On this 12 months’s GDC State of the Business report — a large and far-reaching survey of recreation builders throughout all disciplines throughout the business — respondants have been requested to element their present and near-future plans for his or her software program amongst differing platforms. This, in fact, additionally contains digital actuality and augmented actuality builders, who appears to largely be coalescing round Meta Quest and Steam VR as their main touchdown zones for these applied sciences. That in itself is not any shock, as these two platforms additionally dominated the 2024 VR/AR listing.
One notable change in dynamics, nonetheless, has been a flip between the PlayStation VR ecosystem — together with each the unique PlayStation 4-compatible headset and its PlayStation 5 successor — and Apple visionOS — completely used for Apple’s Imaginative and prescient Professional headset. Whereas final 12 months had the Imaginative and prescient Professional edged out by the PlayStation headsets 15% to 13%, in 2025, 26% of respondents stated they have been engaged on Apple visionOS software program whereas 25% are making efforts on PlayStation VR/VR2.
That is particularly odd for the reason that PlayStation VR2 is a gaming-focused headset, primarily serving no different goal apart from taking part in VR video games, whereas the Apple Imaginative and prescient Professional is positioned as a multifunction productiveness system. Apple’s personal web site for the headset doesn’t even point out gaming till halfway down the web page. Which isn’t stunning, since at $3500, it’s decidedly the much less mainstream system. The PlayStation VR2 struggles available in the market for distinct causes, main one former PlayStation government to state he was “mistaken” in regards to the system’s potential success just lately.
It appears unlikely that any VR system can declare marketshare from Meta’s gadgets anytime quickly, because it stays the preeminent VR headset due largely to a less expensive, sponsored value and untethered format. It does appear the battle for mindshare amongst VR builders is slipping for PlayStation until one thing main revitalizes their VR model in 2025.
