PlutoSphere is shutting down.
PlutoSphere 是一个云 VR 流媒体服务，允许 Meta Quest 的所有者玩 SteamVR 内容，如《半衰期：爱莉克斯》和 VRChat 的 PC 版本，而无需拥有游戏 PC。
The service sells game time at "game room model" pricing, using "tokens". The price per hour ranged from $1 to $3 per hour, depending on the number of tokens purchased.PlutoSphere no longer sells tokens, but plans to make existing tokens available for approximately 30 days.
I tried it on PlutoSphere back in 2021, before going live, and found that it felt exactly the same when using a nearby datacenter as it did on Virtual Desktop and on a PC on my local network. This technology works.
But the technology doesn't matter. As a product, PlutoSphere's biggest limitation is that it can't be distributed on the public Quest Store; Meta's policy only allows VR streaming from "devices that are physically accessible to the customer," and explicitly prohibits VR streaming from "virtual devices or cloud sources. Meta's policy only allows VR streaming from "devices that are physically accessible to the customer" and explicitly prohibits VR streaming from "virtual devices or cloud sources.
Instead, PlutoSphere is distributed through SideQuest as a loadable application. This means that users must set their helmet to developer mode, connect it to a PC, and install the SideQuest software, which is more of a hassle than the App Lab. It also means that PlutoSphere can't use the built-in Quest in-app payment system to easily charge users via a Quest PIN to a tied card.
Here is PlutoSphere's full statement on closure:
"After long and intense negotiations with our partners and unexpected challenges, it is with deep regret that we announce that PlutoSphere operations will cease.
Despite our strong belief that streaming use cases for spatial computing to standalone devices is a necessary and exciting use case, it could not be pursued.
We will shut down the PlutoSphere service immediately.
Because we are unable to launch on the Meta App Store and increase the number of users, we are unable to fulfill our commitments with third-party AWS cloud service re-sellers.
Our journey with PlutoSphere has been surprisingly complex and full of resistance. The Meta App Store failed to approve our use case, effectively banning cloud streaming, severely hindering our marketing strategy, limiting growth, and preventing us from meeting our usage obligations. Despite efforts over the past year to restart the agreement used for the promised AWS service, we are at an impasse.
We are now forced to shut down PlutoSphere. this means discontinuing our products and services, downsizing our team, and initiating the process of shutting down operations.
This outcome goes far beyond the vision with which we began our partnership. We signed a contractual commitment that we failed to fulfill, even though, surprisingly, we were unable to find a way to renegotiate it. We have exhausted all efforts to avoid this situation, and we take this news very hard. We understand the impact this will have on our team, our users and the wider XR community. We apologize for any disappointment and inconvenience this may cause.
Your support and understanding is very important to us during this difficult time. Being involved with PlutoSphere has been an incredible journey, and we are sad to see it come to an end. We are grateful for the opportunity to contribute to the XR field and will apply the lessons learned in our future endeavors."
Evidence found in Quest's firmware suggests that Meta has been working on its own cloud VR streaming service for years, codenamed "Avalanche". About two years ago, a Quest owner even posted a screenshot on Reddit showing "Avalanche" as an option in the experimental setup, claiming that they were able to load the original PC-only Wrath of Asgard 1 game for a short playthrough.
In 2020, Meta executive Jason Rubin described cloud VR gaming as a five-year-plus goal, while John Carmack said the company has "endless debates" about the minimum quality threshold for VR streaming.
Meta could face accusations of anti-competitive behavior if it launches its own cloud VR streaming feature in the near future. This would be similar to Virtual Desktop's PC VR Wi-Fi streaming, which was banned from the platform until Meta launched its own Air Link feature. In 2022, Bloomberg reported that the U.S. Federal Trade Commission (FTC) is investigating Meta's competitive practices, but there have been no further reports on the progress of that investigation.
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