Meta is adding some better customization features to its avatar maker as part of the latest update to its Quest headsets. With the v57 update, you can “fine-tune things like your hair and eyebrow color, more precisely adjust your skin tone, add makeup and face paint, and otherwise make your VR persona better reflect how you see yourself IRL,” according to a blog post from Monday from Meta.
I don’t have the update yet, but based on a screenshot from Meta (which I added at the top of this post), it looks like the update will add a lot of much-needed improvements. For example, in the screenshot you can see that there are sliders that let you specify a shade for the person’s base hair color and highlights; on v56, which I have, I can only choose from Meta’s pre-selected colors for my hair. Meta’s v57 screenshot also shows off some new makeup options like blush and face paint.
It looks like there are a lot of nice additions here, and considering that the long-promised avatar legs for avatars will soon be available to everyone, it looks like Meta’s avatars are about to get a lot better.
v57 also includes a few other updates. Users in Australia, Canada, Iceland, New Zealand, South Korea, Switzerland, Taiwan, and the US can unsend image messages you send in VR and the Quest mobile app. The Explore feed, which suggests apps you might like, is being rebranded as the Horizon feed (which is likely to better suit the company’s specs). Horizon worlds branding it uses for this purpose Roblox-like social app). But according to the v57 full release notes, the update also removes the ability to simultaneously cast what you see on your Quest headset to the Quest mobile app on your iPhone.