Oculus Quest introduced a bunch of new features for the standalone VR headset that emphasises accessibility and safety.
Metaverse
A few days ago, social networking giant Facebook announced that the company is soon going to change its name to Meta. In the official announcement, it also declared that a host of exciting changes and upgrades are also waiting to be released, making Facebook (Meta)’s vision of metaverse a reality. Keeping up with the promises, the company announced the rollout of the latest v34 update for its Oculus Quest platform. Within the next few months, users will experience certain changes and upgrades in the platform, along with a host of new features making their way to the standalone VR headset. The most promising of them includes Passthrough API, Android phone notifications, and an improved voice command feature.
Space Sense
The hype regarding the upgrades, however, is mostly building around the proposed Space Sense feature. As per the information received till now, this is going to be an experimental feature to be integrated into the Quest Guardian system that will highlight any large object that moves within the established playspace, be it another person or your pet. With this upgrade, whenever someone walks into your Guardian boundary, they will show up in your headset’s visual display as a ghostly figure with a pinkish glow around them. This way, you can avoid bumping into others while enjoying an immersive experience and be in undisrupted virtual reality.
Primary stage
Although it sounds fascinating, Space Sense is still in its primary stage. It is still actively in development and users can experience the full spectrum of the feature not until later. As for now, you can access the early version of Space Sense via the Experimental Features tab provided in the settings of your Oculus Quest headset.
Exciting features
Along with Space Sense, the v34 rollout also promises several other exciting features. For example, it would support Android phone notifications, through which the users can check emails, texts, or other notifications from their smartphone directly through Quest. This means you don’t have to pause a game or remove your headset to check on your phone ever again.
Android
Oculus Quest already had iOS notification support. With the latest upgrade, now it is expanding the support to the Android users as well, making the immersive experience wider than before. Just like the iOS feature, no other account signed in to the headset can view your notifications. You can set up this in-headset feature with the free Oculus Companion app.
Voice command
The expanded app support will also feature an upgraded voice command. Now you can use your voice to perform various tasks in your VR headset, such as play and pause media in your Oculus TV app, access the Settings tab, show or hide Oculus Move stats during live sessions, and much more.
Passthrough technology
The final and most awaited update in Oculus Quests is focused on the Passthrough technology. Earlier in 2021, the company has opened public access for its Passthrough API Experimental, allowing developers all around the world to create their own mixed reality experiences and publish them on the Quest Platform. Soon, Facebook will also release Passthrough SDK.
