The concept of the metaverse and virtual reality (VR) are often intertwined in people’s minds, and various platforms like Somnium Space, Crypto Voxels, and Meta’s Horizon Worlds have already embraced this technology. However, one platform, Decentraland, which describes itself as a “decentralized virtual reality platform,” is still lacking VR capabilities despite its claims.
Sean Ong, the founder of XR Dev Studio, a company specializing in extended reality, is part of a team that has developed an “alpha” version of the VR platform for Decentraland. Ong explained that VR has always been part of Decentraland’s vision, but the Decentraland Foundation has been focusing on implementing core features before prioritizing VR.
As a member of Decentraland’s DAO, Ong and his team received grants after submitting a proposal to bring VR to the platform. However, the funding only allowed them to create an alpha version of the VR client, which lacked stability. Ong stated that the challenges in bringing VR to Decentraland are due to fundamental incompatibilities.
Porting VR involves adapting the original code to make it compatible with another platform, but Ong highlighted that this approach requires constant updates whenever the main project is updated. Building a dedicated VR client would take longer, but it would be more resilient in the long run.
Ong and his team requested an additional $240,000 in funding to develop a dedicated VR client, but the proposal was rejected by the community. The majority voted against it.
In regards to The Sandbox, another blockchain-based metaverse, Sébastien Borget, its co-founder, stated that while metaverses will eventually exist in VR, their focus for 2023 is on mobile platforms. They have no immediate plans for VR as they believe the technology is not mature or mainstream enough.
When addressing the recent criticism of Decentraland’s relatively low daily active user count of 8,000, Ong acknowledged that these numbers are still low and that the platform should aim for millions of users. He believes that Decentraland would be able to attract more users if it had VR support, emphasizing that VR should be a significant component of a complete metaverse experience.
Agustin Ferreira, the executive director of the Decentraland Foundation, responded to the criticism by stating that the DAO could eventually take over platform development. The foundation aims to support community development and incentivize developers to add value to the ecosystem as a whole.