With the advent of the Quest Link, which allows to (at some extent) play Rift games on the Quest, it's high time we got a Rift version of cross-compatibility.

The Rift is a powerful VR headset, capable of playing many things the Quest can't alone, but the one thing that is bugged is the lack of cross-playability, especially Rift to Quest. A number of Quest users love to play multiplayer games, but, even when there is a Rift version, Rift users most likely can't play with Quest users.

The Rift users paid a high premium to have a VR headset, both in PC power plus the unit itself, but slowly Rift users are being left behind, with more support for the cheaper Quest, and without the capability to play with other users, the Rift is becoming more and more a dead unit. Therefore I suggest a new approach.

Design, via update or download, a "Quest player," that allows Rift users to log into Oculus as if they are on the Quest, and play the Quest version of the games, letting their powerful PCs do the work of the Quest hardware. The benefit to this is you keep Rift users, and they can join in with Quest users in online gaming, from Arizona Sunshine to Elven Assassin. Also, it would open up a new set of apps that are available for use, including Go compatibility to play apps like Netflix, or go around the world with friends via Wander.

I feel that after the announcement that Quest will have the option of using PCVR, this has made the Rift S a much worst value.

I and many other Rift S users would instantly exchange our Rift S for a quest and gladly pay for the Link since it gives you more versatility and the option of PCVR and wireless. The improvement that the Rift S has over the quests are not worth the price of admission. Four months after launch and I deeply regret buying a Rift S.

The Rift s is simply not worth 400 usd on the current market and a price drop is not gonna fixed disgruntled customers who feel betrayed by Oculus/Facebook.

Sep 17, 2020, 0:36 PDT

I am rift s owner of which I got my rift s in late July of this year with the plan of devlopeing games and experiences with it, I thought that this device only just year old would serve me for such purpose for the next five years or so, I am deeply unhappy that only two months on and you have discontinued both models I had plan to build for.
I don't have the money to replace this item as it was the kindness of my family who scrimp and saved to get me the handset as I wouldn't have had the money to get such a device myself.
I am absolutely horrified that this has happened, I now have a headset that will not live up to such a time line, and would have to fork out an additional £299 for the updated model, of which I don't have such a fund for.
I am beyond livid, due to press releases giving miss leading information in regards to the replacement product being a step down from the quest as a quest light, however this seems to be a quest pro, superseding both quest and rift s.
I feel that some compensation is in order, this is not exceptible behaviour for a market leader to discontinue two perfectly good products in less then two years.
This will once again be a massive setback to myself and the project I am working on, one would of hopped that this would have not have been the case with a company such as Facebook and oculus.

On the original Rift, you could calibrate your height during setup. It allowed seated play by sitting down and adjusting your height as such so you'd be sitting and be for example 6'0 and be sitting down instead of crouching. I don't have the strongest legs and it's not comfortable for me to stand up, I'm sure people have the same issue and I've also met a few people who couldn't even move their legs and were either in a wheelchair or they just sat in bed/a chair all day exploring a new world when they couldn't with our own reality. I'm not saying to remove the whole other function for calibration, but I'm just asking you make it avaliable to those who aren't as strong/capable as others regarding their own physical health problems.

I was prompted to submit this idea following the recent controller tracking debacle & this comment from an Oculus software engineer: https://www.reddit.com/r/oculus/comments/hobaop/foroculusriftsuserswhoare_experiencing/fxgw1sh/

I wrote a reply to that which I'll quote here:

The immense diversity of setups - different CPUs combined with different GPUs in different motherboards with different chipsets, power deliveries, USB ports, etc etc, with different RAM kits using different clock speeds & memory timings, interfacing differently with that exact motherboard at that motherboard's BIOS settings & that CPUs memory controller, with that version of Windows with those settings & those registry keys, running those background apps with those software versions & those settings... on and on and on it goes.

The factors involved in building the landscape for any piece of software to run in are luridcrously numerous. There's no amount of QC, QA, or testing that can account for all of them. As hardware & software gets more complex, which they are at a break-neck pace, testing is only going to get exponentially harder, and large-scale constructive community engagement with beta programs will become absolutely essential.

The best thing anyone in the community can do is report the issues. Oculus have a beta program, a log gatherer (IIRC in /Oculus install folder/support/oculus-diagnostics/), and a support channel. If you encounter an issue, mention it on public forums to contact other people who might have it, establish it's an issue, then en-masse use the log gatherer & send the info to Oculus Support. That's how you actually, constructively contribute to the fixing of the issue.

Given the increasing complexity & diversity of the home PC landscape, internal testing is getting more and more unfeasible & fallible. It's simply not reasonable or practical to set up an in-house testing area of thousands of PC rigs with tens of thousands of old & new components, different software versions, different OS settings, etc etc.

I suggest an incentivized Beta program, where users could receive something like store credits for participating in the Public Test Channel & submitting system logs using the Log Gatherer included in the Oculus software suite. Participate in the beta, provide feedback to Oculus, get store credits, buy free games. It would of course be up to Oculus to balance this in such a way that they gain significant beta program participation without seeing a significant loss of revenue, but I would argue that the loss of faith & goodwill from the community following issues like these are more harmful than some people getting a handful of free games.

You need a significant amount of users testing your software on a plethora of system configurations. In-house testing is no longer sufficient, and scaling that up to a point where it would be would instead be financially & logistically unpractical. This tracking debacle demonstrates that incredibly well, and it isn't the first time something like this has happened.