Now, hear me out. I am not just saying this because I really want VR support (even though I do). I am saying this because I genuinely believe it would be a great move development and marketing wise. Right now VR is going CRAZY. The amount of Oculus Quest 2s (or I guess now the “meta quest 2”) that people are getting is insane. VR is blowing up like never before. In turn, demand for VR games is also skyrocketing.
I believe that the earlier VR support is fully implemented the better for sales and the community of Tower Unite. It would be a win win for both PixelTailGames, and the consumer. VR is already so much more popular then ever before. It will only continue to keep growing rapidly. If VR support is added, it will bring in lots of new players to the community, which is always welcome. It will also bring lots of revenue for PixelTailGames.
I do NOT want it to seem like I am lecturing or saying how things should be done. However, from my perspective (which I have very little experience in this sort of thing so lots of salt should be taken from what I am saying) it seems like adding VR support soon would genuinely help the game greatly.
I know it isn’t an easy thing to do. I know adding full VR support is most likely unimaginably time consuming and difficult, but it might be worth it with the way the VR industry is currently headed. Tower Unite is a game based around socializing with friends. One of the things VR is best at by far is letting people socialize virtually. I can think of very few games that are a better fit for VR then Tower Unite. It just seems made for it.
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VR Support is currently in background development, a basic Alpha is available from the Steam Launcher.
I believe right now it’s just Mac working on VR, and last I heard he was still getting the foundation ready. VR Crossplay is an amazing feature in any game, and I’m glad that they’re finally taking this step. But porting will take some time for VR so it’ll probably be released in Phases (Condo + Plaza in Phase 1, and then Game Worlds for the rest).
3 Likes
You mention that VR support will likely bring in more players, but consider this: the current playerbase consists entirely of keyboard+mouse users. Even if pursuing VR development helps bring in VR users, prioritizing the majority of development time for a feature not accessible for the vast majority of the playerbase would only serve to alienate the current playerbase. The last Steam hardware survey reported that only about 2% of players actually have access to a VR headset, and even that doesn’t mean those players regularly play (or want to play) games in VR. Plus, higher access to VR doesn’t mean demand for standard keyboard and mouse games will decrease.
This isn’t mentioning the large amount of performance/accessibility considerations, as well as major gameplay alterations, needed to make this a VR-focused game. VR is fun, and I’m looking forward to its integration, but pushing it that hard just doesn’t make sense.
13 Likes
As a huge fan of VR and as someone who has been driving Mac crazy over the years bitching about the lack of VR support, this absolutely should NOT be a priority. There are waaaaaaaaaaaaay more important things to get into the game first. Hell, the game right now is fairly unoptimized and barely can even hold 90 fps even with the beefiest of rigs. That right there is enough to warrant not prioritizing VR. But also, VR makes up just over 1% of the Steam playerbase. That is a completely insignificant number and is not worth prioritizing VR over other (much more crucial) things. I really don’t think they should prioritize VR until after it leaves Early Access.
9 Likes