The Public Test version of the Quest Update 39 hit yesterday and thanks to our friend Lubos V we got a look at some of the new features which include the ability to adjust space sense so you could have it kick in at 1 meter 2 or 3 or for us non metric fools about 4, 7 and 10 feet. You can now also sign out from messenger which I guess I never really noticed you couldn’t before which inherently just feels very on brand for meta book. With those lackluster feature updates a new set of fun bugs also arrived. And of course I preface this with the fact that this is a beta release and test so the bugs are understandable but its always good to know what bugs exist just in case you encounter them in the actual release version like uh you know the fiasco that was version 38. 

Okay so here we go, infinite office looks to be there but it constantly crashes, 2D Apps are crashing, and the one I’m worried about the most there is a controller firmware update which has led to some tracking issues and placing you in a menuless black void.  Another bug submitted by a user showed they no longer had the ability to choose a 120hz refresh rate and they are locked to 72. Lets hope that isn’t going to be the case for future. Lastly and well weirdly for the update the power off dialog box has a different design and Lubos says when turning off the headset it glows the oculus logo. Maybe thats meta trolling, start up your headset and say hi to meta but turn it off to say so long to your old friend oculus. I’m sure its just an oversight. 

Now inside the code of this new update VR genius, youtuber and data miner Brad Lynch found new updated lines of code to the codenamed projects for Metas future headsets. From the code he predicts there may be 3 different headsets in the works for meta. A Micro OLED Cambria code named seabrght which until this update had been dormant as far as code updates go, then a MiniLED cambria (sea cliff) which is more than likely already in the hands of devs and will be announced probably before the end of 2022 and then the Quest 3, which still not much is known. Bradley believes cambria will have a pro and standard model much like the Iphone Pro and iPhone pro max. We shall see what the zuck reveals in the coming months.

Nonetheless shout out to SadlyItsbradley for his skill and Lubos for the access. A link to  their channels are in the description. Let’s hope the bugs get fixed and version 39 goes over better than 38.

Getting a new quest? Get $30 free store credit on me by using my referral code: https://www.oculus.com/referrals/link/SlurpeePinata

Be sure to check out

LubusV: https://www.youtube.com/c/Lubo%C5%A1V

SadlyItsBradley: https://www.youtube.com/c/SadlyItsBradley

Some more tips for Nock VR and frequently asked questions answered by the developers Normal of Nock.

How do I adjust the music volume?

• In V1.1.1 Volume sliders were added in the pause menu. The changes you make will stay between matches.

• Pause the match (if your quick menu is the right controller, press the left controllers oculus button, and vice versa)

• Volume sliders will be on the left.

How can I mute the enemy?

• While in game open the pause menu and Use the mute buttons next to player names on the left hand side. You can also mute yourself.

If you have stick drift You can disable thumbstick input by selecting Turn mode "None" from the pause menu. The changes you make in this menu will stay between matches.

How do I change the bot difficulty?

• From the main menu start a custom match and add the bots you would like.

• Once in game, pause the match and On the right hand side there is a drop down menu where you can select the difficulty level! If you want to hate yourself Try the "On fire" mode!

Now lets talk about blocks.

A block can be used to interrupt your enemies play and redirect the ball.

• After firing an arrow, press A while it is in flight.

• The angle of your bow when you press A determines the angle of the block when placed. And if the ball hits your block you get an arrow back for it which makes it a little less risky if you are good with blocks.

How do I get down when I jump into the air?

• You can use your pulling hand to grab the air and throw downward, launching yourself upwards but under stand the longer you spend in the air aka the higher you jump  the less effective your  movement will be until you are near the floor, wall or ceiling again. One tip is to use the grip button on your bow hand to grab the air and push upward to basically fight gravity and get down more quickly but this really only works if you jumped once and not double jumped.

How do I get the ball to move more quickly?

• Shooting the ball once will get it rolling, shooting it twice rapidly will increase its speed exponentially, so try and get a quick first shot and then a longer more powerful shot right after to get the ball speed up. Try using this on kickoffs to get the ball going into your opponents territory right of the jump.

• Also the players speed is added to the arrow speed when you shoot.. So use your movement momentum to get faster ball speeds. When you are attacking the opponents goal.

Extra tip here if you need to increase your accuracy just enable the reticle in the menu. 

Does the arena size change?

• Thy answer is yes, the arena size changes between the match types. 1v1 is the smallest, 2v2 is medium and 3v3 is of course HUGE.

Here is a quick tip For getting the max shot strength quickly with less effort
Imagine T posing with your controllers in your hand, face towards your bow hand with the hole in your bow hand fist facing upwards, now take your arrow hand and point the hole in your arrow fist behind you (edited)

Take your standard bow pullback pose not when you pull back turn the controller out and away rather than as far back as you can. This puts more distance between the two controller rings maximizing your shot power more quickly.

Getting a new quest? Get $30 free store credit on me by using my referral code: https://www.oculus.com/referrals/link/SlurpeePinata

This weeks 3 VR stories that caught my eye include a possible silent hill VR game, You can now turn your house into a dungeon crawler and of course Smell your own poo in VR. Lets get into it.

Vermont Tech Start up OVR Technology has created a cartridge that can snap onto your headset just above your nose that is filled with vials of different scents OVR has meticulously  manufactured in their lab. Testers have been able to use the product to pick up a rose in VR and legitimately smell it and then pull the rose away and the scent goes away and doesn’t linger. Which sounds pretty impressive. It’s like a personal version Smell-O-Vision from the 50’s which yes was a real thing hollywood tried to implement in theaters but due to having to make a whole theater smell like something it encountered lots of overlapping smells and problems. Just imagine smelling the penguin in batman… You wouldn’t think it but smell is actually pretty vital to experiences and creating memories just imagine your grandmothers cooking or how thanksgiving dinner has a smell triggered memory. None the less OVR has experimented with more smells than just flowers they have yes worked on urine, garbage, dirt, feces (yum) gunpowder and blood. Luckily these types of scents are more used for training for soldiers or firefighters bc blade and sorcery would definitely be a different type of experience if I had smell the gallons of blood that spills in that game. On the brighter sense of smell this tech can help with meditation apps to add calming scents or add to atmospheric games like Nature Treks VR where you could actually smell the forest or the beach and that’s Escapism at its finest. Currently OVR is only contracted with businesses like clinics for addiction recovery, and they have not divulged the price but I think this is an interesting step into the future of immersion for VR.

You can now turn your whole house into a dungeon, well unless you already have… Using a new app on Sidequest called Dungeon Maker you can create all kinds of midevil traps and obstacles right in your living room. This app makes use of the recent passthrough updates for devs so you can travel through your own home trying not to die. You begin by creating a starting point with your touch controller and then choose a challenging path by adding traps like a giant swinging ax or a pit filled with spikes and add waypoints as a goal for making it through the course. Right now though the traps actually don’t affect you in anyway so you still need to cut off your video game brain a little bit but it is still an interesting experience. The developers field of vision plan to add in more features like spatial anchors, a scoring system, buttons and doors and object collision. If you want to dungeon up your basement you can download the game from Sidequest from the link in the description below

Lastly Konami has updated the trademark for Silent Hill referencing a virtual reality headset, possibly suggesting that if there is a new game in development it could also come to VR which would be absolutely insane. Just imagine playing the infamous PT demo from Kojima on your quest. Oh wait you can, well sorta you can download the hallway as a custom home on sidequest the link of course is in the description. A full fledged silent hill game in VR would be a nightmare and yet a joy all at the same time. So here’s to hoping konami can make something worthwhile in the future. Again this is just a trademark update and internet speculation so I wouldn’t get your VR hopes up just yet.

Thanks for watching and I’ll catch you next week with 3 more VR stories I found interesting. Let me know in the comments what game you’d like to smell. Mine would be Walkabout mini golf Sweetopia level. See ya!!

Getting a new quest? Get $30 free store credit on me by using my referral code: https://www.oculus.com/referrals/link/SlurpeePinata

https://www.wbur.org/news/2022/03/14/virtual-reality-smell-ovr-technology

https://sidequestvr.com/app/7524/dungeon-maker

https://sidequestvr.com/app/6100/pt-hallway-silent-hills
https://www.oculus.com/experiences/quest/2616537008386430/

Nock is quickly becoming an incredibly popular multiplayer game on the quest 2 and they recently just posted their roadmap for updates and features so lets see what the future holds for Nock.

Here are the features the developers normal are working on currently. Feature 1 is a dark arena. I personally would really enjoy this and so would my eyeballs. I do like the white floor and bright blue atmosphere in the arena we have at launch, its a nice escape buy my old man dad eyeballs get a little strained after a while but nonetheless this dark arena looks like a california  sunset into the deep blue sea and would be welcomed change of scenery for us players.

More characters are coming, they are looking to release about 6 unique characters as you can see here in this shot it looks like we have an assassin on the right, a shrouded cricket that almost looks like the character from journey. But noticing what is in their hands leads to 

New Bow Designs, here’s a close up image of some of the bow models they are looking to release 6-10 new ones and next to characters I think these will be the most sought after cosmetics. But I personally want that clippy paper clip bow. 

Custom block skins are up next which I think would be an interesting unlockable that I would never pay for but it will look cool to shoot a block of cheese to defend against a goal.

This next one is a big one quick chat. In my opinion quick chat is very important in games like this especially for people who don’t like to have their mic on during gameplay maybe because their uh kid is sleeping in the next room. I’m interested to see how they would implement it and what button they will use, but I’m excited for that feature.

Up next is having the ability to curve your arrows which will surely be above my skill set but will make the game much more interesting. As you see here in the provided gif it says you will be able to curve your arrows with your wrist. This should help making contact with those long off axis ball and directing the ball more easily

They are also working on an integrated friends list and party support for your questies along with of course a PC-VR version which I’m sure will send this game into the stratosphere once it hits steam.

Now for the future future of nock. In future updates normal is planning on adding a free play and training mode to help practice shots much like rocket league. They are planning on adding in match spectating which would be awesome for streamers and the potential of turning this franchise into a VR master league gaming title. Something I wish was there for launch, in game replays with the ability to save them for later which would be nice for youtubers and tiktokers and finally more game modes. Honestly gorilla tag in that arena would be pretty dope.

There you have it the future of Nock, are you playing nock obsessively? Let me know in the comments below.

Getting a new quest? Get $30 free store credit on me by using my referral code: https://www.oculus.com/referrals/link/SlurpeePinata

A quick beginners guide and tutorial for Knock, now out on the Meta Quest 2. Tips and tricks to make you better in Knock, the rocket league of VR.

So here ladies and questlmen is nock. A competitive first person bow and arrow ball shooter soccer game from the creators of Half and Half. The movement in the game is incredibly fluid fun and the game loop is real addicting so lets jump in.

Movement:
When you start you can choose to put the bow in either your right or left hand so for this guide we will have our character be a right handed archer. Starting with movement using your left bow hand engane the grip button on the controller and you can glide your way around the arena. Fairly similar to gorilla tag. 

Now with your right hand use the grip button to pretty much pull the arena around you and best of all jump. To jump all you need to do is while holding the grip button you can sling your arm down to jump into the air just like mario you can double jump into oblivion.

Shooting:

Let’s talk shooting. As you can see just to the inside of your bow hand there are three circles that represent how many arrows you have in your wiggly quiver. Holding the trigger button on the hand opposite of the bow you can pull back your string and let that arrow fly. Once you run out of arrows you will need to traverse the map hitting the green dots laying around to refill your ammo. You will notice some are on the ground and some are in the air. Also, a few have three arrows, so put those in your memory when you are in a desperate situation.You get three arrows to start with and unfortunately you can’t stockpile more than three at a time.

You can change your arrow to a defensive block by hitting the a or if you are a lefty the x button on your string hand while your arrow is in the air to create a block to use in case your opponent is getting too close to your goal. These are a fun way to make your opponent made and why this game is easy to learn but hard to master.

Quick Tips:

Speaking of mastering Let’s hit a few quick tips that will help you in nock

This one is fairly obvious but figured I should point it out anyway, make sure to notice the green arrow cone that shows up letting you know where the ball is when it is out of your sight as well as the circle surrounding it. The circle lets you know how close the ball is to you.

If you are looking for max velocity on the ball try and hit it in directly in the center, you’ll notice as you play more that off center hits usually don’t push the ball forward very much.

If the ball is moving at a fast enough speed it will turn red and if you hit the ball while it is red into an opponent it will kill them like in rocket league for about 5 seconds.

Fun fact you can run into the ball and move it or block it with your body, just of course make sure its not red of course. Honestly I kinda hope they turn that into a gametype in the future, kinda like slappers only on goldeneye but with a ball. We shall see.

A good tip for movement is to remember you can keep your arrow pulled back and ready to fire even while you move throughout the arena.

Lastly when you shoot your arrows and they hit the ball you’ll see a +1 that means that arrow goes back into your arsenal so do your best to always hit the ball so you don’t run out of those precious arrows.

Getting a new quest? Get $30 free store credit on me by using my referral code: https://www.oculus.com/referrals/link/SlurpeePinata

Here is a Quest 2 tutorial on how to enable developer mode on your headset in under 60 seconds.

Oculus Developer Site: https://developer.oculus.com/

Developer Creator Site: https://developer.oculus.com/manage/organizations/create

Developer Drivers For PC: https://developer.oculus.com/downloads/package/oculus-adb-drivers

Getting a new quest? Get $30 free store credit on me by using my referral code: https://www.oculus.com/referrals/link/SlurpeePinata

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