‘Asgard’s Wrath 2’ Video Teases ‘endless dungeon’ Mode with Asynchronous Social Gameplay

By
Scott Hayden
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40

Meta’s Sanzaru Games released a new look at Asgard’s Wrath 2 in a developer diary video that, in addition to showing off more of the upcoming action RPG, teases an opportunity to put your combat skills to the test against other players.

The studio says that in addition to its main narrative-driven quest, Asgard’s Wrath 2 is going to feature an “asynchronously social dungeon-crawling mode” where you as the Cosmic Guardian will “take part in an ongoing battle that evolves over time,” the studio says in a blogpost.

We’re due to learn more about the newly teased dungeon mode in the game’s next deep dive video, where the studio says it will further explore the so-called ‘Uncharted Rifts’.

Announced during the Quest Gaming Showcase in June, the Asgard’s Wrath sequel is headed exclusively to the Quest platform, which includes Quest 2, Quest Pro, and the upcoming Quest 3 headset.

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In it, you travel across the realms in pursuit of the trickster god Loki, taking on the role of four mortal heroes with various weapons and playstyles. Like the first, which was a Rift exclusive, the new Quest-only title is said to be packed with creatures, quests, puzzles, and the ability to convert loyal animals into fierce warrior companions. The studio says we can expect “60 hours of exploration [and] viscous combat” when the game launches in Winter 2023.

You can also now pre-order the game, priced at $60. Pre-orders include exclusive in-game weapon and armor set, a free download of Asgard’s Wrath 1 on PC, a Meta Quest home environment, and an exclusive Asgard’s Wrath 2 character bundle for battle royale shooter POPULATION: ONE.

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Scott Hayden
Well before the first modern XR products hit the market, Scott recognized the potential of the technology and set out to understand and document its growth. He has been professionally reporting on the space for nearly a decade as Editor at Road to VR, authoring more than 3,500 articles on the topic. Scott brings that seasoned insight to his reporting from major industry events across the globe.
  • ViRGiN
    • Cless

      Bro, not even a PC can save those meager 3D assets lol

      • ViRGiN

        If you haven’t noticed, much much more worse looking games are dominating pcvr playlists.

        • Cless

          That has a few layers to it.
          First, how many of those are ports made first for the Quest and second for PCVR? I wouldn’t blame those on PCVR since they were done with inferior hardware in mind first.

          And second, how many of those are being sold at $60 like this one is? I’m pretty sure the list becomes way thinner once you do that.

          On the side, once thing you have to consider too is, that having worse graphics makes your game literally cheaper to make, in the sense that, those assets take less time to make.

          For example, a character from HL:Alyx, I could make it in about a month time, while one for this game, in a week I should be about done.

          Apply that to the whole list of assets and sudenly the game has become WAY cheaper to make.

          And third, charge AAA prices, and I will expect AAA content, so I REALLY hope they did something else with their time since they are charging that much, we will see once I get to play it.

          • ViRGiN

            That is insane. Not all models are equal. Less details doesn’t mean faster to make. For alyx you could just use photogrammetry for any prop and do a little cleanup. You have infinite performance on pc.

            60 dollars for Asgard is nothing. It’s only 3x more expensive than pcvr biggest hit.

            Beat saber was done for pc first. Job simulator was done for pc first. But it doesn’t matter. If I’m going to play on pc, after 7 years of consumer vr, i won’t accept indie style early access bullshit. And that’s – let’s be honest – is 1000% of pcvr.

            It’s clearly a better game than Skyrim as well. Nobody cares about Skyrim because it’s so shitty and unpolished as vr game. Those who play it, have played flat anyway. Requisites petabytes of mods, installed in the right order, and it’s still jank af.

          • Cless

            Its not insane, it is what it is.
            Less details is directly related to the amount of time an asset takes to make, FULLSTOP.
            Photogrametry, because of their incredibly fucked up mesh after being taken, takes a long time to fix together with the need to use specialized tools or plugins to speed it up. This is ESPECIALLY important for VR titles where you need to optimize assets as much as possible. Then spend even more time to get a set of UVs that will show the asset at its best for the minimum amount of texture space.
            Then add to that the technique only works with photo realistic games, and only for completely static assets.

            “You have infinite performance on pc.”

            Not really, no. The target for PC is always the currently most sold GPU, or the next one. Right now it would be around a 3060/4060, which is PS5 graphics and up. That will get you around medium/high settings for PC. Then, we give fullsize textures plus giving higher resolution to postprocessing/effects and you get yourself your High/ultra for PC.

            “Beat saber was done for pc first. Job simulator was done for pc first.”

            Those two are both indie titles from… 2018 the first, 2016 the other… when adoption of HMDs was way less than anything we have now. What is your point there exactly?

            “If I’m going to play on pc, after 7 years of consumer vr, i won’t accept indie style early access bullshit. And that’s – let’s be honest – is 1000% of pcvr.”

            The thing you are getting here is… sure, they will be indie style kind of games but… they are priced accordingly 9 out of 10 times. How many of those are $60?

            “It’s clearly a better game than Skyrim as well. Nobody cares about Skyrim because it’s so shitty and unpolished as vr game.”

            Damn, I didn’t know you had already played AW2 to know its a better game.
            If on the other side you are referring to graphics, it isn’t, and that is sad. All that thanks to the Quest of course. We get the bulk of VR games for all platforms with PS3/X360 era graphics. Until the Quest 3 when… nevermind, they will still look the same, just slightly higher resolution with slightly better frames.

          • ViRGiN

            PC games can run on RTX4090 and look awesome, and also look very good with GTX1080. That is not the case with PCVR, as it’s exclusively all indie titles where there is no real art direction or even asset artists lol.
            Whatever “high end” game you can come up with, it’s not impressive.

            I don’t see the problem with pricing – either you buy it or don’t. For 60 dollars, realistically 45 as everyone like a chainlink will spread refferal links – you will get amount of content that no bundle will provide. No, I didn’t play it, but I believe in it’s length and replayability – if you’re into that type of games.

            There are more PCVR exclusive games that are far more modern. Vertigo 2. Is that impressive? Hubris? LONN? It seems like PCVR crowd forgot what means good art and actual quality, instead focusing on raw specification of “high res” crappy textures, 2 billion polygon teacups and stuff like that.

          • jbob4mall

            That maybe true but is the character you created after a month interesting? The character models in half life 2 is superior artistically to my eye. This is the problem with modern graphics and artists like yourself. You’re too obsessed with pushing polygons instead of creating anything interesting to look at.

          • Cless

            Look, I get what you are getting at, but you are talking from a place of not knowing right now.

            The reason for that is that it isn’t even my job to make a character interesting or not, that is the 2D artist that designs and makes the character before I ever even see it.
            Their focus is on making cool looking stuff and are usually the least technically inclined people on the team, so it comes to us the 3D artists to simplifying their designs to fit into the performance budget we are given. HOW MUCH we cut, is decided by the hardware limitations.

            Mobile hardware will take us back 2 generations of consoles worth back, and cutting corners starts to actually affect design choices in bigger more noticeable way.
            Not so much so for PC/Consoles, where we maybe go back just by 1 generation of console GPU power.

      • shadow9d9

        Imagine caring about graphics more than gameplay.

        • Cless

          Where did I say that? The reason graphics have been butchered is to maintain the gameplay more or less intact I hope, I haven’t played it yet.
          And call me crazy, but yeah, as a professional 3D game artist I do care a lot about graphics, throw me in jail I guess lol

    • MeowMix

      lol, ok this made me laugh lol

  • Bartholomew

    Pathetic Sony fanboys begging for the PSVR2 port in 3, 2, 1…

    • kool

      Naw we good over here bro…

      • MeowMix

        honestly, besides the frensel lenses, I haven’t purchased a PSVR2 yet because of the inflated price (old tech), and lack of content.
        It’s not a money issue, but a value issue. I have a QuestPro, PS5, and recently upgraded my PC to the 7800x3D platform with all the bells and whistles to boot.

        So when you say ‘ we good over here’, I disagree. Ya’ll should be on SONY’s ass askinf for more content. A nearly $600 headset that requires a $400-$500 console ($1000 system) needs more content. Ya’ll still mainly playing Questicle content lol

        • ApocalypseShadow

          No. Don’t lie to yourself. The PS VR 2 is good without this game. I bet you spent more than the price of Sony’s combo but then come down on Sony for price. How ridiculous is that? How much was your PC? How much was your headset? How much was your upgrades on graphics cards? Don’t be silly. PS5 doesn’t just do VR. But you know that.

          You talk about new content when it just came out. Matches PC in graphics and makes better previous games that were ported while having exclusives already that’s not on PC or Quest.

          You should be on PC’s ass being that no third party cares about it which is why you’re only getting hand me downs from Quest and half finished games from early access. The only hope being mods or pray dog to give you some type of improvement on content. What big games are coming to PC from Namco or Capcom or anyone? Nothing. RE4 is coming to PS VR 2. Not PC. What is Valve building in games? They built one game that’s not even all that. Sony’s built multiple great VR games. That’s the difference. What games are Pimax making? What games are HTC making? What games are Microsoft making? Lol. What games are Bytedance making? Lol. All those headsets and nothing big coming. You have to hope to get games ported now because Sony has a high end headset on the market.

          You even got PC gamers begging to have PS VR 2 support because Sony thought of actual game related features like haptics and eye tracking. The latter would actually benefit PC so as to not need a high end graphics card to run games. But most PC headset manufacturers are too stupid and chase resolution. Doesn’t mean a thing if no games are coming.

          Sony is going to have more games coming. You know it. Don’t fool yourself. Because they are a game company as well. Sony only pushing SSD actually helps PC.

          • MeowMix

            Sony is going to have more games coming. You know it.

            So no point in buying now since it’s overpriced and lacks content. Exactly my point lol :)

          • ApocalypseShadow

            It’s already got games. Games not on other VR headsets. Did PC VR have a bunch of games at launch? How about Quest 2? No? Then the hypocrisy is real coming down on Sony’s when it just came out.

            Quest Pro is $1,000 or more and has no one using it for face tracking, no productivity, barely anything for eye tracking, the haptics in the controller add nothing new, and it’s built on Quest 2 power where you have to get a PC just to do anything with it. You wasted your money bro. Features not even used. PS VR 2 has more useful features for games and costs less.

            Guess I was right about half finished games and waiting for mods. It’s not you’re getting anything. Name these big PC VR games coming for you to spend upgrading? Action games? Adventure games? What?

            I thought so. Pro was discounted because no one bought it. Well… You.. for absolutely no games that take advantage of it. Smart shopper you are. But there’s always hope you might get to utilize it for something. No one is using it for business. You aren’t either. Lol.

          • shadow9d9

            It has a climbing simulator 1st party and an average third party roguelike and Switchback with rancid reviews. The rest are ports.

          • ApocalypseShadow

            GT7 isn’t a port. RE8 isn’t a port. Synapse isn’t a port. Upcoming games like RE4 or Arizona Sunshine 2 aren’t ports. Every VR headset has a climbing game. It’s fun. Horizon blows the others away in graphics.

            And, the ports are matching PC like Kayak and way better than Quest like Saints and Sinners or Moss or Red Matter 2.

            Keep fooling yourself buddy.

          • shadow9d9

            PC is not a console and has no game funding. PSVR 2 is Sony and Sony is supposed to lead the way by funding titles.. which they aren’t.

            Meanwhile FB has 8 studios making exclusives.

          • ApocalypseShadow

            You nailed it. PC has no funding. Lol. So, why waste money when there’s no big game development?

            GT7 full game, getting RE8 at launch and not on PC. Getting Star Wars: Tales from the Galaxy’s Edge Enhanced Edition and not on PC. Horizon: Call to the Mountain exclusive, publishing the upcoming Firewall that uses eye tracking. Because eye tracking is not standard on PC. Getting Arizona Sunshine 2 announced. Having such a high level headset that Capcom can create RE4 Remake VR as well. And not on PC. Eye tracking actually being used without the need of buying expensive graphics cards to handle VR. Also not on PC. PC ports like Kayak that match PC. Crossfire, Aces of Thunder and Project Wingman. Again, because PS5 can match a PC. Getting games like Lo-fi. I mean, what do you expect Sony to do? Drop all their games at launch and have everyone’s games cannibalize each other for sales? That makes no business sense.

            Yeah. Facebook development. No AR games, no eye tracking games, no games to take advantage of the new controllers that are still inferior to Sony’s controller features. Where are these games? Where’s GTA? Those games should have been out a long time ago. 20 million headsets should be racking up all kinds of big games. But Quest 2 isn’t getting squat but indie games. It can’t even handle Skyrim that came out on PSVR in 2016. Lol. Where’s the productivity software for Quest Pro? It was discounted because no one is using it for business. And it lacks upgraded games because it runs on Quest 2 power.

            Here. Let’s say this? Where’s Facebook’s games like Blood and Truth? Astrobot? GT7? Wipeout? They are only building games because Quest 3 is coming. And eventually Quest 2 will be dropped just like when RE4 came and Quest 1 became obsolete.

            I’d put my money on Sony supporting PS VR 2 with great VR games over Facebook any day. Facebook is not even in the same league as Sony in making games. Don’t make me laugh.

          • shadow9d9

            You have a lot of strange responses to me. Despite having a 4090 and a dedicated wireless AP, I still prefer native, not on the quest pro. I also own a psvr 2, but it collects dust.

            The psvr 2 controller is horrible. Have to squeeze your hand into tiny plasticky controllers. The ringless design of the quest pro is leagues and leagues ahead.

            The quest and rift have a little more than a dozen exclusives, all backwards compatible, and all highly rated. Meanwhile, psvr 1 sony games are unavailable on 2. The quest 3 is Meta’s launch, so that is when the bulk of their work from the last few years has been building towards. If they come up with nothing, then you are right. Sony came up with nothing but a single climbing simulator and 2 ports of old games. I don’t need resident evil iteration #1000, in heavily oversaturated and mindless genre tbh. I also don’t play racing games, so couldn’t care less about GT. AR 2 is a full game built from the ground up, of a genre we haven’t seen much of.

            Also, indie titles are generally the best games. AAA means insane bloat, repetition, pretty graphics, and heavy marketing.

            Sony has had nearly6 months since psvr 2 launch. Not a single sony first party game announcement in all of this time. Just dead silence after admitting horrible sales numbers.

            It is also funny that you are pumping an enhanced version of a game that was Quest exclusive for over a year, as the benefits of psvr 2.

            Antiquated wire. Antiquated fresnel lens with heavy, heavy mura/sde and miniature sized sweet spot. Games with 60 hz reprojected with blur. Altogether horrible experience combined with no new games except a climbing simulator.

            Before your eyes is the only game to use eye tracking on psvr 2. This is a port of a pc game that has been out for a while and the use is a complete gimmick, forcing you to keep yourself from blinking if you want to actually see the full story. Foveated rendering isn’t enough to save the psvr 2, since, as mentioned, even first party games are still forced to use 60 hz reprojected with blur even WITH the boost from foveated rendering.

          • ApocalypseShadow

            Dual Sense controller horrible? Now you’re being ridiculous. I guess PC gamers wanting to use Sony’s controllers and headset on PC is a myth. Who are you kidding. There’s more features in Sony’s controllers then most of PC and Quest. At least with Sony, it’s standard. PC isn’t which is why it’s so convoluted and not everything is supported for games.

            Yeah. Backwards compatible. But cheap indie games that don’t push the hardware at all. Just like there are no games that push your 4090 to its limits. It’s just brute force resolution and frame rates.

            More excuses. Quest 2 has been out for years. With a supposed 20 million headset sales where most are collecting dust. That’s why no big games are being announced. Just more indie games. And yes. I love indie games too. But I don’t want to live on cheap games forever in VR. AAA bloat? More ridiculous comments. I guess HL Alyx is AAA bloated? See how dumb that sounds?

            Sony already had 2 that launched with the system. Sony doesn’t overlap by announcing games before current releases. That’s why they have only concentrated on Spider-Man 2. That’s why they announced PS VR 2 games after Horizon and GOW. Are you new to this? Lol. Sony quit annoying games too early.

            Funny that you’re pumping BC as great when those are old games playing on a new system.

            Here’s a question… How many headsets have you bought for VR? I’d bet you kept jumping to the next graphics card or next headset or next PC spending money only to be playing games like guerilla tag. Waiting for mods because no big developer supports PC. That’s why you get hand me downs from Quest. Valve hasn’t made anything for some time now and if you don’t like racing, that means games like F1 and Assetto Corsa aren’t in your back catalog. Just wasted games on PC gamers like you.

            You think Sony don’t get anything but PC is getting nothing. And Quest don’t either because it’s too underpowered. That why Grid Legends looks the way it does. Which is why they stick with PS2 graphics and cheap development cycles.

          • Cless

            “Sony is supposed to lead the way by funding titles.. which they aren’t.” Oh yeah, big brain moment. When was the last time you spoke to Sony about it? lol

          • Arno van Wingerde

            Old tech – seriously? Sure, your PC easily beats the PS5 in terms of TFLOPS. The PS5 makes up for most of it with eye-tracking and just rendering the central part of your picture sharply instead of the whole view, which even a 4090 would struggle to do. I thought that was a piece of marketing BS until I tried it out – I actually ended up returning the PSVR2 because of the cable and the need for a monitor, but I may go out again and buy a PSVR2+PS5+f****** monitor, because it is likely technically superior at a lower price than a PCVR setup.
            And then contents: Horizon-call of the mountain: the view alone is worth it! I absolutely hate the black level of the Quest2, and while the PSVR2 is not HDR like my OLED TV, it is still worlds ahead. Combine that with the haptic feedback and you easily beat about every other setup on the market today – regardless of price.

          • shadow9d9

            Yes, a wired headset in 2023 is old and antiquated tech. A fresnel lens with a tiny sweet spot is old tech. OLED is canceled out by extreme mura highlighting and separating every pixel giving a huge screen door effect. 60 hz for vr is unacceptable and reprojection is horrible with blur on psvr 2.

          • ApocalypseShadow

            More BS. OLED. Micro OLED. Whatever OLED is still top of the line. 60hz is an option for developers to then use reprojection. It isn’t in all games.

            Wired still gives better quality over sending graphics over wireless. Now you’re being stupid. With all the tech and wireless, PS VR 2 would have been a lot more expensive. Keeping more gamers from getting into VR like PC. Do you think Index sold a lot at over $1,000? Use your head. Definitely not business savvy.

            You spent a whole lot of money but still getting no big games. Lol.

      • ApocalypseShadow

        Bart is hella trolling. No one on PS VR 2 wants this game. They didn’t even want the last one. Lol. PSVR was running Skyrim in 2016. And runs on PS5 through PSVR. And in 2023, Quest 2 still can’t. Some of these gamers think Sony don’t have anything coming when it already launched with bangers and more are coming.

        Sony has headset and controller features a lot of these fools wish they had for the price. All those headsets and none of them have all the features Sony has built in as standard but is reasonably priced.

        Ask them what big games are coming and they can’t tell you. It’s only mods and half finished early access games. But they’ll say Sony has no games when it just released.

        And Quest 2 has no big games and has taken Facebook forever to make something while dangling a carrot of GTA or future headsets in their bases faces. But they’ll say look at all these cheaply made indie games we got with PS2 graphics. Lol. And if something big shows up, it looks like Grid Legends. Lol

        • shadow9d9

          PSVR 2 should have had games at release…Sony is the one funding it and they had years to prep. And it was released nearly 6 months ago and not only are there no new sony games, they haven’t even announced a single one yet.

          • ApocalypseShadow

            It did have games on release. Check your eyes.

            Yeah. Sony publishing Firewall after releasing GT7 and Horizon is just a typo. Who do you think is helping them make it high quality with eye tracking? Pancake lenses won’t get you GT7 graphics. Just cleaner graphics than PSVR powered by PS4. Quest is underpowered. And Quest 3 will still be behind.

            Quest 2 supposedly sold 20 million. Where’s the prep? Where’s GTA? Where’s the games? I’d bet you bought a lot of micro transactions for Beat Saber. But no games from Facebook. Where’s Valve’s, Bytedance, HTC’s games? Pull me a list of their games coming out soon. RE4 VR is going to blow away the Quest version. Just like RE8 blows away RE4 on Quest. Just like GT7 blows away Grid Legends (Lol) on Quest. Do you see a pattern? Grid Legends is so low res and blurry it’s laughable. Did you want to compare the ports to PS VR 2 like Moss, Star Wars or Saints and Sinners to Quest versions? Lol.

            Did you really want me to show Quest 2 users smashing things in their house in VR? And that’s wireless. Lol. Adding the cable makes no need for batteries, not worrying about low quality PS2 graphics like Quest, high quality VR and haptics in the headset that PC and Quest don’t have. Haptics in the controllers that PC and Quest don’t have. Eye tracking standard that’s not on PC or Quest for games.

            Don’t fool yourself talking about the cable. Lol. Watch any Quest 2 commercial or watch any YouTube Quest player and they are standing in place. I thought wireless meant something? Where’s Facebook’s room scale games? AR games? Hand tracking games? I’m still laughing at this investment you say Facebook is doing. Where’s their productivity software for Pro? Too late. It has already been discounted because no one cares for business. Lol

          • Arno van Wingerde

            I agree with your general comments about PSVR2 strong points, but I returned mine because of the cable, which Sony manages to combine with decidedly hopeless battery life on the controllers (less than 1/20 of the Quest2 or so), so you stumble of the cable and still have to stop after 2 hours or so….

          • Cless

            Its hilarious you people keep saying “fresnel lenses in 2023 lmao”
            You know shit about VR hmd hardware and their prices I guess.
            There is a reason the Quest 2 is $400, while the closely spec Quest Pro came out at 3 times that, and half the reason is just because of the changes in hardware those kind of lenses requre.

          • Garhert

            Well, they could have used “cheap” pancake lenses and LCD like the Pico 4. Both combos have pros and cons. I like not having a small sweet spot on the Pico 4 but really miss the black levels and better colors from my Quest 1. I do not own a PSVR 2, but I think they made the right decision for their use case (Feel a New Real) and delivered a good package for that price. But they could have used pancake lenses for a similar price tag imo.

        • kool

          Yeah it’s kind of weird to say Sony doesn’t have any games. If that’s the case there are no vr games. Sony makes there own games and gets the best of the rest. Everyone should be rooting for Sony they are the only top to bottom player in vr and their success only means more vr for everybody.

    • Mike

      This game looks like low quality x360 era to me. maybe its fun but I want more. my current vr rig is a rift s powered by a rtx 4080 so I demand more from vr now. I’m currently playing around with Skyrim vr but Modded all the way, so the graphics and gameplay are beyond next gen. I also have a psvr2 but Sony isn’t supporting it like they should be. I’m holding out hope that I can someday use it on PC. VR is failing because the games aren’t AAA caliber. people now associate vr with last gen graphics and that’s not gonna cut it in today’s gaming landscape. I hate meta, they bought oculus and killed the VR dream and now they abandon all of us PCVR users we were the birthplace of vr to begin with. we were the enthusiasts. my rift s is maybe 4 years old but no more support from meta. that’s anti-consumer and i feel like it’s a stab in the back to the true VR fans so to hell with their stuff. I’m A PSVR2 user that’s waiting for RE 4 remake in vr and beyond that who knows but this last gen crap, you can keep it. Quest 2 Is the Nintendo wii of VR. it was popular because of non VR gamers that got it for the novelty of VR. once that wares off they are gone but the damage has already been done. now all VR games are trying to appease that passive and not truly VR gamers and dumbed down all VR games to the weak Quest 2 hardware spec at the expense of the PC. this has made vr unappealing to real vr users like me that demand more and killed the pc vr game space in the process. meta has killed vr by catering to people that aren’t really vr gamers but just people passing through with week hardware dumb indie stuff and abandoned us who really love vr and want the dream. can you tell I’m pissed about it all. so no I don’t want your meta crap on PSVR2 or PCVR at all, ever. the end.

  • Octogod

    “Async social functionality”

    Time trial rooms?

    • MeowMix

      could be that.

      The first AW had asynchronous Multiplayer where you’d have the chance to avenge where another player died. Doing so would grant you and the other player a reward. It was a neat concept.

  • Ookami

    Looks really cool. VR desperately needs full-fledged games like this. Bummed out it’s not coming to Steam, but maybe someday I’ll pick up a preowned Quest.

  • overzeetop

    That video was…painful to watch. Modern PC graphics have also spoiled me for in-game scenes – the VR looks like a child’s toy version. The voiceover work…again, spoiled by really good AAA games. I’m sure it’s better in-headset, and I enjoyed the original AW, but they’re going to need a lot of polish to make this a top title.