
Oculus sunsets Go, will add easier Quest app distribution - shafyy
https://www.oculus.com/blog/an-update-on-the-evolution-of-the-oculus-platform-/
======
ArcVRArthur
I hate to keep saying "I told you so" but I've had many conversations at
Oculus Connect & elsewhere about the abject failure of 3DoF with few people
seriously considering that the market has spoken. 6DoF standalone VR is the
minimum bar for success with spacial computing. Forget 3DoF & AR. Focus on
what's growing and retentive. That's 6DoF VR standalones and currently Quest
is king.

~~~
didgeoridoo
I'd go so far as to say 3DoF was a massive setback for popular perceptions of
VR.

Low-resolution spherical imagery and video is just not that impressive, and
that's all you get with 3DoF. Contrast with the presence and immersion you get
with even the cheapest 6DoF headsets, and it's not even the same technology
category.

So, now we have a bunch of people walking around thinking they "tried VR"
because they had a Gear or a Go or a Cardboard, but they didn't get what the
big deal was about.

~~~
Impossible
Yes, 3DOF was a gimmick and lead to the perception that VR was another 3DTV
waiting to happen. Turns out "VR" is, 3DOF devices and phone holder VR of the
mid-2010s had a similar adoption and failure curve as 3DTV. I didn't really
get excited about VR until I tried Vive, as tracked controllers are important
also.

~~~
dylan-m
I bet there are a large number of people who have felt sick because of 3DOF
"VR", as well, and have since written off VR because they don't want to feel
sick again. Having a system that ignores most of your movements but not all of
them is a recipe for motion sickness, even if it _is_ running at 90 frames per
second. Developers at Oculus and elsewhere have poured tons of energy into
solving that with stuff like Asynchronous Spacewarp, where the goal is to
respond to every little movement your body makes as soon as possible. As it
turns out, this is really important. And I think we've all learned here that
simply having hands is huge. (It doesn't even matter if they do anything:
being able to see your hands is immediately reassuring). So it's really sad to
me that the product people went on to ignore (might even say sabotage) that
effort with the Go.

------
kbenson
I'm still annoyed that they don't have multiple user profiles for Quest. What
kind of gaming device doesn't support that in 2020? Every time I hear an
announcement from Oculus, I have a little hope they'll announce support for
this, and every time I'm disappointed.

~~~
TulliusCicero
Yeah this is the dumbest part of using a Quest right now. No profiles means no
separate save data, so I can't differentiate my high scores in Beat Saber from
my wife's, which is really annoying.

And then of course in some games with a story mode, if they didn't build in
multiple save files into the game then you're just kind of screwed.

~~~
bonniemuffin
Totally. When I make Oculus friends, I hate that I have to tell them to find
me as [my husband's username] because he signed up on the device first, so now
I can never have my own Oculus account.

I solved the Beatsaber highscores problem by being really really good at
Beatsaber, so I only play on Expert+ and he only plays the lower levels. That
way our high scores are separate. :)

~~~
s369610
I use party mode for this. It lets you enter your names etc.

------
shafyy
> That’s why we’re going all-in, and we won’t be shipping any more 3DOF VR
> products.

This is not exactly surprising, but still a bold and absolutely correct move
from Oculus.

As a developer who was rejected from the Oculus Quest store before, it's great
to hear that they now how concrete plans to start opening up the store.

~~~
ericflo
I'll believe their new distribution method when I see it. How will they
handicap it? How will they maintain their requisite absolute control? And we
won't see it until sometime next year? Hmm. (Spoken as someone who was
rejected from the Rift store.)

~~~
shafyy
I'm imagining you'll just have a direct link to your app in the store that you
can use e.g. on your website or submit to SideQuest. Your app won't be
findable on the Quest store otherwise. Why is that hard to believe?

~~~
ericflo
> Why is that hard to believe?

Because they haven't given us any of these details that you're imagining. Will
there still be an approval process? Will Facebook give up any control? Will
this be just like "keys only" distribution, a return of the Concepts/Early
Access channel, or something like the old Oculus Share? So...I'll believe it
when I see it.

~~~
shafyy
In the linked blog post, they say that apps will be still subject to their
policies (same as when you want your app in the iOS app store or Android Play
Store), but that you'll have a direct link to distribute.

~~~
ericflo
The direct link mention is encouraging, I hope they do something interesting
with the opportunity

------
caiobegotti
In case you're not into VR but is curious about it from time to time: DoF
means degree of freedom and you can easily imagine the tech leap from 3 to 6
(X, Y & Z axis of movements of the head plus surge [back and forth], sway
[sideways] and heave [vertical] movements of your body).

~~~
k__
3DoF -> looking around

6DoF -> looking & moving around

~~~
NegativeLatency
6DoF -> looking around and moving around

~~~
k__
Right!

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leetrout
The Go is a great piece of hardware for what it is.

In my opinion, working with it since day one: It isn't going anywhere. You can
still sideload, you can still tinker and the tooling is there to do this in
pure android studio + 3d engine.

You don't need anything from FB / oculus for hobby projects as long as the
driver is available (and they're already "out" so hopefully FB just puts it on
GitHub or similar).

I still prefer the Go for watching content on planes, to "zone out" with
virtual zen spaces, etc.

~~~
rixrax
And go is still great for watching porn (maybe not in airplane though) for as
far as Im aware all of it is 3DOF 180 fov movies.

~~~
leetrout
There were similar comments in a thread I commented on in 2018. It’s
interesting that a lot of people immediately jump to porn. The Redbull content
is really good and watching regular content in the void or similar is a
novelty, IMO, when you don’t do it everyday.

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17509327](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17509327)

------
Uhrheber
What a dick move. I can understand that they won't accept any new apps, but
also not accepting updates?

A lot of apps for media playing and social media for the Go are still under
active development. Not allowing updates will effectively cut off Go users
from social media.

I sense a class action coming.

------
arkades
So, for someone who isn’t gonna drop a grand on a Valve rig, what’s the right
purchase for a gamer today?

~~~
vl
Quest is better just because you can buy it relatively quickly, and for Valve
Index you have to wait many weeks in line. Valve Index (or Rift, for example)
is lighter, because it doesn’t have battery, and has better tracking (pros),
but is connected by cable (cons). But you need cable for Quest to play PC
games anyway!

But it’s not significantly cheaper - you want 128GB version because games are
huge, this is $500. Then you need a case - this is relatively fragile
equipment, and you don’t want your lens to get dirty since it’s hard to clean
- $40. Then you need Oculus Link cable to play Half Life: Alyx or other more
demanding games - $80. Quest doesn’t have built-in headset - $50 more (I’m
actually using over-the-ear headphones with $10 short cable). You may also
need grips (magnetic battery cover is the most stupid thing!). You can buy
cheaper accessories, but they are hit or miss, so I opted for first-party case
and cable at least. Anyway, this is $670, which is getting into Valve Index
territory.

~~~
vlovich123
The Link cable is totally optional & only if you want a 15ft super-light USB3
cable. You can use any USB cable you want including USB2 cables, 26ft cables,
cables you already own, the in-box charging cable.

On price, the Valve Index is $999. $999 - $670 = $329. Generally a $300 price
difference at this level puts you in a very different market price point
targeting different users. You may also not already have a Windows gaming PC.
Then the TOC difference rises to $~1329-2000 between the two setups because
the Quest works just fine without any extra hardware.

Regarding the case, it was unclear to me if you're implying that the Valve
Index is more robust & thus doesn't need a case?

Disclaimer: I work on Oculus Link.

~~~
vl
For 15ft you kinda want light cable. Also you want L-shaped connector on one
end. From the speed test it does during setup it kinda looks like it needs USB
3 speeds, so USB2 presumably won’t cut it. Anyway, I was going to get one of
the cheaper cables from Amazon, but after reading bunch of problematic reviews
for cheaper cables I ponnied up for the Oculus cable since I didn’t want to
deal with potential problems.

Sure, there is a price difference, but my point was that Quest needs a bit
more accessories than Index, so it pushes the price a bit up. I still would
recommend Quest to anyone, because people who get Index (or other PC-based
headset) know what they need already.

My plan is to store Index in the original case. It didn’t work out for Quest
because case is not that convenient for reuse, and Quest is not actually
stored in the office next to PC (and at the kitchen area I prefer smaller
footprint). Also Quest is moved around way more.

>Disclaimer: I work on Oculus Link.

I sure hope you’ll fix the problems because some VD users report better colors
(deeper blacks specifically) and better latency (hard to believe, but still).
;) ;) ;)

~~~
vlovich123
We still officially recommend USB3 but USB2 is still functional.

> after reading bunch of problematic reviews for cheaper cables I ponnied up
> for the Oculus cable since I didn’t want to deal with potential problems.

That is your choice as the consumer to make. A non-trivial amount of users are
using USB2 cables & there are lots of successful reports on the subreddit
discussing cables that work.

> but my point was that Quest needs a bit more accessories than Index, so it
> pushes the price a bit up.

In my experience I haven't observed the need for these accessories personally
but YMMV. Still, even with all the extra accessories, you're still $300
cheaper than the Index. I wouldn't put them in the same pricing category. The
pricing disparity grows significantly if you consider someone knew to VR
without a gaming PC. The TOC for just trying VR content is significantly
higher as is the setup complexity.

> I sure hope you’ll fix the problems because some VD users report better
> colors (deeper blacks specifically) and better latency (hard to believe, but
> still). ;) ;) ;)

I have not heard any feedback that indicates that VD latency is better than
Link. There are some color differences. IIRC VD uses the wrong color space for
its rendering (intentionally or otherwise) which can make things seem more
vibrant, but that reproduces if you compare against Rift/Rift S as well.
"Deeper blacks" generally wouldn't be impacted by anything in the Link stack &
this is the first I'm encountering of anything like that.

If you have any actual links to such reports (lower latency, color issues)
that would be helpful so we can make sure to be talking about the same thing.
If you have links for reports of these problems that would be helpful. Given
what you've described it's hard to link it back to anything actionable.

------
Mindwipe
> [https://developer.oculus.com/blog/the-next-chapter-of-
> oculus...](https://developer.oculus.com/blog/the-next-chapter-of-oculus-
> development-and-a-new-quest-distribution-path-coming-in-2021/)

Still lots of content censorship requirements for this new way to distribute.

Why does content have to submit to a blanket rejection of dealing with any
sexuality when it's not even going through their store?

[https://developer.oculus.com/policy/content-
guidelines/](https://developer.oculus.com/policy/content-guidelines/)

------
rcarmo
I’ve been thinking of getting one now that it is a pretty well supported
target in Godot ([https://godotengine.org/article/godot-oculus-quest-
support](https://godotengine.org/article/godot-oculus-quest-support)), which
means I could easily get prototypes running on it with little hassle. Am
curious about when they’ll refresh the hardware, though, because it comes
across as a little underpowered on the standalone front (and I don’t have a
beefy machine to use Oculus Link with it).

------
drcode
> People have spent more than $100M on Quest content and more than 10 titles
> have generated over $2M in revenue on Quest

That sounds weird: The only numbers they can share with us are that people
have spent $100M on game development, but they only point to a total of $20M
of revenue. Obviously $20M isn't the entire revenue on the platform... but
since they didn't share any other numbers, the default assumption would have
to be that they aren't very flattering, either.

"Come develop on our platform! Spend $100M to make $20M in revenue!"

~~~
rgovostes
They are saying $100M in transactions have taken place on their app store, and
a handful of the most popular titles have made $2M each. Not that developers
are burning $5 to make $1.

~~~
zhoujianfu
Also, at least $2M... it’s probably like #1: $20M, #2: $10M, #3: $5M, and so
on. So probably half the $100M went to the top 10?

~~~
jachee
Probably a huge chunk of it is $30+ never-on-sale Beat Sabre.

------
toeachtheirown
When this happens, will we still be able to sideload into the Go? Haven't
found a solid answer for this yet.

------
theschwa
Focusing their product line like this is a great move. I hope that they do
more to hone in on overall usability for the average user, and continue to
expand beyond gamers as their core persona. Focusing on standalone VR, hand
tracking, and hopefully more social and productivity apps like Facebook
Horizon will be the best way to grow.

------
terpsichorean
As an old VR developer, this is great news. I agree with you all - remove
3DoF, it’s “diluting” the experience, and not in a good way. In the apps
themselves, too many design sacrifices have to be made to account for this
narrow use case. The price point was great - but for overall flexibility
standalone devices are the future.

------
krapp
I bought a Go recently because it was the only VR platform I could afford
and... it was cool for a minute but quickly felt like a gimmick, so this isn't
surprising.

I'd still like to develop for "real" VR and play around with it in the future
but this is out of my league at the moment.

~~~
whywhywhywhy
Definitely try the Quest if you have a chance.

Real VR isn't about the 3D effect it's about having body and hand presence.

------
coffeeaddicted
Unfortunately just the kind of experience you can expect when buying non-open
systems. Company loses interest in hardware - it can stop everyone developing
for it. If they would at least open it up for sideloading so the hardware
isn't doomed to become electronic trash.

~~~
shafyy
That's like saying the Palm handhelds should still be supported.

~~~
coffeeaddicted
I don't know about Palm as I never had one. But I can still code for my first
Android phone. And I do not ask for support, but for opening up sideloading so
users can install apps from PC when the shop closes.

------
mrfusion
To paraphrase, we want a way you can distribute crappy games but no way
they’re going in our store.

------
gorgoiler
How easy is it to ship exemplar apps to Quest? Can I just pick up Unity XR,
riff a little on the FPS example, and compile it straight to something I can
load on a Quest?

~~~
zlsa
I don't think there's a pre-built FPS VR template from Unity, but it is pretty
simple for basic projects. Word of warning, though: VR locomotion is very
different from FPS locomotion, and gets very complex pretty quickly.

~~~
gorgoiler
Ah, that’s a shame. I naively thought the Unity FPS game would load onto
Oculus Quest.

My real goal is to have students ship content of their own to the Quest, to
dive a little deeper into programming and technology than they might do as
mere consumers.

------
kingnothing
How does Quest compare to Rift for anyone who's used both?

~~~
TulliusCicero
I own a Quest and Rift CV1. It's hard to go back to the Rift, even with the
extra computing power. It's just a pain to clear enough space, whereas I can
be more flexible with where I use the Quest. Plus, the cameras are an eyesore,
think I might just take them down.

The resolution on the Quest is better too, and when I really need my gaming PC
for some VR title I can always use link with it.

The Quest has a lot of cool titles on it, though I'd be lying if I didn't
admit that most of the time it's a Beat Saber machine for me. Beat Saber is
fantastic.

------
Causality1
After a few years with an Oculus Touch, my basic conclusion is that I'm too
good at immersing myself in standard games to ever be truly excited about VR.
For me there just isn't a big enough difference to justify all the
inconveniences.

