On New Year's Eve, nearly 150,000 people spent the holiday in VRChat worlds, a majority of them in headset while setting a concurrent user record as the calendar changed from 2025 to 2026 across the United States. Then, last Saturday January 10, 2026 at 10 a.m. Pacific, Another Axiom's planet of apes received an off-world visitor and broke their own record too.

Virtual worlds are becoming important and reliable destinations for the adults and teens up at midnight partying like it's 2050 in VRChat, and kids gathering a few weeks later to witness a comet in Gorilla Tag as well as countless more dipping in and out of other virtual worlds. As Meta shifts its hiring focus again and institutes another round of layoffs this week, I've put together this piece in hopes of shifting the broader narrative.

The following studios being shut down: Sanzaru (Asgard's Wrath series), Twisted Pixel (Deadpool VR), Armature (RE4 Quest VR port)

Meta acquisitions have proven to be a death sentence for so many great VR game developers already before, most notably Ready at Dawn.

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.zip/post/56884744

AI infrastructure will provides Meta with a "strategic advantage," Zuckerberg said. He once said almost the exact same thing about the metaverse.

Jacob Smith has been in prison for two decades but he and other inmates are still taking regular trips to far-flung, exotic locales. No passport required, just a virtual reality headset.

“I went to Thailand, man!” Smith recalled with a grin, describing the first time he strapped on a VR device and was transported to the lush landscapes and bustling markets of Southeast Asia.

A Los Angeles-based nonprofit is bringing the technology to California prisons with the goal of providing inmates a brief escape and, more importantly, exposure to real world scenarios that will prepare them to reenter society.

During a weeklong program last month, incarcerated men at Valley State Prison near Fresno sat on metal folding chairs in a common area. They shuffled in their seats as they were outfitted with the headsets that resemble opaque goggles. Their necks contorted slightly and smiles spread across their faces as the high-definition videos started and their journeys commenced.

The key takeaway here is that I expect to install more stuff to the Steam Frame headset using Linux directly on day one than I did in four days with Android XR. And I expect to be able to install a lot more to the headset overall than I have been able to in years of ownership of Vision Pro or Quest. Am I going to install my own operating system? Probably not. But am I going to personally screw up my installation of Linux so bad the system is going to need to restore me to factory settings? After this many years messing with computers, that's probably my goal and I'm going to enjoy doing it.

Decades after my incident in 1990s Windows, as I was explaining what Mac and Steam Deck can do for a teenager, I found myself overwhelming them. My effort to make personal computing seem less daunting than it was for my forefathers was not going well. I told my eldest that if they break a Steam Deck by installing too many games and modding the system with software, I would be impressed.

Back in 2019, Facebook set up a call with me to discuss their "console-like curation strategy" for the Quest ecosystem, and today leadership at Meta has abandoned that strategy entirely for a policy of openness, as a great many developers struggle for sales inside of an ecosystem flush now with low quality projects. Meta seems to have meant for Horizon Worlds to be the floor of the Quest ecosystem, but requiring a Meta account and giving developers a cut of subscriptions is not providing stable footing to keep developers afloat, nor must-have reasons to put on a headset.

Now consider the game Valve is playing in comparison to that and the space their engineers are making for experimentation. Valve funded faceless developers worldwide to work on a series of key open source projects for the last decade forming the basis of SteamOS all trying to make it easier to play games with computers.

A Chinese company which mass produces many of the best known headsets in the industry has shared a new compact MR headset reference design which sets expectations for 2026.

Goertek is a little-known but massively important player in the XR industry. The company is a key enabler in the production of XR headsets as it provides reference designs which function as blueprints for consumer companies to build headsets, and handles mass production for some of the best known headsets in the industry.

At CES 2026, Goertek revealed its latest MR headset reference design. Reference designs like this act as a blueprint for any company that wants to put their own spin on the device and take it to market. Rather than a prototype—which might use novel materials or techniques that aren’t yet mass producible—reference designs like this represent a fully functional set of ready-to-manufacture components with tangible costs and delivery dates.

There isn’t a lot of info available on the reference design yet, except what has been officially stated by Goertek:

An Ultra-Lightweight MR Reference Design showcases system-level optimizations, reducing the weight of a 4K MR headset to approximately 100 grams. It delivers retinal-level clarity (38 PPD) within a 100-degree field of view, with Video See-Through (VST) and 6DoF [tracking].

Shiftall, the Japan-based VR hardware startup, is no longer working with Panasonic on its MeganeX series of thin and light PC VR headsets.

Initially acquired by Panasonic in 2018, Shiftall developed a number of devices as the company’s ad hoc internal skunk works, including the first MeganeX PC VR headset, HaritoraX wireless body trackers, FlipVR motion controllers, and mutalk soundproof microphones.

While Panasonic sold off Shiftall in early 2024, the companies continued to collaborate on the MeganeX headset series.

Now, according to a Shiftall press statement (via Mogura), Panasonic is officially no longer involved with development of MeganeX as of December 2025.

I saw a reddit post on the r/virtualreality subreddit and wanted to share it:
Link (redlib)

Aces of Thunder (3 Feb 2026)

https://youtu.be/lp_VwoKNpC0
https://store.steampowered.com/app/2754090/Aces_of_Thunder/

EXD - Extra Dimensional (February 2026)

https://youtu.be/-aYEPGHSJeY
https://store.steampowered.com/app/3962020/EXD__Extra_Dimensional/

The Warp: Cephisso (Q1 2026)

https://youtu.be/Z9P0YPVsV2s
https://store.steampowered.com/app/3814060/The_Warp__Cephisso/

Gunman Contracts - Stand Alone (Q1 2026)

https://youtu.be/xIxSAuZZC9k
https://store.steampowered.com/app/2421750/Gunman_Contracts__Stand_Alone/

Maid of Sker VR (March 2026)

https://youtu.be/e5gKMA9YwL0
https://store.steampowered.com/app/4005370/Maid_of_Sker_VR/

Total Chaos (Q2 2026)

https://youtu.be/yOdP0fm6Oqo
https://store.steampowered.com/app/2208350/Total_Chaos/

Golel (Q2 2026)

https://youtu.be/sxoIO-Go8Xg
https://store.steampowered.com/app/2577730/Golel/

Automa (2026)

https://youtu.be/ng3nv5fcFKk
https://store.steampowered.com/app/4139020/AUTOMA/

La Royale Below Deck (2026)

https://youtu.be/37K3-O-AFhQ
https://store.steampowered.com/app/4002690/La_Royale__Below_Deck/

G-Rebels (2026)

https://youtu.be/VZkzlti8KzI
https://store.steampowered.com/app/2445980/GRebels/

Road To Yvhalon (2026)

https://youtu.be/4UUg15SFsxQ
https://store.steampowered.com/app/3368470/Road_To_Yvhalon/

The Mighty Eight VR (2026)

https://youtu.be/owaX1Kvd6RU
https://store.steampowered.com/app/1325580/The_Mighty_Eighth_VR/

Subliminal (2026)

https://youtu.be/Oe8lU18G89Q
https://store.steampowered.com/app/2300840/Subliminal/

FYR: The Lost Island (2026)

https://youtu.be/tNFoC_7Rho4
https://store.steampowered.com/app/3337350/FYR_The_Lost_Island/

Remnant Protocol (2026)

https://youtu.be/0OuyuSmRDOI
https://store.steampowered.com/app/2201470/Remnant_Protocol/

Cradle of Sins (2026)

https://youtu.be/2DGiTa9ZVaI
https://store.steampowered.com/app/1037380/Cradle_of_Sins/

Project Louisiana - The BOUNDS VR (2026)

https://youtu.be/UzHmTFAL-9w
https://store.steampowered.com/app/3415410/Project_Louisiana__The_BOUNDS_VR/

Falcon Fall™ (2026)

https://youtu.be/uRLhoClvG_I
https://store.steampowered.com/app/3942390/Falcon_Fall/

Slender: The Arrival VR (2026)

https://youtu.be/hQ1d9NPcLsI
https://store.steampowered.com/app/2815020/Slender_The_Arrival_VR/

The tech industry has spent roughly a gazillion dollars trying to convince people to strap face computers on their heads. It hasn't worked.

But the tech guys haven't given up. Their new pitch: Instead of buying bulky goggles that replace your reality with a computer-generated version of something else, what about some glasses?

At first glance, this makes a bunch of sense: People don't wear big heavy stuff on their head unless they have to — like if they're skiing, perhaps. But lots of people wear glasses. So if the tech guys want to sell new tech, they should stop trying to make things people don't wear and focus on the things people already wear.

There's been a lull in the VR space. Since the release of the Meta Quest 3, along with the more affordable Quest 3S, there hasn't been much in the way of headsets to expand the scope of virtual reality. Well, Valve changed this with the announcement of the Steam Frame.

Kicking off a new era of hardware devices from Valve, along with the Steam Machine and new Steam Controller, the upcoming VR headset is gearing up to be the virtual reality device to grab for PC VR gaming. It's not like it has much competition, with the latest HTC Vive Focus Vision arriving back in 2024 and Meta pausing plans for third-party VR headsets from Asus and Lenovo.

In any case, that gives the Steam Frame plenty of time to shine. Not only is it a bonafide "PC," according to Valve, but it's also made for VR and non-VR gaming. It may not be the mixed-reality headset some were expecting (no full color passthrough cameras here), but with a huge backlog of VR and non-VR PC games via SteamOS it can delve into, the gaming giant's priorities have become clear.

This is a VR headset made for PC gaming, through and through, and Valve is delivering a host of unique features I can't wait to try out. If these tools give me the best experience while playing the mythical Half-Life 3 (if it ever comes out), then the Steam Frame will have achieved its goals.

Cloudhead Games, the veteran VR studio behind hit rhythm shooter Pistol Whip (2019), announced that it’s laying off 70% of staff, making for at least 37 affected employees.

Cloudhead CEO Denny Unger released the news via a Bluesky post, explaining the decision was based a “downturn of the gaming industry, VR’s still nascent challenges, including a lack of platform funding.”

Unger, who co-founded the studio in 2012 alongside Tracey Unger, characterizes the decision as a “difficult choice,” noting the studio’s mission still includes the core belief in the power of VR and its coming mainstream relevance.

Unger maintains that mainstream relevance isn’t here yet though; when devices that “do everything” eventually arrive, it will “take studios like ours to be there.”

“Our ongoing priority is to find ‘the reason’ to use VR and we will continue on that road until we can no longer,” Unger says. He further notes that a future update will include more about the challenges and potential opportunities in the VR games industry.

Bigscreen founder Darshan Shankar believes Beyond headsets could be among the top five systems in use on Steam in the next few years.

On that path, Shankar hopes to fully catch up to demand for Beyond 2 headsets in February so they "ship within 1-2 business days, including custom-fit and universal-fit orders." In April, Bigscreen marks 10 years of shared co-watching in VR on Steam with Shankar suggesting over email "perhaps we'll keep the 'beta' tag forever."

Shankar said Valve's announcement of Steam Frame coincided with "one of our biggest sales days" as "the Beyond 2 has become the obvious upgrade path for those who want ultra-lightweight high-resolution micro-OLED and still use their preferred SteamVR tracking…

Metaverse dating is opening a new way for people to connect through immersive virtual environments. Instead of just texting or swiping photos, users can actually spend time together in digital spaces that feel interactive and real.

This shift is not just about technology. It is about how humans socialize, express emotions, and form relationships in a digital world.

VRChat broke its concurrently connected user record as the year flipped from 2025 to 2026 in various time zones, according to figures posted on social media by the head of community. As the New Year rolled across the United States from December 31 at 11:59 pm to January 1 at 12:00 am, from Eastern Time to Pacific Time, VRChat's servers supported nearly 150,000 staying online in various spaces together concurrently. VRChat's long-time head of community Tupper posted on Bluesky that Japan saw a surprisingly high peak figure over the holiday, with no specific number provided, as well as specific peak numbers across the four time zones dividing up the United States for concurrently connected users:

• Eastern: 147226
• Central: 148886
• Mountain: 141184
• Pacific: 127708

While VRChat doesn't always detail how many users access the service in headset versus traditional flat interfaces, the figures help ground the narrative around VR headset use. Tupper noted that "normal weekend" use of VRChat in recent times has seen around "120-125K CCU at peaks."-

Project's Github Page
(releases)

LibreOffice might be a great way to view and edit documents on any platform, but it has never crossed into the realm of virtual reality. That's now changing, as LibreOffice is officially available on Meta Quest VR headsets.

The Document Foundation, which manages the open-source LibreOffice office suite and related projects, has announced a LibreOffice Viewer app for Meta Horizon OS. It's a port of the existing Android app, which allows you to open documents in Open Document Format (ODT, ODS, ODP, ODG), Microsoft Office 2007-365 (DOCX, XLSX, and PPTX), and Microsoft Office 97-2003 (DOC, XLS, PPT) file types. Limited editing capabilities are also available.

So, why is it now on Meta Quest headsets? Well, Microsoft already has Word, PowerPoint, and Excel apps on the Quest platform, which was part of a push by Meta to turn Quest headsets into general productivity devices. It makes sense that LibreOffice would meet Microsoft on the same battlefield. Also, it's not much work to port an Android app to run as a two-dimensional window on Quest headsets, especially with apps like LibreOffice Viewer that are not dependent on Google Play APIs and services.

Poor sales have reportedly forced Apple to cut production of the Vision Pro headset that it had hoped would herald a new era in “spatial computing”.

The tech company also reduced marketing for Vision Pro by more than 95% last year, according to the market intelligence group Sensor Tower in figures first reported by the Financial Times.

Apple continues to sell iPhones, iPads and laptops in the millions each quarter, but analysts say sales of Vision Pro headsets, which cost at least £3,199 ($3,499) each, have been sluggish.

Apple has not released sales figures for the device, but the market research group International Data Corporation (IDC) estimates it will have sold only 45,000 in the last quarter of last year.

Another one:
https://youtu.be/VNIjZ36ugQg

A group of researchers from the University of Bologna, the University of Messina and the CNR-ISTC (Institute of Cognitive Sciences and Technologies) has used virtual reality to allow a sample of young men to embody a female avatar subjected to verbal harassment.

The research group has published the results of their study in Scientific Reports.

"We used immersive virtual reality technologies to give participants a direct experience of catcalling in an everyday context," explains Chiara Lucifora, researcher at the Department of Philosophy of the University of Bologna and first author of the study. "The results show that undergoing this experience elicits strong feelings of anger and disgust, closely linked to moral disapproval."

The study involved 36 young men with an average age of 23, who were immersed in a virtual reality scenario in which they embodied a young woman. In the first scene, the female avatar was in her bedroom, standing in front of a mirror and getting ready to go to a party. In the second scene, she arrived at a subway station, where several male characters interacted with her.

Created by ‘Crementif’, the BetterVR mod for BotW promises to bring fully stereo-rendered, 6DOF VR support to the Cemu emulated version of the game, including full hand and arm support for things like wielding weapons, torches and Bokoblin arms.

Notably, the mod is designed for the Wii U version of BotW, which comes with the usual provisos of requiring a legal copy of the game—no game files are supplied in the mod. Additionally, because it’s using Cemu, the popular Wii U emulator for PC, the VR mod also boasts a large list of mod compatibility.

“While I put a lot of effort into this mod, not everything works. Expect some jank that’ll be resolved over time,” Crementif says. “AMD graphic cards might not be supported (at launch at least). During testing we could not get it to work on an AMD system due to a driver bug.”

Nearly a decade after consumer VR took its first real steps—driven by headsets like the Oculus Rift, HTC Vive, and PlayStation VR—the medium has outgrown its novelty phase.

Those early platforms reshaped not just how players experienced games, but how studios thought about presence, interaction, and scale. Today’s VR games and experiences walk along that groundwork—and are also judged against it.

With expectations higher than ever, this year’s standout titles aren’t just impressive in isolation. They’re the ones that meaningfully build on what came before—and that’s what this year’s awards aim to recognize.

Without further ado, here’s Road to VR’s 2025 Game of the Year Awards:

Game of the Year

Ghost Town

Developer: Fireproof Games Available On: PC VR, Quest, PSVR 2 Release Date: April 24, 2025

Best Meta Quest 3S (128GB) Holiday Sale: Best Buy – $50 discount + $159 in bundled value Deal Includes:

• Quest 3S (128GB) (discounted by $50)
• Best Buy gift card ($75 value)
• Walking Dead: Saints and Sinners game ($30 value)
• 1 month subscription to Xbox Game Pass Ultimate ($30 value) [new subscribers only]
• 3 month subscription to Meta Horizon+ ($24 value) Gives you access to a catalog of great Quest games