I really wanted to like the HTC Vive Focus Vision: in my first few tests with Alyx and VR Sim Racing, everything was going well. However, after a few weeks of using this headset, the relationship became a bit more complicated. Let me explain.

During my first few play sessions, I felt that what I had heard about this headset from friends in the industry might have been a bit harsh. This makes the hot-swappable battery all the more important and impressive.

Combine this with 5K display technology, stunning eye tracking with minimal latency, all-around excellent tracking, and an ergonomic controller, and you have the perfect headset for gaming. But this is where the story of the Vive Focus Vision starts to get a little muddled.

When you see a $999 standalone headset, you would expect the standalone part to shine. But there are several issues here that are preventing it from becoming one of the best VR headsets you can buy.

First, the use of a Fresnel lens results in edge distortion and chromatic aberration. The onboard Snapdragon XR2 chipset (the same one used in the much older Quest 2) is disappointing, and as a stand-alone headset, there is relatively little to do when looking at what is offered from Meta.

And now, when it comes to VR gaming for PC, there is a new challenger, PSVR 2. PSVR is a veritable combo breaker, offering high-spec VR technology at an incredible price. There are a few standout features, but there are too many drawbacks for anyone other than an HTC-only enthusiast to buy it.

With certain uses, you can get a great experience from the HTC Vive Focus Vision.

With the right kind of gaming PC with the raw horsepower to drive ultra-high-resolution visuals, a 5K LCD display with a 120-degree viewing angle will shine.

Whether you want to immerse yourself in the sim racing experience of Assetto Corsa Competizione, have a blast with Keep Talking and Nobody Explodes, get lost in the trippy visuals of Tetris Effect, or shoot up Half-Life Shoot 'em up: the sharpness of the HTC Vive Focus Vision's visuals and the vibrancy of its colors cannot be understated.

Not only that, but the field of view is the widest we've ever tested, and we didn't think we'd appreciate it as much as we did. The details of the peripheral vision are clearly visible, which adds to the immersive experience.

Furthermore, this resolution and 90 Hz refresh rate (although 120 Hz would have been better) eliminates the screen door effect that has become so prominent with this company's headsets.

If there is one thing that HTC's headsets do better than anyone else in the industry, it is wearability, and the Vive Focus Vision is no exception.

Starting with build quality, the aesthetic is more utilitarian and not particularly stylized. There is a reason for everything you see, and everything seems to fit together well without the plastic creaking when the headset is placed on the face.

But the most important thing here is that any VR headset should be comfortable to wear. If you want to immerse yourself in gaming for hours on end, you will have no problem keeping the Vive Focus Vision on.

And speaking of batteries, the ability to hot-swap makes it easier than ever to stay immersed in gaming.

With nearly latency-free eye tracking, hand tracking, high resolution pass-through, and two great ergonomic controllers, this is a great PCVR headset. What makes this headset work so well is the byproduct of all of the above coming together.

Besides, with the additional streaming kit, connection is easier than you might think. Usually, it can be a mess of cables, but here there is diversity in how it works: some streaming cables, like Meta Quest's, can be connected directly to a VR-enabled PC. And for a professional visual lossless connection, a Wired Streaming Kit for DisplayPort connections can be used.

There is also a wireless option here, but since the data is transmitted wirelessly, the fidelity of the video is expected to be reduced. However, it is possible to take the Roto VR chair out and I had a lot of fun playing Half-Life while spinning on this throne.

It's a good PCVR headset, but as you start peeling back the other layers, you start to notice some frustrations.

This is always a problem with headsets that do not have the word Meta in the name. Yes, the headset is technically a standalone, a hybrid that allows you to quickly switch between PCVR and your own Android-based OS on the fly. However, given the very limited selection of games found on the Viveport (many are quite old), it doesn't really feel like a standalone.

HTC is working on its own front end, and the OS itself is easy to navigate, and the room scan makes it easy to set boundaries (plus kudos to the rather nice full-color pass-through). However, if I really had nothing better to do, I would spend the majority of my time with this headset plugged into my PC.

Who knows. Maybe Android XR will change this in the future. But I can only judge from what I have now.

Why this does not have the Snapdragon XR2+ Gen 2 is beyond me. Instead, it has the same chip that is in the Meta Quest 2, the Snapdragon XR2, which in a standalone VR experience will start to stress the system more than casual gaming and productivity pressures.

There is multitasking capability with 12GB of onboard RAM, but it is not clear if it is a chipset bottleneck to that RAM or something else (perhaps graphics performance). What's even more frustrating is that I spent $999 on a headset for this. Speaking of complaints...

I think everyone agrees that pancake lenses are absolutely the best way to go in VR right now; Meta knew this with Quest 3, but had to choose Fresnel for Quest 3S to cut costs.

So why use a Fresnel lens for a headset at this price? The sharp image prevents some edge blurring, but blooming seems inevitable in games that make heavy use of contrast ratios.

Of all the choices for Vive Focus Vision, this one seems the most puzzling.

And this is the story of the HTC Vive Focus Vision. It has an impressively crisp, colorful, and smooth 5K screen, impressive eye and hand tracking, an ergonomic design, and a hot-swappable battery that will keep you playing all day long.

However, for a $1,000 price tag, there are too many unsatisfying shortcomings. The limited app library and reliance on the older Snapdragon chipset mean that this is not that great as a standalone experience. And perhaps most critical is the inclusion of a Fresnel lens in a $1,000 headset.

So, considering this is a non-standalone headset and requires a PC to utilize all of its features, we are in a world of other options, such as the more cost-effective PSVR 2, which has all the OLED brilliance for a fraction of the price. At that point, it becomes difficult to recommend it to anyone outside of the PCVR elite.