VR devices are a necessary stepping stone to enter the world of VR entertainment, especially the head-mounted device that displays images, which is the most important core component of the entire set of VR equipment. Even though the popularity of VR at this stage is lower than that of traditional amusement machines, computers and other products, the overall market share is still increasing steadily. Recently, Oculus, a subsidiary of Facebook, launched its latest VR device Oculus Quest 2. However, this product caused the Quest 2 to become “bricked” because Facebook changed a product certification policy. In fact, some people are unable to use their Quest 2 device to enter the game because they are blocked on Facebook or their identity verification is not passed. It can be said that whether you can play Quest 2, the authentication of your Facebook account is the most critical part:
▲Oculus Quest 2 was recently launched but was accidentally held back by a Facebook account (Image source）
Starting last week, gamers complaining about Facebook’s account policies started raging around the world. These people are angry because their new Oculus Quest 2 VR gear has been “locked” by Facebook. The reason for the lockout is that the newly launched Quest 2 device has changed from the previous method of binding Oculus accounts to binding Facebook accounts, so many players have to retrieve their Facebook accounts and authenticate themselves.
Among them, this binding method has caused various problems. First of all, once the bound account is bound, it cannot be unlocked. As long as the Facebook account is suspended or deleted, the Quest 2 device will be immediately locked, which is the so-called “bricking”. Secondly, a Facebook account can only be bound to one Quest 2 device at a time. If it is bound to more than one device, the account will be officially suspended, which will also affect all Quest 2 devices bound to the account and brick all bound devices at once:
▲If there is a problem with the account or it is officially suspended, Oculus Quest 2 will be locked and bricked (Image source）
Once this problem was disclosed, it caused dissatisfaction among many consumers. Facebook officials quickly came out to put out the fire, but did not propose a better solution to this problem. At this stage, there is only an announcement stating that “Due to the merger of Oculus and Facebook, the practice of co-existing Oculus accounts and Facebook and registering two devices with different serial numbers will be cancelled.” At this stage, Facebook will adhere to the “one device, one account” authentication principle. In a way, this is relatively unfair to players who have purchased multiple devices. However, other than following official recommendations, there is no other better solution at this stage:
▲As VR devices are gradually entering many people’s homes, the disaster caused by account bricking really shouldn’t happen (Image source）
To make matters worse, players have discovered that once their Facebook account is deleted, they will also lose all personal information or game data stored in their Oculus account. Therefore, the problem immediately expanded into a more serious “archive retention dispute.” In recent times, Facebook has apparently compromised. At present, the registration of multiple machines with one account will not cause the Facebook account to be blocked and all bound devices to become bricked. The player’s problem has been solved, and Facebook has also avoided a major incident that caused a consumer dispute on its own products due to account sharing permissions. However, this incident also makes people think about it. Once the company that develops the device changes the account security policy, sometimes the impact may not be just a few letters in the clause, but it may be so serious that the device may be bought home, but it can only be used as a gorgeous paperweight:
▲Oculus responded as soon as possible, allowing users who discovered problems to directly go to the support page to raise issues for official resolution (Picture remake network）
▲With Facebook revising the account terms of use, the problem finally has a chance to be solved (Picture remake network）
Source: KOCPC Chinese