XR glasses like the Viture Beast have been around for a few years now, but I always saw them as kind of a gimmick. Back when the original Legion Go handheld came out, I tried Lenovo’s first try at the Legion Glasses, and while they were definitely neat, they were fiddly and just ended up giving me a headache. But a lot has changed in the last few years.
The Viture Beast XR glasses deliver the feeling of a gaming headset, but for your eyes. The 1200p combined display looks crisp, and the speakers embedded in the stems, or temples, are good enough that I don’t feel the need to dig out headphones to wear awkwardly on top of them.
But more than anything, these glasses are actually comfortable to wear for more than 10 minutes, which is huge in a world where handheld gaming has blown up as much as it has. Because no matter how good the built-in displays on the Legion Go 2 or the Switch 2 are, nothing quite beats laying back and playing your games on a giant TV that your brain’s been tricked into thinking is on your ceiling.
What Even Are XR Glasses?
If you’re not already a handheld gaming sicko, it’s very likely that you’ve never even heard of XR glasses before. Basically, these are glasses with little displays embedded behind each lens, which project a display right in front of your eyes. And because there are two displays so close to your eyes, these glasses essentially trick you into thinking you’re looking at a much larger display than you are.
To be clear, nothing is actually running on these XR glasses. Instead, think of these as a monitor that you can strap to your face, and connect to whichever device you want to use – as long as it supports USB-C display output.
Right off the bat, that means all kinds of devices can use this to expand screen real estate. You can plug it into your phone, a tablet, or even that 14-inch work laptop you’re hunched over all day. All of these devices would benefit from a larger display, and Viture claims the Beast glasses simulate a 174-inch screen on its highest setting. And while I can’t exactly break out a tape measure to check that, it feels accurate.
But the biggest benefit I’ve found for the Viture Beast and other XR glasses has been plugging them into a handheld gaming PC like the Xbox Ally X, especially while traveling. Because, for all the progress that handhelds have made in being comfortable to use over long periods of time, they can still really start to weigh you down, especially during a long flight. With these glasses, though, you can lay your head back and play your games on a giant screen, while just holding your device in your lap.
Even at home, because I don’t have a lot of space for large TVs, I’ve been using these glasses to watch TV or play games on the Xbox Ally X without having to stare at its small 7-inch screen for hours at a time. So while it does still feel like we’re in the early days of XR glasses being a thing, they are only getting more sophisticated over time, and I can see them becoming ubiquitous, especially as portable gaming gets more and more popular.
