If you don’t read a lot about tech, the idea of XR glasses might be one that you’ve never even considered being available for consumers. Plenty of people are familiar with the AR term, Augmented Reality, since Pokemon Go is the widest adapted example of AR technology on the market. A decade or more ago, Google tried to get into the wearable space years ago with Google Glass but they were ultimately super expensive and they had a very limited use case. See also: Microsoft’s failed attempt called Hololens. XR, or Extended Reality is a catch all term that describes all of the various twists on (Adjective) Reality, but realistically XR glasses sit right on the cusp of potential market adoption for the right individual. So when Viture pitched us to check out their new XR glasses for gamers, we knew it was time to see what this space was all about. Are Viture’s XR glasses appropriately named to be beastly, or are they just another growling competitor that no one asked for. Find out in our review of The Beast!
The Beast XR Glasses
Manufacturer: Viture
MSRP: $549.99 USD
Author’s Note: While I am going to talk about the whole kit that Viture sent me, this review only scores The Beast glasses themselves.
As a glasses wearer, I am often turned off by the idea of VR/XR because none of these pieces of tech feel normal enough that I’d want to reach for them on a daily basis. As good as Meta’s Quest 3 is, I find myself dinking around in the headset maybe once a month if I want to play something in VR, but more often than not it’s to enjoy the private glasses-free 3D movie theater. As watching personal movies is likely my favorite use case for my Quest, I’ve had my eye out for a device that offers a similar experience but doesn’t need to engulf my entire head and cause me to sweat profusely from my face just to watch a movie.
Viture’s Beast glasses offer a modest solution: They look like a typical pair of sunglasses, but they’ve got a beefy little set of Sony screens behind the lenses, with enough room to peer out from the sides without feeling like you’re segmented from the world around you. The very first thing I wanted to test was the dimming capability of the actual lenses that sit behind the personal screens.
I’m pleased to report that being able to adjust this with a rocker button is pretty handy so you don’t have to take the glasses off to see something that’s going on around you. It’s light enough to feel like you’re wearing a normal pair of glasses, but gets dark enough that you aren’t distracted by things moving in your peripheral vision while wearing them. The balance is terrific.
The Sony screens in the center of each lens is vibrant and clear, and with the brightness maxed out, the picture quality rivals sitting three feet away from a computer monitor. When watching movies or playing games, this feels great. The Beast is thankfully being marketed toward gaming, cause I’m less than thrilled about it from a productivity standpoint. Their Spacewalker software works pretty decently on my iPhone, but it’s a little bit clunky to use.
The promised 3D features only work on 3D that’s recorded side by side where it involves layering two videos to reach the desired effect. Watching the 3D trailer for Avatar: Fire and Ash was pretty cool because it was filmed the right way, but if the 3D involved two videos that were stacked vertically, the Beast would show me two stacked blurry videos.
In the course of my testing, I could not get my Beast glasses to be fully compliant with my computer or my iPad. On my iPad it was detected as a secondary display, but I constantly had to tell it to move things there, and that experience is kind of terrible unless you have your iPad connected to a bluetooth keyboard/mouse combo. This wasn’t Viture’s fault, but Apple really needs to fix compatibility with iPad accessories in third party applications. I tested Honkai: Star Rail and the game would freeze and refuse to animate the menus unless it was opened fresh from within the Viture display’s visible menu bar.
I tried connecting my Viture Beast to my desktop via the USB 4 Alt Displayport and was continually greeted by a failed USB message. In fact, the only way I could update the firmware was to connect a USB-A to USB-C cable, choose the glasses in the browser’s hardware passthrough drop down, and then update it from Viture’s website. Spacewalker never would connect for me on Windows 11, and while I did get the failed USB error message, the glasses did partially function as a secondary display. In fact, because of the USB error I was never sure if it was functioning properly, and to Viture’s credit, their PR/Marketing team did try to assist in figuring out the problem, but we never did land on a solution before this went live.
Browsing the web or reading documents was a bit of a challenge because there are often noticable fuzzy bits around text and you’ll often see some color blur around the edges, but I guess that’s to be expected with prism lenses. Attempting to write drafts here in WordPress was doable, but I wouldn’t consider it a great experience. I think I’d still rather just type away on a laptop with ear buds in if I’m not at one of my desktops. That said, in full transparency, I think it sucks in VR too. Neat parlor trick, but not very practical in either space.
Shifting gears and using the Beast for what it’s advertised for, they sent me the Switch docking kit, their mobile dock, and their collab controller with 8bitdo. Connecting the Beast to the Nintendo Switch 2 is pretty simple, though you will need to remove any protective casing you might have since the dock mount assumes your Switch is naked to properly fit. The mobile dock comes with an HDMI in so you can route a console or a computer through it in order to utilize the dual plugs so that two Viture glasses users can watch the same content. This is cool for two people sitting together watching a movie or doing some local multiplayer, but this is probably going to be a very rare use case since these glasses are expensive and it’s very unlikely that a single household will own multiple pairs.
Gaming on the Switch 2 via Viture is a pretty good experience. The 8bitdo controller feels pretty good in the hands, but I wish it had been a Switch 2 version, since I don’t own a Switch 1, and there’s a downside to not having access to an on-controller C button. Minor gripes, but worth mentioning if you’re a Switch 2 only user. As much as I think Viture tried to make this a killer companion for the Switch, The Beast remains caged by Nintendo’s insistance on offering mediocre hardware. The Switch 2 can barely utilize the 120hz option (there’s maybe three games that can actually even support 120hz) and it can’t support the Beast’s 1200p in each mode either – a feature that was recently added which held this review up for additional testing.
Having a “screen” that you can travel or move with that’s far larger than the native Switch 2 screen is definitely attractive, and all of the colors pop and look great on the built in Sony lenses. In my testing, leaving the “viewing mode” on smooth follow, while setting the screen size to Medium with a viewing distance of 2.5m was perfect. Any larger at 2.5m and the screen would get cut off, while I didn’t really notice much change pushing it out to 5m aside from the screen being slightly smaller. Anything larger was either cut off by the viewing distance or by the smooth follow. I liked the 0DOF mode the most, but it had some issues where it didn’t want to stay centered. Firmware updates did address this and it’s far better now than it was a month ago when I first got The Beast in, but it still happens enough that I stick with smooth follow for reliability.
Anchoring the screen to a wall and making it huge was super cool but in practicality failed because the screens are just barely bigger than the size of your eyeball. I found myself often trying to look up from underneath the black plastic on the inside as if it were in my way as opposed to realizing that the hardware was getting in the way of the image.
Because my nose is kinda weird, none of the included nose tips quite fit right, though I had the best luck with the longer ones since they would keep the glasses pushed up so they were closer to my face, that was until after a bit of wear, the natural oil in my skin would cause the silicone pads to slide and I’d be right back to readjusting them every few minutes. I was actually slightly miffed that the plastic clip was just a smidge too tight for the bridge of my nose, cause that would have probably held better.
Shout out to Viture for having a really nice “lens mount” that allows you to put mini pair of prescription lenses in front of the two OLED screens, and they were super accomodating as they sent me a pair that matched my prescription so I could test these to their full capacity. That said, I’m not a big fan of how it clips in. The nose piece pulls out and there’s a small little metal notch that holds the glasses frame, and it’s a bit of a pain to get lined up – but once it’s lined up, it’s rock solid.
Unfortunately, it’s also a pain to remove and the first time you apply/remove it, it feels like you’re gonna break the glasses based on the force it requires. Thankfully, the glasses aren’t as fragile as they appear at first touch. Speaking of fragility, the glasses get warm to the touch in the top right corner which is a little bit odd considering there’s an obvious space where the Viture V could (and should) have been LED lit when the glasses were on. It’s not super warm, but I wonder if it gets warm enough that it might damage the structural integrity of the glasses arms over time.
I’m probably being more harsh on The Beast experience on Switch than a Switch only gamer would be, but having tested it with other platforms, Switch is absolutely the worst performing platform I used it on. For example: the 1200p and 120hz settings do work when connected to the Steam Deck or my iPhone. There’s basically zero latency when connected though, which is excellent, regardless of what platform you connect it to. That hardwire is doing work and quickly made me forget that I had wished that it was a little more wireless.
The Beast also has an optional shade attachment that clips over the glasses, allowing you to “black out” everything behind the embedded screens. It works well when it stays in place, but it’s held on by a very thin lip at the top and two small grooves where the glasses notch into place. I can’t help but feel like the shade would be perfect if they had included two little magnets so it could clip onto the front of the glasses where the hinges meet the frame without increasing the price much, so why it’s so weak and flimsy is beyond me. At the very least, the notches that hold the lenses in at the bottom should be tall enough that you have to put the top lip on and then slightly bend them into place so it holds firm. As it stands, it’s not worth the headache to get it to stay in place.
So, at the end of the day, is The Beast truly the most capable set of XR glasses available? I can only speculate given this is the only pair I’ve actually tested, but through my testing, I’d say yes. It is a tremendous companion for the Steam Deck and for mobile phones. In fact, I will mostly use these with my Steam Deck going forward. The use case for this thing is very specific and niche (ayyyy).
So if you’re looking for a killer way to play games or watch movies in bed without disturbing your significant other, The Beast is very capable of accomplishing that task. It would probably be decent on a plane too, now that I think about it. Far less annoying to use than pulling out a laptop or iPad for watching in-flight films. I think it would also serve as a great tool for someone who has a small bedroom that might not have space for a TV. This is a best case scenario, because all the “oh neat” in the world can’t replace the idea of asking someone who isn’t a bleeding edge tech enthusiast to plunk down $550 for a pair of glasses that they can’t wear all day.
The onboard Harman speakers are surprisingly good for what they are, but in order to get audio that’s good enough to feel, you’re going to want to use headphones. Turning the volume up loud enough to a punch out of the sound ultimately defeats the personal audio space, since others will be able to hear it. The built in microphone is passable but not great, and honestly, you’ll probably have headphones on for higher volume with less chance of disturbing people around you, so you’d likely just use the microphone on those instead.
I think it would be cool to see a version of The Beast that doesn’t include speakers, a microphone, or that adequate at best front camera that I can’t really see any logical use case for, for a more affordable price. Maybe a quiet model w/ the magnetic cable instead of the current one that seems to get caught on something every time I move my neck would be attractive offer at a $399 price point.
At the end of the day, XR glasses continue to sit in a space that there’s very little demand for. Upgrades made to the Meta Quest turned it in into more than a VR machine, as it now has passthrough vision to support AR capabilities, but it also allows for desktop connection so that you can do more than play around in virtual reality spaces, you can also work in a fully realized private office area.
On top of that, the creation of Meta’s new AI powered glasses called Display that embed things right into the lens in real time, the window of possibility for XR is looking smaller and smaller. The Beast is likely going to be the pinnacle of achievement in this space, because going forward, new models will likely be forced to fall in line with whatever direction Meta decides takes the market.
The Beast is enjoyable to use, even if it does make my eyeballs feel like mush after a few hours of continous use. I’m willing to suffer a little bit of discomfort to get used to something if the experience is worth it, and while I could probably find plenty of use case for these glasses, no matter how cool they are, they are still a super hard sell for 90% of consumers.
The Beast XR glasses were reviewed using a review unit provided by Viture. You can find additional information about Niche Gamer’s review/ethics policy here. The Beast XR glasses are available directly from Viture for $549.
