Roblox VR - UI Update

[MetaVars]

Hi Developers!

We are happy to announce that with Build 545, VR has significantly improved on Roblox.

The focus of this release was to better the interaction with the UI as well as improved compatibility with other experiences. For that reason, we introduce a new, VR-specific menu in the form of the BottomBar.

Other changes include:

• Updated how the PlayerGUI is rendered in VR and how it follows the headset movements.

• Collapsable UI for improved immersion in VR

• Aim-through wand controls - With improved compatibility and a context-sensitive laser pointer, you can control Roblox experiences through the player GUI.

• VR menus - Chat, inventory, leaderboard, and emotes now work in VR

• Fixed bugs with existing interactivity APIs.

Known Issues

We are aware of the following issues and are working on a fix. We apologize for any inconvenience this may cause.

• The BottomBar menu will sometimes not show up in experiences with custom-scripted camera behavior.
• Camera.Headscale will not work well with the BottomBar and wand controls
• Due to an unrelated bug, SteamVR currently only loads correctly through the Windows Desktop App.

We would love to hear your feedback on the changes above and any suggestions going forward.

Thank you.

[ValiantWind (Val)]

When will we be able to restrict experiences to VR only?

Something like this:

[Den_zee]

I second this. We really need an option to restrict VR Games.

[Timelens]

This is brilliant news. I’m hoping that Roblox will now detect when certain buttons on the controllers are pressed, as I am unable to bring up the menu on my Quest 2 when using Virtual Desktop.

[SomeFedoraGuy (Him)]

An improvement awaited by many of us! Thanks for the update.

[Abcreator]

This actually existed for a while, but a regression occurred as it was removed.

[MatsRatz (Mat)]

The icons on the bar looks so random and out of place when you put all of them together.

Can’t you guys just stick to one design?

[pyxfluff (Pyx)]

You can probably do it via a script for now.

local UIS = game:GetService("UserInputService")

if not UIS.VREnabled then
	game.Players.LocalPlayer:Kick("Sorry, you have to be in VR mode to join this game. Connect your headset and try again.")
end

[Nootian (Noot)]

It seems like the Studio UI changed with this update for me
DockWidgetPluginGUI’s are easier to move around and take up less space
Cool!

I’m using mac osx roblox studio, don’t know if that changes anything

[chesse20 (ChesseThe FluffyWasp)]

After the bottom bar update my vr headset started lagging a lot more while playing The Open Space [VOICE CHAT] - Roblox but it works fine in other vr games like [RIOT] social experiment - Roblox . I am using the Vive if that helps.

[nvckx]

Well but even if it gets bypassed, what can the non-VR users really do? I mean the only reason I could imagine a developer removing access to non-VR players would be if the game wouldn’t be compatibile without a VR Headset. So if players would bypass and join VR games without VR they couldn’t play.

[hatespine (Nefris)]

You do not understand my original point, how come a server knows whether you actually have a VR headset or not? It needs to trust you

[ValiantWind (Val)]

@hatespine

And there’s no “server” that is checking there is a VR device in your house

That’s not the point of the feature

@hatespine

how come a server knows whether you actually have a VR headset or not? It needs to trust you

I don’t understand what you’re saying? What does this have to do with a feature that restricts a game to VR Devices only.

[OverinduIgence]

I second this, the bottom Sidebar is Dark Mode, but the side one is light? What’s going on, pick one!

[TankFullOfOofs (Tank)]

Amazing update, I have been waiting for this forever! The only work around previously was to make your own UI and slap it on a head-tracking billboardGui.

[ValiantWind (Val)]

See the points made in this feature request:

Unable to completely disable VR use in my experience

As a Roblox developer, it is currently too hard to prevent my visitors from using VR in my experience whether legitimately or by utilising an exploit involving VR. I currently need to use a flimsy workaround by locally kicking the visitor if UserInputService.VREnabled returns true. If Roblox is able to address this issue, it would improve my development experience because I would not need to spend time working on VR support for my experience or use fickle solutions to work VR out of my experien…

The feature was implemented before which is why is was marked as solved, but was removed for an unknown reason.

[fizzysaur (Fizzy)]

FINALLY! So glad to see an update at last.

Haven’t had the chance to try it yet but does this include a mute/unmute button for voice chat? Enabling/disabling it in VR is literally impossible, which sucks because both VR and VC are immersive features and they seemingly cant even be combined due to that.

[Beloathed (Gamer)]

And yet there’s no explanation for why I get 38-50 FPS when using VR despite having the RTX 3090.

[Nootian (Noot)]

After this update studio has gotten a bit slower while I’m editing
Using the script editor especially

I’m running it on mac-osx