If you were planning to spend Christmas with your PS5, Sony’s new virtual reality headset on your head, it’s grated. In a very laconic tweet, the Twitter account of PlayStation France has just announced on August 23 that the highly anticipated PS VR2 will arrive on the market “early 2023“.
Available early 2023. #PSVR2pic.twitter.com/mh08u5wqMt
— PlayStation France (@PlayStationFR) August 22, 2022
Sony gave no other information except this vague release date that the company posted on its Instagram and Twitter accounts around the world. The headset was no secret since the company had already mentioned the technical characteristics of the device at the beginning of 2022 and the first rumors of the existence of such a gadget date back to May 2021. Only the release date and the price were still a mystery. Let’s bet that we will have to wait a few more months before knowing this second unknown.
A headset for the elusive PS5
However, we already know a lot about the technical characteristics of the device that will compete with the Meta Quest 2 and other virtual reality headsets on the market. Obviously, the PlayStation VR2 will be an accessory reserved for owners of PlayStation 5, of which it also takes up the visual codes. The Oled screen will offer a resolution of 2000 x 2040 px per eye, a refresh rate of 90 or 120 Hz and a field of vision of 110°. The headset will also use foveal rendering – which optimizes rendering in the center of the field of view to save computing power.
Like the Quest 2, Sony’s headset will feature a “transparency” mode that will see through the built-in photo modules on the headset shell. An automatic virtual border tool will also be present to prevent players from kicking their TV or sofa during immersion in the virtual world. Finally, an option to stream content from the headset live – as well as player reactions – will also be available (if you have the official HD camera for PS5).
The announcement of the release date of this new helmet for 2023 therefore only confirms what informed observers have been sensing for months. Let’s hope that by then Sony will have finally solved its availability problems for the PS5, otherwise the purchase of a PS VR2 will only be of very limited interest.