For the second time in 24 hours, Sony has crushed the hopes of PSVR fans hoping for new VR experiences on the upcoming PS5 console.
After suggesting that the PSVR 2 is at least a couple of years away, Sony has now confirmed that upcoming VR releases for Hitman 3 and No Man's Sky will only be available if you buy and play the PS4 version of the games.
Speaking with UploadVR, a Sony rep said that PSVR on the PS5 is only backwards compatible, and that “We have not announced PS5 titles for PS VR.”
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Sony is currently giving away a free adaptor that, according to Sony's FAQ page, "allows the use of PlayStation VR when playing supported PS4 games on a PS5 console". It makes no mention of playing PS5 VR games on the console. Evidently, none of the upcoming PS5 exclusives will get a PSVR version anytime soon.
We know that Hitman 3's IO interactive plans to give gamers a free PS5 upgrade if you buy the PS4 version digitally, and Hello Games recently announced the same offer for No Man's Sky.
In this case, however, we wonder if the developers will also offer PS5 buyers a free downgrade to PS4, so they can try out the VR mode. PSVR owners may want to buy the last-gen version of these games, even if they only own the PS5, just to be certain they'll get access to both ports of the game.
The future of Playstation VR
Sony is allegedly hiring engineers for the PSVR 2, and we recently spotted a patent showing potential new PSVR Move motion controllers. So it's clear that the company is hard at work on a VR successor, even if it's years away from fruition.
Until the company finishes producing this new headset, it clearly doesn't want to muddy the waters and let current PSVR owners enjoy next-gen PS5 VR experiences – not until they've bought a new VR headset first.
This disappointing news brings up new questions. Another recent rumor suggested that Resident Evil 8: Village would, like its predecessor, have a PSVR version. However, we've heard no word that Capcom intends to make Resident Evil 8 compatible with the PS4. So does this mean that Capcom will make a PS4 port specific to PSVR, wait until the PSVR 2 launches to sell its port, or is this rumor false?
We'll have to wait to find out more information in the coming months.
