{"id":495582,"date":"2026-01-06T03:38:09","date_gmt":"2026-01-06T03:38:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/495582\/"},"modified":"2026-01-06T03:38:09","modified_gmt":"2026-01-06T03:38:09","slug":"asymmetric-pc-vs-vr-game-panoptic-is-getting-a-sequel-with-1v4-multiplayer-and-quest-support","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/495582\/","title":{"rendered":"Asymmetric PC vs. VR Game ‘Panoptic’ is Getting a Sequel with 1v4 Multiplayer and Quest Support"},"content":{"rendered":"

Panoptic (2020) is an innovative \u2018PC vs. VR\u2019 game that plays out like a game of 1v1 hide-and-seek, with one VR player seeking out a flatscreen PC player who tries to blend into the crowd. Now the studio behind the game has announced\u00a0Panoptic II\u00a0and says it plans to expand the game with up to 1v4 multiplayer and make the game more widely accessible with support for Quest 3 and mobile devices.<\/p>\n

The News<\/p>\n

Developer Team Panoptes announced Panoptic II late last month in a livestream<\/a> where the studio elaborated on plans for the game.<\/p>\n

The studio confirmed that\u00a0Panoptic II will continue to be designed around a singular VR player who acts as the \u2018seeker\u2019. But the studio plans to make the game accessible for larger groups and on more platforms than the original.<\/p>\n

Instead of a single non-VR as the \u2018hider\u2019,\u00a0Panoptic II is said to support up to four non-VR players who can work together to outwit the seeker. And this time around the non-VR players will join the game from mobile devices (presumably iOS and Android), making the game more accessible than the original game which required the non-VR player to play on the same PC being used by the VR player.<\/p>\n

That new approach to non-VR players also stands to make Panoptic II\u00a0more accessible to VR users; the studio says it has plans to bring the game to PC and, for the first time, Quest 3 as well.<\/p>\n

Team Panoptes tells Road to VR that the\u00a0gameplay loop will be expanded from the first game, and include brand new maps.<\/p>\n

The studio is aiming to fund development of Panoptic II\u00a0with crowdfunding support via a Patreon campaign<\/a>, and\u00a0says it plans to release early versions of the game closed testing, with a first build expected in Q1.<\/p>\n

My Take<\/p>\n

Panoptic\u2019s\u00a0asymmetric PC vs. VR gameplay is undoubtedly niche, but incredibly fun.\u00a0During the Covid pandemic, friends and I spent many hours playing the game remotely using Discord and Steam\u2019s \u2018Remote Play Together\u2019 feature.<\/p>\n

Thanks to VR, the seeker\u2019s embodied presence and giant scale feel exceptionally imposing to the tiny non-VR player, creating tense moments where a single slip-up could lead to a suspenseful cat-and-mouse chase. The seeker may be powerful, but with roaming NPCs that look identical to real non-VR player, there\u2019s many opportunities to blend in and outwit the seeker.<\/p>\n

For as unique and enjoyable as the gameplay was, the technical structure of\u00a0Panoptic\u00a0(a multiplayer game where both the VR and non-VR player are expected to play from the same PC)\u00a0made it minimally accessible.<\/p>\n

Panoptic II\u2019s\u00a0approach should make the game considerably more accessible. Not only because it will add support for Quest 3, but also because non-VR players will be able to join from their phones. With any luck, the phone version of the game will be \u2018free\u2019, which would turn the Quest 3 version of\u00a0Panoptic II into a portable party game.<\/p>\n

Back when I was playing with my friends over Discord, it was easy for the non-VR players to take turns being the \u2018hider\u2019. But as the only one with local access to the VR headset, I was the only one who got to play the role of the seeker. With the purported changes to\u00a0Panoptic II, I\u2019m already looking forward to being able to take my Quest anywhere and pass it around to friends so they can finally experience the other side of the game.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Panoptic (2020) is an innovative \u2018PC vs. VR\u2019 game that plays out like a game of 1v1 hide-and-seek,…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":495583,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[20],"tags":[158,67,132,68,729,730],"class_list":{"0":"post-495582","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-virtual-reality","8":"tag-technology","9":"tag-united-states","10":"tag-unitedstates","11":"tag-us","12":"tag-virtual-reality","13":"tag-vr"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115846073713254463","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/495582","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=495582"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/495582\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/495583"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=495582"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=495582"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=495582"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}