PSVR 2 Is The Wrong Device, At The Wrong Time, At The Wrong Price


There’s a new report out from Bloomberg that Sony is going to cut its sales forecasts down for PSVR 2 after pre-orders have been lacking. According to the report (where admittedly, Bloomberg has missed on Sony insider reports before), the forecast is being cut from 2 million to 1 million for its launch quarter. The headset launches in just three weeks on February 22.

(Update: Sony has now denied it is cutting production numbers for PSVR 2. Though that wasn’t quite what the original report said, rather that it was cutting internal sales forecasts).

I was not all that surprised when I learned Sony was making a second PSVR headset, given that the first one was effectively the most popular of its VR generation, but Sony seems to have misfired on a bunch of fronts here the second time around:

  • PSVR 2 Is Priced At $550 – Well above not just its Meta Quest competitors, both present and likely future, but also more expensive than even a top-end PS5 itself.
  • You Need A PS5 To Play It – That’s the other thing. The Meta Quest is standalone, while you will also need to own a PS5 to run PSVR 2. That may have been more acceptable when other VR headsets were needing to be plugged into high end computers, but standalone sets have been the big breakout since then.
  • It Has a Cord – Again, this is not what most VR players are hoping for in 2023, where many VR headsets, including Meta’s, are now cord-free, where here, you’ll still be tethered to your PlayStation.

  • Launch Games Are Limited – The new Horizon VR title is its biggest launch draw, but again, you’re charging $550 for something with only a scattering of games, and many of them are ports because…
  • PSVR 2 Is Not Backward Compatible – I am picturing many people who enjoyed PSVR 1 and yet are very dismayed to find that entire library is not transferring over to the new unit. I understand, technically, why that may be happening, but it doesn’t feel good to be asked to A) buy pricey new hardware and B) not have any backward compatibility when that’s been very normalized in the console space itself.

Finally, I’m just not sure continued mass investment in VR is the move right now. We are watching Meta’s grandiose VR ambitions come close to sinking an entire trillion dollar company. While VR has experienced some growth, it has not been explosive in any sense, and the next big VR headset release is nowhere near as anticipated as the next big normal console drop. There’s a reason Microsoft and Nintendo have stayed pretty far away from this road.

If PSVR 2 significantly underperforms and Meta keeps burning cash on its own headset ecosystem, it feels like we are heading toward a place where few large companies continue to invest significantly in the VR space for a long while. The breakthrough moment for the tech always feels just 5-10 years away, but here we are, about seven years into a time period when that was first said, and even if the tech has evolved, in many ways it’s facing more challenges than ever, and some aspects feel like they’re going backwards.

Follow me on Twitter, YouTube, Facebook and Instagram. Subscribe to my free weekly content round-up newsletter, God Rolls.

Pick up my sci-fi novels the Herokiller series and The Earthborn Trilogy.





Source link

Denial of responsibility! galaxyconcerns is an automatic aggregator around the global media. All the content are available free on Internet. We have just arranged it in one platform for educational purpose only. In each content, the hyperlink to the primary source is specified. All trademarks belong to their rightful owners, all materials to their authors. If you are the owner of the content and do not want us to publish your materials on our website, please contact us by email – [email protected]. The content will be deleted within 24 hours.

Leave A Reply

Your email address will not be published.