12-01-2024 11:33 AM - edited 01-19-2025 09:31 AM
In just a month, it'll be 2025, and we already know of many PCVR games which will arrive next year, so I'll start a bit early on this post 🙂
Feel free to add your favorites - these are some of my "most wanted" VR games in 2025!
January 14 2025. Pirates VR - Jolly Roger
https://store.steampowered.com/app/1443620/Pirates_VR_Jolly_Roger/
January 16 2025. Arken Age
https://store.steampowered.com/app/2274200/Arken_Age/
16 January 2025. Assetto Corsa Evo (Early Access)
https://store.steampowered.com/app/3058630/Assetto_Corsa_EVO/
Q1 2025 (estimated). Zombie Army VR
https://store.steampowered.com/app/2058030/Zombie_Army_VR/
Q1 2025 (estimated). Wanderer: The Fragments of Fate
https://store.steampowered.com/app/2472940/Wanderer_The_Fragments_of_Fate/
Q1 2025 (estimated). Pools VR
https://store.steampowered.com/app/2663530/POOLS/
Q1-Q2 2025 (estimated). Into the Darkness
https://store.steampowered.com/app/1529530/Into_The_Darkness_VR/
Q1-Q2 2025 (estimated). Aces of Thunder
https://store.steampowered.com/app/2754090/Aces_of_Thunder/
2025. The Midnight Walk
https://store.steampowered.com/app/2863640/The_Midnight_Walk/
2025. Heroes of Forever
https://store.steampowered.com/app/2863590/Heroes_of_Forever/
2025. Slender the Arrivel VR
https://store.steampowered.com/app/2815020/Slender_The_Arrival_VR/
Q1-Q2 2025. Thrasher (from the makers of Thumper)
https://store.steampowered.com/app/2702300/THRASHER/
Q2 2025. Golel
https://store.steampowered.com/app/2577730/Golel/
2025. The Riese Project
https://store.steampowered.com/app/2142400/The_Riese_Project__Prologue/
2025. Low-Fi
https://store.steampowered.com/app/395830/LOWFI/
2025. Irreversible
https://store.steampowered.com/app/3215560/Irreversible/
2025. Gunman Contracts
https://store.steampowered.com/app/2421750/Gunman_Contracts__Stand_Alone/
2025. Ghost Town (from the makers of The Room VR: A Dark Matter)
https://store.steampowered.com/app/2496180/Ghost_Town/
As in 2024, the best games may be the ones which are kept a secret until a few weeks before launch, so much more will surely arrive!
Oculus Rift CV1, Valve Index & PSVR2, Asus Strix OC RTX™ 3090, i9-10900K (5.3Ghz), 32GB 3200MHz, 16TB SSD
"Ask not what VR can do for you, but what you can do for VR"
3 weeks ago
Note that I just asked the devs about release date and singleplayer content - and just got the reply:
"Around March an early access. There will be conquest campaign."
I'm keeping my fingers crossed for a great game 🙂
Oculus Rift CV1, Valve Index & PSVR2, Asus Strix OC RTX™ 3090, i9-10900K (5.3Ghz), 32GB 3200MHz, 16TB SSD
"Ask not what VR can do for you, but what you can do for VR"
3 weeks ago
Normally I would not care much about such titles, but if the quality is close to Focus on You, we could be into some impressive graphics and npc animations (no pun intended). Then again, if the wife catches me with this app, I better have some excuses ready .... like "oh, I'm just studying the graphics" (but she might misunderstand that in a very bad way) .... or maybe "better in VR than in real-life, right honey?" (ok, might not work well too...)
https://store.steampowered.com/app/3384220/VR_Secretary_Ailey_Edition/
Oculus Rift CV1, Valve Index & PSVR2, Asus Strix OC RTX™ 3090, i9-10900K (5.3Ghz), 32GB 3200MHz, 16TB SSD
"Ask not what VR can do for you, but what you can do for VR"
3 weeks ago
Not exactly a new game, but No Man's Sky just received another big update - and if you're new to this game on PCVR or PSVR2, there may never have been a better time to enter this reality:
Oculus Rift CV1, Valve Index & PSVR2, Asus Strix OC RTX™ 3090, i9-10900K (5.3Ghz), 32GB 3200MHz, 16TB SSD
"Ask not what VR can do for you, but what you can do for VR"
a week ago - last edited a week ago
Cold VR is another Quest port coming to PCVR in a few days:
Find the game here:
https://store.steampowered.com/app/2636890/COLD_VR/
UploadVR was not impressed and rated the game only 2.5/5 - or 50%:
https://www.uploadvr.com/cold-vr-review/
Quote: "It's hard not to think of the wasted potential here with COLD VR, and the 40-stage campaign took me roughly three hours to complete. ALLWARE's debut game needed more time, better balancing, and considerably more polish to fine tune the core campaign before next week's launch. That's especially true when playing on Quest compared to the Steam edition.
I hope future updates can address these issues because there are moments where COLD VR delivers a fun twist on SUPERHOT's premise. I came away from numerous levels celebrating my victory, dodging bullets in slow motion still feels cool, and the action is satisfying when it works. Presently though, it's a difficult game to recommend."
That said, the game is massively enhanced for PCVR - or massively downgraded for Quest - see the comparison video in the UploadVR review. Cold VR does have 4 PCVR settings for graphics, but I'd recommend awaiting more reviews when the game arrives in 2 days.
Btw, the PCVR version does seem to support some dynamic shadows:
Oculus Rift CV1, Valve Index & PSVR2, Asus Strix OC RTX™ 3090, i9-10900K (5.3Ghz), 32GB 3200MHz, 16TB SSD
"Ask not what VR can do for you, but what you can do for VR"
Thursday
THe Midnight Walk just got a release date trailer - the game is expected 8 May this year:
Weighing 100GB, this may be one of the largest VR releases this year - Index and Meta hmds are officially supported.
https://store.steampowered.com/app/2863640/The_Midnight_Walk/
Oculus Rift CV1, Valve Index & PSVR2, Asus Strix OC RTX™ 3090, i9-10900K (5.3Ghz), 32GB 3200MHz, 16TB SSD
"Ask not what VR can do for you, but what you can do for VR"
Friday - last edited Friday
Just some thoughts I've been having for long - and a small rant. Let's take The Midnight Walk: potentially one of the greatest VR releases for long. I posted the trailer on Index Subreddit, and today the trailer only has 8 upvotes:
https://www.reddit.com/r/ValveIndex/comments/1iog489/the_midnight_walk_release_date_trailer_game/
It seems few care about the game. Anything but Alyx 2 may have a hard time to impress PCVR users. Behemoth, Alien Rogue Incursion and especially Arken Age are getting very few ratings on Steam compared to the massive investments these games represent.
Do we have too much PCVR content? - Steam now has 8,564 VR games and apps, so the competition is fierce.
The quality indicated by The Midnight Walk should have many VR users impressed, but that's not what I see. Great VR investments are getting little interese. Last year Metro Awakening got much attention, and many more ratings for PCVR than for Quest - but many PCVR users complained about the very low-end Quest graphics. Are burnt customers lowering their expectations and starting not to care for new content?
In Behemoth and Aliens IR, devs did a great job of making the games look like true PCVR, still few buy the games, maybe both games recommending RTX 3080 or better did scare off some customers? Then again, Arken Age being made ground-up for PCVR and having low hardware requirements is doing even worse.
Not sure what's going on, but if we do not support new PCVR titles and stop caring about them, do we really deserve to get more? Still nice to see that devs have not given up - and luckily for high-end PCVR, PSVR2 users are buying many copies - and may be an essential support for PCVR.
These are the latest trends for the newer "blockbusters":
Arizona Sunshine 2
The 7th Guest VR
MADiSON VR
Behemoth
Metro Awakening
Alien Rogue Incursion
Arken Age
Playstation PSVR2 seems like a very strong force right now. Also note how the combined ratings for PSVR2 and PCVR often are much higher than Quest ratings. The Quest platform seems very weak for VR games directed against adults.
Getting 8 upvotes on Index Subreddit for the The Midnight Walk Release Date Trailer is a massive contrast to the same trailer getting 384 upvotes in the PSVR Subreddit:
https://www.reddit.com/r/PSVR/comments/1io3l9b/the_midnight_walk_release_date_announcement/
I do wish that PCVR users would show more interest or I would not be surprised if PSVR2 soon will become the devs primary target for new high-end VR games. Apart from Metro Awakening, PSVR2 seems like a much stronger platform for devs than both Quest and PCVR, sadly.
Oculus Rift CV1, Valve Index & PSVR2, Asus Strix OC RTX™ 3090, i9-10900K (5.3Ghz), 32GB 3200MHz, 16TB SSD
"Ask not what VR can do for you, but what you can do for VR"
Saturday - last edited Saturday
The Voxel Project has just launched:
Find the game here:
https://store.steampowered.com/app/2858370/Voxel_Project_VR/
Recommended specs:
Oculus Rift CV1, Valve Index & PSVR2, Asus Strix OC RTX™ 3090, i9-10900K (5.3Ghz), 32GB 3200MHz, 16TB SSD
"Ask not what VR can do for you, but what you can do for VR"