Meta’s Metaverse Horizon Worlds Lands on UK Shores

Facebook might have changed its name to Meta as company CEO Mark Zuckerberg continues to push his metaverse vision, but its actual metaverse Horizon Worlds hasn’t been that accessible globally. Previously only available for North American Meta Quest owners, this week finally sees Horizon Worlds coming to UK headsets.

Just as with any of Meta’s bigger software updates Horizon Worlds will gradually roll out to UK Meta Quest owners over the coming week, so if you can’t access it now keep checking back. Initially released in beta in 2021, Meta’s metaverse aims to be a one-stop-shop for all your online social needs, whether that’s just hanging out with friends or playing a game together. As reported in May, Meta is adding more content by integrating apps like Venues, where you can watch concerts or enjoy film shorts from the Tribeca Festival.

As the name indicates, Horizon Worlds is made up of individual worlds for users to explore, or they can make their own. Hence why Meta has been encouraging creators onto the platform to build worlds for new users to venture into. Starting with a $10 million USD fund to help support the initiative, the company then began testing monetization features allowing builders to make money from their creations.

The roll-out of Horizon Worlds to the UK is just the start of a wider expansion to more European countries during the course of the summer. Meta hasn’t said which will be next on the list. The UK launch announcement also includes several platform updates to improve the user experience.

All new Horizon Worlds users go through an onboarding process to teach them about the Safe Zone tools that can block, mute, or report anyone engaging in unwanted behaviour. Adding to that list is Voice Mode, giving you the option to choose how you hear people who aren’t friends. The default setting is as you’d expect, you can hear everyone at the same volume. Or you can select Garbled Voices where strangers’ voices are unintelligible, yet friendly sounds. They’ll see an indicator so they know you’re not ignoring them and if you do want to un-garble their voice simply bring the controller next to your ear.

Voice Mode will be rolling out to Horizon Worlds in the next few weeks.

The Horizon Worlds metaverse is free to download for Quest owners who are 18+. For continued updates keep reading gmw3.

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• Source: https://www.gmw3.com/2022/06/metas-metaverse-horizon-worlds-lands-on-uk-shores/