The 2018 VR/AR Tier List

Ranking the VR/AR industry across the board

Most videogames with differentiated characters have a tier list. It’s a ranking of which characters are the best in the game due to their special abilities or stats. Here is the 2018 tier list for the VR/AR industry.

OVERALL TOP PICKS

Best Consumer VR: Sony PSVR

Best Enterprise Training: Microsoft HoloLens

Best Potential Consumer AR: Magic Leap One

Best Mobile AR App: Snapchat

Best Mobile AR SDK: ARKit 2

Best Content Tie: Where Thoughts Go

Best Content Tie: Beat Saber

CONSUMER VR

A-Tier — Actual contenders

1. Sony PSVR
2. Oculus Go
3. HTC Vive/Vive Pro
4. Oculus Rift

B-Tier — Things that exist but don’t really exist

1. HTC Vive Focus
2. Windows Mixed Reality
3. Google Lenovo Mirage Solo

A-TIER DISCUSSION

Having PSVR as number one may be a little controversial, as PSVR is solely focused on gaming, and most people believe that VR extends beyond gaming. However, there is no denying the success of PSVR. In August, Sony officially announced three million PSVR units sold (over $1B in revenue). Super Data estimates 1.3M PSVR units sold in 2018 alone. On top of clear sales numbers, 2018 PSVR has phenomenal exclusives like Astro Bot: Rescue Mission, while delivering industry breadwinners like Beat Saber.

Sony PSVR takes #1 in the 2018 Consumer VR Tier List

Currently, VR’s consumer behavior mirrors that EXACTLY of traditional gamers

In retort to the “but VR isn’t about gaming!” statement, it’s become increasingly clear that currently, VR’s consumer behavior mirrors that EXACTLY of traditional gamers (own high-end hardware, play alone + online, spend > $30 for killer content). So much so that Oculus has begun to call the Quest (standalone headset coming out 2019) the “Nintendo Switch” of VR AND brought Aaron Davies back to head up gaming content. Moreover, Oculus’s promoted titles and million dollar funded content (see Marvel: Powers United) have, to my knowledge, all been games. Clearly, Facebook/Oculus have committed to the fact that games are the near-future consumer power play. Just look at the way VR controllers are designed. VR controllers scream “use me to play games!”

Number two for 2018 is the Oculus Go. Released in May, the Oculus Go was touted as accessible VR for anyone. No PCs, no wires, no phones, all for $199. My little brother could bring VR to a retirement home in a village in the Spanish mountains, my students could build VR apps on their own laptops, and Walmart could train over a million employees. This was an incredible step forward for the industry. Super Data estimates Oculus Go sales clocking in at 1.1M units, and even realist Oculus CTO John Carmack was impressed with Oculus Go sales.

Oculus Go takes #2; requires no PC or phone, 3DOF standalone for $199

For pure in-home VR, Rift has better content, better set up (less cables and wall mounts/tripods), and better controllers than Vive.

Oh the perennial Rift vs. Vive square off. CES 2018 saw the announcement of the Vive Pro: higher resolution, built-in headphones, adjustable housing for glasses/lashes*, and a wireless adapter to go tetherless. It sounds like the Vive Pro is perfect for…VR arcades. I put Vive above the Rift on the tier list simply due to the fact that LBE-VR (location-based entertainment) is largely Vive-centric, IMO due to Vive’s larger tracking space capabilities. Arcades and LBE easily outpace home usage of VR, which puts Vive ahead of Rift for consumers.

*As an aside, I absolutely hate that Oculus Rift was designed seemingly exclusively for people with large, protruding noses (Oculus is an American company). As someone with a flat nose, a huge amount of light leaks into the Rift when I use it. Meanwhile HTC, a Taiwanese company, has clever nose flaps on the Vive that block out light if your nose is flat and pull back if your nose protrudes. Please design products for people of all shapes.

If you think arcades are NOT consumer VR, then I would put Rift ahead of Vive. For pure in-home VR, Rift has better content, better set up (less cables and wall mounts/tripods), and better controllers than Vive. Rift also pulled slightly ahead in Steam market share this year. I just think in-home PC-VR is still a very small market.

If you’re an Oculus fan, don’t worry about Rift being the bottom of the A-tier. Oculus has clearly shifted its focus away from PC-VR, even supposedly cancelling the Rift 2. The Oculus Quest will be an interesting contender next year.

Going into 2019, I think games will become the pivotal point for consumer VR headset adoption. Rumors of Nintendo Switch’s “test VR-mode” make me curious about Nintendo potentially making a play in the space. As we know from Pokémon Go and Super Smash Bros Ultimate, Nintendo’s IP makes huge PR ripples and convinces people to spend money. As standalone 6-DOF VR with 6-DOF controllers hit the market, look to see this list completely upended next year.

B-TIER DISCUSSION

A quick discussion about the B-tier. These are B-tier due to very few units sold and a lack of content. HTC Vive Focus was the first standalone 6-DOF VR HMD to release to consumers. BUT it was only in China, and there were no 6-DOF controllers. There are very limited use cases in which having 6 degrees of freedom is useful without 6-DOF hand-tracking — in fact, the only one I can think of is 3D asset viewing (and even that benefits from having tracked hands). I’ll throw the Lenovo Mirage Solo into this boat as well and say that this leads to a very confused purpose. Developers aren’t sure what to build for the platform, and consumers aren’t sure what to use the platform for. It’s a sad limbo between Oculus Go, which can achieve standalone 360-video viewing and basic interactive experiences, and the Rift/Vive, which have full VR capabilities. Thus, no content. Be on the lookout, however, as the Vive Focus makes its way into Chinese classrooms and Western enterprises. Vive also announced the coming of 6-DOF controllers, and Google already has devkits out. Whether or not the Focus can rival the upcoming Oculus Quest is a different matter, as the Quest will have similar specs at a lower price point.

Windows Mixed Reality headsets are… I don’t even know. They are super cheap, require no set up, and work on most Windows machines. However, I think this is also a content issue for now. There is also a lack of support from Microsoft to really market and push these headsets, especially towards developers. Even though they gave me a free headset and brought me in for a multi-day build-a-thon, I never ended up shipping my game for Windows MR due to development barriers.

I can see the Vive Focus and Google Lenovo Mirage Solo both making a play next year once they have their 6-DOF controllers. Windows MR will require a huge play from Microsoft to survive.

ENTERPRISE TRAINING

A-Tier — Large clients signed

1. Microsoft HoloLens
2. STRIVR (disclaimer, I worked here for two summers)
3. Scope AR
4. Taqtile

B-Tier — Sleeper companies (watch for deals and growth in 2019)

1. Mira Reality
2. Mursion
3. Meta

I’m not that familiar with the smart glasses space, so the companies above use headsets capable of tracking and 3D renderings. I acknowledge the fact that Google Glass and companies like DAQRI and Vuzix are contenders in the enterprise space.

A-TIER DISCUSSION

I believe that enterprise contenders mark their spot on this list by signing large deals. This year, HoloLens signed a $480M deal with the United States Army*. HoloLens also powers the solutions used by #3 and #4 companies Scope AR and Taqtile. Moreover, Microsoft is backing the future of HoloLens, creating a HoloLens 2.0. As a “standalone holographic computer,” the HoloLens is a powerful unit with just enough capabilities for enterprise training needs. Aside from signing a $480M deal with a huge client with potential for future horizontal scaling, controlling the hardware is what makes HoloLens the #1 for 2018.

*Side note, I feel ethically uncomfortable with AR being used to enhance activate combatants’ ability to kill. I acknowledge that, arguably, AR will also enhance their safety.

HoloLens takes #1 in Enterprise Training

STRIVR signed a massive deal with Walmart this year. EVERY single one of Walmart’s (nearly 5,000) stores will have STRIVR in it. Almost 17,000 Oculus Go’s will be used to train Walmart employees. STRIVR’s other clients include Verizon, jetBlue, and Chipotle. STRIVR’s software is rapidly becoming a robust product suite, and its team is quickly growing. During a meeting at STRIVR this year, a potential software partner gawked in awe and told me, “I’ve never seen a VR startup this big.”

STRIVR is in Walmart Academies now; 5,000 stores next year

Scope AR lock(he)ed in a deal with Lockheed Martin Space (halving onboarding times) and Taqtile worked with the King County Water Treatment.

B-TIER DISCUSSION

Mira Reality’s key advantage is the fact that they have a smartphone-based solution rather than the HoloLens. Why are smartphones better? Smartphones are easy-to-secure devices, secured by standard enterprise security software installations. HoloLenses need to be uniquely onboarded onto enterprise Wi-Fi in a secure fashion, which is costly (time and money). I’m concerned for Mira’s moat, as it seems like other companies can easily replicate.

Mira will have video chat, useful for beaming in an expert to talk to workers (credit Mira Reality)

Mursion is focused on interpersonal skills, which is a unique niche that has a good market of existing L&D products. Mursion uniquely employs actors to remotely engage with trainees through virtual avatars. Actors make compelling behavioral realism, but are expensive to scale.

Meta is hanging in there, but seems to be floundering. I hope it holds on, since Meron Gribetz has a good vision.

CONSUMER AR HEADSET

This doesn’t even deserve a list. Consumer AR HMDs are non-existent. But alright, let’s talk about potential contenders.

POTENTIAL CONSUMER AR HEADSETS

A-Tier — Good showing this year

1. Magic Leap

B-Tier — Keep an eye on

1. Apple
2. Avegant

A-TIER DISCUSSION

Based on 2018’s showing, Magic Leap is the only potential contender to become a consumer AR headset in the next 5 years. I think the HoloLens is not going to be a player in the consumer space and is clearly making moves towards enterprise use cases. Similarly, Meta has also staked its position as an enterprise play (it’s tethered to a high-end PC for crying out loud), even denouncing consumer use cases. Magic Leap has set up partnerships and positioned itself as a consumer content focused device. As the price point decreases, the form factor slims, and the experience improves, Magic Leap will easily claim this space. Experiences already include: games like Seedling and Luna: Moondust Garden and Dr. Grordbort’s Invaders, streaming/news services like Cheddar and NYT AR, and music experiences like Sigur Ros’s Tonandi.

Dr. Grordbort’s Invaders from Weta Workshops (credit Upload VR)

B-TIER DISCUSSION

This is a 2018 list. I only put Apple in the B-tier because they have not officially announced an AR headset…yet. As soon as Apple announces their AR headset, which is rumored to be in the next two years, Magic Leap will have to fight very hard to get into the hands of consumers. I truly believe Apple will be the first large tech company who can take a crack at AR for the mass consumer. But it’s a 2018 list, so they’ve got to be in the B-tier.

An Apple patent (credit Macworld)

Avegant has no public product yet. However, I believe the company has the foundation for a strong AR headset play (or acquisition play) in the next 10 years. Avegant has excellent technologists building lightfield displays (light enters your eye as if it were bouncing off a real object). They also have experience with and a good relationship with hardware production lines.

Avegant’s lightfield display technology will enable things to appear in focus vs. out of focus — the above image is allegedly not edited for effect AFAIK (credit Avegant)

MOBILE AR

A-Tier — Real usage

1. Snapchat
2. Houzz

B-Tier — Sleeper companies to look out for

1. Torch AR
2. Wonderscope

A-TIER DISCUSSION

I don’t care about all the mobile AR games out there. Snapchat has over 70 million users use AR EVERY day. Snapchat Lenses, filters developed by third parties, are the first look at the large-scale distribution of AR content created by artists and developers. No need to download an app, just open Snapchat. I would say that Snap is the largest distributor of AR content in the world. Snap has introduced the masses to the concept of digital objects (filters and dancing hot dogs) overlaid on top of the real world. I strongly believe that the camera will soon become a platform, and Snapchat currently owns that space for a huge number of users, albeit in a specific demographic.

Snapchat filter showing a digital Big Ben, whose physical counterpart is currently under construction (credit Guernsey Press) *6 months ago in an interview with Snap Inc., I told them that overlaying digital monuments over real ones with inpainting to cover the background would be a super cool use case…coincidence?

Houzz’s new feature, View in My Room, released in May, is an AR feature where one can preview a piece of furniture at scale in their house. Over 2 million shoppers have used View My Room in the Houzz app. That’s huge.

View in My Room is used by prospective furniture buyers

I don’t count Pokemon GO because it is questionably AR and wasn’t released this year. However, it’s still going strong!

B-TIER DISCUSSION

To be honest, I didn’t try that many mobile AR titles this year. If you’re interested in mobile AR titles, definitely check out arcritic.com.

Torch AR is a fantastic application that delivers real value. Torch intends to deliver simplistic prototyping tools for UX designers creating mobile AR apps. Drag and drop assets from Sketchfab and Poly into the world to easily set up a scene, link them with various interactions, then click through your medium fidelity prototype. I am eager to see their growth in 2019, especially under the fantastic vision of Paul Reynolds, whom I was lucky enough to speak with earlier this year. Paul showed me live realtime video integrations with Torch, demonstrated Torch’s complex interaction systems capabilities, and painted Torch’s future as the “InVision” of AR.

Prototype mobile AR experiences with Torch AR (credit Torch AR)

Early in 2018, I built the first AR short film, Snowbird, with my friend Max Korman. Through building and shipping Snowbird, I established several predictions.

Snowbird, the first AR short film, follows the tale of a young bird and a snowman living in a snowglobe

1. Immersive storytelling in AR would be very compelling
2. Kids were the primary target because they would be willing to deal with tracking issues, enjoy a story no matter how low-poly the animation was, be willing to walk around and explore, and have time to enjoy whimsical cartoons (vice versa, Katie Hughes of Beast Pets VR says they made baby dragons instead of adult ones because people have lower expectations of baby animals).
3. AR story distribution would not happen via the App/Play Store. No one would download an app every time they wanted to watch a few-minute-long AR story.
4. Platforms that have lots of stories available, like Within, would need to exist in the AR space soon.

Well, I was right on all four. So right, in fact, that Within itself made an AR story platform for kids: Wonderscope. Wonderscope is a well-crafted application that brings AR stories to kids. It combines a wonderful 2D interactive narrative through a great mascot with augmented reality and voice interaction that encourages reading. Currently with three stories, Wonderscope will become a platform for AR short stories geared towards children, though I see Within launching more mature stories soon. My first impressions of the stories were that they were quite gimmicky and haven’t fully leveraged the AR medium yet, but it’s only a matter of time until they figure it out. Already, the user experience of “finding a landing place” for the AR story helicopter is a fantastic way to get users to scan their environment.

Little Red the Inventor, one of Wonderscope’s stories (credit Upload VR)

MOBILE AR SDK

1. ARKit 2
2. ARCore
3. 8th Wall
4. Ubiquity 6
5. 6D.ai

ARKit 2, Apple’s native AR SDK, has a wealth of features that make it incredibly powerful right now. Firstly, the baseline tracking is superb because Apple has full control and access to the hardware. ARKit 2 has persistence, multiuser, 2D image recognition and movement tracking, 3D object scanning and recognition, and most importantly: Quick Look. Quick Look will enable native Apple apps like Safari and Mail to preview .uszd files in AR. Apple even claims you’ll be able to see reflections of real surroundings in shiny objects!

Digital sphere reflects real world images using ARKit 2's Environmental Textures (credit Ivan Nesterenko)

ARCore is the Android equivalent to ARKit. ARCore has some great features, including cross-platform capability for shared experiences, meaning an Android user and an iOS user can simultaneously, locally view the same AR experience. ARCore has to deal with a variety of different hardware devices due to the variability of Android phones in the wild.

Two Androids playing multiplayer using Cloud Anchors (credit Android Central)

8th Wall is an SDK that utilizes ARCore on compatible Androids, ARKit on compatible iOS devices, and uses its own algorithms on other devices. Plainly stated, it is trying to bring AR to every device. 8th Wall’s killer feature is web AR, augmented reality that works in your mobile browser. Yes. Go to intothespiderverse-ar.com right now to check it out.

8th Wall signed Sony to make a web AR experience for Into the Spiderverse (credit Sony)

Ubiquity 6 has an all-star team backed by all-star funders. They are another SDK working on killer computer vision solutions for mixed reality. They did an exhibition at the SF MOMA earlier this year with over 100 people leaving persistent artifacts in augmented reality.

Multiuser creation at SFMOMA (credit Road to VR)

6D.ai is built on solid tech (I believe from Oxford) and good leadership under Matt Miesnieks. Their distinctive feature is occlusion. They also have fantastic physics based on real-time world meshing. The goal for 6D.ai is to crowdsource a 3D mesh of the world, which will be huge. They also have Cymatic Bruce ❤

6D.ai showing occlusion of digital spheres (credit TechCrunch)

CONTENT

Full disclaimer, I don’t try as much VR/AR content as I should. As a student, it’s really hard to find time to put on the headset. I don’t play many VR games anymore, so I’m sorry to all the other 2018 releases that didn’t make the cut. If you’re curious about the other games, I take Jesse Damiani’s opinion of the top 25 games very seriously. I didn’t get a chance to try SPHERES, Pixel Ripped, or Stormlands, all of which were large titles this year.

A-Tier — Fantastic Titles

1. Beat Saber and Where Thoughts Go (they’re so different, yet equally good)
2. Virtual Virtual Reality
3. Crow: The Legend

B-Tier —Experiences with missed potential

1. TendAR
2. BOT-NET

Beat Saber just absolutely crushed it by being insanely fun. ‘Nuff said. There’s plenty of glowing (no pun intended) reviews out there. Beat Saber identified one fun mechanic in VR, slashing things with a light saber, and distilled it and amplified it to the MAX.

Beat Saber (credit Road to VR)

Where Thoughts Go is a pure, refined, emotional piece that leaves you feeling vulnerable, healed, raw, and refreshed. Made by a team lead by Lucas Rizzotto and Darragh Dandurand, Where Thoughts Go is the first experiment that shows the potential of technology to bring people together. Disclaimer, I am now friends with Lucas and Darragh, they are brilliant, authentic, playful people. I look forward to seeing what they make next.

Where Thoughts Go, where you can touch others’ thoughts to listen to their intimate stories, as well as share your own (credit Tribeca)

Virtual Virtual Reality is whimsical and clinical, playful and dark, easy and challenging, and a whirlwind of fun. All of the interactions, stories, characters are ridiculous yet believable. In a world where humans now serve robots, you enter various virtual realities to fulfill the wishes of a plethora of demanding artificial intelligences. Arguably this was released on Daydream in 2017, but really who uses Daydream?

Virtual Virtual Reality; water those plants for this robot! (credit Road to VR courtesy of Tender Claws)

Baobab’s Invasion was the first VR content I ever tried, and I absolutely loved the colors, quirky characters, and fun animation style. Baobab quadruple delivered with Crow: The Legend. Crow: The Legend is a impeccably-crafted immersive narrative based on the Native American legend of the crow. Crow: The Legend is voiced by an all-star cast including CONSTANCE WU!!! Oprah, John Legend, Diego Luna, Liza Koshy and Tye Sheridan. I loved the colors, the environments, the lighting, the little animals and their quips. Baobab paces VR stories extremely well, leaving you in incredible environments just long enough to enjoy them while still being able to follow the story of Crow. What did the crow do? Watch it to find out.

Crow: The Legend; Crow’s colors and the lighting are phenomenal! (credit Variety courtesy of Baobab Studios)

Okay, so Tender Claws crushed it with Virtual Virtual Reality. However, I was left wanting more from TendAR. TendAR is an experimental interactive app on your phone where you feed a virtual fish through your emotions. Smile at the feed-o-meter and your fish will eat “happy flakes” and become happy. But what if you’re having a bad day, will your fish comfort you? No, your fish will eat sad flakes and become sad as well, leaving you feeling guilty and probably even worse :( TendAR doesn’t really leverage spatial AR well. The fish allegedly swims around your world but there is no sense of depth besides how big your fish is. The tracking experience is poor and the UX related to your fish’s position in 3D space is similarly lacking and confusing. However, TendAR makes great use of effects for the face and emotions AR portion of the application. It’s a lot of fun to see the particles swirl around in realtime, adjusting to your emotions using Google’s emotion detection API. There is also an area where your fish has a fish tank and you can use coins to buy decorations. This seems pretty out of place, as these decorations don’t exist in the AR experience, as well as seeming very mobile-store-in-app-purchase-y. Overall, TendAR has great parts of an app — fun to make weird facial expressions, cool to see fish swim around real world, entertaining to see fish make weird facial expressions, relaxing to decorate fish tank — but lacks solid cohesion across the various stages, leading to a disjointed game loop.

TendAR has various modes; a fully virtual fish tank is one (credit Variety courtesy of Tender Claws)

Disclaimer, I tried BOT-NET when it was released, but still early. I think they have new updates coming out with multiplayer. I just wasn’t super impressed with the AR affordances. Most of your real world is blocked out by a virtual landscape (okay it’s an AMAZING virtual landscape with excellent graphics and animations and particles), defeating the purpose of AR. However, let’s say this is more of a…hand-held VR experience that utilizes ARKit for tracking. Tracking is a little jumpy, so the movement in the game is a little rough. There’s also a joystick in the screen, so you don’t even have to move in real life, which confused me. Holding your phone up is tiring, holding up your phone AND using your thumbs to move and shoot is SUPER tiring. The narrative is unclear and the objective is equally unclear. The first 5 minute rule, where you need to hook the user in the first 5 minutes, was lost on BOT-NET’s design. It just plopped me in and had me start shooting stuff. However, I absolutely am floored by the graphics level achieved while using ARKit’s tracking. The animations and models in BOT-NET are very polished and put together, leading to a pretty immersive feel. Overall, the art team did a wonderful job, but the gameplay is a little flat.

BOT-NET’s graphics are phenomenal for a mobile game, ESPECIALLY an “AR” one

CONCLUSION

2018 was a building year for VR/AR. We saw devs buckling down to create real value, powerful tools, next level narratives, and gloriously imaginative worlds. Next year will be what I call “the standalone standoff.” As the Vive Focus, Google Lenovo Mirage Solo, and Oculus Quest go head to head with 6-DOF standalone tracking and 6-DOF controllers, I expect big deals to be signed, crazy content to emerge, and valuable use cases to be identified.