I’ve had the Meta Quest 3 for a few weeks now and I’m ready to deliver some initial thoughts on this new device.
I’ll start with the stuff I like:
The first thing I noticed when putting on the Quest 3 was the quality of the passthrough combined with the resolution of their new UI. Seeing a super crisp interface with sharp text floating in my living room was shocking. In general I’d say that if anything, the Quest 3 has made me a believer in the future of mixed reality. The ability to interact with virtual objects without cutting yourself off from your surroundings feels like the future more so than even VR does in my opinion.
Mixed reality gaming is a little hit or miss right now but when it works, the experience is magical. Placing a ping pong table in my living room or hunting zombies through my kitchen made me feel like I was living in 2099. I'm really excited to see where this goes.
The screen is another huge improvement over the Quest 2. Colors are MUCH more vibrant and I feel like I have more peripheral vision. This is especially noticeable when playing iRacing in the Quest 3. The colors really pop now and I get more awareness of the cars around me.
The stuff I didn’t like:
Everyone in my family who tried the quest 3 complained about it hurting their forehead after a short time. I found the bit they call the “facial transition” piece to be incredibly uncomfortable. I upgraded to the silicone version that they offer on their website and found it to be much better. If you plan on spending serious time in the headset I feel like this upgrade is a must.
The new smaller design is certainly lighter but it does not leave much room for glasses inside the headset. I find that mine are pressed against my face. Jerry is actually talking about getting special lenses for the headset that have his prescription. I’m gonna wait and see how that works out for him but I’m interested.
The battery life on the Quest 3 leaves a lot to be desired. On a full charge I can only do one or two races at most in iRacing. I get maybe an hour and a half out of this thing and it’s getting pretty hot by the end of that time. This seems like something that can be fixed with an update but for now it’s frustrating.
Overall I would say the Quest 3 is a big improvement over the 2. My sim racing experience was much improved with better colors, fidelity and peripheral vision. It still cannot compare to the PSVR2 and Gran Turismo 7 in terms of visuals or comfort but it can also be used as a self contained device to play all kinds of VR games without a cable.
It's a very impressive piece of technolodgy and like I said it is a big improvement over the Quest 2. I'd like a few updates to smooth out the expereince but overall I'm happy with it.
-Gabe out
