In this article we would like to review one VR apps called “Wander“. It is one of the best apps for you to perform something like virtual tour or expedition. Just to let you know, this review is based from our own experience of using it and it might be different from others. Anyway, we still hope we can help you by sharing our insights on it…
What is Wander Apps?
Wander is a VR apps that you can used to travel around the world instantly. It is developed by Parkline Interactive and it is first released in May, 2019. This apps is available for VR headset like Oculus Quest and Oculus Go.
How Wander Apps Works?
To navigate or maneuver in Wander, most of the time you need to use your touch controllers. Once in, you can immediately view your surroundings in 360-degree.
To move around, you can use the point and click approach to teleport to next position. To see the menu or information about the location, you can use your left controller to bring it up in front of you.
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How the Wander Graphics or Images Looks Like?
First of all, the images are all static. Once you are there, you can feel like time time stop. Nothing move except you. You can feel something like “Bullet Time” from The Matrix movie. If there is bird, you can see the bird is hanging in the mid air.
From our experiences, there are some locations where the images are blurry and like disjointed. But most of the time, the images are very sharp and crispy clear where you can see the details of it. Especially when we look down at our foot and can see clearly the road tar surface or ground with shiny rocks and sands. It really feels like you are really there.
For your information, the data and images is from Google StreetView. So most of the time, it looks like the images are stiches. Anyway, the quality of the images really depends on the outcome of the contributors work when they submit it to Google.
What Do We Like Most About Wander?
Well, first of all, we really enjoy most of the great images that we can see. It really creates the illusion like we are really there.
Secondly, this apps is very easy to use and not too complicated to familiarize with it. The UI (User Interface) is very simple, clean and intuitive.
One important aspect that we love about this apps is the Social function of it. It feels like we are having a tour with the real tour guide. If we can find a room where the “tour lead” is very knowledgeable, informative and chatty, it will be a very awesome and memorable experience for us.
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Any Room for Improvements for Wander?
Hopefully, one day, instead of having the static images, we can also able to experience the virtual tour where the images around use are moving such as people walking and smiling when passing us. And yet at the same time, we are still able to move around in the environments. So, we don’t feel like we are trap in time.
Maybe it is hard to have it now due to to the technology limitations or constraints. Nevertheless, it will not stop our joy of using it.
What is the Price of Wander Apps?
As of the 9th October 2022, you can get it at the price of USD 9.99 at Oculus Quest Store. With all the functionalities at that price, it is a really value for money.
In Summary…
For us, it is a must have app for those who love to do virtual tour and for VR beginner since it is easy to use. In case you do not have any idea where to go, maybe you can try google the list of interesting places to visit on earth. One example is the list of “25 Best Parks In The United States” from HTownBest. Maybe you can get more ideas from there for your next virtual tour.
This apps is still one of our favorite apps for recurring use. You should try it yourself since seeing is believing.
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I’m hugely disappointed. I’ve gone plenty of places in this app, even my home town.
But, the app is seriously lacking in some very popular places I’ve always wanted to visit.
For example, have you ever tried to go to Jamaica in Wander? It refuses!!
Instead, the user gets everything with the word Jamaica in it like Jamaican Queens, NY or some city named Jamaica, but NO WHERE in the actual country of Jamaica!
The closest one can get is some random island several hundred miles away! For an app that appears to be sourced from Google Earth, this is an easy giveaway to ANY potential competing app.
This is very disappointing.
Thanks Ma_Leek for dropping by. Hope the developer can use this input and feedback to further improve the apps in the subsequent version.
I returned the entire Occulist set because I bought it for Wander and couldn’t get help on the floating issue. Being 30 -40 feet in the air on a cliff in England turned my stomach. It was like that everywhere and I got tired of looking at rooftops
Hi Karon, most of the location in Wanders is on the road since it is based on Google Map. In case you want to try it again in the future, you can get the help from a Facebook group called “Wander VR Travel Club” that focus on Wander app.