The VR glasses Oculus Quest 2 are better and cheaper than its predecessor, which made VR much more affordable last year. That makes it the most accessible headset ever – for which you have to make one sacrifice.
In the roughly four years since virtual reality began its rise, it has mainly been a hobby for nerds. To use the first, expensive glasses, powerful PCs were needed, which only hardcore gamers had at home.
That changed when Facebook bought eyewear maker Oculus. Hoping to find a mainstream audience for the technology, the company released the Oculus Go and first Quest glasses. Neither required a PC, while the Quest offered much the same experience as expensive machines. That was very special for 450 euros.
We wrote in a review last year that the Quest was the first VR glasses for non-geeks, although it wasn’t perfect at the time. The hardware made the Quest quite heavy, which made it pull on your head with use.
With the Quest 2, Facebook tries to make a big step in one go. In summary, the glasses have a much higher resolution, a lighter weight and a lower price of 350 euros.
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Virtual reality is now razor-sharp
The improvements for the screen are very big. The amount of pixels has increased by 50 percent, giving the device a resolution of 1,832 by 1,920 pixels per eye. It’s as if half a 4K television is hanging in front of every eye.
This increase in resolution ensures that the virtual world looks razor-sharp. Previous headsets showed a kind of ‘screen door’, caused by the space between the individual pixels on the screen. This is no longer the case with the Quest 2.
Where the Quest 1 used a somewhat older smartphone processor, the Quest 2 has a chip that is specially designed for virtual reality. The difference is noticeable in practice. Games optimized for the new Quest look much more beautiful and detailed.
It is hard to believe that such powerful hardware is sold in a device for only 350 euros. But there is also a downside: to use a Quest 2, you must log in with a Facebook account.
Facebook is a sacrifice to make
That obligation feels a bit crazy, given that previous headsets could use a separate Oculus account. Perhaps this is how Facebook hopes to recoup the high production costs of the glasses.
By linking what you do and play to your account, the company can show more targeted advertisements on the social network in the long term. In this way, the guaranteed small margin on the selling price can be offset.
There is no clear benefit for users. Those who prefer not to create a Facebook account, for example due to privacy concerns, must therefore make a sacrifice if he or she wants to use these glasses.
Lighter, but with a worse tire
The Quest 2 is 10 percent lighter than the previous. It is also more compact, so that it weighs less on the face. One drawback: the new headband does not distribute the weight as well, so it still pulls a bit on your face.
Facebook sells an alternative band that should make wearing the glasses more comfortable for 50 euros, but we could not test it yet. It feels like a trick: by saving money on the headband and selling a better model separately, the price of the Quest 2 is kept low.
Not as obvious as a smartphone
The question remains: are the above changes enough to make virtual reality truly mainstream? We do not yet live in a world where such glasses are just as self-evident as a smartphone or tablet. A mainstream app seems to be missing. Cameras and apps such as WhatsApp and TikTok make smartphones interesting for a wide audience, while VR still relies mainly on games.
Those games on the Quest 2 are astonishingly beautiful and extremely fun to play. Music games like Beat Saber make you feel like you’re swinging laser swords yourself, while in Arizona Sunshine it feels like you’re really among the zombies. But there is still very little bait for non-gamers.
Facebook is currently working hard on its VR app Horizon, of which a test version already exists. That should one day become a social network in virtual reality. But whether that will be the big killer app remains to be seen.
Conclusion
The Quest 2 is lighter, more powerful and even much cheaper than its predecessor. Never before has virtual reality been so easy to use for a large group of people. It remains to be seen whether that will happen. Because although the hardware is phenomenal, the range is still mainly aimed at gamers.
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