Even at a Lower Price, It Still Made Me Uneasy

I hadn’t dived into the world of mixed reality headsets for quite some time until my recent encounter with the Meta Quest 3S during Meta Connect. At home, I own the Quest 2, but it’s collected a bit of dust as my attention shifted towards a foldable Android device. This latest experience, though, got me thinking about whether these immersive worlds might have a spot in my routine. My only gripe? The queasiness that tagged along.

Meta recently introduced the Quest 3S, starting at $300. It’s a bit more wallet-friendly than the usual Quest 3 but still operates on the Snapdragon XR2 Gen 2 platform. The trade-off here is its resolution and field of view, which isn’t quite as expansive as its counterparts, though still an improvement over the earlier models. Meta appears to be targeting users like myself—those who haven’t used their headsets in a while and might be enticed to upgrade. The full-color mixed reality passthrough was particularly impressive, allowing me to comfortably navigate my surroundings by toggling this mode during the demo.

Initially, as I donned the Meta Quest 3S, nostalgia kicked in, and I felt like I’d missed this realm of technology. But as time went on, my old nemesis, motion sickness, reared its ugly head. Whether it was the empty stomach or the intense heat, I’m not sure, but around 32 minutes in, I had to politely bow out and escape back to the real world to catch my breath.

The tipping point came during Horizon World’s Music Valley Experience. It stars Sabrina Carpenter, who, funnily enough, is someone I remember from her days on the Disney Channel. As she serenades in the distance, approaching her stage gradually pulls you deeper into the experience, almost intrusively so. Suddenly, it felt a bit too personal for my liking.

Then, a fellow avatar joined me, graciously offering a tour around this digital music haven. We found ourselves at a hovering spaceship, tossing out music notes. Unfortunately, wrangling these elusive notes with the joysticks was a challenge, and it was during this task that my stomach began its protest.

Despite that, there were aspects of the Quest 3S that went smoothly. Watching the start of a Celine Dion special on Amazon Prime was a treat to the ears, and an 8K, 3D YouTube video featuring a serene daisy field was wonderfully calming. I fiddled with some window stacking, just because I could. I even tried an Xbox game, but the demo controller gave me no luck. I did manage a round of Just Dance, but at that stage, my limit had almost been reached.

Horizon Worlds really exacerbated the queasiness, partly because it lacks a stable horizon to focus on—something that usually helps steady you, akin to being on a rocky boat. I hadn’t expected that kind of reaction while simply sitting down. Looks like sitting might be my strategy next time I step into virtual reality. While Meta has done a commendable job of lowering the Quest’s cost, they’re still figuring out how to keep sensitive stomachs like mine from rebelling in these new digital adventures.

The new Meta Quest 3S is available for $300 with 128GB of storage, and $400 if you opt for the 256GB version. You can pre-order it now, although it officially hits the shelves on October 15.