Third-party metaverse apps: almost as bad as those from Meta
It is quite natural that apps built on a poorly-defined platform will suffer from the same issues as the platform, however some app vendors are clearly just aiming for a check box implementation.
The first part reviewed the hardware, the second part looks at the Meta software experience, and this is the third part looking at some third-party apps that I tried. My overall view of the hype can be read here.
Summary: almost as bad as Meta’s apps, while some are somewhat better.
Arthur
Arthur is an attempt at a virtual workspace. It offers the choice of a personal, free workspace or a subscription-based corporate workspace. Both offer sample rooms, all of which were completely deserted when I tried them.
First off, congrats to the Arthur team for labelling things! The controller buttons have floating labels besides them at all times and there are proper contextual menus available depending on what you are doing.
Navigation is based on pointing at where you want to go and then clicking a button. This works reasonably well but the visuals are unpleasantly like someone urinating on the floor. While it is hugely preferable to sliding around a step at a time, it has some very strange capabilities, such as ending up standing on top of the virtual coffee machine, the “tool table” or completely outside the building. I jumped over to read a document, and instead of landing in front of it I ended outside the window, hanging in space 30 storeys above the ground. I am not freaked out by heights, but some people might be. I seemd to be floating above a virtual Dubai, but not outside the Burj Khalifa which was visible in the distance. The ground looked suspiciously like bad pizza.
A huge PDF document hangs in the distance, with left/right click buttons on either side. Jumping over to be closer resulted in me standing so close I couldn’t read anything. Upstairs in the enterprise demo was a room of “use cases” which transpired to be two customer stories, told as flat videos on screens floating in the virtual air. You can look at the back of these kinds of things —and you see the content, backwards just like being behind a projection screen.
Jumping back into the small business space, and run through the tutorial about how to grab and move things, I ventured into the “meeting room.” There was a wall of Post-Its and a whiteboard. I tried and failed to stick a Post-It to the wall, and managed to make some scribbles on the whiteboard. While the contextual menus are far better than anything Meta offers, trying to writing or draw with your left hand controller was horrible. Yes, left hand. Well, most of the time, sometimes the right hand controller turned into a pen too, but the angle was all wrong.
The interior design and architectural detail was better than Meta’s, but that’s not a high standard to beat. It was much too easy to end up in or on something rather than beside it.
And finally, why? Seriously, why? What benefit does this give over a video conference or whiteboard and Post-It apps such as Miro? What business value does making people wear a headset and struggle with controllers offer when the surfaces are intrinsically flat?
You can watch me flailing about here.
Immersed
Immersed is essential a set of virtual desktops viewed through the headset. the company claims to let you work faster in VR than in real life. I can’t say if this is even close to true as a bug stopped me from getting past the tutorial.
The app starts with you standing on a small platform in the middle of the cosmos. To your right is a dismembered guy who is going to talk you through getting setup. The cosmos graphics was the highest res thing I’ve seen so far in the Quest Pro but completely defeats the company’s claim to eliminate distractions. Presumably when actually working you can change the background to something without passing meteorites.
Once you’ve finished gauping at the view you have to do some stuff on your computer, either Windows or Mac. This requires both installing stuff an agent and linking the devices. The former is painless, the latter is awful. You have to somehow transcibe a long number and a URL from the virtual environment onto the computer. This was most easily done by putting the controllers down on the desk, pushing the headset up a little onto my forehead where I could still just about see the images and writing the information on a Post-It, after which I removed the headset and proceeded on the computer.
Once connected my 49" external monitor and laptop screen floated in space. This was impressive. I could move them around and stretch them. While the resolution was good, it wasn’t as good as the actual screens right in front of me.
Next the dismembered guy, who had a very engaging voice and facial expressions, tried to talk me through doing something with a “diamond” the floated around. Except it was red, so it was a ruby. He showed me how to do the manipulation, but the diamond/ruby failed to reappear for me to learn how to manipulate it.
Fail. At least Immersed support got back to me when I reported this via the NPS request. Maybe if you have a truly tiny workspace in the middle of a noisy office this might be useful, but I fail to see the attraction.
YouTube VR
This app was identical to when I last tried VR using the Google VR kit that strapped your phone on the front of your face. It seems to have the same experience and the same content. There are some fun videos where you are in the middle of gorgeous locations, but you have no agency over what is happening. The resolution was ok, but not stunning.
Once you’ve ridden the rollercoaster, dropped down into Death Valley and explored a reef the novelty has gone. Maybe this offers an alternative viewing experience when there are multiple people sharing a big screen in their living space and they cannot agree what to watch. However I think most people would prefer headphones and a laptop for normal content.
Netflix
This one was definitely a check box. A fake home-theater environment floats in front of you with an iFrame for a screen showing then normal Netflix experience. Poor resolution and very clunky navigation.
Games
As mentioned before, I am not a gamer. I do not enjoy playing games, although exploring virtual worlds can be fun in itself. Games are plentiful, however they are much more expensive than I had expected. I don’t fancy shelling out £12 or more just to try something that I probably won’t enjoy that much. The only game environments I tried were community-created ones in Horizon Worlds and they were frankly dreadful. Real games require huge investment so it is no surprise. This investment presumably is what drives the cost, given the paucity of potential players.
