when the first visionOS 26.4 beta released for Vision Pro developers.

Before you continue reading, note that foveated streaming is not the same as foveated rendering, though the two techniques can be used alongside each other. As the names suggest, while foveated rendering involves the host device actually rendering the area of each frame you're currently looking at with higher resolution, foveated streaming refers to sending that area to the headset with higher image quality than the rest of the frame.

It's a term you may have heard in the context of Valve's Steam Frame, where it's a fundamental always-on feature of its PC VR streaming offering, delivered via the USB PC wireless adapter by default.

Given that the video decoders in headsets have a limited maximum resolution and bitrate, foveated streaming helps prioritize resolution and compression quality where you're currently looking.

Unlike the macOS Spatial Rendering introduced in the main visionOS 26 release last year, which is a relatively high-level system that only supports a local Mac as a host, Foveated Streaming is a low-level host-agnostic framework, that any PC VR server could in theory implement. For developers who want a ready-to-go implementation, Apple worked closely with Nvidia to add support for its CloudXR SDK. And despite the name, CloudXR can be used for both local and cloud PCs.

Normally, for native visionOS apps, the operating system does not provide developers with any information about where the user is looking – Apple says this is in order to preserve privacy. Instead, developers only receive events, such as which element the user was looking at as they performed the pinch gesture. But crucial to foveated streaming working, the API tells the developer the "rough" region of the frame the user is looking at. It's the first time visionOS developers get this kind of information.

This should allow the host to render at higher resolution in this region too, not just stream it in higher resolution. As always, this will require the specific VR game to support foveated rendering, or to support tools that inject foveated rendering.

X-Plane & iRacing Getting Official Apple Vision Pro Support Via PC VR Streaming

X-Plane 12 and iRacing will be officially playable on Apple Vision Pro, streamed from your PC via Nvidia CloudXR, with your physical accessories blended in using mixed reality passthrough.

UploadVRDavid Heaney

Autodesk VRED Gets Immersive Mode That Streams To Apple Vision Pro

Autodesk VRED now has an immersive mode that streams to Apple Vision Pro via Nvidia’s CloudXR, and Kia, BMW, Volvo, and Rivian are already using it.

UploadVRDavid Heaney

Clear XR Brings Apple Vision Pro’s Foveated Streaming To OpenXR PC VR Games

Clear XR, available on TestFlight, lets Nvidia RTX 40 and 50 series owners use Apple Vision Pro’s foveated streaming feature for OpenXR PC VR games.

UploadVRDavid Heaney

Over the past few weeks, multiple companies have announced supporting Vision Pro's foveated streaming via Nvidia's CloudXR SDK:

• X-Plane 12 and iRacing are releasing dedicated visionOS clients that automatically connect to the sim on your PC, automatically align your cockpit to your physical peripherals through computer vision, and segment out those peripherals with passthrough so you can see them in VR.
• Autodesk VRED has already added an immersive mode that pixel streams high fidelity assets to Vision Pro, and it's already being used by Kia, BMW, Volvo, and Rivian.
• A lone developer released Clear XR on TestFlight, which lets you stream any OpenXR VR game from your PC with foveated streaming.

One notable limitation is that Nvidia's CloudXR SDK only supports Nvidia's Ada and Blackwell GPU architectures, meaning RTX 40-series and 50-series graphics cards.

Improved Spatial Audio In Mixed Reality

Since launch, Apple Vision Pro has supported not just basic positional spatial audio, but audio that scans the features and materials of your space to precisely match sound to your physical environment. Apple calls this Audio Ray Tracing.

With visionOS 26.4, Apple says Vision Pro now stores and remembers the acoustic properties of rooms you use the headset in, such that the Audio Ray Tracing feature can initialize quicker and have a more holistic model of your environment without you needing to move around first.

The chaotic and comedic physics-driven melee game throws players into over-the-top tavern brawls. You'll fight your way through tavern after tavern of troublemakers, all in various stages of inebriation, defeat epic bosses, and restore order to the land of Mliuej one punch at a time. The game's immersive combat involves throwing punches and using weapons and the environment to dispatch your foes.

The game's developers describe TaVRn's Takedown as "equal parts absurd adventure and stress-relieving brawler."

TaVRn's Takedown is the first VR experience set in the fictional Naheulbeuk universe. Created in 2001 by John Lang, The Dungeon of Naheulbeuk began as a comedic audio fantasy series parodying traditional role-playing game tropes, and has grown into a cult phenomenon with comics, novels, videogames, and more.

We've been playing TaVRn's Takedown over the past week and will have an impressions article posted early next week.

TaVRn's Takedown is available now on Meta Quest and SteamVR.

The annual PlayStation Spring Sale kicked off earlier this week with many of the best PS VR2 games on sale. Just to name a few: UploadVR's 2025 Game of the Year Arken Age, The Game Awards' Best VR/AR Game The Midnight Walk, and the Dice Awards Immersive Reality Game of the Year Ghost Town.

A partial list of the games on sale is below, but be sure to check out the full sale here. Over seventy full games are on sale along with many DLC add-ons and bundles.

Note: Games marked with an asterisk (*) have an additional discount for PlayStation Plus Premium subscribers.

Full Games

• Gran Turismo 7 - $29.39 (58% off regular $70 price)
• The Midnight Walk - $19.79 (34% off regular $30 price)
• Arken Age - $19.99 (50% off regular $40 price)
• Crossfire: Sierra Squad - $17.99 (40% off regular $30 price)
• *Jurassic World Aftermath Collection - $8.99 (70% off regular $30 price)
• Madison VR - $20.99 (40% off regular $35 price)
• *Vampire: The Masquerade - Justice - $5.99 (80% off regular $30 price)
• *Ghost Town - $19.99 (20% off regular $25 price)
• Hellsweeper VR - $8.99 (70% off regular $30 price)
• Vertigo 2 - $8.99 (70% off regular $30 price)
• *The Light Brigade - $9.99 (60% off regular $25 price)
• Beat The Beats VR - $15.99 (20% off regular $20 price)
• The Last Clockwinder - $7.49 (70% off regular $25 price)
• HappyFunLand - $7.49 (50% off regular $15 price)
• After The Fall - $5.99 (76% off regular $25 price)
• Humanity - $14.99 (50% off regular $30 price)
• Hotel Infinity - $16.99 (15% off regular $20 price)
• *Zombie Bar Simulator - $15.99 (20% off regular $20 price)
• Mare - $12.49 (50% off regular $25 price)
• *Ghost Signal - $1.99 (80% off regular $10 price)
• Mixture - $6.19 (38% off regular $10 price)
• *Masters of Light - $7.99 (60% off regular $20 price)
• Retropolis 2: Never Say Goodbye - $6.19 (38% off regular $10 price)
• Harpagun - $3.99 (80% off regular $20 price)

Bundles

• Dyschronia: Chronos Alternate - $11.99 (70% off)
• The Fisherman's Tales Bundle - $9.89 (67% off)
• Arizona Sunshine Freddy's Bundle - $26.99 (55% off)
• Kayak VR: Mirage + Soča Valley - $20.99 (25% off)

The PlayStation 2026 Spring Sale runs from March 25 to April 22.

Medieval Dynasty New Settlement celebrates its two year anniversary this week. It first released in late March 2024 for $29.99. Update 2.5, the fifteenth post release update accompanies a permanent price drop to $13.99, less than half its original price.

Medieval Dynasty is no stranger to seasonal events. Developer Spectral Games has previously done Christmas, Halloween, and Easter updates with themed decorations in towns across the valley and as craftable items. This year's Easter update brings back an Easter egg hunt spanning the entire map and three new decorations: an outhouse (with a 'smelly' daily reward), a stone pathway, and a barricade.

In the announcement, Spectral Games also addressed the noted downturn in frequency of updates with the following statement:

We’re not hiding the fact that in recent months the pace of work on the game has slowed down. We want to be transparent and explain that this is tightly connected to production economics and technological barriers. Maintaining the original development pace has become unprofitable given current sales. Although the game has been successful, the cost of further development is enormous. As a small studio, we must manage our resources wisely. Moreover, with the scope of features like its open-worldness and customizations, we’re reaching the limits of Meta Quest 3, and with Quest 2 we’ve likely already exceeded them.

Meta’s FrameSync OS Upgrade Promises Visually Smoother VR On Quest

Meta is upgrading the frame timing algorithm of Horizon OS with an overhaul called FrameSync, and it should result in more consistently visually smooth VR with noticeably fewer hitches. Read the technical specifics here.

UploadVRDavid Heaney

The new update also notes support for Meta's new FrameSync technology, bringing better gameplay performance. There were no specifics in the announcement about FrameSync-specific improvements.

Medieval Dynasty is available on Meta Quest for $13.99.

Birdseed VR is a cozy birdwatching sim currently available free-to-play on Meta Quest in Early Access. The game participated in a recent Steam Next Fest with the demo still available to play. We took a look at Birdseed recently, saying "when it works without crashing, I'm enjoying every minute that I spend in Birdseed. Though those minutes amount to just about 30 per day, it's a nice half hour in VR."

Hands-On: Birdseed Invites You To Relax & Photograph Cute Dumb Birds

Birdseed is a cozy VR game about photographing silly birds, and so far we simply love it.

UploadVRJames Tocchio

The full release was originally slated for March on Quest and Steam, but today Buffalo Buffalo announced on BlueSky that the full release on Quest has been pushed to April 30. The PC VR version is stated to come "at a later date in 2026." Buffalo Buffalo is also working on a VR port of its skiing rhythm game Fresh Tracks.

Birdseed VR is available now in Early Access on Quest 3 headsets. A free demo on Steam will be kept up for a few more weeks due to the delay.

For those not familiar with The Boys, imagine if the Justice League or the Avengers were arrogant, socialite, super-powered jerks ('supes' is the canon term) working for and protected by a corrupt mega corporation. The titular Boys are a group of vigilantes working to take them down.

VR stealth games are an acquired taste. Some VR gamers who put on a headset want to actually do something and stealth works against that. Great stealth games are about waiting, usually crouched or otherwise out of sight, while plotting and memorizing guard patterns to either sneak past or take them out quietly. In that respect, The Boys: Trigger Warning delivers, bringing every stealth trope in the book to its roughly ten hours of gameplay.

Bad enemy AI that rarely thinks to look up? Yes. Getting spotted, only to hide and wait out the thirty seconds of alarms and guards before they forget they spotted you? Absolutely. The same enemies never noticing what should be very loud movement above their heads? Of course. A powerful, well armed protagonist that still manages to die far too quickly if attacked? You bet! I laughed each time I killed a guard and watched another walk past the body as if nothing was wrong. If you are expecting any innovations on the basic stealth formula, look elsewhere. For comparable games in VR, Digital Lode's Espire series and Fast Travel Games' Vampire: The Masquerade - Justice come to mind.

You play as Lucas Costa, who takes his daughters to visit The Armstrongs, a celebrity superhero family. Things go tragically wrong, leaving Lucas on the brink of death. He's rescued by series regulars Butcher, Mother's Milk, and Kimiko and injected with a drug called Compound V that saves his life and grants him superpowers. After this, he is recruited into The Boys with the promise of vengeance. It's a fairly straightforward revenge story wrapped in the vulgar, violent world The Boys fans know and love.

With these artificial powers, starting with telekinesis, a 'TK sense' (X-ray vision), and a long range teleport, you infiltrate Vought to gather intel on and eventually confront the Armstrongs. Throughout the game are injectables called 'Temp V' that temporarily grant other abilities. Dosages are limited, but like any good stealth game, there are just enough refills scattered about to avoid going empty for too long, plus they regularly respawn. When you do use your powers to take enemies down, particularly the sneak-behind telekinetic kill, it's very satisfying.

The game also ramps as it wears on. Every mission adds a new wrinkle in the form of new enemies or environmental challenges to test your mastery of Lucas's powers as well as the restraint to keep from relying on them like a crutch. As you get better, the game raises the stakes to match.

Using new characters is smart because The Armstrongs and the Costas don't have plot armor, meaning Arvore was free to do whatever it wanted to service the story. With that said, the best parts of the game are with the series' cast. Butcher's callous characterization is spot on. Homelander is a standout each time he appears and has the best dialogue in the game. The usage of Soldier Boy is surreal and excellent. Several of the show's cast members voice their characters, lending some authenticity to the game as well.

There are collectibles in the form of documents and audio recordings for players into that sort of thing. I'm usually not, but thankfully these flesh out the world and contain Easter eggs for fans of the series, so I felt compelled to track them down.

The Boys is hurt by two issues: visuals and interactions. The series characters are at least recognizable, albeit a bit goofy, but this is at least in line with Arvore's Pixel Ripped aesthetic. The flat and bland environments are the true letdown. You only interact with The Boys between missions, otherwise it's just Butcher speaking through an ear piece while navigating drab hallways avoiding the same guards for most of the game. Then there are some visual quirks. If I killed a guard on a staircase, their blood hovered above in a flat circle. While scaling an elevator shaft, the area above me flickered in and out of existence. Walking side to side produced a mirrored, almost reprojection-like effect. Here's hoping the upcoming PlayStation VR2 version gets a visual lift.

You physically touch half a dozen objects in this game. The Temp V syringes, enemies if using one specific Temp V ability, a hacking device, keycards, keycode terminals, and keyboards, the latter of which is just banged on. Your hands just don't cooperate at times, especially in the vents and using keypads. Telekinesis and teleportation do most of the lifting here, leaving Trigger Warning without a sense of tactile presence I found myself longing for.

With all that said, I still liked Trigger Warning. There's a tricky balancing act here, empowering the player to indulge in gloriously graphic violence, while still maintaining a belief that you can die at any moment. Trigger Warning pulls this off while still delivering an effective, if mostly predictable, story.

The Boys: Trigger Warning - Final Verdict

Trigger Warning mostly plays it safe, delivering a run-of-the-mill stealth game lifted by the world it is set in. The wry, dark humor of The Boys undercuts the earnestness of the Costas/Armstrong story and the game strikes a good balance between power complex and a genuine sense of danger.

I would recommend The Boys: Trigger Warning to specifically to fans of the series and players who enjoy stealth games. Others may otherwise find the pace too slow and the lack of physicality off-putting and with underwhelming graphics, it's tough to recommend.

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

Earlier today, nDreams released their latest game for Meta Quest. Oh My Galaxy! is an inventive and captivating little arcade action puzzler that’s as challenging as it is cute. I’ve spent some of the past 48 hours slinging asteroids across its colorful cosmos (and my living room), and I can’t get enough.

In Oh My Galaxy!, players are tasked with defending hapless planets and moons from invading asteroids bent on their destruction. You’ll do this by flinging your own asteroids at the offending creeps. You wield them like a slingshot, positioning your launcher with one hand, aiming meticulously, and pulling and releasing the projectiles with your other hand.

Gameplay challenges and mechanical wrinkles come in the form of obstacles to be avoided, planetary gravity that can curve your shots, and special modifiers (bounce pads, for example) floating out there in the universe. There are also different types of projectiles that unlock over the course of your adventure, such as asteroids which split into multi-ball shots, or asteroids that create massive explosions.

The game can be played with controllers or with full hand-tracking. Either methodology works beautifully. Hand gestures work well, too, and are thankfully sensibly designed. For example, to burst the multi-ball asteroid, you simply launch it, make a fist, and then burst your fist open and the asteroid shatters apart.

The game can be played in virtual reality mode, which drops you into the center of a gorgeous cosmic environment, and in mixed reality, which brings the planets, moons, asteroids, and explosions into your own living space. Note that on Quest 2, only VR mode is available.

So, the game’s presentation is lovely, the music is wonderful, and the controls are responsive and precise. In short, the game is technically excellent.

But what really makes Oh My Galaxy! stand out, beyond this combination of obviously great factors, is its simplicity. Like so many of my favorite things, Oh My Galaxy! is a game where all the nonsense has been stripped away, leaving you with a pure and delightfully refined experience. There’s nothing here that doesn’t need to be here, and everything that’s here simply works.

I‘ve now made my way through about half of Oh My Galaxy!'s levels, which unlock based on your performance (clearing levels cleanly and with as few asteroids as possible earns you more stars and unlocks later chapters), and I can’t wait to keep going.

Oh My Galaxy! offers the sort of jump-in, jump-out game experience that I really enjoy these days. I’ve had a great time with my daughters, both around ten years old, launching in to clear a few levels and earn a few stars, inviting the cute personified celestial bodies into our home for a fifteen minute block of cosmic destruction before homework or dinner.

Their screams of delight and surprise or their cheers when they solve a particularly tricky puzzle are enough of a review for me. They love Oh My Galaxy! and so do I. It’s simply my kind of game, a game with a solid gameplay mechanic, a bubbly personality, and decent challenge. It’s a game that asks little of you and offers a lot.

Oh My Galaxy! is available now on the Meta Horizon Store for $9.99.

nDreams' latest release, Oh My Galaxy! has arrived today on Meta Quest headsets. Originally launched on Samsung Galaxy XR, Oh My Galaxy! is a physics-based arcade puzzle adventure in which players fling asteroids toward aggressive space invaders that are siphoning energy from cartoonishly innocent planets and moons.

The VR/MR game allows players to play in a full virtual environment, or turn their living space into a cosmic play area. Using controllers or hand-tracking, players will slingshot projectiles of various types at the offending invaders across more than 100 stages spread across three chapters.

On Meta Quest 3 and 3S the game is playable in both MR and VR modes, while on the Meta Quest 2 it's playable in VR only.

I've played Oh My Galaxy! from start to finish over the last 48 hours, and it's a whimsical, charming, and challenging game that's perfect for quick sessions. At the same time, the game is so well-made and fun that I often found myself happily binging for an hour or more at a time. You can read my full impressions article here.

Oh My Galaxy! was developed by nDreams' studio Near Light, the studio that had also developed Frenzies, a competitive multiplayer first person shooter that launched free-to-play in Early Access on Quest in October 2024. News broke recently that nDreams had closed Near Light during a massive restructuring, and that Frenzies will be shutting down on April 7.

Oh My Galaxy! is available now on the Meta Horizon Store for $9.99.

At GDC earlier this month, I had a chance to play Sporelando, the newest paid expansion for Dimensional Double Shift, on a Galaxy XR headset, with Andrew Eiche. The following is a transcript of my discussion with Eiche immediately following that demo.

Dimensional Double Shift Travels to Sporelando In Next Paid Expansion

Dimensional Double Shift’s next DLC, Sporelando, launches in April. We got a chance to play at GDC this month.

UploadVRMike Johnson

UploadVR: So, we just played the new world in Dimensional Double Shift. What was different about that versus the first [worlds] that you introduced when the game went out?

Andrew Eiche: Yeah, so this is our fourth. Each one has a different theme. You still do these two consistent jobs, but what changes is obviously the environment, that's part of the biggest change, and the characters. But for then the cars and what you do, we increased some of the complexity between things. So, in Treeatle, our base dimension, things are very straightforward.

And now we’re having more of the kind of puzzles where it’s like, “Hey, I’m wearing this and this, can you figure out how to dress this gator, for instance?” So, we’re increasing complexity. We changed the modules, we generally changed all what we call the "appliances," which are the pieces around the outside. On the diner, we changed what food you make, and then we changed those appliances too. So you’re still doing the same high-level job, but on the specifics of it, it’s all themed to what Fungus Florida would be like.

UploadVR: How long in terms of QA and playtesting does it take you to get that balance right between, “Okay, this is intuitive, the player will understand this,” versus “We probably need to give a bigger signpost”?

Andrew Eiche: That is constant. That’s throughout the whole thing. It takes us about six months to make a dimension, and that is the whole time we’re doing that. So, we have a process where we write a one-page document of what we think it would be, we call it the brief, and then we review the brief. We have a ton of briefs and we kind of cut it down, and then we make a mechanical sketch. So, all of those pieces that we do, and there’s like five or six pieces, we’re doing that refinement over and over again until finally it gets to you.

UploadVR: You’ve been out for quite some time on the record saying that hand tracking was something that you really believed in, and it was pretty much the way forward for a lot of people who aren't comfortable with controllers. This is your first hand-tracking-first game, because hand tracking was added to your previous games post release. Were there any different challenges in doing hand-tracking-only versus your previous games?

Andrew Eiche: Yeah, so with hand tracking, you can do a bunch of things that you can’t do as easily with controllers. So, because of your fingers, you can finally do fine movement, right? So we have lots of small switches that you pinch with just two fingers. And that was always off-limits. If you play Job Simulator, you’ll see every object is a certain size, like the keyboard being large is on purpose because we couldn’t track your finger. And then the other thing is like these secondary gestures that feel more natural. On a controller, we could make that sprayer work, that air sprayer where you use your thumb, and it’ll work just fine. It won’t feel as natural; it’ll feel like pressing a button versus when you pick up that air sprayer and it has that thumb trigger, it really feels nice when you’re doing hand tracking.

UploadVR: Did you notice a difference between when you built it for Galaxy XR versus Quest? Was there a massive gulf in hand tracking, or was it pretty comparable to where there wasn’t a lot of fine-tuning to do?

Andrew Eiche: Each platform has their own take on hand tracking, and I’d say in terms of technology, that Meta is the furthest along in pure hand tracking, which is what we’re doing, right? So the Apple Vision Pro that we’ve ported our other games to and the Galaxy XR, the main thing they focus on for hand tracking is that pinch gesture and making sure that’s right. And so that works beautifully. But then we have to just put in a little more guardrails just because they’re kind of new at making this. So they’re getting better every day, but Meta has the deep, long experience making hand tracking, so they’ve been doing it for a while. So you can just play it and feel it. Like with certain fast movements, you’re going to lose tracking that you wouldn’t necessarily lose on a Quest, but I imagine that’s a temporary state of affairs.

UploadVR: Okay. This is also your first multiplayer game, from my understanding?

Andrew Eiche: Yes.

UploadVR: How challenging was that? You built Job Simulator, Rick and Morty, Vacation Simulator, Cosmonious High, they're all single-player. Just the simple act of, “Hey, pass me this,” how complicated was that?

Andrew Eiche: I mean, we threw it all away. We used to build on the same tech, and we basically threw it all away to rebuild. When we first started what would become Dimensional Double Shift, the game director at the time was like, “I don’t even think we’re going to get fluids in multiplayer,” right? We have to start completely from scratch. That’s how much we went back. And so we were able to convince him otherwise and we got fluids in the game. But it’s totally different and we also violated some of the rules of multiplayer that we wanted to do, which was, “Hey, don’t have high-fidelity interactions where you cross spaces because physics is a mess and all that.” We worked really hard to figure it out. I gave a talk last GDC where I walked through how we got there and it was a lot of trial and error to get those to the fidelity where we finally felt comfortable that we could approach a multiplayer game. And now we’ve done the multiplayer game, and yeah, there’s all sorts of challenges and there’s bugs that you never anticipated where we have this concept of authority. It's exponentially more difficult to make the multiplayer game than the single-player game.

UploadVR: What was the biggest bug you encountered that you weren't expecting? I’m sure you were expecting some roadblocks going into it.

Andrew Eiche: The biggest bug that we’ve encountered that is completely unexpected is... we have a lot of bugs where you don’t see it because we catch them, but there’s this concept where one player is what we call the authority. And so essentially that player is telling the other players, if there’s a mismatch, they go, “No, no, no, I’m the right one,” right? And if the authority doesn’t tell the other players like, “Hey, I did this,” then you get these states where you’ll have one person go, “I see the world this way!” and then everybody else will be like, “Uh, what are you talking about? Like nothing happened.” We got very adept at finding it, but yeah, it’s just one of those things you don’t think about.

UploadVR: Job Simulator turns 10 years old this year from its initial release. It’s at 6 million downloads. It’s perennially in the top 10 on Quest and on PS VR2. Where do you think that staying power came from?

Andrew Eiche: I think with Job Simulator, obviously there’s like a level of "we were there early," that kind of stuff, but I also think it meets the promise of VR. A lot of our games do that in ways that developers still struggle to meet the promise of VR. And what I mean by that is the promise of VR as in no limits on a small scale. So we have a lot of games that are really good at no limits on a big scale, right? Like even Gorilla Tag in a weird sense is like, “There’s no limits if you can be the monkey, you can get there” kind of thing. But on the small scale of “Can I open every drawer? Can I fumble around with the items? If I do something with this, will the game block me?”

And we still have the problem in VR where somebody puts a water bottle on a table and you go to reach it and you reach through it. And so it’s that kind of promise. And I think the staying power, especially the staying power we’ve seen from the younger generations, is that you get to be experimental. You get to play around in a space and no one’s going to yell at you that you can’t do that, and no one’s going to yell at you that you won’t. And it’s like the Fisher-Price play set, but it’ll actually light things on fire. And I think it’s that joy of exploration and that space to experiment freely that has really pushed it. And the lack of strict goals of all things. And we see this time and time again in VR where, you know, the games that are really capital-V video games don’t perform as well as the games that have a little bit more space to explore and be free and less guardrails around it.

UploadVR: So I’m guessing that carried all the way through to your other projects, down to Vacation, all the way through to DDS?

Andrew Eiche: Actually, we took a diversion. So Cosmonious High feels very much like a video game, right? And it was not our best-performing game. I mean, it was one of our worst-performing games. And it has all these collectibles and all this story and all this stuff. And it’s not a top-10 game. That’s when we took a step back and looked at what worked. And one of the parts of the inception of Dimensional Double Shift is looking at what players liked was that there’s no goal in the game right now. We have a million downloads and the game doesn’t tell you that you have to do anything or not, and people seem to enjoy that.

And there’s a big group of people that want to play and be together, but they don’t want to be like, “Now is the time where you pick up fifteen widgets and you give it to this person." And especially in VR, players are very resistant to that. And I think on the Gorilla Tag-style games, that’s like a wonderful example where like players are very resistant to that kind of goal setting and that boundary setting because it’s like... go nuts. And they do. And you can choose to be put in the box, but you don’t have to be. And so it’s more of an opt-in, in the same way that our game is an opt-in.

UploadVR: So in DDS, everything is directly in front of you. You could reach everything from a seated position, just like Job Simulator, for instance. But then in other games you introduced motion. Vacation Simulator was node-based, then Cosmonious you could move around. What made you want to pull that back and just say, “No, you’re going to stay in this station, everything’s going to be right here in front of you”?

Andrew Eiche: It’s a great question. We’ve come to the conclusion, after many, many years of doing this, that either your game needs to have locomotion as a core mechanic in the game, or it’s better if you actually don’t do it. And we have very few players complaining about that. And the point is if you look at Bone Lab or you look at the Gorilla Tag games or you look at any of these other very popular games with high motion, your position in the world and how you move and interact with it, that’s important to the game. That is a key mechanic and it’s worked out.

Movement is actually unimportant in Cosmonious High. If you look at Cosmonious High when you’re moving, you’re just trying to get from one place to another station, essentially. And so movement actually acts as an impediment to what you want in the game. In Job Simulator, we had all these tool switchers because we couldn’t move, and when we started moving, we started reducing that. And so what increased was this liminal time that was not very fun. Because in a flat game, when you’re riding your horse in Breath of the Wild, it’s awesome because you get these great vistas and stuff. In VR it’s like: boring, boring, I want to do something.

The physicality of the space matters, and so either your game has locomotion as a core mechanic or it’s better if you just remove it entirely. And we see very, very few complaints from the community. I mean, we do get the occasional “Can I please walk around?” thing, but a lot of our community, what they do is they actually back into a corner of their room, reset their space, and then they just run. They just run across... they just run around. But the thing is if we make you not want for locomotion, then we don’t have to solve that problem, and not every game needs it. And in fact, I’d argue that there’s many, many games that would benefit from removing it entirely and stop worrying about it.

UploadVR: Was there ever a point where you considered DDS not being free-to-play? There’s been such an industry shift towards that model for multiplayer.

Andrew Eiche: So it was originally not free-to-play, and we were going to launch all these dimensions all at once in the game. And then it was taking a long time to make dimensions and we’re like, “We do have to ship a game.” We looked like geniuses because we made this choice, but what really caused us to switch was we were looking at the game and we said, “It’s an $80 buy-in if we charge $20 for you and your friends to play.” We’re asking for $80 sight-unseen for all of you to play. And so we thought, “But if we make it free-to-play and we do one pay, everyone plays,” now we’re just asking for one person to pay, and it’s a much more straightforward transaction where you could try it, or one friend goes, “Hey, I picked it up and I picked up the dimension,” and you’re like, “Okay, I’ll jump in.” And given the size of the VR market, we just didn’t see a path where like we could convince a lot of people like these groups of four to drop 80 bucks, especially when there were other games that didn’t require that.

UploadVR: I’d be remiss if I didn’t talk about the state of the industry. In the last three years, over 200 companies have gone through layoffs. VR has not been immune from that. We just heard about Mighty Coconut earlier this year. Where do you sit with where the market’s going from when you started over 10 years ago now?

Andrew Eiche: At Owlchemy we’re an interesting case because we’re part of Google, so that insulates us a bit from a lot of what’s happening. VR, it’s entering a downturn. So is games in general, right? And, I think some of it is that we saturated it. We built a device and then because there’s really only been one player, Meta, and Meta has its own goals and some of them align with games and some of them are orthogonal to games. Given that, what you’re seeing, as they realign to go, “Oh, we should probably make something profitable,” they have to unwind a lot of choices they made. And that’s causing a lot of the problem in that had we done this slowly, had we said, “Okay, we’re going to unwind and this is like a three-year plan,” but it feels like what happened is Meta showed up and was like, “Yeah, let’s make a profitable division tomorrow, and we’re going just take an axe to everything.” The Galaxy XR is wonderful, it’s a great headset, but even Google will be the first to tell you it’s not supposed to replace the millions of Quest 2s. It’s the first headset in a line of headsets which will be coming out for Android XR. So, looking at the big picture of the industry here is like there’s one major player, and when they make changes, the ripples are enormous to the rest of us.

UploadVR: With that said, what excites you about it, about the future outlook that you have now? What do you see?

Andrew Eiche: We’re really excited about some of the new form factors of headsets. Project Aura, which is the Google headset, so that’s a collaboration between XReal and Google. That’s really exciting. There’s some others along that line. I think one of the big hang-ups that we’ve been seeing and why we’re not reaching this market saturation point is looking like a dork. We all don’t care clearly because we put on the headsets, but there’s a large percentage of population that really cares about that kind of look. And you have to answer the question: would you wear this in a coffee shop? And if we can start answering that with "maybe" or "yes," that starts to swing VR and XR more in our favor. So that’s really exciting to us. Ebb and flow is normal. VR is not going anywhere. There’s an entire generation that lives and breathes VR. We can tell you this. I go and talk to people and they know Job Simulator. We do this "Owlchemy vacation," and if you wear an Owlchemy shirt around the kids, they’ll say something to you if they recognize it. It’s pretty ubiquitous. So I’m not worried that VR is going to go away, you know? It’s really like: when is VR going to come back?

UploadVR: So do you feel like there’s a full generation of kids who are growing up with this tech as just... this is part of their lives, in the same way that we grew up with Atari, Nintendo, and all that?

Andrew Eiche: A hundred percent. That’s it exactly. I’ve heard stories where lunchrooms divide in half on whether or not you have VR. I had a friend who had two undergrad babysitters that they alternated and both of them individually knew and had played Job Simulator.

UploadVR: That's fantastic.

Andrew Eiche: Yeah, but this is what I’m saying. And then we pop up on random shows where somebody will complain about their kids or go, “He’s doing a job in VR!” Gen Alpha is VR native. They don’t see it as novel. It’s not a new tech, it’s just part of their life. And every time I say this, I always get a parent who’s like, “Oh yeah, we went and visited our cousin’s house and one of the cousins was just in the headset the whole time.”

So some of the downturn is just us waiting for this generation to have a salary, so they stop having to ask their parents or some adult to say, “Give me money so I can spend money,” right? They don’t need to request that money anymore. So it’s coming.

UploadVR: Coming back to DDS, do you have a cadence of how often you want to release new maps?

Andrew Eiche: We have a plan for dimensions, but we’re still in early access, so there’s a lot of experimenting happening with the community. We’re thinking about all the things the community wants and addressing some of that. So we have the direct communication with the community and then our metrics and everything. So it’s less about cadence of dimensions and more about what’s going to make this game the best thing possible, right? So we have four dimensions out now. We’re going to see how this one does and we’re going to look at the metrics, look at all that stuff, and then see where our efforts are best spent next.

UploadVR: Okay. So you haven’t figured out what the next two or three are, you’re taking it one at a time?

Andrew Eiche: We do know what we would make if we’re going to make another dimension.

UploadVR: Last question: anything else you want to tease out for the future of DDS, the future of Owlchemy, anything you're working on that you want to talk about?

Andrew Eiche: Owlchemy has some really cool stuff coming. We’re very excited for the anniversary of Job Simulator. For Dimensional Double Shift, Sporelando is the big thing, but looking at Sporelando and beyond, we have a lot of really cool stuff in the pipe that I can’t talk about. I think that the people who play the game are going to be very happy with where things are going, and I think that the people who may have been sitting on the fence or maybe they played a little bit will be really excited to come back and play with their friends. 2026 is going to be a really cool year for Owlchemy.

The first VR Games Showcase of 2026 is in the books with multiple game announcements, release dates, new content, and gameplay spotlights. It's a lot to dissect, so we've compiled everything here for your convenience.

Each game listed has a link to our detailed VRGS coverage for that title. If the showcase simply spotlighted news we have already covered, we linked to those details instead.

The showcase was sponsored by Bandai Namco's upcoming Little Nightmares: Altered Echoes VR. This trailer was the same featured in the official announcement earlier this month.

We also played a demo of the title sponsor at the Game Developers Conference if you want to know more about the game.

The Main Show

Payday: Aces High (Quest, PC VR, Steam Frame), a four player co-op heist game was the first new game reveal, coming from veteran studio Fast Travel Games (Vampire: The Masquerade - Justice, Mannequin) sometime in 2026.

Compass (Quest, PS VR2, PC VR), another brand new game reveal, is an open world piloting adventure from Trebuchet Studios (Prison Boss, Broken Edge) coming in Spring 2026.

Exoshock (Quest, PC VR, Steam Frame, PS VR2) has released a $12.99 Founder's Edition available now with early buyers getting access to the current developer's build and a complimentary Quest or Steam key upon the game's full release and other perks. This hybrid first person shooter will be crossplay-compatible with PS5 and Steam players.

Thirty-two player first person shooter Forefront (Quest, PC VR, PS VR2 coming soon) announced April 23 for its 1.0 release.

Owlchemy Labs' co-op job simulator Dimensional Double Shift (Quest, Galaxy XR) revealed its latest DLC world, Sporelando, coming on April 23. We actually went hands on during the Game Developers Conference this month.

Among Us 3D's Definitive Edition (PC VR, Quest, PS VR2, Pico) gets a full launch trailer and (delayed) release date of April 7.

One More Delve (PC VR, Quest) is a physics-based co-op dungeon crawler coming next month on April 27.

BMX, scooter, and mountain biking title VMX (PC VR) hits Steam this week on March 26. A Meta Quest port will follow at a later date.

As we previously reported, chaotic sci-fi adventure Space Control touches down on Meta Quest, no joke, on April 1.

The developers of roomscale puzzle-based narrative game The Amusement detailed the 1920s-based title's movement system. The Amusement hits Quest and PC VR on April 16.

We got more gameplay and details from co-op survival game The Lightkeepers, coming to Meta Quest in Q3 2026 from Spectral Games (Medieval Dynasty: New Settlement).

After a teaser trailer earlier this month, Innerspace (A Fisherman's Tale) dropped a new gameplay trailer for its upcoming espionage thriller Spymaster, coming to Meta Quest and PC VR in Early Access later this year.

Asymmetrical multiplayer hide-and-seek sequel Panoptic 2 ups the ante from the first game by pitting VR players against up to four flatscreen challengers. Panoptic 2 is coming to PC VR and Meta Quest.

Just a couple of days ahead of its March 26 release on Meta Quest, The Boys: Trigger Warning showcased an extended look at the gameplay players can expect. Look for our full review of Pixel Ripped developer Arvore's newest offering on UploadVR soon.

We got a developer's breakdown of Primal Rumble, a charming turn-based mixed reality deck combat game coming to Meta Quest.

VRacer Hoverbike shadow dropped a brand new track editor in a free update, available now on PS VR2, PC VR, and Quest.

Flat2VR Studios' roguelite FPS Roboquest VR announced a May 21 release date for both the Meta Quest port and a new co-op gameplay mode.

Sticking with Flat2VR Studios, Trombone Champ Unflattened teased a new update. Wait, does that look like Disney lettering to anyone else?

Flat2VR kept it rolling with a PC VR Early Access release date of April 23 for its next game, Flatout 4 VR: Total Insanity.

The main show closed out with Team Beef giving an extended look at old school FPS Wrath: Aeon of Ruin Brutal Edition and a release date of April 9 for Quest, PC VR, and PS VR2.

Special Montage

Fans of Bootstrap Island, Beat The Beats, Puzzling Places, and Legendary Tales got some quick hitter updates to chew on in a montage narrated by showcase host Jamie Feltham.

In case you missed it, Bootstrap Island has exited Early Access. The first post launch update is coming in Q2 2026, adding a new creature encounter, refined inventory management, and a new challenge mode.

Fist-filled rhythm game Beat the Beats punches its way onto PC VR and Meta Quest next week on April 2.

Puzzle enthusiasts on Steam don't have much longer to wait. Puzzling Places arrives as a hybrid title on April 9. A flatscreen demo is available now with a new update adding another puzzle.

The next surprise was a shadow drop for Legendary Tales' Dawn Of History DLC, available right now on PC VR and PS VR2.

Pre-Show

Prior to the main show, there was a twenty minute pre-show featuring a selection of updates on some of VR's upcoming indie titles.

Bloxer, from Incuvo (Green Hell VR, Tracked: Shoot To Survive), is a nine player party game that adds a physical twist to the standard match-4 formula. Bloxer releases on March 24, shortly after the showcase.

How To God has a new update introducing new gameplay systems, upgrades, and new quests and rewards. How To God is currently available on Quest with a Steam release on the way.

Shop & Stuff, the latest in the 'Stuff' series from HyperVR Games (Pets & Stuff, Shave & Stuff) drops on PS VR2 on March 27 with a new update.

Climbing-based rhythm game Peak Rhythm's latest update is out today (March 24), bringing a multiplayer game mode.

Claiming to have the biggest hordes of any VR shooter, A Long Survive arrives on PS VR2 and PC VR in April with full crossplay support.

Virtual Hunter dropped a new trailer ahead of the releases for the PS VR2 and Quest ports on May 27.

Full Steam Undead offered up a new trailer with more gameplay of the zombie blasting steam train driving adventure.

Isle of Food, a cozy cooking and exploration sim, releases on Quest and PC VR in April with a PS VR2 version also in development.

We got our first look at Squingle Arcade, a free-to-play follow up to the original Squingle, coming to PC VR, Quest, Apple Vision Pro, and Pico.

Inspired by the Bunker series, Confined: Leaving OKB-134 is coming to PC VR with flatscreen support sometime in 2026. There is a VR supported demo currently available on Steam.

Pulse-pounding dual-wielding shooter Plasmaborne, out now on Meta Quest, showed off more gameplay in a new trailer.

Interlocked: Puzzle Islands is a new cozy puzzle game available today (March 24) on Meta Quest. A PC VR port has been announced with no release window given.

Crepe Master is a colorful arcade brawler coming to Meta Quest 3 headsets on May 7.

Sol Protocol is a three-player co-op sci-fi roguelike coming soon to Meta Quest 3 headsets in Early Access with a later PC VR release also planned.

The full VR Games Showcase is available on YouTube now.