How To Watch Live NCAA Football Games in Virtual Reality
When you first watch a movie on a VR Big Screen, your first thought will likely be, “Holy cow, I wonder if I can watch college football like this?”
And the answer is Yes! It’s possible to watch college football games in VR; however, it’s not necessarily easy. Here are the ways I’ve found to make it work.
Try The ESPN+ App
Oculus has an ESPN+ app (with decent ratings) that shows some live games. You’ll need cable or a login to get access. You’ll also need your preferred content to be playing on ESPN. But if you have all those things, it’s a good option for watching the game on a big screen VR screen.
Unfortunately, I haven’t found any 360° content for college football as of this writing (this option just gives you a virtual big screen). That said, if you want to get an idea for what watching a football in 360 might be like, check out the following YouTube video using your VR headset.
Remote Desktop Into Your PC / Mac
I wrote an entire article about writing code while in VR by using the Immersed app to remote desktop into your computer.
The process for watching NCAAF games is effectively the same. Any game you can pull up on your computer via a web browser becomes accessible in virtual reality (on as big a screen as you like). Heck, an app like Immersed even lets you invite friends to hang out in your private room.
Here’s what that looks like when I did it for an NFL game.
So the real question becomes, “how do you get access to NCAA Football games on your computer.” Here are a handful of options that will actually work (though most aren’t free).
- Local Network & Cable Streaming: Using YouTube TV, Sling TV , Hulu TV, etc.
- College Sports Networks: Big 10 Network, SEC Network, ACC Network, etc.
- Streaming Sports Networks: ESPN+, Pluto.TV, & Facebook
It’s not your own personal private sports bar just yet, but we’re certainly getting there if you can figure out how to pull up several games online and have the Internet connection to support it.
Try The DeoVR, Oculus, or Firefox VR Web Browser
Sometimes college football games are streamed online through CBS sports, Fox Sports, ESPN, etc. You can try using your VR headset’s web browser as an easier way to stream to your device than setting up a remote desktop experience.
The problem with this option is VR web browsers tend to have compatibility issues with various websites. That said, if it works with the website you need it to, that’s an easy way to stream the game on a big virtual screen.
Also, DeoVR is the best VR web browser for watching videos. I’d start by downloading that browser and giving it a try.
Conclusion: Is Watching Football on The Quest 2 Worth It?
For me, the resolution on the Quest 2 isn’t high enough for me to prefer watching a game in VR over a traditional television just yet. That said, higher resolution VR headsets are dropping in 2022, which promises to fix that problem.
So we’re not quite there yet. That said, virtual reality will blow up over the next 5 years. It’s entirely possible there are more content options in the near future.