Earlier this year, Apple launched its Vision Pro headset, positioning it as the gateway to a new era of “spatial computing.” At the time, some games industry observers predicted that the device heralded the arrival of the next big gaming platform, set to disrupt industry dynamics and usher in a wave of new mixed reality games and startups. (Our decidedly more measured take is here.) In the months since, that vision has yet to fully materialize. 

Despite the slow uptake, the race to dominate the spatial computing market hasn’t lost steam — especially for Meta. The tech giant made several noteworthy announcements at its annual Meta Connect conference a few weeks ago, including updates to its Quest headsets and a preview of its AR glasses, codenamed Orion. 

None of these headlines attracted the sort of game industry response that the launch of Apple’s Vision Pro did, though they are arguably far more impactful. Importantly, and in stark contrast to Apple, games are a large part of Meta’s spatial computing strategy.

Over the past several years, Meta has also hired a number of gaming executives, acquired VR game developers, and secured exclusive titles for its platform. This latest set of announcements from Meta Connect solidifies the company’s already sizable lead in the nascent spatial gaming market.

At the event, Meta announced that it would be discontinuing its older Quest 2 and Quest Pro models in favor of a newer, more budget-friendly version of the current-gen Quest 3 — the Quest 3S. At $499 and $299 respectively, the Quest 3 and 3S are comparable to standalone consoles in price, require no additional hardware to operate (unlike, say, Sony’s PSVR line), and are far more likely to appeal to budget-conscious gamers than the $3,5K Apple Vision Pro. 

This affordability is particularly important given VR’s growing popularity among younger cohorts. Survey data from earlier this year found that 33% of U.S. teens had access to a headset and that 13% of them now use VR devices weekly. A quick glance at the most popular games on the Quest store reveals several kid-friendly titles — like Gorilla Tag, Roblox, and Rec Room, among others. 

Apple’s Vision Pro, meanwhile, has struggled to gain any sort of traction with consumers. According to IDC, the device is expected to sell fewer than 400K units in its first year. While many observers expect a cheaper model to follow, even that will likely be more than double the cost of the Quest 3 and 3S — Bloomberg has previously reported on internal discussions of a $1,5K to $2,5K price range.

What further complicates matters for Apple is the tepid response to the Vision Pro from game developers. According to a damning report from MobileGamer.biz, developers have complained about a lack of technical support from Apple, no financial incentives for building games on the platform, and discoverability problems, among several other issues. 

To be fair to Apple, the Vision Pro doesn’t appear to have ever been designed for gaming in the first place. Perhaps the company has no interest in enabling the game industry to grow on the back of its hardware; this would certainly track with many of its previous decisions.

Nevertheless, if spatial computing is ever going to become the revolutionary new platform that Apple hopes it will be, then it follows that gaming will eventually find its place in that ecosystem.

Ultimately, VR may never achieve that end goal. As a fully enclosed experience, VR can be quite isolating, shutting off the world around the user. The larger prize for spatial gaming and spatial computing more broadly could be AR. 

Though both Apple Vision Pro and Meta’s Quest line feature passthrough technology, allowing users to view real-life spaces alongside digital elements, all head-mounted devices are, shall we say, unfashionable. No one really wants to be wearing a computer strapped to their face when they’re out and about.

Until Tim Cook finally appeared on the cover of Vanity Fair, Apple observers were openly questioning why no executives had been photographed wearing the headset in the lead-up to the launch. These concerns add to the already persistent VR issues of motion sickness, head and neck fatigue, and eye strain.

To that end, Meta’s Orion announcement may ultimately prove to be the most impactful. The company has already gained some traction with its Meta Ray-Ban AR glasses — critically, a device launched prior to the surge of generative AI and LLMs, as Mark Zuckerberg recently stated on the Acquired podcast. Now, the company is going all in on the combination of AI and AR, betting that AR glasses will one day replace our smartphones. 

To be clear, there are really no AR-native games to speak of yet. There are a few developers experimenting in this space, such as Monsarrat or DB Creations. There are also some notable ventures pushing into tabletop gaming, like Tilt Five. Yet, AR gaming (outside of quasi-AR location-based experiences like Pokémon GO) remains a niche, at best.

However, if AR glasses do eventually supplant the smartphone (Apple, too, is rumored to be working on its own pair of smart glasses), we can be certain that games will find their way onto the landscape.

For game developers, the question of when and where to invest remains. Despite the industry’s repeated stops and starts over the years, new VR studios continue to emerge, some to port existing games to VR. Publishers like Skydance and Warner Bros. are also launching new VR titles, and established IPs are still finding their way to VR via licensing agreements.

Like all investments, however, getting the timing right will be critical. Many of VR’s earliest entrants are struggling, with some experienced studios going through layoffs and others closing altogether. One has to assume that AR gaming will eventually face a similar timing challenge, given how much earlier along dedicated AR hardware is relative to VR. 

Risky new platforms, particularly those with backing from the likes of Apple and Meta, will certainly attract adventurous builders. But perhaps the more interesting question is which, if any, existing ecosystem players will be the first to try their hand at AR game development.

Will existing VR developers seek to pivot into the adjacent AR market? Or will mobile publishers view AR as an opportunity to skate to where the puck is going to be? An interesting AR use case is the capability to “project” a 2D screen of variable size in any space, meaning that a wide variety of existing games and linear entertainment could theoretically be ported to this new form factor with relative ease.

If AR takes off the way that Apple and Meta think it will, this blue ocean could rapidly turn red. That’s a mighty big “if”, but the AR landscape nevertheless merits closer observation and analysis than many in the game industry have been willing to provide thus far. 

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