Bigscreen is building a 3DoF mode for Beyond 2, and HTC calls dropping base stations unlikely

Bigscreen is building a mode for the Beyond 2 that works with no base stations at all, and it has published a line from HTC on whether those base stations have a future. Bigscreen’s post of 17 October says it is working on “a 3DoF mode for Beyond 2, which tracks which way your head turns (but not where it moves), so you can use your headset for flat experiences without any base stations”.

The 3DoF mode is aimed at using a Beyond 2 for flat content with nothing else in the room. Image: Bigscreen

The HTC sentence is a statement HTC gave Bigscreen, and Bigscreen quotes it in full: “If there is a plan to discontinue Steam VR Base Stations, we will ensure everyone is informed. However it is unlikely to happen at this time.” Bigscreen’s own next line is the caveat: “This isn’t a commitment.”

The question has a reason behind it. The Valve Index went out of production in October, and Valve’s own page says the remaining headsets, controllers and accessories are available “while supplies last”, which leaves the lighthouses with HTC, the company that still sells them.

Bigscreen sells its own audio strap, and says it does not make controllers for its headset. Image: Bigscreen

3DoF turns with your head and follows nothing else

Three degrees of freedom means rotation only: the headset knows which way you are facing and how far you have tilted, and nothing about where your head is in the room. Lean in or take a step and the scene stays put, which rules out room-scale VR and leaves a large screen in front of you, which is what Bigscreen means by “flat experiences”.

That suits the company’s own history, since Bigscreen began as a virtual cinema app rather than a hardware maker. There is no date, no beta and no technical detail beyond the one sentence, and Bigscreen says only that it will “share more here on the blog and on our YouTube channel soon”.

Beyond 2 and Beyond 2e both track against SteamVR base stations, which is why HTC’s answer reached Bigscreen’s blog. Image: Bigscreen

Controllers are the harder half of the problem

Bigscreen does not solve that half itself, and says so plainly: “Bigscreen doesn’t make controllers for its headset (…at least not yet, anyways)”. With Valve’s controllers out of production, the post runs through what still tracks against lighthouses, from Shiftall’s GripVR and FlipVR to HTC’s Vive Controller 2.0 and glove systems that need a tracker clipped to each hand.

Shiftall’s GripVR is one of the lighthouse-tracked controllers Bigscreen’s post names. Image: Shiftall

On the Index controllers themselves Bigscreen is blunt about what it has lost. They “are still some of the best VR controllers around, especially when it comes to finger tracking”, the post says, and “as a business, Valve’s controllers were important to our product”.

For anyone who already owns lighthouse kit, the compatibility detail is the useful part. Base stations from an Index or a Vive “work with Beyond 2 and Beyond 2e right out of the box”, Bigscreen says, “along with your controllers and trackers”; 1.0 and 2.0 base stations cannot be mixed in one setup; and the SteamVR interface “can be navigated entirely with a gamepad, even if it is less than ideal”.

That gamepad line is the shape of the 3DoF mode as well, a headset used without a tracked controller in sight. Bigscreen’s September production update had the Halo Mount slipping again, so the 3DoF mode is planned rather than scheduled, and HTC’s answer comes with “at this time” attached to it.

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