Valve Introduces SteamVR Home Beta

Valve announced that as of yesterday, SteamVR will have a redesigned look with a new home experience that is richer, more interactive, and more social than the existing launch area. SteamVR Home is currently in beta and can be accessed by anyone who ‘opts in’.

To Opt In to SteamVR Beta, simply follow these steps below:

1. Open Steam on your desktop
2. Find SteamVR in your Library under Tools
3. Right click and go to Properties
4. Select the Betas tab and pick SteamVR Beta from the dropdown

SteamVR Beta gives more options to customize the launch area (where players start when starting up SteamVR). In the announcement on the community page, they released the following statement: “It’s been exciting to see the creativity of the community in the diverse environments and backgrounds submitted to the SteamVR Workshop so far. We’ve also heard loud and clear that creators want the ability to make more detailed home environments, with sound, animation, interaction, and social elements. All of these features and more are now available with the new SteamVR Home update.”

Key Feature Updates:

• Richer, customizable environments
  • higher resolution
  • supports animation, sound, games, and interactivity
  • teleport around to explore the hundreds of environments created by community members
  • customize and save your environment with props and drawings, then set it as default home space
• Socialize with friends
  • built in social functions
  • easier to connect with friends and other players
  • invite friends to join you in your home space, or open any environment up to friends or the public
  • voice chat with other players, interact with tools and props, and explore different SteamVR environments with others
• Customize your avatar
  • choose your avatar’s head
  • accessorize it with wearables and props
  • access additional avatars and wearables by completing quests in other SteamVR environments
• Quick Links
  • easy access to your most recently launched:
    • VR apps
    • friends lists
    • open Public and Private rooms
  • Creators can access panels and embed into any environments they create

As of yesterday, all SteamVR backgrounds and environments were updated and are  available for use. The next roll out will be the hand customization workshop which is still under active development but will be available soon.Creators can use SteamVR Workshop Tools to create and submit environments. This app is accessible in the Tools section of the Steam Library.

These cool new updates received their core functionality from Steam’s other VR app  ‘Destinations’. To learn more about what’s happening with Destinations, check out this post. Steam believes that their new beta will enhance the experience for all Steam users and are extremely excited about this release. With all the customization options, it’s easy to see why. Have any of you tried the SteamVR Beta? Let us know in the comments below.