Meta Quest's Killer Gaming App May Be Racket Sports

The Apple Vision Pro and Meta Quest headsets are pretty different, and not just in price. One of the most distinctive advantages Meta has is its included physical controllers. While they're not great for everything, they're phenomenal for virtual racket games. Ping-pong, pickleball, tennis-type stuff…or floating galactic wall-destroying arcade games like C-Smash VRS.

C-Smash VRS is a VR remake of a Sega arcade game called Cosmic Smash from way back in 2001. Despite being a huge Sega fan growing up, I somehow never heard of it. C-Smash VRS arrived on PlayStation VR 2 last year, and I liked its weird retro style. But the tethered nature of the PSVR 2 isn't ideal for active full-motion games. A port for Meta Quest 2 and Quest 3 headsets plus the Pico 4 comes next month, and it's a far better fit. I got an exclusive chance to play the game prerelease, and I really loved it. It also reminds me that, apart from dancing and boxing in VR workouts on Quest, the headset's next best killer app is VR gaming with swinging rackets.

C-Smash has a visual vibe that reminds me of the cult hit Space Channel 5 (another Sega game from that era also updated for VR recently). The minimal Tron-like design vibes don't rely on bleeding-edge graphics so they run super-smooth on the Quest 3. It's a simple concept: You hit a ball across a cube-shaped room to destroy targets on the other end, like pickleball and Arkanoid combined. 

C-Smash has a number of levels to play through for high-score challenges, including a mode that lets you draw new routes to play different levels each time. There are also two-player modes (hence the "VRS" part), although I didn't get to try those yet in Quest since the game's not out yet. That'll up the replay value, for sure.

The game's easy to get into, quick to play and fun to get active with. The game also has control settings to allow for smaller play spaces like my living room, where you can move the left stick to run across the court instead of actually physically diving from side to side. Either option can be used, but I'd need a few more feet of free space to prevent myself from any accidental hand damage on a sudden swing.

There are other great racket games on the Quest already: Eleven Table Tennis (a fantastic ping-pong simulator I've played for years); Racket Club, a newcomer, sets up a pickleball-like court and kinetic squash-like wall ricochets; Racket NX (a block-breaking racket game that preceded C-Smash VRS and has larger arenas); and Pickleball One for more of a pickleball simulator (I haven't tried that one, mainly because my home playspace isn't big enough). By the way, both Eleven Table Tennis and Racket Club have great mixed-reality modes that allow for play while still seeing your environment (it looks great on Quest 3).

Racket sports are such a good fit because they lean on the big advantage the Quest headset has over Apple's Vision Pro headset: a quick set of rapid-response, lag-free controllers. The instant reaction time and subtle responsiveness for wrist moves make all these games seem even more immersive than you'd expect. 

I also love fitness apps like Beat Saber and Supernatural, but I still admire what a great fit tennis-like games are for VR. Supernatural feels like a great workout, but isn't a perfect simulation of boxing or dancing. But games like Eleven Table Tennis, Racket Club and C-Smash VRS really make you feel like you're playing in an arena -- either in space or in my own home. Keep an eye out for C-Smash VRS, but also just keep in mind that you should have one of these racket games in your Quest VR game library without a doubt.