Mark Zuckerberg is struggling to renew his 2004 stroke of genius in the metaverse. If Facebook revolutionized a whole generation by becoming the first online social network, the same cannot be said for Horizon Worlds, the virtual world that the boss of Meta created in the metaverse for the modest sum of 13 billions of dollars. Already mocked at the time of its launch and the unveiling of the avatar of the American billionaire because of its “childish” graphics, the social network does not seem to be able to seduce, including in the ranks of the American giant, as explained by the Les Echos newspaper.
After more than a year of launch in the United States and two months in France, the magical world of Horizon Worlds would have failed to attract more than 300,000 users and even Meta employees would have a hard time catching up. game, according to an internal memo written by Vishal Shah, vice president of the US company’s metaverse business. The reason: numerous quality issues and a lack of hierarchy in the hundreds of universes to explore.
“Feedback from creators, users, testers, and many of our team members exposes the weight of frustrating little things, stability issues, and bugs that make it impossible to experience the magic of Horizon Worlds,” Vishal wrote. Shah. This would encourage even its designers to turn away from it. ” Why is that ? Why don’t we like the product we created enough to use it all the time? The truth is, if we don’t like it, how can we expect our users to like it? asks the vice-president of metaverse activities.
However, a solution seems to have been found. After urging Meta employees to visit Horizon Worlds “at least once a week” – “Get in there!” Arrange moments with your colleagues and friends…”, thus enjoined Vishal Shah -, the parent company of Facebook would consider developing a two-dimensional version of its metaverse, less immersive, but more realistic, with a watchword: the quality. A surprising alternative when you know that the characteristic of the metaverse is the evolution in a three-dimensional world and that Horizon Worlds was designed to be explored with the virtual reality VR Oculus headset.
