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Comment by an_opabinia | Hacker News Reader

> The thing is, I also recognize that while it is already an incredible achievement, it's still probably 5-20 years from hitting its iPhone moment.

Ironically, by getting acquired by a giant company, Quest development was set back by that many years.

The real problem isn't technology or even adoption, it's that people who work at giant companies suck at making games.

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I'm not even sure we are at the compelling apps stage yet. I think there are still very difficult hardware and software platform issues to solve first that are going to take tons of basic research. I expect the first 100 million unit headset to include extremely accurate eye-tracking that is used to drive foveated rendering, varifocal active lenses and neural network interpolated facial expressions for high fidelity social avatars. Facebook Research seems to be making good progress on all of that, but it will still take many years of additional research to perfect.

Facebook wants to be the company to invent the first mainstream VR Metaverse, but that doesn't mean they won't invent the hardware and get beaten to market on the software. They are about to release Horizons which is clearly in this vein, but I expect they are still too early.

Microsoft has a good track record with making games, but yes all of FAANG is terrible at this. I have a little more hope for Facebook now that they've started acquiring studios and letting them run independently, instead of the previous combination of publishing\funding and having few internal game teams (which generally doesn't work in big tech anyway). This could lead to a model that looks more like Microsoft Game Studios.

One of the best VR experiences out there was made by a single dev, Eleven Table Tennis. Most of what Facebook puts out there is mediocre tech demos and they don't seem to understand the strengths of their own platform enough to take advantage of them in their games.

> I have a little more hope for Facebook now that they've started acquiring studios and letting them run independently

The reality is, the acquisition of best VR game of any objective measure, Beat Saber, set back VR for all game developers because it will rob other VR platforms of a doorbuster title (i.e. Beat Saber 2).

Also, it enables Beat Games to keep using unlicensed music by fiat of Facebook's legal might, a completely unassailable competitive advantage that is strictly better than actually licensing the music and making a game with it.

It is illustrative of how the things giant companies are good at, which is using their huge cash piles to achieve totally anti-competitive advantages, changes nothing for the status quo of the consumer - they don't pay for the music no matter who the game's owner is - but just winds up harming other game developers.

Consider also Facebook Horizon is seeking to replace VR Chat, I believe the #1 free VR title by installs. How is that benefitting game developers and gaming culture? Just compare a screenshot of VR Chat here (1) to Facebook Horizon here (2), it tells you everything you need to know about why the kind of people who work at giant companies are awful at making games. It's so fucking sterile dude, and it's sterile on purpose.

People have said this for eons about Disney, but it's not comparable. By the way, Disney also totally blundered Disney Interactive, shutting down under the CEO Bob Iger who was known as the "tech" CEO of Disney.

(1) https://miro.medium.com/max/3840/1*I5c-QMDHVPeyC35pM1V4Ng.pn...

(2) https://cnet1.cbsistatic.com/img/9kGJANvUNFtxp5mGEgMIDI95DnA...

I worked on the Horizon team, and there's only so much I'm comfortable saying, but I can say the team burnt me out and I quit.

There isn't a 100% chance that Beat Saber 2 will be exclusive, but you're right that it's likely and if that happens it will be a shame. My hope is that Facebook moving away from PC VR as a focus means they won't see it as competition, and start releasing previously exclusive games on Steam in the same way Microsoft and Sony have started releasing previously console exclusive titles, but I won't hold my breath.

Well by no means I meant to shit on what you do, it is of course going to be a well engineered and nice product. I understand it's tough in most roles to do anything about like, sterility - it's above everyone's pay grade at giant companies. So please take it with a bit of exaggeration, it's certainly frustrating as an outsider to see that kind of money lit on fire and talented people getting burnt out. A more experienced and culturally thoughtful decision maker would do things differently.

> Also, it enables Beat Games to keep using unlicensed music

Huh? All BeatSaber music are originals or licensed.

> it's that people who work at giant companies suck at making games.

I don't understand this statement. The Oculus store is open to developers and is filled with third party games. All of the games I personally play are not Oculus/Facebook games.

The store is available but its screening is a little strict (near to game console, rather than Play Store or Steam). Alternatively it seems that FB unofficially supports SideQuest.

> Alternatively it seems that FB unofficially supports SideQuest.

They're actually opening support for off-store apps [1], but with some limitations:

> Applications will have to meet the obligations of the Oculus Content Policy, but won’t be held to the same technical standards as official Oculus Store Apps.

[1] https://www.roadtovr.com/oculus-quest-distribution-non-store...

> The real problem isn't technology or even adoption, it's that people who work at giant companies suck at making games.

Many companies besides Facebook have developed games for the Quest. I guess you could say Facebook sucks at working with game developers, but I’m not sure if that’s true either. Unreal and Unity have well-developed integrations with Oculus [0].

I think where Facebook really falls down is tying customers’ FB account to their Oculus Store purchases (and ability to use the Quest at all). They’re applying a social media platform’s aggressive algorithms to suspend or ban accounts which violate their expansive TOS, which is wrong in consumer product and digital marketplace space. For that reason, mixed with personal experience at the hands of Facebook's algorithms, I have no interest in developing for Oculus.

[0] https://developer.oculus.com/get-started/

> Ironically, by getting acquired by a giant company, Quest development was set back by that many years.

What does this mean? We likely wouldnt even have a Quest (or really even a 3rd headset imo) from Oculus if not for Facebook. The Oculus founders were all almost completely about building high end enthusiast hardware, which wouldve almost surely made the market die off again.

FB mostly publishes games and what that have published include some excellent games. Lone Echo is probably the mostly complete example of a AAA quality VR title for years until HL:Alyx launched.

Wouldn’t have been possible without a large enough company to bankroll it.

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