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Why don’t all vr games release to all platforms

alphatrader
Explorer
I don’t get why vr devs don’t release to all vr platform(pcvr psvr quest)at the same time, they literally leave money on the table, I get it can be hard to develop for multiple platforms at the same time, but it definitely worth it , look at beat saber it’s on all platforms and it the only game to reach 1 million copy sold same as rec room or super hot who hit 800k sold, mark zuckerberg said we need 10 millions users to make vr self sufficient and we basically got it now 5millions psvr 4 millions pcvr(according to nvidea) and probably at least 500k quest,
9 REPLIES 9

Kentobi
Heroic Explorer
PCVR, PSVR, and Quest are 3 totally different platforms with totally different technical specs. It’s not anywhere near as simple as clicking a button to port; if it was, they’d all be doing it. They are making a financial decision - if they spend the time and money to port, are they going to make that money back and hopefully profit. And on top of that, many quest owners complain if games aren’t cross-buy, which means developers do the port work and don’t get paid for it. Until install bases get larger, it’s a tough problem. 

kevinw729
Honored Visionary
Ah @Human999 - welcome to the forum, and welcome to a very old and ticklish debate.

Fundamentally we can break this down for you simply. Originally the hope back in 2012 when OVR started was this latest phase of VR would have been a "Open Platform" as was promised with the Kickstarter - but then due to the acquisition, and the injection of major investment in exclusive content, it became clear that a ecosystem would be promoted. This was supported by others like Sony when they entered the fray with their own "unique" platform for their VR content. Then with Samsung and OVR with the GearVR initiative and finally with HTC / Valve and Microsoft with their platforms, (and even Google with Daydream). 

This "ecosystem" standard from various providers created a difficult environment for AAA developers to see true value from development (as well as for Indies) - and also saw a confusion of hardware adoption, as seen with the original "Seated Only VR" false-start for OVR. Now some five plus years on and we see that the walled-garden that Sony created has limited the penetration of some content created for PSVR that could have seen a life in PC VR (and visa versa). There have also been a stagnation of innovation as each developer clung to their respective hardware format.

The hope is that away from 'Standalone' VR - the High-end PC scene will see a new phase of development in 2021 and with that the original premise of an open platform will be adopted - that could also have the inclusion of the new 5G VR Streaming standard added (all depending on certain parties play nice!)
https://vrawards.aixr.org/ "The Out-of-Home Immersive Entertainment Frontier: Expanding Interactive Boundaries in Leisure Facilities" https://www.amazon.co.uk/Out-Home-Immersive-Entertainment-Frontier/dp/1472426959

Anonymous
Not applicable

Human999 said:

I don’t get why vr devs don’t release to all vr platform(pcvr psvr quest)at the same time, they literally leave money on the table, I get it can be hard to develop for multiple platforms at the same time, but it definitely worth it , look at beat saber it’s on all platforms and it the only game to reach 1 million copy sold same as rec room or super hot who hit 800k sold, mark zuckerberg said we need 10 millions users to make vr self sufficient and we basically got it now 5millions psvr 4 millions pcvr(according to nvidea) and probably at least 500k quest,


Beat Saber first released to pc in May 2018, as 'early access'. It then released in November 2018, for the PSVR...6 months later, not 'at the same time'. The 'full release' was May 2019, and included the Quest.

Nobody's 'leaving money on the table'...if someone wants the game, they'll buy it when it's released for that platform. They aren't losing anything.

As for developing for 'all' platforms at the same time...that's literally impossible, unless you have a massive team of coders, broken into individual groups, each working on a specific platform. If your dev team is only 2 to 5 guys...that's just not going to happen.

kevinw729
Honored Visionary

Spuzzum said:
....
Nobody's 'leaving money on the table'...if someone wants the game, they'll buy it when it's released for that platform. They aren't losing anything.
....



Picking BS as an example is a great one to show the difficulties that the eco-system has caused VR establishment this phase perfectly @Spuzzum.

This is one of a handful of games that has crossed the isle to other platforms, and it has been a long and drawn-out process littered with hurdles - even for a mega success like this. Just think of the other middling successes that fell at the first or second fence to achieve this. And that does not even include the walled-garden miss-calculation that was Rock Band VR!!

Right back in 2013, some spoke of the issues of not stifling Indie dev teams, let alone AAA studios with a complicated eco-system, or cherry picked exclusives. Some said that "exclusives" were essential, and others said that they were needed to survive and grow. We now see that some of those assumptions may have been wrong. But with that said, without the investment made by OVR and Sony (and others) we would not have the little content we have now. 

But after what happened with FalloutVR, I doubt many AAA devs will take the plunge on only one platform at a time. Though that said, what Valve proposes to do with the HLA release in March may bust through much of the Eco-System (even though it will be a Steam exclusive!)

https://vrawards.aixr.org/ "The Out-of-Home Immersive Entertainment Frontier: Expanding Interactive Boundaries in Leisure Facilities" https://www.amazon.co.uk/Out-Home-Immersive-Entertainment-Frontier/dp/1472426959

Anonymous
Not applicable

kevinw729 said:


Spuzzum said:
....
Nobody's 'leaving money on the table'...if someone wants the game, they'll buy it when it's released for that platform. They aren't losing anything.
....



Picking BS as an example is a great one to show the difficulties that the eco-system has caused VR establishment this phase perfectly @Spuzzum.

This is one of a handful of games that has crossed the isle to other platforms, and it has been a long and drawn-out process littered with hurdles - even for a mega success like this. Just think of the other middling successes that fell at the first or second fence to achieve this. And that does not even include the walled-garden miss-calculation that was Rock Band VR!!

Right back in 2013, some spoke of the issues of not stifling Indie dev teams, let alone AAA studios with a complicated eco-system, or cherry picked exclusives. Some said that "exclusives" were essential, and others said that they were needed to survive and grow. We now see that some of those assumptions may have been wrong. But with that said, without the investment made by OVR and Sony (and others) we would not have the little content we have now. 

But after what happened with FalloutVR, I doubt many AAA devs will take the plunge on only one platform at a time. Though that said, what Valve proposes to do with the HLA release in March may bust through much of the Eco-System (even though it will be a Steam exclusive!)



 
I think the biggest hurdle, at least for porting to the Quest, is the amount of RAM available. The minimum amount of RAM needed for PCVR is 8GBs, along with the amount of VRAM the recommended GPU has. The PS4 has 8GBs, but from what I can tell, it's shared between system and GPU. The GPU's also 8 core, but only 800MHz. And the Quest only has 4GBs, shared between the system and GPU.

On top of that, there's the difference in OS languages, and whatever coding differences that details. Windows, vs Linux, vs Android. As well as differences between directx, Vulcan, and whatever PlayStation uses.

kevinw729
Honored Visionary
Quest is a ticklish subject for software support @Spuzzum - OVR was unable to future-proof the system stuck following the fall out with Samsung / Qualcum with the Snapdragon 835 processor. This means its a tricky port for most of the key VR devs to consider - squeezing a quart into a pint pot. This explains the slow content take-up, while a number of studios evaluate if they wait for numbers to increase, or for the promised Standalones next year with 855 processors to emerge, (CES will be very crowded). 

https://vrawards.aixr.org/ "The Out-of-Home Immersive Entertainment Frontier: Expanding Interactive Boundaries in Leisure Facilities" https://www.amazon.co.uk/Out-Home-Immersive-Entertainment-Frontier/dp/1472426959

Anonymous
Not applicable

Spuzzum said:


Human999 said:

I don’t get why vr devs don’t release to all vr platform(pcvr psvr quest)at the same time, they literally leave money on the table, I get it can be hard to develop for multiple platforms at the same time, but it definitely worth it , look at beat saber it’s on all platforms and it the only game to reach 1 million copy sold same as rec room or super hot who hit 800k sold, mark zuckerberg said we need 10 millions users to make vr self sufficient and we basically got it now 5millions psvr 4 millions pcvr(according to nvidea) and probably at least 500k quest,


Beat Saber first released to pc in May 2018, as 'early access'. It then released in November 2018, for the PSVR...6 months later, not 'at the same time'. The 'full release' was May 2019, and included the Quest.

Nobody's 'leaving money on the table'...if someone wants the game, they'll buy it when it's released for that platform. They aren't losing anything.

As for developing for 'all' platforms at the same time...that's literally impossible, unless you have a massive team of coders, broken into individual groups, each working on a specific platform. If your dev team is only 2 to 5 guys...that's just not going to happen.



Actually it's easier and cheaper to develop for multiple platforms. You can do it with even 2-5 programmers.

The reason why developers aren't coding for both PC VR and PSVR is because most developers are small indie developers and don't have the finances available. And the reason why big publishers aren't doing the same is because the numbers aren't there yet to make it financially viable, and won't be until Microsoft adopt VR for their console.

Until then we'll continue to see relatively cheap ports like Resident Evil, Skyrim, Fallout and Borderlands from the big boys rather than them bringing their big name and big budget titles to the VR table.

Anonymous
Not applicable
If you build it, they will come...

Anonymous
Not applicable

snowdog said:


Spuzzum said:


Human999 said:

I don’t get why vr devs don’t release to all vr platform(pcvr psvr quest)at the same time, they literally leave money on the table, I get it can be hard to develop for multiple platforms at the same time, but it definitely worth it , look at beat saber it’s on all platforms and it the only game to reach 1 million copy sold same as rec room or super hot who hit 800k sold, mark zuckerberg said we need 10 millions users to make vr self sufficient and we basically got it now 5millions psvr 4 millions pcvr(according to nvidea) and probably at least 500k quest,


Beat Saber first released to pc in May 2018, as 'early access'. It then released in November 2018, for the PSVR...6 months later, not 'at the same time'. The 'full release' was May 2019, and included the Quest.

Nobody's 'leaving money on the table'...if someone wants the game, they'll buy it when it's released for that platform. They aren't losing anything.

As for developing for 'all' platforms at the same time...that's literally impossible, unless you have a massive team of coders, broken into individual groups, each working on a specific platform. If your dev team is only 2 to 5 guys...that's just not going to happen.



Actually it's easier and cheaper to develop for multiple platforms. You can do it with even 2-5 programmers.

The reason why developers aren't coding for both PC VR and PSVR is because most developers are small indie developers and don't have the finances available. And the reason why big publishers aren't doing the same is because the numbers aren't there yet to make it financially viable, and won't be until Microsoft adopt VR for their console.

Until then we'll continue to see relatively cheap ports like Resident Evil, Skyrim, Fallout and Borderlands from the big boys rather than them bringing their big name and big budget titles to the VR table.



Easier? Did you watch the video of what the devs of something as simple as Superhot went through just to get it running on the Quest? Or how about the devs of Ready At Dawn saying how they had to literally rebuild Arizona Sunshine from the ground up? It's not as easy as you seem to think dude. Look at the Beat Saber releases...6 months apart for each platform, not all at the same time. Definitely not cheaper if it takes an extra 6 months per platform, and definitely not easier, as it still takes the full amount of time per game per platform. Not even close.

Vertigo_TT11/23/2019

We see your excitement, and we also see your questions. So we feel we must address some of the biggest questions: 

1) Will there be cross-buy?
---Unfortunately no. As mentioned before in the Discord channel, ne of the tough decisions we’ve had to make was to not offer cross-buy as to support the development of this version and it's DLC. The game has been rebuilt from the ground up for this release.

2) Will DLC be included?
---As the team is in full-focus on getting the release ready for launch, we decided to make sure the base game runs optimal on the Quest platform. As such, we will be releasing the DLC for Arizona Sunshine Quest in the following months. The dates for these will be announced ASAP.

3) Is co-op cross-play supported across platforms?
---Again, due to the nature of it being rebuilt from the ground up, the Quest version is not compatible with the other VR platforms.
We hope to address more issues soon in the coming weeks leading up to launch. Thank you for your patience and we hope you're looking forward to play Arizona Sunshine completely wireless and anywhere you want with your friends.