“Meta is slicing costs for 2 of its digital actuality headsets because it continues making an attempt to spice up adoption for the nascent know-how on which it has wager its future,” reviews CNN:
The corporate introduced Friday that it’s slashing the value of its higher-end Meta Quest Professional headset by some $500, bringing its value to $999, roughly six months after it was launched. Meta can be decreasing the value of its Quest 2 headset from $499.99 to $429.99. The worth reduce for the Quest 2 will go into impact in additional than a dozen international locations together with america on Sunday. The Quest Professional worth drop will take impact the identical day in america and Canada and on March 15 in all different international locations the place it’s bought.
“Our purpose has at all times been to create {hardware} that is inexpensive for as many individuals as attainable to make the most of all that VR has to supply,” the corporate stated in a weblog submit.
Yahoo Finance believes Meta is decreasing costs “as a result of shoppers are, nicely, simply not shopping for as many as the corporate anticipated.” The Verge agrees that the Meta Quest Professional was “an absolute boondoggle of a tool” — however means that’s not the entire story.
“should you have a look at the Quest 2, which most individuals use for enjoying video games, as a sport console, it is achieved moderately nicely.”
Mark Rabkin, Meta’s vice chairman for VR, informed employees that Meta has bought over 20 million Quest headsets so far. That features each the Quest and Quest 2…. That looks as if a small quantity, however the Nintendo GameCube solely bought 21 million consoles in its complete lifespan, and the Xbox Collection X and S are estimated to have bought roughly 20 million consoles so far. So should you have a look at the Quest 2, which most individuals use for enjoying video games, as a sport console, it is achieved moderately nicely. Their conclusion? “Meta might need large ambitions for VR headsets and their place within the metaverse, however the actuality is that the highest software program on the Quest 2 are all video games…. And whereas Meta is thrusting metaverse experiences onto customers, it is sort of ignoring that core gamer viewers.”
