This is just a transcript from the Developer Update video! That’s why the post is locked. We will have a regular Dev Update post on Thursday where we’ll talk about this there.
Hey! It’s Strasz, from the Community Team. It’s been a hot minute since we’ve had a Developer Update video – but we have something important to introduce today!
Avatar Accessories!
Avatar Accessories are… exactly what they sound like! They’re accessories that you can put on your avatar: think a hat, or sunglasses, a halo, a tail, or… well, you get the idea. There’s a lot you could do with a system like this!
But let’s just cut to it: yes, you can put cat ears on any avatar. Or Googly Eyes.
No, seriously – any avatar. If you can use the avatar, you can throw Accessories on it.
It’s simple. You just do it… like this. Click the Accessory, then wham, just like that, it’s on your avatar.
When you add an Accessory to an Avatar, it will automatically create a “Look.” Looks are just a combination of Accessories + whatever avatar you’re wearing at the time. This way, you can quickly switch between different combos with essentially no friction. As a note, right now, you can have as many Looks as you’d like.
But hey, how much can you do with Accessories? Well… a lot.
Move ‘em around! Play with it a little. You can get more precise with the controls on the right side. For some Accessories, you’ll be able to adjust various properties to better match your vibe.
In order for an Accessory to move correctly with your avatar, it has to be attached to a bone. Your avatar has a skeleton! That’s how, well, it moves. By default, we attach Accessories to the bone we think makes the most sense – so, for example, your head, hips, arm, whatever. If you click this button, though, you will see a new screen – this lets you attach an Accessory to any of your bones.
Once you’re done, hit save! But hey – you don’t have to limit yourself to just one! Duplicate the same Accessory you previously added, or add a brand new one! For now, you can throw a maximum of 5 Accessories on your avatar – but we’re still testing, so that number may change.
Hit “Apply,” and you’ll jump into that Look! Easy as that. But wait: it gets even easier. You can access nine of your last Looks from the Action Menu.
Of course, you probably have a lot of questions – so off the rip, we’ll knock out some we know you’ll have.
First: the big one – who will get to make Avatar Accessories?
To start, it’ll just be us. However, we’re already working with some Community creators to build some accessories with us! We’ll likely privately invite more to collaborate with us moving forward.
As far as opening the system up beyond that, well, we’re still talking about it! To be precise, it’s something that we’d like to do – likely in a system similar to the Avatar Marketplace – but there are a few questions we need to answer first, like…
How does this impact the performance rating system?
First: we’ve done a lot of work to ensure Accessories are pretty performant! By limiting the number of them you can have on your avatar, as well as carefully managing the specs of each accessory, we can be pretty precise about how much they impact performance.
But what happens when you throw a few accessories on an avatar that’s right on the line, approaching very poor? Wouldn’t that, traditionally, push it over? Well, yes – but the current system doesn’t account for that.
We think that’s okay, for now… but that’s a perilous “for now.”
We’ll likely continue to iterate on Avatar Accessories’ performance. However, it’s also likely that we’ll take a good look at the performance system in general. While that system is okay, there are a lot of ways it could be doing its job better.
In the near future, we’ll be tackling this. For now, things might be a little wonky, but we’re aware of it, and absolutely have to tackle it before we can move Accessories to some form of “UGC.”
What, what about Items!!!
Okay, so quick aside – we’ve been getting asked a lot about when Items will turn into “UGC.” Someone asks in the comments of every video! We get it. A lot of people are excited about them.
So, nothing has changed: we’re still figuring things out. The thing is, Accessories are part of figuring those things out, too. One of the earliest requests from the Community was for us to have “wearable Items” – that, it turns out, led us down quite the rabbit hole. Following through with that request meant answering even more questions – you can see how something like Items and all that they affect in VRChat can be, well, complicated.
This is what we meant when we said that we’d need time to evaluate Items – Accessories merely shows the complexities of one potential part of that system! Seriously, whenever this question comes up, we can’t emphasize enough how complex it is to add a new type of UGC to VRChat.
In short, it’s still going to be a bit, but we’ll keep you updated as we figure things out.
But Wait, What’s Different About Items and Accessories?
Well, you can’t wear a Shopping Cart.
But seriously: outside of the simple fact that you put one on, and one… uh, you don’t do that, there are several other key differences.
For one, Accessories have no scripting attached to them. They’re not interactable in the same way Items are.
They also don’t have the same limits that Items do – so, for example, worlds can’t limit their usage. Likewise, they travel with you between worlds, unlike Items. You don’t have to “spawn them in” every time you travel to a new instance.
Accessories are also separated from the Inventory, as we thought it makes sense to put them with your Avatar… which, you know, you’ll be putting them on.
Will Avatar Accessories Have a Cost?
Out of the gate, we’ll be throwing some at everyone. Some will be for sale. Some might come in a Shop bundle. Some might be just for VRC+ subscribers. We’ll see!
What About [Insert Avatar / Shader Setup Here]
We know there will be edge cases where Accessories will look funky. Point them out to us! We’ll try to fix some of them, but there will be cases where things just won’t line up. When you give folks the ability to use… well, basically any shader, you open the door to potential jank.
We’ll see what we can do!
For the curious, by the way, Accessories use our Toon Standard shader – we’ll be adding some additional functionality to it for the sake of customization, which will hopefully benefit Avatar Creators as well.
Conclusion
Avatar Accessories were built for everyone: if you’re the kinda person who buys an Avatar from the Marketplace, or you’re the kind of user who doesn’t mind cranking open Unity and smashing together a few assets, or you’re just someone who uses a public avatar you found, we wanted to make sure that Accessories add something to VRChat for you.
They’re powerful, easy to use, and… well, a little silly. Look at those eyes.
We’re excited for you to play with them – and to see where we’ll take this system in the future.
As always, thanks for loving VRChat as much as we do. I’ll see you next time!