Cross-Platform Multiplayer VR Games
Virtual reality games are great fun, but with several platforms on the market, the communities for these games are often fractured and suffer from small installed bases. The best way to avoid a fractured community is to offer a way to bring everyone together. Here’s a look at VR games that offer cross-platform gameplay in one form or another.
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Eve: Valkyrie
Eve: Valkyrie was the first multiplayer VR game to grace the Oculus Rift platform. The game started off as an Oculus-exclusive title, but CCP games brought it to the HTC Vive and PlayStation VR platforms months later. In mid-2017, CCP added desktop PC support to Eve: Valkyrie.
The EVE: Valkyrie servers support cross-platform play. When you hop into a match of Eve: Valkyrie, you could be playing with and against players on all four platforms.
- HMD Support: HTC Vive, Oculus Rift, PSVR, Desktop PC
- Crossable Platforms: SteamVR, Steam, Oculus, PlayStation Network
- Input: Gamepad, Touch as Gamepad, H.O.T.A.S.
- Publisher: CCP Games
- Developer: CCP Games
- Store Page: Steam, Oculus Store, PlayStation Store
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Eagle Flight
Ubisoft’s Eagle Flight is a first-person flight simulation dog-fighting game, but instead of taking the helm of a fighter jet or a spacecraft, you are a bird of prey. Fly through the skies and swoop between the trees in a battle over territorial boundaries.
Eagle Flight is available on HTC Vive, Oculus Rift, and PlayStation VR. Players from all three platforms face off in the same deathmatch servers.
- HMD Support: HTC Vive, Oculus Rift, PSVR
- Crossable Platforms: SteamVR, Oculus, PlayStation Network
- Input: Motion Controllers
- Publisher: Ubisoft
- Developer: Ubisoft
- Store Page: Steam, Oculus Store, PlayStation Store, Ubistore
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Werewolves Within
Werewolves Within is another cross-platform-enabled VR game from Ubisoft. Werewolves Within is a VR adaptation of a party game called Werewolf.
The game is simple: A village is being terrorized by werewolves, and the citizens must figure out who’s innocent and who’s guilty. Each player is randomly assigned a role, such as The Watcher, The Gossip, or The Werewolf, and each character role offers different knowledge and skills.
The gameplay in Werewolves Within relies on social interaction with other players. You must communicate with each other and coordinate your guesses if you hope to weed out the cunning werewolves.
- HMD Support: HTC Vive, Oculus Rift, PSVR
- Crossable Platforms: SteamVR, Oculus, PlayStation Network
- Input: Motion Controllers
- Publisher: Ubisoft
- Developer: Ubisoft
- Store Page: Steam, Oculus Store, PlayStation Store, Ubistore
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Star Trek: Bridge Crew
Star Trek: Bridge Crew is a multiplayer strategy adventure game in which you and three other players must navigate the USS Aegis (and later the USS Enterprise) through deep space.
You and your team must work together to succeed. No one person can handle the complexities of a starship alone. You must have a competent helmsman, a brilliant tactician, a talented engineer, and a fearless captain to keep the starship on course and out of harm's way.
Like Ubisoft’s other VR games, Star Trek: Bridge Crew supports Oculus Rift, HTC Vive, and PlayStation VR, and players from all three platforms can mingle together.
- HMD Support: HTC Vive, Oculus Rift, PSVR
- Crossable Platforms: SteamVR, Oculus, PlayStation Network
- Input: Motion Controllers
- Publisher: Ubisoft
- Developer: Red Storm Entertainment
- Store Page: Steam, Oculus Store, PlayStation Store, Ubistore
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Trackmania Turbo
Trackmania is a long-running racing franchise from Nadeo. The game features wild tracks that include loops and jumps and look like they should be part of a Hot Wheels collection. Trackmania Turbo is the latest entry in the Trackmania franchise, and it features the same heart-pounding racing action that we’ve grown to expect from Trackmania titles. However, Nadeo kicked the excitement up a notch with the inclusion of VR support.
Trackmania Turbo supports HTC Vive and Oculus Rift on Steam, but the game isn’t available on the Oculus Store. Nadeo also added VR support to the PS4 version of the game.
Trackmania’s multiplayer system is managed by Ubisoft’s Uplay platform, which enables all Trackmania players, regardless of platform or display method, to race against each other.
- HMD Support: HTC Vive, Oculus Rift, PSVR, PS4, Desktop PC
- Crossable Platforms: SteamVR, PlayStation Network
- Input: Motion Controllers
- Publisher: Ubisoft
- Developer: Nadeo
- Store Page: Steam, PlayStation Store, Ubistore
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Rec Room
Rec Room is a free-to-play VR social experience. It’s sort of like a virtual community club. Rec Room offers a variety of group activities, such as charades, basketball, dodgeball, paintball, laser tag, and more, and developer Against Gravity regularly adds new activities to participate in.
Against Gravity released Rec Room for HTC Vive and Oculus Rift in 2016, and the developer brought the title to the PlayStation VR platform at the end of 2017. Players from all three platforms interact together on the same server.
- HMD Support: HTC Vive, Oculus Rift, PSVR, Windows Mixed Reality
- Crossable Platforms: SteamVR, Oculus, PlayStation Network
- Input: Motion Controllers
- Publisher: Against Gravity
- Developer: Against Gravity
- Store Page: Steam, Oculus Store, PlayStation Store
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Arizona Sunshine
Arizona Sunshine is a first-person zombie shooter that takes place in the Arizona desert. Undead roam everywhere you look, and shelter is hard to come by. You must scavenge for weapons, ammo, and food to keep yourself alive.
Arizona Sunshine’s campaign supports cooperative play, so you and a friend can work together to survive. The game also features a survival mode with never-ending waves of zombies that supports up to four players.
Arizona Sunshine is available for HTC Vive, Oculus Rift, and PlayStation VR. However, the PSVR version lives in a bubble on the PlayStation Network. Vive and Rift players can play with each other, though cross-platform play requires a direct IP to IP connection. Vertigo Games’ matchmaking system doesn’t transcend the Steam and Oculus networks like Ubisoft’s Uplay platform.
Vertigo Games also ported Arizona Sunshine to the Windows Mixed Reality platform, and the developer said that multiplayer support is in the works.
- HMD Support: HTC Vive, Oculus Rift, PSVR, Windows Mixed Reality
- Crossable Platforms: SteamVR, Oculus, Windows MR (coming)
- Input: Motion Controllers
- Publisher: Vertigo Games
- Developer: Vertigo Games, Jaywalkers Interactive
- Store Page: Steam, Oculus Store, PlayStation Store, Windows Store
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Skyworld
Skyworld is Vertigo Games’ second VR title, but this game isn’t anything like Arizona Sunshine. Skyworld is a real-time strategy game that plays like a tabletop game. Lead an army of miniature soldiers into battle and watch the war unfold on the table in front of you.
Skyworld features a single-player campaign to concquer, and when you’re done fighting the AI army, you can take the battle online and challenge other players for supremacy. Skyworld supports cross-platform gameplay with HTC Vive and Oculus Rift players. It’s also one of the few cross-platform multiplayer VR games that supports Microsoft’s new Windows Mixed Reality platform.
- HMD Support: HTC Vive, Oculus Rift, Windows Mixed Reality
- Crossable Platforms: SteamVR, Oculus, Windows MR
- Input: Motion Controllers
- Publisher: Vertigo Games
- Developer: Vertigo Games, Wolfdog Interactive
- Store Page: Steam, Oculus Store, Windows Store
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Raw Data
Raw Data is a first-person sci-fi action game designed from the ground up for VR. You must infiltrate Eden Corp’s facility and gain access to the company’s secure network. Armed with powerful weapons, you must fight through waves of blood-thirsty AI-controlled killing machines.
Raw Data features a single-player campaign, which you can play on the HTC Vive, Oculus Rift, or PSVR. The Vive and Oculus versions of the game also feature a co-operative multiplayer mode in which you can enlist a friend to help with your mission. The co-op game supports cross-platform matches between the Steam and Oculus networks. Survios said the PSVR version would not support cross-platform play, though a co-op mode is in development.
- HMD Support: HTC Vive, Oculus Rift, PSVR
- Crossable Platforms: SteamVR, Oculus
- Input: Motion Controllers
- Publisher: Survios
- Developer: Survios
- Store Page: Steam, Oculus Store, PlayStation Store
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Onward
Onward is a virtual reality military simulation. It’s the closest thing to ARMA that you can get in VR today. Two teams of five players face off with rifles, machine guns, pistols, and grenades. Work together with your teammates to build a winning strategy and outsmart the opposing team.
Downpour Interactive launched Onward on Steam in August 2016. In November 2017, the developer released the game on the Oculus Store and added cross-plaform gameplay. All Onward players connect to the same servers regardless of the equipment they use or store from which they bought the game.
- HMD Support: HTC Vive, Oculus Rift,
- Crossable Platforms: SteamVR, Oculus
- Input: Motion Controllers
- Publisher: Downpour Interactive
- Developer: Downpour Interactive
- Store Page: Steam, Oculus Store
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