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Please explain how game sharing works?

maillemaker
Explorer

We bought 3 Oculuses for Christmas for our family of 4.

On my wife's device, she enabled sharing with my son's Oculus.  He can see her purchased games.

When I log int onto my wife's device and switch user to me, I can't see any purchased games.  She says this is because you can only share with 1 device, and that is my son's device.  Sounds like our 3rd Oculus is "stranded" on it's own. 

 

We've dropped $1200 on Oculus hardware.  I expected that when the "main account" bought games, then the rest of the family would be able to play them also.

 

I guess we could just log into all 3 oculuses with my wife's account, but then if you have any games with saved progress you break that functionality.

 

How does the sharing work?

23 REPLIES 23

jsizzlechambers
Explorer

@OculusSupport will you please weigh in on this? It seems wildly unfair to parents who bought multiple devices for families with multiple children. We’ve wasted so many days since Xmas trying to figure this out on our devices to no avail. Please advise on how we can do this within our families. We can do it on Spotify, Apple, etc. How do we do it on Oculus?  

maillemaker
Explorer

My wife says that you can share your library with one other account.  If you do this, then the games you purchased on *your* Oculus account are also visible on the other account.  But you can't play the same game at the same time, she says.

 

We have 4 people in our family and 3 Oculus devices.  I just re-purchased Demeos so we could play as a family tonight with all 3 devices.

 

It's not quite as bad as Steam (Steam allows sharing your library but if anyone is using ANY SINGLE GAME the entire library is locked from sharing with anyone else).  Sounds like Oculus lets 2 people share a library.  This isn't very helpful if you have two parents with children.

Absolutely - the problem is you can’t play against each other or even the same games at the same time at all. Hopefully @oculussupport will tell us how we can do this so we can play against our family members in our own homes. Thanks @maillemaker !

So does this mean that to play multiplayer within the same house, we still have to buy games two or even 3 times?

Hey guys, all good questions in this thread. Here is an article explaining how app sharing works. If you guys have any further questions please submit a support ticket here and one of our support specialists will take care of you!

If you're the author of a thread, remember to mark a reply as the Accepted Solution to help others find answers!

So from the article, it sounds like:

  • On a single Oculus device, you can share your games with up to 3 people.  This is useful only if:
    - Your family only has 4 or less people in it.
    - Only one person can play Oculus at a time on the single Oculus device.
  • With two Oculus devices, you can enable sharing on the second device and it can access the games from the first device's admin account.  Maybe you have to have the same admin account on both Oculus devices (I think my wife set them both up).
  • If you have more than two Oculus devices, numbers 3 and up have to re-purchase games they want to play with the rest of the family.

What happens when every member of your family has their own Oculus device?

 

My expectation is that if the admin account (head of family) buys, say, "Demeo", then everyone in the family can play Demeo on their own Oculus device.

 

Otherwise, not only do I have to drop $400 per family member to have their own Oculus so they can play together simultaneously, I have to buy the game for each separate family member, too.

 

We set up 2 Oculus devices with the same admin account and enabled sharing on one of them (my son's device).  This seems to allow my wife (admin account) to play on her device and my son can also play on his device.  I think, anyway.

 

But the 3rd Oculus device is "stranded" as you can only share on one device.

 

Oculus needs to understand that VR headsets are going to become like phones.  Every family member will want/have their own VR headset.  App sharing needs to work with all devices in the family.

 

I know there is a concern of one person buying a game and "sharing" it with 300 "family members".  Maybe the devices will only share apps with devices within, say, 100 feet of each other. 

 

Anyway when we are dropping $1200 on Oculus devices, plus more for battery packs and custom head harnesses, I was hoping for more family-friendly app sharing.  I guess it's better than Steam where if one person is using the library the entire library is locked out from all other family members.

 

But Oculus needs to re-think multi-headset households.

 

I want to say that I think this technology is absolutely astounding.  It has the potential to revolutionize social interaction.  We now have "family board game night" playing Demeo.  It is much better than sitting around the kitchen table where you can't read the stuff on the other side of a traditional board game.  Now each person can manipulate the "board" to their own best vantage point, zoom level, etc.

 

I then got into a game called Echo VR (weightless game) and you can actually see and interact with other people from all over the world.  It was...eerie...to see other avatars that were actually real people you could wave at and they would wave back!  I can see so many opportunities for this technology.  Virtual business meetings with real interaction unlike Zoom/Teams.  Virtual tour guides of museums or other historical places, with avatar tour guides and avatar tourists walking around historical places.  This even has business potential.  Imagine being able to become a paid virtual tour guide of, say, the National Monument, or whatever historical site you can think of!  The possibilities are off the chart.  I've been a gamer for decades and am no stranger to online game playing.  But this kind of "virtual avatar" experience is nothing like any FPS game.  The feeling of actual interaction with another human being is staggering.  Your brain can't tell it's not dealing with another actual person, even when the avatar looks like some kind of robot being!

 

But for my family, I see this as a way to socially interact together more than we did before even though we are in the same house!  Not to mention other extended family members who live far away.  Now we can virtually play with our cousins!

 

 

PieRockStar
Honored Guest

No, Each device who shares with primary will be able to start new data on that game and save data separately on all 3 different devices

No, all 3 others can play as long as they log into primary acct on thier device, which can be done simultaneously 

At least that’s my understanding but then again, it’s very confusing, I might be wrong, but I have watched over 15 tutorial videos and how tos, including the rules and fine print of app share. GL lol. We will all need it