January 21, 2025 1:02 PM
In this year’s GDC State of the Industry report — a massive and far-reaching survey of game developers across all disciplines within the industry — respondants were asked to detail their current and near-future plans for their software among differing platforms. This, of course, also includes virtual reality and augmented reality developers, who seems to largely be coalescing around Meta Quest and Steam VR as their primary landing zones for these technologies. That in itself is no surprise, as those two platforms also dominated the 2024 VR/AR list.
One notable change in dynamics, however, has been a flip between the PlayStation VR ecosystem — including both the original PlayStation 4-compatible headset and its PlayStation 5 successor — and Apple visionOS — exclusively used for Apple’s Vision Pro headset. While last year had the Vision Pro edged out by the PlayStation headsets 15% to 13%, in 2025, 26% of respondents said they were working on Apple visionOS software while 25% are making efforts on PlayStation VR/VR2.
This is especially odd since the PlayStation VR2 is a gaming-focused headset, essentially serving no other purpose other than playing VR games, while the Apple Vision Pro is positioned as a multifunction productivity device. Apple’s own website for the headset does not even mention gaming until midway down the page. Which is not surprising, since at $3500, it is decidedly the less mainstream device. The PlayStation VR2 struggles in the market for distinct reasons, leading one former PlayStation executive to state he was “wrong” about the device’s potential success recently.
It seems unlikely that any VR device can claim marketshare from Meta’s devices anytime soon, as it remains the preeminent VR headset due in large part to a cheaper, subsidized price and untethered format. It does seem the battle for mindshare among VR developers is slipping for PlayStation unless something major revitalizes their VR brand in 2025.
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