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Applab version

Sep 30, 2024 SlashGorden link
I've just sold my Quest 1 and upgraded to a Quest 3. I know that VO is now in AppLab at a rather expensive £20 but I also still have the APK that I extracted from the Oculus Go 4 years ago. Is there any difference between them, i.e. is it worth spending the £20? Nicer graphics maybe?
Oct 03, 2024 Luxen link
Well, unless something changed, originally the Oculus Go apks were __NOT__ compatible with the Oculus Quest 2 when the q2 came out. It was a pretty big deal at the time - at least, there was a lot of noise at the q2's launch iirc. A quick search brought this as first result.

As for what's different/changed/etc with the actual application, assuming you could even bypass that backwards compatibility issue, that's a question for Incarnate. My intuition would expect the newer edition on applab would have vastly improved integration with the system, let alone being properly designed for the Quest headset and therefore more visually appealing... but I dunno. Maybe even change how controllers work (Go was 3dof vs the 6dof of the quest series)

I'd also just say *support the devs for their hard work!* but i'm biased.
Nov 22, 2024 yodaofborg link
Yeah, like Luxen stated, there is no way to run the Gear/Go version on the Quest 2/3. Even if you use some fudging to get it installed it will not launch as it is missing something somewhere. Yeah, I tried. Not cos I didn't want to slap down the £20 tho, heck, I even spent time trying to get the Rift version working on the GearVR even tho the GearVR version worked fine and I owned it!

Anyways, as for the differences, again, Luxens take is pretty much on point, but as someone who has used both I thought I'd chime in.

The graphics, yeah, mainly the graphics. The fidelity is just soooo much better (speaking of Quest 3 here, milage may vary on lower spec devices but not by much I expect). You really are talking apples and oranges when comparing the two visually. Even dynamic lights work well, hardly a frame drop even in the busy sectors too. Now if only they would let me turn the background up to max, that would be neat. I'd even sacrifice a little overall resolution to have them sweet sweet hires skyboxes but I digress. Most the available options were simply not present or did nothing on the Gear/Go version so yeah, even if it did work it would still look like pants in comparison.

Controls are pretty much what you would expect. There was a 'head to steer' mode on the Gear version that worked quite well, this has been done away with in place of some 'flap your controller around in the air like you just don't care!' option which is pretty much useless and I really would prefer the old one? But eh, probably made people sick or something. As the only buttons you are missing from an Xbox style controller is the d-pad, you can quite comfortably find a controller layout that works well with Quest controllers, even if missing a few binds. This certainly would not work with the old APK and you would require a 3rd party controller. I haven't tried an actual Xbox pad yet for this reason, but I suspect they will work fine too if really desired (at least the menu has the options for it). There's also a pretty neat point-to-target feature which works great!

The 3dof Vs 6dof is certainly a thing, and looking/moving about in the 3D world works as expected but to be honest? It isn't really something you will notice 99.9% of the time as you spend most of the time looking in the forward position or there abouts and rarely have a reason to move your head more than 3dof anyway. I suppose it does add a little realism tho.

But yeah, coming from GearVR to Quest 3 was quite a step up visually. The rest is gravy but the real meal is the visuals. Is it worth the money? Heck, I don't even play anymore and I'd still say yes. Personal history aside, VO really is one of the better sit-down VR experiences. Even if you are just using it very infrequently it's still nice to chill n splat a few botsies (or newbs, although I haven't actually fought a willing target yet...).

Oh, and as long as you ain't afraid to side load a few 2D applications (an archive manager and a file manager that isn't afraid to poke about in /Android) a lot of plugins work too. Stuff like TCS, trade databases, spotter plugs all work grand, and the only ones that don't seem to are the ones that move/replace HUD elements. They would need rewriting for the 3D HUD. Drazed did make a 3D HUD moving plugin so it is possible, but yeah, I wouldn't expect anything like MDI HUD to work.

/me goes back to sleep.