The Apple Vision Pro isn’t designed primarily as a gaming device, but it can actually offer some surprisingly decent gaming capabilities. While it doesn’t have dedicated controllers, it leverages hand tracking and spatial computing to enable immersive gaming experiences. Let’s explore some of the gaming options available now and the potential for gaming on future Apple AR/VR headsets.
Check: How to Open Control Center and Customize Controls on Apple Vision Pro
Native Apps and Games
While limited compared to platforms like the Meta Quest, the Vision Pro does come with some pre-installed apps and games that work well, especially those using hand tracking.
Lego Builder’s Journey
One of the best is Lego Builder’s Journey, an innovative puzzle game with beautiful graphics. Initial impressions suggested pinch gestures were required, but you can actually grab bricks with your hands by moving closer to the environment. This allows for very tactile, natural interactions as you build creations to solve puzzles. The crisp visuals and graphics really shine on the Vision Pro displays.
Game Room
Game Room offers classic games like Chess and Solitaire. Early reports claimed the pieces couldn’t be moved by hand, but that’s not actually true. When you walk up close to the virtual board, you can grab and move pieces manually for an authentic spatial experience. The ability to move pieces with your actual hands makes games in Game Room much more immersive.
Other Native Games
There are other native games that work well, like:
- Cut the Rope 3: A fun physics puzzle game leveraging pinch gestures
- Puzzling Places: An expansive puzzle game with excellent hand tracking
- Loóna: Cozy Puzzle Games: Relaxing puzzle games in scenic environments
- Synth Riders: A rhythm game with an immersive mode to play surrounded by environments
- Fruit Ninja: The classic slicing game overlayed onto your real environment
- What the Golf: A quirky golf parody game that’s more spatial than flatscreen
While basic compared to dedicated gaming systems, these native games showcase the potential for immersive spatial computing gaming experiences that leverage the Vision Pro hardware.
Flat Gaming on a Vision Pro
One of the most impressive gaming uses of the Vision Pro is playing flat, traditional games on a huge virtual display. Using a browser like Nexus and a gamepad controller, you can play:
- Xbox Cloud Gaming: Streaming Xbox games, up to 1080p resolution
- GeForce Now: Streaming games from your Steam library or supported games, up to 4K resolution
The visual quality of the virtual screen is simply stunning, with incredible clarity, sharpness, and detail. Playing Call of Duty: Warzone on a screen that spans from floor to ceiling and is wider than physically possible in reality, with better image quality than high-end 4K TVs, is an experience that has to be seen to believed.
The fidelity and resolution when streaming games surpasses what should be possible on a standalone device. It really demonstrates the potential for high visual quality virtual content on future Apple AR/VR headsets. Experiencing this level of clarity has me excited for a future where crisp, smooth graphics are the standard in VR and AR.
The Vision Pro as a Gaming Platform?
The Apple Vision Pro clearly isn’t optimized specifically for gaming. The lack of controllers and focus on productivity and content consumption are evidence of that. However, the combination of hand tracking technology and stunning visuals lends itself nicely to certain gaming experiences. Native apps prove basic gameplay works well, while streaming games to a mindblowing virtual display opens lots of possibilities.
While I can’t recommend the Vision Pro solely as a $3,500 gaming device, the gaming use cases reveal:
- Hand tracking and spatial computing enable immersive gameplay, even without controllers
- The visual fidelity sets a new bar for resolution and clarity in XR headsets
- Apple has the hardware capabilities to deliver excellent gaming experiences
The potential is clearly there. With more optimized software and the possibility of future controllers, Apple could disrupt the gaming space. For now, the Vision Pro offers a taste of some unique gameplay experiences that take advantage of its cutting-edge hardware.
The Future of Gaming on Apple Vision Pro
Gaming likely isn’t the primary focus with the first-generation Vision Pro. But Apple now has a platform capable of high-quality gaming thanks to its displays, hand-tracking camera, and onboard compute. As Apple iterates on future AR/VR hardware with newer silicon and capabilities, gaming could move more into focus.
If we see additional gaming capabilities like the rumored controllers for the Vision Pro, tighter integration with Apple Arcade, and more powerful hardware at lower price points, gaming might play a bigger role. This could ultimately challenge dedicated gaming systems.
For now, though, enjoy pushing the boundaries of gaming with some creative native apps and by streaming flat games to incredible virtual screens. The Vision Pro proves Apple has the technology to deliver amazing gaming experiences as the ecosystem matures. The future remains wide open for Apple to pursue the gaming market in innovative ways only they can.