Developer Update - 9 November 2023

[tupper]

Welcome to the Developer Update for 9 November 2023!

Today’s Dev Update thumbnail features Drivable Steam Train by soverin! Make sure to keep your arms, legs, and head inside the train at all times. And don’t breathe the smoke. Or coal dust. Or blow the boiler. Steam trains are kinda scary…

If you’d like to catch up, you can read our previous Developer Update from 12 October.

Important Info / Announcements

We’re going to AnimeNYC!

We’re coming to NYC! AnimeNYC!

This year, our team will be at the hololive production booth at AnimeNYC from November 17 - 19. Check us out at booth #1619!

For those of you who can’t make it in-person, we’ll also be streaming the main screen of the booth into our special hololive Meet x VRChat world in VRChat itself! More details will be shared as we get closer to the event. Keep an eye on our socials!

VRChat is now on the Pico store!

VRChat is now on the Pico store!

If you’ve got a Pico headset, search for VRChat and you’ll find us! We also have a new, refreshed trailer to go along with this launch:

PICO VR Game | VRChat | PICO 4

Submissions for VRCNYE2024 are OPEN!!

We’ve just opened up the submissions for the VRChat New Years Eve 2024 world!

If you’re unfamiliar, each New Years Eve, VRChat opens up the VRChat New Years Eve Square for everyone to party and ring in the new year!

While you’re enjoying each successive New Years across the world, you can also explore the New Years Square! we’ll have posters featuring various parts of the community, booths and storefronts with familiar creators, and a video stream playing the VRChat Entertainment Network, which is a pop-up video stream featuring VRChat videos created by you!

This time around, we’ve got lots of ways you can participate:

PUBLIC Poster and Logo Submissions!

Thanks to ExploreVRChat for the image of the NYE2022 world!

We’ve got a limited number of poster slots available for anyone to submit to! Create a poster featuring your community and send it in! If chosen, your poster will be featured in the VRChat New Years Eve Square world!

Let’s be extra loud:

Anyone can submit a poster this year!! Yes! Even YOU!

Head on over to the Posters and Logos forum thread on our Discord, where you can find all the links you’ll need!

VRChat Entertainment Network

The VRChat Entertainment Network is a video stream consisting of pre-recorded content for New Years Eve 2024!

Want to show off your Group? Do you make worlds in VRChat? Make avatars? Do you tell stories? Run an event? Do you make animated content? Make or play music? Do you dance? Do you DJ? Want to make sure everyone stays hydrated? Do you want to wish VRChat a happy new year?

Can you think of anything remotely VRChat-related that’ll fit in a video? Now’s your time!

Create whatever you like, submit it here, and we’ll take a look. As long as you follow the rules and the video is good, we’ll play it as part of the compilation!

Find the submission link, FAQ, and more info in the thread in our Discord.

Due Date?

All materials are due by 12PM PT, Friday, December 1st.

There’s no exceptions, so please submit your content on time!

Spookality 2023 ending soon!

Spookality is ending on November 11th 2023!

Haven’t explored everything yet? Don’t worry! We’ll be archiving the special Spookality-themed VRChat Home world as the “Spookality Hub 2023” world so you can check it at any time after November 11.

Ongoing Development

Impostors coming soon!

We’re expecting Impostors to finally make it into VRChat with our next update! Expect to see them pop up in the next Open Beta.

You’ll be able to “impostorize” your own avatar by heading to the VRChat Home website, navigating to your avatar, and clicking the “Impostorize” button. It’ll be placed into a queue, and you’ll get a notification in-app that’ll tell you if it succeeded, or if there were problems. (In the future, this will be automatic!)

You’ll only be able to impostorize your own avatar during the test. We’ll have a specific Feedback board set up for reporting issues and weirdnesses in Impostor generation.

With the current implementation, you’ll see Impostors in the following situations:

• If the avatar you’re viewing has an impostor available, an impostor will show if:
  • The avatar gets blocked for download size, and does not already exist in your download cache
  • The avatar gets performance blocked
  • The avatar is not available for your platform (I.E. I’m on Quest looking at someone with a PC only avatar)
• If the avatar doesn’t have an impostor available, the fallback will be used instead
• Users can also choose to only ever use their Fallback to display to others! We put this in for the (few, but dedicated) creators who made a good Fallback that they use on a regular basis

The rule of thumb is, if the fallback would have been visible, it will now default to being an impostor, if the impostor exists.

We will have further docs available once Open Beta launches.

we apparently decided we’re spelling it “impostor”, i am on the way to the british consulate to lodge a complaint right now

SDK for Unity 2022 Progress

We now have an SDK in Closed Beta testing that works with Unity 2022.3.6f1! This will be eventually be released as 3.5.0.

Many thanks to our beta testers who are helping us find and fix issues before we release it to a wider audience! We’re also working on updates to the Creator Companion so it can manage multiple Unity Editor versions, and help you transition your projects to the new Unity Editor version after you have backed them up.

New Udon Mobile Feature: OnScreenUpdate

OnScreenUpdate is a new event available in the Udon Graph and UdonSharp in 3.5.0. This event fires on Android Mobile whenever the device’s orientation is changed, and includes the new device orientation and screen resolution. Here is a video showing how it works in ClientSim:

This feature is an example of why we recently merged ClientSim and UdonSharp into the Worlds package. However, we know this also caused some problems! Moving forward, new features available in Udon should be usable in UdonSharp and ClientSim at release, whenever possible. Keeping the three systems in the same package (and importantly for our devs, the same codebase) makes it much easier to deliver on this, and ultimately improve the VRChat creation experience.

Next Steps for SDK 3.5.0

• Fix as many 2022-specific issues as we can.
• Finish integration of new Unity Editor functionality into Creator Companion, release to Closed Beta as 2.2.0.
• Release Creator Companion 2.2.0 to everyone.
• Release an Open Beta for SDK 3.5.0 (3.5.0-beta.1), which will make it available to everyone opted-in to prerelease packages.
• Fix as many 2022-specific issues as we can.
• Release 3.5.0 to everyone!

Conclusion

That’s it for this Dev Update!

Our next update is scheduled for some date near thanksgiving, will update later, maybe you just get turkey for the next update. See you then!

[simsora13]

question does that mean on the Android version of vrchat all very poor avatars will show up as imposters if available

[VoicesShiature]

@tupper

Anyone can submit a poster this year!! Yes! Even YOU!

Head on over to the Posters and Logos forum thread on our Discord, where you can find all the links you’ll need!

VRChat Entertainment Network

The VRChat Entertainment Network is a video stream consisting of pre-recorded content for New Years Eve 2024!

Want to show off your Group? Do you make worlds in VRChat? Make avatars? Do you tell stories? Run an event? Do you make animated content? Make or play music? Do you dance? Do you DJ? Want to make sure everyone stays hydrated? Do you want to wish VRChat a happy new year?

Can you think of anything remotely VRChat-related that’ll fit in a video? Now’s your time!

Create whatever you like, submit it here, and we’ll take a look. As long as you follow the rules and the video is good, we’ll play it as part of the compilation!

Find the submission link, FAQ, and more info in the thread in our Discord.

Due Date?

All materials are due by 12PM PT, Friday, December 1st.

There’s no exceptions, so please submit your content on time!

( ^-^ let’s see what people made beautiful creations + I hope you’re ready your skills and I know you’re different people you’re a different skills + I hope your family and your friends and your lovers is doing great in day 23 Thanksgiving)

[Salbug]

@tupper

With the current implementation, you’ll see Impostors in the following situations:

• If the avatar you’re viewing has an impostor available, an impostor will show if:
  • The avatar gets blocked for download size, and does not already exist in your download cache
  • The avatar gets performance blocked
  • The avatar is not available for your platform (I.E. I’m on Quest looking at someone with a PC only avatar)
• If the avatar doesn’t have an impostor available, the fallback will be used instead
• Users can also choose to only ever use their Fallback to display to others! We put this in for the (few, but dedicated) creators who made a good Fallback that they use on a regular basis

The rule of thumb is, if the fallback would have been visible, it will now default to being an impostor, if the impostor exists.

It’s good to hear Impostors is right around the corner, although part of me wishes they’d also replace the diamonds for avatars that are culled and have been impostorised. ^^;

[dark]

@tupper

Impostors coming soon!

WOOOO!!! THANK YOU!!!

[lackofbindings]

Please I’m begging you, make an option to show impostors instead of the diamond avatars for distance and max number of users shown limits. I use those limits wayyyy more than the old safety settings, especially at large events and clubs.

[rami-pastrami]

I am sure you guys are still working on this, but is there any release date for persistent world storage in Udon? You guys mentioned it was coming “soonish” quite some time ago

[splitscream]

The orientation update sounds like a cool idea to make it a game setting

“Vertical? Enable text chat and menus”
“Horizontal? Switch to Game mode”

[RelationCapable]

Can we please get an update on the creator economy? I understand you like to keep things behind the scenes, but there has been no new information in a very long time. Very little is actually known about it and I assume its been in development for quite a while now. originally, you said you were shooting for this year. I understand being secretive about security stuff but why not talk about the devolpment of arguably the next biggest feature. It’s understandable if things get delayed or get thrown out but I want to have insight into what’s happening, otherwise what’s the point of having this blog. I look forward to this blog every two weeks but I feel like it doesn’t real communicate much. all I see every time is repeating information about deadlines, technical details and little pieces of info. I would love to have even the smallest bit of new detail on the progress of the biggest new features, especially the creator economy. Could we at least get a confirmation that things are still on track or get a possible timeline. For instance, is the security update still due this fall? Sorry, I just really want to know what’s going on.

Thanks for reading

[AwkwardCynic]

Enjoyed speaking with you at TwitchCon, Tupper! Still interested in if it’s possible to toggle the ability to interact with chairs/interactables in 3.0 now that we cleared up I wasnt saying to turn off a world’s chairs completely. Would be a nice radial menu addition to use for when you find the perfect spot but keep accidently clicking on chairs

[tupper]

@simsora13

question does that mean on the Android version of vrchat all very poor avatars will show up as imposters if available

Yep!

@Salbug

It’s good to hear Impostors is right around the corner, although part of me wishes they’d also replace the diamonds for avatars that are culled and have been impostorised. ^^;

@lackofbindings

Please I’m begging you, make an option to show impostors instead of the diamond avatars for distance and max number of users shown limits. I use those limits wayyyy more than the old safety settings, especially at large events and clubs.

That’s a common feature request, I’d like it too!

@rami-pastrami

I am sure you guys are still working on this, but is there any release date for persistent world storage in Udon? You guys mentioned it was coming “soonish” quite some time ago

@RelationCapable

Can we please get an update on the creator economy?

No public updates on these so far, but both are getting worked on. CE in particular is in heavy background work and closed testing. We’ll have more soon but it will be in a bigger post rather than tiny peeks in a Dev Update.

@RelationCapable

Could we at least get a confirmation that things are still on track or get a possible timeline.

Things are still on track. We don’t put out public timelines because that doesn’t really ever benefit us, and only really serves to bite you in the butt when something comes up and you inevitably have to push it back. There’s a reason nobody gives dates on stuff like that!

@RelationCapable

For instance, is the security update still due this fall?

I don’t follow you here. The “Security Update” was last year in July, when we added EAC. We made a post earlier this year in a Dev Update stating that we’re always working to improve security. Maybe that’s what you meant? There’s no discrete, singular update called the “security update” coming up. Just more iterative improvements!

[DAG-XR]

a new, refreshed trailer

DIAMONDS, THEY’RE FAKE…

(okay, but that disc throw was wicked cool)

[KSTR]

So with the release of the Pico 4 version, will avatars/world’s in-game still use the “Quest” label or are you gonna switch to using another name like “standalone”, “portable” or something along those lines, since the “mobile” label is being saved for phones.

[zexc]

How much of a perf hit are impostors compared to diamonds, or worded differently, do imposters have a noticeable perf hit depending on the amount that is visible.
Are impostors going to use more data throughput? Since its a fake avatar kinda being streamed into a frame, are they going to use a bit of bandwith? This is more so a concern for android rather than pc but still an interesting thing.

[docteh]

The impostors are not streamed video.

[RelationCapable]

Sorry, I wasn’t more specific. I am talking about a message from the security team from the September 14th, 2023 blog update. In this message, the team states “We have a series of updates planned for this late fall that should significantly reduce future occurrences of avatar ripping and piracy.” I am wondering if this is still happening this fall. It reads as follows:

A Letter from the VRChat Security Team

Hello everyone! I wanted to take a moment to peel back the curtain some and provide a little more visibility into VRChat’s security.

Historically, we haven’t shared many details about our security projects or responses. This is for a variety of reasons, but it can be summed up as “if we tell you what we’re doing, it’s easier for bad guys to bypass it.” That said, I believe we could be sharing more!

As such, today, I am going share some info on avatar ripping and piracy, and what we’re doing about it.

If you’re unfamiliar, the term “avatar ripping” in VRChat context refers to the act of taking an avatar someone else is wearing, and converting the files used to display that avatar on your local device back into something that they can upload. We also refer to this as “avatar piracy”, as this problem is very similar to software or media piracy.

First, I want to acknowledge that we’ve seen the reports that you have filed. We see the pain, upset, and cost that ripping and piracy inflicts on the community. We see the difficulty this causes for our creators, and the confusion it creates for you. As community members ourselves, we have many team members who have been impacted by ripping. Piracy is an issue we have taken seriously for several years, but like many companies out there, we have struggled to fix it. To put plainly, it’s a very difficult problem to solve technically.

So, what are you doing about it?

We have a series of updates planned for this late fall that should significantly reduce future occurrences of avatar ripping and piracy. Sadly, I can’t share the technical specifics on this with you (see above re: bad guys). However, I want to reassure you that we are tackling this issue on multiple fronts. These updates will be a culmination of efforts that have been in development for some time.

In addition to technical solutions, we have previously and will continue to employ other methods with the same goal of making it harder to pirate content out of VRChat.

So my avatar will never be ripped again?

I want to tell you yes, but… I can’t. The truth is that there will always be extremely dedicated malicious people out there, and they will find a way to bypass protections we develop.

Our goal is to make the difficulty bar so high that malicious pirates don’t consider it worth their time to rip avatars. This makes it much easier to find those who still pirate content, and to respond to them on an individual basis. We think these updates should fit that bill.

Will we hear from security again?

I hope so! My general philosophy on security is that when we’re doing our job well, we’ll be in the shadows and you won’t even notice we’re here. However, there are still going to be times when it may be helpful or necessary to hear from us directly.

We want you to know we see your reports, and the VRChat team is here to help protect our community against those who would hurt it.

Sincerely,

StarChild
VRChat Security Team Lead

[tupper]

@RelationCapable

In this message, the team states “We have a series of updates planned for this late fall that should significantly reduce future occurrences of avatar ripping and piracy.”

Those updates have been and are happening. As Starchild said, we don’t talk about it openly.

[dangerkiddy]

Hello, did VRChat also release on Picos’s China store?

[breaker_love]

Big Welcome to PICO users and looking forward to the imposters. Im glad you guys are taking the time to make sure this works properly.

[Salbug]

According to one of the devs, impostors all use the same material and thus should only be rendered in one draw call.