10 Best Oculus Quest Games New Players Should Try First

With a growing user base and comparatively accessible price point, virtual reality gaming on the Oculus Quest 2 is on the rise. However, as with anything new, it can be difficult for new adopters to know where to start. While the platform’s best-selling titles like Superhot VR and Population: ONE are immersive and exciting, jumping into the VR deep end can be a recipe for headaches and confusion.

Whether they present wild new worlds to explore or let players drift into relaxing virtual experiences, the best introductory games on the Oculus Quest 2 allow gamers to experience a wide variety of genres from competitive sports to space shooters that effectively showcase the VR system’s impressive graphics and immersive sound. Although the levels of difficulty may vary, these games all promise to deliver a rewarding and entertaining time for neophyte players.

10 Beat Saber

Though Beat Game’s Beat Saber came out back in May of 2019, it’s still one of the most popular and commercially successful VR games that the Oculus Store has to offer. In Beat Saber, players hold lightsaber-like glowing swords and hit boxes in a marked direction as they fly forward to the beat of the chosen song. While the higher difficulties are an intense workout for both the body and the brain, the game played on its easier settings is about as close to a perfect introductory VR experience as there is.

9 Eleven Table Tennis

While many VR games on the Quest are great for transporting players to fantastic new worlds, others, like For Fun Labs’ Eleven Table Tennis, are remarkable for their ability to meticulously recreate real life. With an incredibly realistic ball and paddle physics, experienced players can enjoy practicing spin and placement while newcomers will have a blast with some casual volleys. With pick-up matches against scalable AI opponents, public and private player vs. player lobbies, and fun mini-games like cup pong, there’s plenty of content in Eleven Table Tennis to keep layers busy for months.

8 Space Pirate Trainer

Space Pirate Trainer doesn’t try to do too many different things, but what it does it does extremely well. The game’s concept is simple: players stand on a platform on the edge of a space station and use their arsenal of offensive and defensive weapons to protect themselves and destroy endless waves of flying drones.

While the leaderboards give veteran players something to aim for, the game functions remarkably well as an introduction to VR. The various weapons take skill to use, and players need to move within a small area to avoid laser fire, but without any complex rules, new players should be able to quickly find their space legs and have a good time.

7 Tilt Brush

Google’s Tilt Brush may no longer be receiving updates or official support, but the now-open source three-dimensional art app is still one of the best introductions to virtual reality available to players on the Oculus Quest. Like most of the best beginner VR experiences, Tilt Brush is easy to pick up and enjoy while also offering incredible depth for users that learn the program’s ins and outs.

Placing players in an empty virtual space, Tilt Brush lets players draw and animate in three dimensions. The ability to scale creations from palm-of-the-hand tiny to sky-scraper large makes it incredibly satisfying to create sprawling, immersive works that are as fun to show off as they are to make.

6 Tetris Effect

A lot of people have played a game of Tetris, and, in terms of gameplay, Tetris Effect doesn’t do much to shake up the formula. While this may make it seem like a less than an exciting choice for players looking to experience something new, there are few games with graphical and aural presentations as impressive and immersive as Tetris Effect. With gameplay rules that are familiar to most, this game works well as a perfect introduction to VR, and there’s plenty of challenge for even Tetris veterans.

5 Moss

At first glance, Moss may not look terribly different than a traditional flat-screen platformer, but this game cleverly uses the virtual reality platform for both incredible immersion and clever gameplay that wouldn’t be possible any other way. In Moss, players view the journey of adventurous mouse Quill from a top-down perspective as if they are sitting in the middle of each environment.

Moss is great for new beginners as it can mostly be played from a stationary, seated position, but the way it requires players to look all around them to follow their character and discover environmental information makes it a great, stress-free way to jump into virtual reality on the Oculus Quest.

4 Google Earth VR

Google Earth has made quite a few other applications possible, but Google Earth VR is one of the most immersive. The game literally puts the world in the users’ hands, letting them manipulate the globe to either view top-down renders of just about anywhere or drop down to a street level in an immersive street view. Environments outside of highly populated or visited places may not be as visually striking as what can be found in other VR games, but the ability to go almost anywhere in the world is an incredibly empowering introduction to how immersive virtual reality can be.

3 Vader Immortal

With its immersive environments, canon Star Wars narrative, and varied gameplay, Vader Immortal is a fantastic first experience for players new to VR and one of the best Star Wars experiences in any medium. Taking place between A New Hope and The Empire Strikes Back, the narrative campaign functions more like an interactive movie than a game that can be won or lost, which can be good for newer Oculus Quest players still trying to get comfortable with their system.

The story is split across three purchasable chapters, which combine to last a few hours, but the game’s dojo mode adds longevity to the experience by challenging players to defeat waves of enemies with a lightsaber and force powers in a set length of time.

2 Phantom: Covert Ops

This military shooter may be slightly more demanding on players’ stomaches than the other beginner-friendly VR games, but Phantom: Covert Ops still does a lot to be more approachable than other games in its genre. While the game’s general setup of putting players in the shoes of a specialized military operative may not be particularly unique, what makes this game stand apart is that the engaging campaign keeps the player seated inside of a tactical kayak. Although it may seem a bit strange, this locomotion limitation works in favor of newer players that may not yet be ready for potentially nausea-inducing full direction movement.

1 Walkabout Mini Golf

Any good mini-golf course leans at least a little bit to the wacky side, and Walkabout Mini Golf perfectly blends solid controls and ball physics with themed courses filled with jumps and twists. There are four different courses each consisting of 18 holes to play, each one is unique and visually pleasing.

There’s reason to explore these colorful, low-poly locales as well, with a number of hidden balls scattered throughout the game for players to hunt down. With simple controls and rules that are familiar to most, Walkabout Mini Golf is a great, low-stress way for novice players to test out Oculus Quest 2.

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