Sure, quickly, your VR avatar will even have legs, so that you received’t appear to be the genie from Aladdin floating round Meta’s VR areas.

Right here’s a have a look at the important thing updates from the occasion:

First off, Meta’s releasing a brand new, upgraded model of its standalone Quest VR headset, with the Quest Professional, the subsequent evolution in VR interplay.

As defined by Meta:

“Meta Quest Professional is the primary entry in our new high-end line of gadgets, and it’s filled with progressive options like high-res sensors for strong combined actuality experiences, crisp LCD shows for sharp visuals, a totally new and sleeker design, plus eye monitoring and Pure Facial Expressions to assist your avatar replicate you extra naturally in VR.”

The Quest Professional, which as initially titled ‘Mission Cambria’, can be capable of show 37% extra pixels per inch, which can make the VR expertise extra immersive, and extra life like – which could possibly be a great and unhealthy factor (a few of them VR rollercoasters genuinely make me really feel sick).

The superior gadget may even facilitate a spread of new skilled options, together with multi-screen show, workrooms for collaboration in VR, ‘Magic Rooms’, which can mix VR and video members, and extra.

Much more than this, Meta additionally introduced a new partnership with Microsoft that may see the 2 tech giants working collectively on a spread {of professional} integrations, together with Microsoft Groups immersive assembly experiences, and the combination of Microsoft’s prime apps, together with Phrase, Excel, and many others.

All of it appears probably beneficial, and one other step in the direction of the way forward for VR interplay.

However it’ll price ya’.

Meta’s Quest Professional is now obtainable for pre-sale at a whopping $US1,499. For comparability, the present best-selling standalone VR headset, Meta’s Quest 2, sells for $US399.

Meta’s been coping with numerous challenges in getting the elements and processes in place for its VR provide chain, which already pressured it to improve the value of the Quest unit by $US100 again in August. However even with that in thoughts, an nearly 4x improve in worth is a large leap, which can possible go away the Professional model as a theoretical idea for many common customers.

However then once more, because the identify suggests, the true focus right here is on skilled use, and integrating VR in all new methods. Meta additionally notes that it’s working with Accenture, Autodesk and Adobe, amongst others, in serving to them construct VR into their processes, and information their employees, and purchasers, into the subsequent part {of professional} collaboration.

The Quest Professional will begin delivery from October twenty fifth – extra information right here.

Meta additionally introduced that it’s growing Horizon Worlds on the net ‘so you possibly can ultimately decide up your cellphone or laptop computer and go to pals who’re hanging out in VR, and vice versa’.

Meta’s been on the lookout for extra methods to combine extra entry factors and interplay choices for VR, which might primarily allow you to make use of your VR avatars in numerous on-line areas, not simply within the VR realm. That’s a part of the broader view of the absolutely built-in metaverse, that folks on numerous gadgets, and in numerous apps, will have the ability to faucet into the metaverse expertise, even with no VR headset.

Curiously, Meta additionally famous that it’s working with the YouTube VR crew to construct extra partaking leisure experiences in VR areas, like internet hosting YouTube watch events in Horizon Dwelling.

And once more, avatars with legs:

Meta says that its new full-body VR avatars will roll out to Horizon Worlds shortly, whereas customers may even quickly have the ability to use these new avatars in video chat, on Messenger and WhatsApp too.

Meta additionally previews its newest advances in electromyography, which can ultimately allow extra management over AR and VR experiences by detecting actions in your wrist, Mission Aria, its AR glasses mission, which it’s now growing to help individuals with visible impairments, and new course of to construct 3D objects in VR areas.

And after Zuckerberg obtained lambasted for his now notorious metaverse photograph again in August, he additionally shared the most recent developments in its photorealistic Codec Avatars, that are removed from being an accessible choice for normal customers, however do present the place we could possibly be headed, when it comes to digital illustration.

Meta’s been engaged on these for a while, however a key obstacle to widespread adoption and utilization is that it requires a number of specialised scanning tools, and laptop energy, to construct these extra life like depictions.

Finally, Meta might look to put in VR scanning models in accessible locations to facilitate such (probably even Meta shops if it expands its retail operations), and you might quickly have some fairly wonderful choices for show and engagement inside the digital area.

General, it’s an attention-grabbing showcase of the place Meta is headed with its VR developments, and its broader metaverse push. However then once more, there’s nothing actually mind-blowing, as such, right here – there’s nothing that’s going to assist shift perceptions of Zuck’s metaverse funding as an enormous potential waste of cash, as a result of there’s nothing that common individuals can take away and apply to their lives day by day, or nothing that transforms the VR or metaverse expertise proper now.

As a substitute, Meta’s trying to merge its VR instruments into skilled functions as an alternative, within the hopes that it will broader VR adoption, via superior system utilization at work to start with.

That makes some sense. Enterprise customers usually tend to pay extra for these superior experiences, and if extra individuals are utilizing VR at work, that might expedite the broader shift in the direction of metaverse interplay in your social life too.

However it’ll be attention-grabbing to see the market reactions to Zuck’s newest VR showcase, and whether or not it’ll be sufficient to shake off the detrimental perceptions of the metaverse, which appear to be gaining extra momentum day by day.