Meta Launches New Avatar Fashion Items As Questions Are Raised Over Its “Fake” VR Avatar Legs
You’d think, given the various issues and controversies surrounding metaverse avatars in Meta, that the focus on them should probably be reduced for the time being, until things start to take on more shape.
But that’s obviously not Meta’s approach, as it has rolled out a new set of Liverpool FC fan outfits for Meta avatars, providing another option to customize your digital lookalike in its apps.
According to Meta:
“Today Liverpool FC launched a collection of virtual clothing which you can buy from the Meta Avatars store on Facebook, Messenger, Instagram and later this year in virtual reality. The collection includes both a home and away kit from Liverpool FC, as well as a pair of LFC-branded fashion apparel.”
Note that these new outfits are not yet available in VR. This could be because Meta’s VR avatars have faced major criticism for the company’s metaverse push, following this post from Meta chief Mark Zuckerberg:
Meta, which has invested billions in VR development, has since been heavily questioned as to why its VR environment looks so bad and why Zuckerberg was apparently unaware of this fact when he published this image.
Following this, Zuckerberg clarified that his avatar and virtual reality developments are actually much more advanced than it appears, and promised to show more of them during his Connect conference.
And Meta indeed showed off her upgraded avatars at Connect, which also included, for the first time, legs on her VR depictions.
Legs are obviously very difficult for Meta to simulate, as his VR headsets don’t include any leg sensors of any kind, so he has no way of tracking leg movement. But Meta is working on a new process, called QuestSim, which will use AI to estimate what your legs are doing as you engage in the VR environment, taking cues from movements it can track, in your arms and your head, to guess where your legs are placed at any given time.
And it seems pretty accurate in practice, going through Zuckerberg’s demo to Connect.
It’s pretty good, isn’t it? Meta’s leg estimation process seems pretty accurate, which could be a major upgrade for metaverse interaction.
Except it’s not really good – or at least it might not be, because this video wasn’t created using QuestSim, it was created using motion capture, which is a much more advanced and expensive process for capturing body movement.
As Meta told UploadVR:
“To allow for this preview of what’s to come, the segment featured animations created from motion capture. »
Motion capture isn’t currently part of Meta’s commercial VR offerings, and it seems ludicrous that it’s going back to using it as a way to showcase what it claims is its leg simulation process that happens to all VR users. Because it is not, and we have no idea how good QuestSim is for the same.
But Meta needs to present the best version of its vision for the metaverse, in order to win people over to the project and keep investors impressed. It seems crazy to think that adding digital legs is going to become a key point of contention in the company’s next earnings update, but it probably is, with some market analysts now raising questions as to the validity of Meta’s claims, since it would be tantamount to asserting that improved representations such as this are representative of future updates for consumers.
Again, it doesn’t seem like the best time for Meta to show off its latest avatar additions. But it’s still, with his Liverpool FC kits adding to already available fashion collections from Balenciaga, Prada and Thom Browne in her avatar fashion store.
Finally, Meta sees these digital goods offerings as a new source of revenue for the company and for commercial promotion, with virtual goods opening up whole new connection possibilities for various vendors.
And they’ll likely become a thing, like they’ve already done in Fortnite, Roblox, and others.
But Meta still has a few avatar challenges to complete before it can really take the next step.
But, you know, football kits. Cool isn’t it?
