PS VR2
Sony
As Meta struggles to achieve its metaverse, even with decent Quest sales, it will now face additional challenges with an old champion returning to the fray. In a previous generation of VR, Sony’s PlayStation VR was king, outselling Oculus at the time. Now, PSVR 2 is coming, although we’ll see if it can dominate the niche market again.
PSVR 2 is coming on February 22, 2023, according to a new announcement from Sony. And it will cost $550, $50 more than the highest-priced PS5 model, at least in the US. The original PSVR launched at $400 in 2016, and even assuming somewhat severe inflation, that doesn’t make up for the full gap in price increases, even though PSVR didn’t come with controllers at the time . The PSVR 2 bundle includes the headset, its Sense controllers, and the stereo headset. And yes, PSVR 2 connects to your PS5 with a cable. This means more power, but also not a wireless experience like research.
Of course, PSVR 2 at $550 is miles cheaper than Mark Zuckerberg’s just-announced $1,500 Meta Quest Pro, aimed at ultra hardcore VR enthusiasts and business use. The Quest 3 is likely to come out next year, and the Quest 2 is currently $400, so a bit cheaper than what we’re seeing from Sony here.
Sony also took the opportunity today to announce 11 new titles coming to PSVR 2 at some point, almost all of which are dedicated VR titles, no VR ports or anything like that.
I remain somewhat skeptical of Sony’s decision to continue devoting so many resources to VR. At least no, they’re not relying heavily on VR to be the next big thing like Mark Zuckerberg has staked his entire reputation and company on the metaverse, but I wonder if hardware resources could be better spent resurrecting, say, a console mobile, at a time when Switch and Steam Deck are very popular. But as a former VR market leader, I guess I understand why we’re here for a sequel. I just hope they make a PlayStation Home VR at some point and that ends up being a lot better than Meta’s Horizon Worlds, which seems like a pretty low bar.
The VR market has continued to grow, but slowly, and remains a fractional part of the gaming landscape compared to console, PC, and mobile gaming. I expect PSVR 2 to do pretty well, but price is a big deal for many in this economy, and a fancy VR headset for a small handful of short games might not be worth it to many besides extreme enthusiasts. We’ll see how things go at launch and what Quest 3 can bring in terms of competition next year.
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