Payday 2 Dev Teams With Acer to Work on High-End VR Headset

Payday 2 developer Starbreeze has joined together with Acer on its virtual reality headset. The two companies will work together on designing, manufacturing, promoting, marketing, and selling the StarVR head-mounted display.

StarVR was announced by Starbreeze at E3 last year, alongside a demo based on The Walking Dead. After the initial reveal, it was taken on tour to be demoed for "thousands" of people, according to the press release. Starbreeze CEO Bo Andersson Klint says partnering with Acer will help the company in "realizing and producing a high-definition, high-fidelity VR headset."

"Since our launch in June 2015, we have had an amazing start with StarVR. By partnering with Acer we shift gears yet again to firmly position us as the leader in top-end VR experiences," said Klint. "We've been working with a clear roadmap for our VR strategy from day one and are now about to realize one of the first major collaborations we set out to achieve. The future for StarVR is now set and extremely exciting."

Acer CEO Jason Chen notes that this is the company's second step into VR, whereas the first was announcing VR-ready computers last month.

"Acer is thrilled to join forces with Starbreeze in bringing the StarVR head-mounted display to the market," said Chen. "We are devoting R&D resources across multiple aspects of the VR ecosystem for a coherent and high-quality experience, while just last month Acer announced powerful desktops and notebooks fully-ready for StarVR. Starbreeze and Acer share the same goal of delivering best-in-class VR applications, and we look forward to unlocking new VR possibilities together with this partnership."

StarVR would enter the market after the Oculus Rift and HTC Vive, which launched in March and April respectively. With no release date for StarVR announced, it's likely that PlayStation VR will also launch before Starbreeze and Acer's headset.

The StarVR headset is designed as a much higher-end headset than the ones currently available. The StarVR headset shown at E3 was capable of a 5120x1440 resolution, while sporting a 210-degree viewing angle. The Oculus Rift and HTC Vive, on the other hand, sport resolutions of 2160x1200 with a field of view of 110 degrees.

For an in-depth comparison of the Rift, Vive, and PlayStation VR, you can read GameSpot's article on the three headsets here.