SteamVR just got a shiny new beta for anyone who wants to try out the upcoming SteamVR Home experience. Those of you out there who have used a VR headset through Steam will be familiar with the SteamVR launcher. For those of you who aren’t, it’s the area that Steam throws you into when you first pop on the headset and while it is frankly a mind-blowing experience, it’s definitely still in its infancy. The community has been busy making custom environments for it, everything from a giant chess set to an English churchyard, but the tools haven’t been there to make significant changes until now.
Fill that library with our list of the best VR games.
An announcement on the SteamVR community page says that Valve have “heard loud and clear that creators want the ability to make more detailed home environments, with sound, animation, interaction, and social elements.” Adding that “all of these features and more are now available.” Here’s the highlight reel:
- Richer, customizable environments now support higher resolutions, sounds, games and interactivity. Players can now teleport around these environments, adding props and saving them for later.
- SteamVR Home has social functions built in, allowing players to join one another in their home spaces and voice-chat.
- Customizable avatars, including accessories and wearables.
- Creators can use SteamVR Workshop Tools to create and submit environments. They now have access to the quick link panels, allowing them to be embedded into any environments they create.
For the full list of features head on over to the Steam community news post. To opt into SteamVR beta simply open steam on your desktop, find SteamVR in your library under ‘tools,’ right-click and go to ‘properties,’ select the betas tab and pick SteamVR Beta from the dropdown menu.