The room was filled with late afternoon light, and I spotted almost a dozen Snap Spectacles AR glasses, all lined up on a shelf, just waiting for me to grab one. I didn’t because I was there to learn how these wearables are slowly making their way into the real world with the help of some intrepid developers.
Organized by Snap, the cozy event highlighted businesses and developers taking advantage of early access to the AR glasses even as consumers wait for full access.
Small clusters of Snap execs, product managers, and entrepreneurs gathered, all chatting about AR-enhanced projects while feasting on canapés. I sidled up to Russell Patton, Product Manager at Snap, who was chatting with Ray Kallmeyer, CEO of Enklu. I didn’t want to eavesdrop, but was curious to hear more about what sounded like a wild new fifth-generation Snap Spectacles experience.
My own experience with Snap’s latest AR gear was limited to a 2024 rooftop session with the rather big and heavy Michael Caine-style eyewear. Since November, developers have had access to Spectacles for a $99-a-month subscription fee, and many have been using Snap Studio to build fresh Spectacles AR integrations.
In some ways, I didn’t find Spectacles quite as impressive as Meta’s Orion AR eyewear, which are lighter, somewhat less bulky, and offered, in my experience, a wider field of view.
However, the more I used Snap Spectacles and experienced the gesture-friendly interface, the more fun I had. I left that day curious and a little excited for what might come next.
I casually stepped forward to face the two men, who stopped speaking and stared at me for a second. Had I inadvertently walked into a private Snap conversation? Kallmeyer, though, smiled broadly, offered me a hand, and then quickly explained his business, Verse Immersive, which is laser-tag-like AR experiential spaces nestled in local movie theaters worldwide.
Kallmeyer initially launched Verse Immersive with Microsoft’s HoloLens mixed reality headsets but in recent months, they’ve been piloting the use of Snap’s Spectacles in select cities like Chicago.
The roughly 1,200 square feet spaces dotted across the US and even in some European locations (the Explorium in Ireland) feature custom, purpose-built spaces designed to enhance the AR experience. Kallmeyer told me they put a lot of work into everything, “so it feels special”. But then it “all fades into the background” when wearing the AR glasses.
Visitors move about the space and interact with wild landscapes, characters, and objects using their voices and hands. Versa Immersive takes advantage of Spectacle’s hand-tracking capability, which lets customers interact with objects and cast spells.
Kallmeyer told me that the previous headsets they used were flaky and relied too much on specific hand gestures, and Spectacles just makes it easier, and, I’m assuming, more natural.
“Stereoscopic sound is a huge part of the experience,” Kallmeyer told me, adding that they use sound to guide players. “If you close your eyes, you could navigate just based on the sound.”
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As for the kinds of games people play in these spaces, Kallmeyer said they are “more like Zynga than Call of Duty“. For now, there are no recognizable brands in these games, but Kallmeyer told me they may have an announcement on some intellectual property integrations early next month.
It costs roughly a dollar a minute for each thirty- to sixty-minute experience. While you still can’t buy a pair of fifth-gen Snap Spectacles, you can bring your own pair if and when you can and may even get a discount on the price of a session.
Snap is paying close attention to these early integrations and meets with the Versa Immersive team as often as twice a week, sometimes to troubleshoot, other times to identify improvements that will upgrade the AR experience.
Patton, who stood beaming like a proud parent through much of the discussion, wouldn’t tell me when we can expect Snap Spectables’ general availability.
“Right now [we’re] still focused on developer availability,” he said, and added, “We want to improve form factor and features that customers and developers see. We want to get to the right spot,” said Patton.
I assume that spot will be on my face in the not-too-distant future.
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lance.ulanoff@futurenet.com (Lance Ulanoff)
