![Sony reportedly slashes PS VR2 HMD production after disappointing pre-orders [UPDATED]](https://d1lss44hh2trtw.cloudfront.net/resize?type=webp&url=https%3A%2F%2Fshacknews-www.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fassets%2Farticle%2F2023%2F01%2F31%2Fpsvr2_feature.jpg&width=1032&sign=VVtYKY0pmLvecXe1pKB6D_hTvfjiYcBpVG-5oms5CEI "Sony reportedly slashes PS VR2 HMD production after disappointing pre-orders [UPDATED]")
Sony reportedly slashes PS VR2 HMD production after disappointing pre-orders [UPDATED]
A new report alleges that PS VR2 pre-orders have led Sony to reduce production.
UPDATED (January 31, 2023 @ 10:20 a.m. PT): Sony has issued a statement refuting Bloomberg's reporting on production of the PlayStation VR2 being slashed. In a statement issued to GamesIndustry.biz, Sony claimed that Bloomberg's original report was false and that the company has "not cut PlayStation VR2 production numbers."
"[We are] seeing enthusiasm from PlayStation fans for the upcoming launch, which includes more than 30 titles such as Gran Turismo 7, Horizon Call of the Mountain, and Resident Evil Village," PlayStation said in its statement.
Original Story: Sony will soon release the PlayStation VR2, the latest iteration of its virtual reality hardware. Designed for the PlayStation 5, PS VR2 has multiple first and third-party games ready to go at launch. Set to release this February, pre-orders for the new HMD have been live for a couple of months, but those numbers may have been less than what Sony was hoping for. Pre-orders for the PS VR2 have reportedly been so low that Sony has significantly cut back on production.
A Bloomberg report published earlier this week alleged that Sony is dissatisfied with the pre-order numbers for the PlayStation VR2 prior to its February release. The company has reportedly halved its internal sales forecast for the device and has consequently scaled back its production. Back in October 2022, Sony stated its intention to produce 2 million PS VR2 units by March 2023, but if this report is indeed true, we can expect that number to now be closer to one million.
Source: Sony Interactive Entertainment
Potentially the biggest factor for the less-than-expected PS VR2 pre-order sales is its price. The PS VR2 costs $549.99 USD, which is more expensive than both the disc and digital versions of the PS5, which are required in order to use the new VR HMD. Though the situation has gotten better, the PlayStation 5 continues to be a difficult-to-find, highly sought-after piece of consumer hardware.
According to the report, Sony told one of its supply partners to expect fewer display panel orders, signaling the company’s lack of confidence in its hardware sales. Sony (SONY) stock took a sharp dive after the news started to get out. Sony has yet to make any public comment regarding changes to its PS VR2 outlook.
Arguably the biggest title coming to PlayStation VR2 is Horizon: Call of the Mountain. With just over a month to go until that launch, stick with Shacknews for more PS VR2 news.
-
Shacknews
replyDonovan Erskine posted a new article, Sony reportedly slashes PS VR2 HMD production after disappointing pre-orders
-
-
https://www.gamesindustry.biz/sony-we-have-not-cut-ps-vr-2-production-numbers
Sony says the story is false.
But who knows, I could see there being less than anticipated demand, given the price and current economy
-
-
What the hell? Weren’t they saying preorders were a lot higher than PSVR1’s?
-
-
Investment in making PSVR games work (universally) would not be worth the return.
The popular PSVR games are largely getting updates. -
This is 100% the reason I didn't order one. Ever since the PS4, Sony has been fucking up hard on long term support. Can't figure out how to force ps4vr games at a higher resolution or adapt DS4 controls to a DualSense? That's just fucking lazy cost cutting bullshit in an attempt to drive solely new hardware and software sales. It's biting them in the ass and I'm legit worried it's going to have a long term negative impact on the ecosystem/tech. Fucking Sony. :(
-
-
How could they possibly do that without help from the developers, on each individual game? I just don't image they can do any sort of API-level thing that works for all games.
-
Do you own a PSVR? It's a bunch of lights tracked by an external camera. All the positional tracking is computed by the PS4 based on data from one point (the PS4 camera).
Then you have the dualshock 4. How is the PSVR2 headset supposed to track that? On PS4 that is tracked from the camera via the light in the front of the controller.-
Cool, thanks for the detailed breakdown of why it's not possible for the controller of the operating system that ties everything together and all of the hardware and software controls in the process can't make a uniform translation layer to adapt the previous generation of games to the new generation of hardware. Given Sony's track record in this regard, you're correct, it's absolutely not a business decision driven by a desire to cut off all support from existing software purchases to enforce only new game purchases. It's definitely far too much of an engineering hurdle that can only be solved by additional hardware.
-
I imagine there wasn't a uniform way all those games interfaced with the data streaming from the PSVR hardware.
I really doubt there is a one size fits all translation layer Sony could make. Which means they would need to go game-by-game. Which means they would need help from the developers.
Then the developers would say "no" becasue they're aren't going to sell enough copies of the game to make that money back.
Like I said, some of the more popular PSVR games are getting ports, that the developers are doing.
If you can find anybody knowledgeable who thinks it's realistic for Sony to make a library-spanning translation layer, I'm all ears. -
Sony uses behind-the-scenes abstraction layer make PSVR games work with PSVR2:
- Publishers say "we didn't want you to do that, we wanted to sell a patch to update to PS5"; Sony loses
- Gamers say "this game doesn't work perfectly out of the box!; Sony loses
- The lower-res graphics targetting the old headset look like shit on the higher-res VR2; Sony loses
- Sony lets developers and publishers update their games on their own if they want to; Sony loses-
Sony already provides the functionality for PS4 games to run fine on a PS5 while allowing publishers to sell either separate PS5 versions, commercial patches to the PS5 version, or free upgrades to the PS5 version. Extending that support to PSVR wouldn't be anything the publishers would be unfamiliar with.
The PSVR library is small enough that compatibility concerns would be fairly trivial.
Definitely think there's merit to the idea that they don't want ugly ass old graphics on their high end new hardware. That goes hand in hand with them not wanting to support old software and push only new stuff.
I imagine devs and publishers do have an upgrade path for pushing out PSVR2 versions of games as separate SKUs regardless and I'm confident we're going to see plenty of double dipping post-launch. Nothing to the level of Nintendo, but they're a special level of asshole.-
I think you're greatly underestimating how much devloper involvment would be needed to make PSVR games work on PSVR2. It's not the same thing as PS5>PS4 back compat for flat games.
THAT SAID.
I do think Sony could make it easier for devs to port by porting their own games first. Like Astro Bot, Wipeout Omega, etc. Then they could at least publish a framework for other devs to do their own ports if they wanted.-
The lack of an "Astro _____" title for launch bums me out so much :(
-
-
the first part isn't even close to the same thing. the entire control scheme is different, all of the hardware is different.
whether or not it is "fairly trivial" is really not something you, or I, or anyone currently discussing the topic have any realistic visibility over. it's pure speculation. for all we know, they could have attempted it and found that it was not even remotely feasible. things like increased latency, bad tracking, bad screen alignment, etc. etc. etc. there are TONS of technical reasons why it would be a massive struggle.
overall, how does Sony stand to benefit from not providing the controls abstraction layer? how would they be coming out ahead in this case? in what way are they going to double-dip? where's the extra profit here? -
It sucks but I don't think this is Sony being greedy or lazy, if anything it would have made PS VR2 even more attractive, which would have been better for them.
Of the few games that are getting updates it seems the majority for now are going to be free, some others like Rez or Tetris effect are going to be a 10 bucks upgrade which isn't so bad considering they are adding haptics, eye tracking etc.
-
-
-
I'd love to see PSVR support on PSVR2, it's actually a serious point of frustration for me as someone who bought Dreams a few months back looking forward to finallybeing able to check out the VR content when it arrived, but he's not wrong about the difficulty of doing BC for titles thanks to the differences in hardware and tracking.
From talking to the folks I know in VR development, it sounds like the biggest issue is that the switch from outside-in to inside-out tracking means Sony literally can't just push a button and drop a patch and make everything work. It's an entirely different method for determining controller placement with entirely different controller layouts and a complete lack of the light bar, which all adds up to BC having to be a title-by-title thing rather than something that Sony could do system-wide.
It's frustrating as hell, you'll get absolutely no disagreement from me there. I especially wanted to play both Dreams and Blood & Truth, so it stings that that won't be possible without ports.
-
-
-
-
Sony could fix this VERY easily: allow it to also work with Steam VR
-
-
I seen a few reports stating that they won't be losing money on the hardware, but just barely. If that's the case, I imagine official PC support is at least a few years out if ever. Sony could sell a ton of headsets to PC gamers, but it really wouldn't matter if you're only making a few bucks on each and have no way to get money from software sales. I'm still hopeful that the the hardware hacking community will find a workaround, but who knows how long that will take.
-
Yep.
-
-
-
It's cheap for a VR headset that advanced.
-
-
-
-
[deleted]
-
-
-
I don't want to buy it a third time, but I probably will just for the HDR lol.
-
-
[deleted]
-
-
[deleted]
-
-
[deleted]
-
-
-
-
-
Same launch lineup here sans Pistol Whip. We should do some GT7 racing one day after launch even though I suck at it!
-
-
-
I just can't imagine they could get wireless latency down to a point where it would work with foveated rendering. Pupils move fast
-
-
-
-
-
the source on this rumor (Takashi Mochizuki) is low credibility
https://www.reddit.com/r/technology/comments/10pus9v/sony_playstation_vr2_headset_preorder/j6n5cz3/ -
-
-
I played Wipeout Omega in VR every day for a few months. Anything with a high skill ceiling is open to draw people in for a long time. Not a lot of that available in the VR space unfortunately. Beat Saber would be another one.
-
Exactly this.
-
-
Halflife Alyx missing as launch title’d
-
Huge missed opportunity. I would have considered budgeting for a pre-order, or at least a purchase after launch down the road.
Other comments in this thread also have me weary.
-
-
