It looks like Valve is working on a new VR headset, with UploadVR reporting about a new prototype VR headset from the company that rocks a Valve logo on the circuit board, with images leaking out onto Imgur.

You'll notice we haven't said HTC in this post, with Valve working with the smartphone maker on the Vive and Vive Pro headsets, but this is a prototype VR headset made in-house at Valve it seems. The new headset seems to have SteamVR tracking photodiodes, with UploadVR explaining: "The leaked headset features what appear to be SteamVR tracking photodiodes under the plastic (similar to how Oculus hides IR LEDs under the Rift). It also has 2 cameras visible and integrated headphones. The padding on the back is visually similar to the padding on Valve's "Knuckles" controllers prototypes.".

The prototype VR headset seems to have a higher field of view, which should in turn mean it has a higher resolution display as well.

This new headset could be a prototype that Valve is making as a footprint for what it wants VR headset manufacturers to make, but it is the last bit of this news from UploadVR's sources that said: "this is in fact a Valve HMD. We've also heard the field of view will be 135 degrees with the Vive Pro resolution and it should come bundled with Knuckles controllers as well as a Half-Life based VR game".

Uh what now? There's a Half-Life VR game included? IS THIS HALF-LIFE 3?!?

HTC has just announced it has now joined the VirtualLink consortium, with the movement pushing a new VR standard with a single USB-C connector that has already been deployed on NVIDIA's new GeForce RTX range of graphics cards.

AMD, Microsoft, NVIDIA, Oculus and Valve are all part of the VirtualLink consortium, but there were eyebrows raised over HTC now being in the ranks. Daniel O'Brien, the GM of Vive in the US said that the company was "working to define not only a connection standard for future VR products but are also undertaking important work to help to define the future of what VR can be".

The news of HTC joining the VirtualLink consortium happened during the 2018 XRDC event held in San Francisco recently. VirtualLink, if you didn't already know, is a next-gen VR standard that will be capable of driving the entire VR experience (HMD, sensors, cameras) from a single USB-C cable. VirtualLink has enough bandwidth for four lanes of HBR3 DisplayPort, 10Gbps USB 3.1 Gen 2 for cameras and sensors, and 27W of power.

Oculus co-founder Brenden Iribe, who helped lead various initiatives across the Facebook-owned company's VR sector, is departing the virtual reality pioneer.

With its Rift headset, Oculus helped form springwell of virtual reality we now have today--and the decades of mixed reality experiences that lay in wait in the future. But one of the key players has now left the digital stage. After six long years helping push the forefront of virtual reality, Oculus co-founder Brenden Iribe is stepping away from the platform he helped create.

While Iribe announced his exit from the VR business in a Facebook post, he didn't give exact details for leaving the company, but he did note this would be his first "real break in 20 years." Unnamed sources claim Iribe clashed with Facebook's current mobile-oriented strategy. Iribe, the sources say, wanted Oculus to push into more dedicated and powerful hardware instead of rolling backwards to more widespread consumer-oriented gear.

Forget watching Twin Peaks (well not really, it's a great show and you should totally watch it): soon we'll be able to walk right into the strange universe thanks to VR.

Twin Peaks VR is happening, and it'll let us wander the strange interdimensional conduits of the small Washington town. The game is an interactive experience where users play as a lost soul caught in the Black Lodge, using clues from Special Agent Dale Cooper along the way.

"Twin Peaks VR takes the surreal world created by David Lynch and lets players explore its depths. It includes iconic moments and settings from 2017's 18-part limited event series Twin Peaks: The Return, as well as the original landmark television series. Utilizing lines and sounds from the show itself, players will travel to Glastonbury Grove, only to end up in the puzzling Red Room. Fans of the series will follow in the footsteps of Special Agent Dale Cooper and try to make their way back into the life they left behind. Twin Peaks VR is being developed for HTC vive and Oculus Rift and will be available on Steam."

Oculus' new all-in-one headset will be surprisingly versatile and powerful for gaming, company CTO John Carmack confirms.

Although the new Oculus Quest is a wireless, self-contained headset powered by a Qualcomm chip, the portable HMD is actually comparable to last-gen consoles in terms of CPU and GPU power. The conjunction of firmware utilities and tools alongside optimized hardware will theoretically allow the Quest to hit up to 72FPS in specific games and apps running at 1280x1280 resolution.

"In terms of raw processing power, there's lots of hedges and if buts when you're discussing different things, but Quest is in the neighborhood of the power of a previous gen like Xbox 360 and PS3. Now that's just in terms of CPU and GPU and what you can expect to do on it," Oculus' John Carmack said in a recent OC5 keynote speech.

Bandai Namco and Nintendo are bringing Mario Kart VR to the United States for some hilarious and ultra-fun virtual reality shenanigans.

Every time I play my HTC Vive, one thing becomes more and more clear to me: VR was made to be played with friends. VR really belongs in arcade environments where everyone can get in on the fun, and the industry has seen various "VRcades" pop up over the years. One of the most intriguing is Bandai Namco's and Nintendo's VR Zone Portal arcade, which breathes new life into Mario Kart. Previously only available in Japan, Mario Kart VR first came to the UK and is now coming to the U.S. for a limited time.

HTC today announced that the Vive-powered Mario Kart VR experience will come to Washington, DC's Union Station alongside other interactive games in the VR Zone Portal banner. Sadly the games will only be playable for six months and won't be a permanent fixture.

Oculus unveiled their mobile-friendly Oculus Quest VR headset for $399, but the VR giant also announced some new projects - one of which was a trailer for the upcoming three-part series Vader Immortal: A Star Wars VR Series.

Vader Immortal: A Star Wars VR Series has been made by ILMxLAB, which announced back in 2016 that it was working with writer David S. Goyer on a VR experience starring Darth Vader. We don't know what you'll be doing inside of the VR experience, but they're clear on it not being a game with Oculus explaining Vader Immortal is a "VR story series, not a game".

Some might remember the previous Star Wars VR experience 'Trials on Tatooine' which was a lightsaber VR experience that was kinda cool, as well as Star W ars: Secrets of the Empire and its immersive VR installation in the collaboration with The Void.

Oculus announces Oculus Quest, a new standalone VR headset platform built from its Santa Cruz prototype.

With its new wireless Oculus Quest headset, Facebook aims to break many of VR's biggest hurdles including price and accessibility. The Quest tracks your movements and the environment around you with 6DoF (six degrees of freedom) sensors, is totally self-contained and doesn't require any extra hardware like a phone or a PC graphics card to operate, and comes with wireless Touch controllers for input. The platform is intended to sit between the lower-end Oculus Go and the higher-end Rift.

Spec details are still light, but we do know Oculus Quest's panels have 1600x1400 per-eye resolution, 64GB of storage, and built-in audio. Exact processing power, system memory, and other internal hardware features weren't revealed.

Sony's new VR HMD patent is pretty weird. It features some interesting add-ons like eye-tracking tech, but it can also monitor the words you say--or words that are spoken to you--to help avoid "ill health effects". The aim here is to tackle different forms of virtual reality sickness and it may be a huge focus for Sony's next-gen PlayStation VR headset.

The patent, which was originally filed in 2017 and published this month, is largely focused on making VR safer and more healthy for users by tackling a huge accessibility barrier: discomfort. The HMD can be outfitted with various biometric sensors that monitor key signals and warn users if they're doing unhealthy things while in VR. It's also linked to an external remote device that processes data and can send it to a smartphone, or via on-screen HMD indicators. Eye-tracking cameras can adjust in-game images based on your eye movements or pupils, or flash a warning message on the HUD if your posture starts to slouch. There's even mention of the HMD being complimented with other sensors that monitor blood pressure, glucose levels, breathing, and even neural activity.

"The present invention generally concerns head-mounted display technologies. More particularly, the present invention concerns mitigation of ill health effects on users of head-mounted displays based on biometric sensor measurements and natural language processing," reads the patent.

Oculus plans to release its new self-contained Santa Cruz VR headset sometime in early 2019, sources tell UploadVR.

The virtual reality pioneers at Oculus may release their new middle-grade VR HMD sometime in first quarter 2019, sources say. With its new headset, Oculus aims to break one of the biggest drawbacks with VR: cumbersome, snaking cords. The headset, codenamed Santa Cruz, will make VR gaming and interacting much more accessible with its wireless functionality.

"Santa Cruz is the future," said Oculus product design engineer Adam Hewko in a 2017 update. "This is what VR should be. I think it's only going to get better as the technology keeps pushing the envelope."