Hi, this is Wayne again with a topic “Quest 2 vs PSVR 2: In-Depth Comparison”.
The psvr 2 has just released and we thought it’d be a good idea to compare it to one of the other leading VR headsets The Quest 2. I’Ve got editor at large Scott Stein here with me, and we have used both of these a fair amount and we have got a lot to go through with all these yeah. Let’S dive into VR there’s a big year in VR. We got like a lot of stuff. The psvr 2 is like the first shot, but we had the quest Pro last year. We’Re expecting some sort of Apple headset by the end of the year.
Uh, maybe it’ll be next year. Who knows the quest 3. The follow-up to this is coming by the end of the year too, and then there are things like the vivexr elite, so a lot of products.
But these are the two most well known right now and I think they’re, the ones that people are deciding between yeah and, as you can tell they look very different Scott. Can you tell me a little bit about the PSV R2 and how that was kind of built? I think people think of VR now, if you’ve seen a quest as a standalone thing where you you set it up, you play, Beat saber you’re, doing workouts, there’s nothing else attached. This is a self-contained VR headset psvr 2 is not. This thing has a big cable that tethers to a PlayStation 5..
That is the first thing you should know, but this has advances in the VR landscape that this one doesn’t. This display is really good. This display is better. This is an OLED display.
This is an HDR display. It’S it’s Vivid, we’ve tried it, it really pops. The resolution is better, so that’s one thing audio wise. This has built-in headphones, which actually can be useful.
You can listen to those. You know when you’re, when you’re doing stuff and other people are talking to you kind of resolve that it also has a headphone jack. This only has a headphone jack or built-in earbuds, which are fine. I didn’t think they were great, but they’re free.
You can also plug in your own. You could also use the Pulse Wireless 3D uh headphones, which Sony has which sound a lot better, but they’re, big, and also when you’re playing with the PS5. The audio will come from the TV too. Yes, in case someone’s watching you play, you can always that’s a good point. You always have that option. So if you want to do something casually and do that, it just won’t feel as as surround.
So those are some of the differences, the controllers. Everyone has these same types of controller designs at this point. So if you haven’t used VR, they all have this split apart game controller concept, everyone’s resolved, the idea of the triggers the analog stick, the buttons and both of these have built-in cameras to do all the tracking there’s nothing you need to plug in anymore, like the Old psvr, but this feels a lot more advanced than those because of the haptics, the vibration. The vibration in here is like the ones on the Dual sense, the PS5 controllers. It has a lot of subtlety, has a lot of Rippling feelings. This trigger has force feedback, so we try this like. If you can do archery and other things you can feel that give to it, which gives realism and to me all of that, makes this feel more immersive, plus this headset freaking rumbles, which is ridiculous. It’S an immersive sensory experience more so than this, and I think that’s who it’s meant for yeah and when it comes to the Quest 2. I like to say that this is like the Nintendo switch of VR headsets right. This one is an at-home console.
You got to plug it in this one you could take on the go. They have a great carrying case. You can find some online. This is very mobile when it comes to the controller, the controller, it feels very ergonomic.
In your hand, I like that there is a place to lay your thumb, which I don’t think is really on that one. The one thing I found on this that kind of stands out to me is that it senses when your fingers lay down on the triggers and the buttons, and I was very surprised not to see that on the psvr too yeah. It’S a good point. Having that not be there, I’ve had games where you can still feel like you’re moving your fingers, but that awareness feels a lot more present.
So if you want to reach out and grab things or get that sense of mixed reality, you know that’s not here, and that also gets to another point which is hand tracking. This has continually updated hand tracking, so you don’t even have to use controllers. The Precision of that is not always there, but it has a lot of uses they’re not doing that yet here and so the whole idea.
Is you pick up controllers and use this and it’s not a hand tracking thing, so the experience here is vivid and immersive, but it’s not as flexible as what you get here with the Quest 2, including mixed reality that you can do on this, even though it’s Using black and white pass-through cameras, this is too, but they’re not dipping in a mixed reality. Yet on the PS5, let’s also get into just like the fit of these. They both have different abilities to to shape it. To your face and your eyes tell me about the psvr too yeah, so I have big chunky classes and I’ve had a lot of problems with headsets. I have to have a separate pair of glasses.
That’S a little smaller to fit into the quest to this fits. My big glasses, it’s a big eye box. Here, it’s very flexible. You can lower the glasses in it has an area to control.
How far in and out the headset goes, plus you’ve got the headband to tighten. So all of those things meant that I felt it was very comfortable, even though my glasses kind of Hit the lens a couple of times until I got The Sweet Spot. This feels much more like it’s glom to your face. Unless you buy a separate head strap, so I also find that the fit on this is more like a like a band or a visor, and the thing lowers in front. So it’s a lot more comfortable to me. That’S a big plus.
I felt the same thing with this like coming out of the box. This one’s very comfortable meta does have accessories that will make this more comfortable. There isn’t a lead, strap for this one. That is a bit nicer than this makes it a little more ergonomic to your head, or, or rather like shifts the weight to your head and help shape.
That also one thing that was not super comfortable to me was the just the three settings for the ipd shifter. The ipd is the interpupillary display uh, shaping it to your pupils, your eyes yeah, the psvr too. It has a longer range, not just like the dial. They can actually control that Hardware is nothing unless you’ve got good soft software now Scott, can you tell me about what software is available right now with the psvr too right we’re just at launch so right now. I think there are about like 40 games or 30 plus games and uh. You know that’s a lot of games at launch, but a lot of the games. When you look down the list are games that you can also get on the quest too or in steamvr. Other platforms, their ports – probably not surprising, because VR has been like this for a while – a lot of classic games that keep being ported over still playable.
But you kind of wait for the new stuff. There aren’t that many exclusives on here and that’s the thing. That’S surprising to me: I got a handful right now. There’S Horizon call the mountain, which is their kind of like immersive Horizon World game that we talked about.
There are some updates to games like Gran Turismo 7, the Resident Evil Village, but not as many as I would have expected, and I think they need more because the capabilities of this graphically with the PlayStation 5 are very intense, plus there’s. This technology called foveated rendering, where it’s using eye tracking, to only look at where you’re looking and maximize the point is they could drive more Graphics out of that and make it look higher res that type of Technology. You know you can’t just update ports from a Quest 2 and give them a remaster which is what’s happening now.
I think you can go a lot further, but they’ve got to kind of lead the way for that, and not everyone’s going to do that. You probably need Sony to drive that that’s a long answer to say it’s games, but it’s a limited set and we didn’t get into one thing that this gets into work apps. Yes, so I did a whole video on mixed reality, where you can work on your computer inside the headset and swap around screens and kind of have like an entire workflow.
The Quest 2 unlocks mixed reality when it comes to working or even applications. The psvr 2 does not have any mixed reality. No and and it could, it could very well have mixed reality, and I expect that it probably will in the same way that it’s using its black and white pass-through cameras and layer things in the real world. It does mixed reality when you set up your room.
It certainly could do that, but you’re right. There are all these other ways of using VR that this does. It could be 3D art and sculpting. It could be metaverse social things, all the fitness apps on here, which it’s a big landscape.
There are a lot of different ways. You could use VR right now. This is not tapping into that. I think those could happen, but the question is: is that even really what this is about, and I think if you’re curious about everything, the future of the immersive landscape could be all those Fringe benefit things you, you probably want to go with something like this yeah.
I think the nice thing about the game catalog with the Quest 2 – is that there’s an entire library of a lot of free games available that are social apps and you can interact with your friends. Currently, it feels like the psvr 2 is not about connecting with your friends yet no currently, no, this probably will be, but we don’t know when, but with the Quest 2. There are so many games that I’m already playing whether it’s golfing population, one which is like a first person, shooter rec room, different social apps. They are all on here and I’m connecting with friends and even making like online friends that I play with.
So I feel like if you are a co-op gamer, this may be the device for you as it stands right now, yeah, so much more established platform and the question of how many people come aboard here, how many things are going to be cross-compatible some games that Are coming out that are also multiplayer coming out here, but will they feel as cross-platform? You know we’re like kind of on day one of this, so one thing that surprised me about the psvr 2 was how you can play PS5 games on it. Tell me about that experience yeah, so I mean really. This just turns into a way you could wear a display on your head and play games. The nice thing is that you don’t even need a TV once it’s set up, so you could potentially just have this plugged into a PS5 and player games, and even though it has a higher res display on paper, what it does is it turns into an effectively A 1080p Cinema display that you play games on and it looks good you can watch movies on it, but uh when I, when I played films on it, it’s not the same as a really nice TV.
It’S it’s fine. I think all VR headsets have this challenge or we haven’t quite reached. The ultimate VR Cinema display experience yet, but I would say it’s fine. It would not be the ideal way. I’D watch something one thing that stood out to me with this feature was the fact that you can resize the screen to have like a huge screen in front of you, which looked awesome, and what was surprising to me is that when you’re playing this watching the Screen in your headset, it doesn’t project to the TV, I’m not sure. Maybe it can’t process them at the same time. Who knows and then the other thing was. You can’t use the VR controllers with most of the games because they’re not built like a PS5 controller right. It’S missing the d-pad. It’S missing that touchpad, that’s clickable, so it has a lot of the buttons, but not all of the buttons. So you’re right, like you, have to go, grab your dual sense controller, just fine! It’S just that! You know there’s one little thing that this can’t be or every controller you will have to go, swap back and pick up the other one yeah, and on that note something that would be helpful. Playstation is the ability for you to find that controller wearing the headset.
Like you know, have it be outlined somewhere, because currently you can’t do that because yeah I know I fumbled around and been like, where the heck is that controller? It’S like pointing Arrow. Let’S talk about price, how much is the psvr too, so it’s 550 for the headset, but that’s not the only thing you need. You need the PlayStation 5, which brings it up to a thousand dollars basically and there’s no bundle, there’s no bundle for the PS5 and the psvr 2 together, which is unfortunate, but you know it’s also only February. Maybe they’ll do that by the end of the year.
I’M hoping that’ll happen, uh there’s one bundle that includes Horizon call the mountain, but basically just including the games. No real, like effective discount. You know, whereas this 400, which is expensive still more expensive than it was the year before last, but it’s still the most affordable, VR headset, that’s all in one. I think meta knows that.
I think that’s what it’s riding on to say: how do you beat that and you kind of can’t, although you probably want to wait for the next one? This is a much more enticing proposition for all the stuff that can do, even if it has a more limited processor plus it can connect to your PC. You can still use it as a tethered headset for PC gaming. If you have a PC, so there’s a lot of benefits here. This is a PlayStation 5 only VR headset, that’s what you use it for it’s not going to work on its own. It’S not going to work with any other device that you might have, and often with the Quest 2 meta does package in a couple games with it so you’re getting that added value to the headset as well. That’S right, there’s also that, and especially as it’s been around for a while, they keep putting in bundles and deals. That being said, you probably want to wait on this, because by the end of the year, we’re expecting another yeah, it’s possible, that we will be getting the meta Quest 3 in the fall and there’s a lot of what the quest Pro one of meta’s, newer.
Headsets. Could say about what we’ll see in the new headset? What are some of the features that you think we’ll see in a quest 3.? The quest Pro is a higher resolution display higher even than the PlayStation VR2. It’S got mixed reality using a color pass-through camera and it’s also got eye tracking plus face tracking now a lot of those features.
I would expect to come to the quest 3, maybe not all of them, maybe not the eye and face tracking, but I would expect the color pass through mixed reality to be part of the picture. Higher resolution uh – probably some sort of a new chip and that’s enough stuff that you probably want to see what that’s going to be and that’s not even counting in all the other things that might come throughout the year. Other players in the landscape and we’re expecting something probably from Apple – the story about Apple – keeps growing that they’re going to have this headset.
Now we don’t know when that’s going to launch. We don’t know how much that’s going to cost. It sounds extremely high and whether even you’d want the first gen one and whether it works at the devices you have so in a sense you kind of want to wait for that, but it’s another one to keep an eye on yeah, and I I do think It’S also safe to say that that Apple headset that could be coming is a different caliber than where these are.
That is supposedly going to be priced around three thousand dollars with more of a push on mixed reality, augmented reality, whereas these are definitely VR first products, while the Quest 2 does have that mixed reality as well. If you do want to see a vision into what mixed reality looks like on the Quest 2, make sure you watch my video, where I worked with the quest Pro and you’ve got to check out Scott’s review of the psvr2 to learn more about this one. We have a lot more coming out on VR and mixed reality.
You got to keep it here on CNET by subscribing give this video a like if you enjoyed it, I’m Justin. This is Scott and we’ll see in the metaverse .