REVIEW OF THE MONTH Oculus Quest 2
Oculus’ excellent standalone VR headset just got better – and cheaper – making it the standout VR option
If you always been intrigued by the idea of virtual reality but put off by the price, chunky headsets and need for a high-end PC, then this could be your month. Intrepid gamer Will Georgiadis straps on the Oculus Quest 2 from p54 to deliver his verdict. Not only is this standalone VR headset lighter, slimmer and more comfortable than its predecessor, but the base model is also £100 cheaper. The result? The best headset you can buy and maybe – just maybe – the longawaited entry of VR into the mainstream.
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Released last year, the Oculus Quest ( see issue 298, p51) was remarkable. It squashed VR into a portable package, side-stepping the need for a gaming PC or compatible smartphone and freeing you from cables in the process. It was an easy way for a consumer to try VR for the first time at a console-like cost of £400.
Slimmer, lighter and better than its predecessor in almost every way, the Oculus Quest 2 takes this a step further. If it had launched at the same price as the original Quest, I’d still have loved it; given that the base model is £100 cheaper, however, the Quest 2 has fast become my favourite VR headset of all time.
In the box
Opening the box emphasises how simple the Quest 2 is. All you get is the headset, two controllers, a charging cable and a spacer for glasses wearers. That’s it.
Oculus (or, technically, its parent company Facebook) uses a Qualcomm Snapdragon XR2 processor for the power. It’s a variant of the Snapdragon 865 found in flagship phones and, paired with 6GB of RAM, means that the Quest 2 is substantially faster than its predecessor.
It has 64GB of internal storage as standard, but you can raise that to 256GB for £100 more. Although I don’t think the added storage is necessary, game hoarders will be pleased. What’s more, even £400 appears cheap when placed next to HTC’s £700 Vive Cosmos or the mighty Valve Index (£919) – while they have better specifications, only established VR enthusiasts need apply. With Oculus killing off the Rift S (£399) in the coming months, the Quest 2 really is in a league of its own.
Sleek design
Like its predecessor, the Quest 2 is a good-looking headset. It’s also gone on a diet, losing over 70g compared to the original. Oculus has opted for a light grey/white paint job this time, as opposed to dark grey, and it’s a move I applaud.
On the left side, you’ll find a 3.5mm headphone jack and USB-C port; on the right, the power button
and a volume rocker on the bottom. Oculus has binned the utilitarian plastic straps and replaced them with fabric ones, which is both a blessing and a curse; they make the headset more compact and comfortable, but tightening the headband on the fly via the new sliders is tricky.
Fortunately, Oculus has a solution. The firm is launching a halo-style “elite” headband for £49 – the kind found on the Oculus Rift S – as the first of several Quest 2 accessories. These halo headbands should distribute weight better and be easier to adjust, but I found the Quest 2 as comfortable as a VR headset can feasibly be. The reduced weight means it’s easier to keep it in a comfortable position for longer, and it helps that the foam eyepiece is a little softer and deeper than before. Still, it will imprint on your face over time.
The Quest 2 has four inside-out tracking cameras positioned as they were on the Quest, and includes the option to adjust your interpupillary distance (IPD) manually. Oddly, though, you’ll have to push the lenses themselves apart/together to do it, which means removing the headset. I’d prefer a standard IPD slider, but this is a happy(ish) medium.
Finally, the controllers have improved substantially. They now last four times longer than the previous iterations on a single AA battery and have a larger surface area for resting your thumbs. I prefer the look of the original controllers, but it’s hard to criticise the new models in light of these improvements.
Sharp display
Strap the Quest 2 to your face and you’ll be peering into a single fastswitch LCD panel with a combined resolution of 3,664 x 1,920 – or 1,832 x 1,920 per eye. For comparison, the Quest used two OLED panels at a resolution of 1,440 x 1,600 per eye.
Not only does this display have the highest resolution of any Oculus product ever, but it also refreshes at 90Hz, which makes a noticeable difference to how fluid gaming or app usage looks onscreen. I say this every time I try a new VR headset, but it’s always true: this is the best VR display I’ve ever used. Colours are vibrant, blacks are deep and individual pixels are now hard to spot.
It benefits from a simplified user interface too, with quick access to the Oculus store, your games library, social options and settings. Oculus jettisons the extravagant “Oculus Home” functions of the Quest or Rift S, but I’m not complaining: I’m not using the headset to mill about in a virtual house but to play games, and here the Quest 2 delivers. Your wireless experience will be limited to what’s on offer in the Oculus store, but with hundreds of games to choose from – including staples such as Beat Saber, Superhot and Vader Immortal, as well as intriguing new entries such as
Jurassic World Aftermath – you won’t go wanting.
Then there’s the small fact that the Quest 2 supports Oculus Link, meaning you can plug it into your gaming PC via a single cable and play games from your Steam library. So it’s really no surprise that Oculus is retiring the Rift S: the Quest is an excellent PCVR headset in its own right.
I experienced only one instance of unresponsiveness after I travelled to and from the Oculus store too quickly. Otherwise, navigating the menus was seamless, and games played beautifully.
One thing that standalone VR headsets still haven’t quite mastered, though, is battery life.
The Quest 2 will run for between two to three hours before it needs to charge, and takes two-and-a-half hours to charge from empty. It’s a good thing that VR gaming isn’t the sort of thing you can do for long periods at a time.
My only real complaint with the Quest 2 is that Oculus still hasn’t figured out casting. VR is an innately isolating experience, meaning that being able to watch the current
“It’s lightweight, powerful and so straightforward that mainstream adoption becomes less a hope and more an expectation”
user’s progress onscreen is a huge plus. I couldn’t get casting to work once during my time with the Quest 2 – and I know Quest users have experienced similar issues. This feature is still in beta, but I wish Oculus hadn’t launched it before it was usable.
Embark on a Quest?
Ready to buy? One last thing to note is that new Oculus users will need to sign in using a Facebook account. You can set up a fake login, of course, but this still sticks in the privacy craw. Otherwise, everything that I loved about the first Oculus Quest – its lack of cables, strong game library, ease of use – has been improved upon by the Quest 2. This is exactly what VR should be: lightweight, powerful and so easy that mainstream adoption becomes less of a hope and more of an expectation. The Quest 2’s price can only help in that regard too. If you want a VR headset, buy the Oculus Quest 2.