Meta Quest 3S Cardboard Hero Bundle Gets Early Black Friday Price Cut

Black Friday waits for no one, but Amazon clearly couldn’t either. The Meta Quest 3S Cardboard Hero Bundle landed on the site this week for $249.99, down from $299.99 and it’s already selling like hotcakes.

For that price you get the 128GB headset, a set of Touch Plus controllers and an exclusive pack for the multiplayer game Gorilla Tag: a Handiwork Helmet, Handiwork Armor and 1,000 shiny rocks worth $45 on their own. Throw in a three-month trial of Meta Horizon Plus for access to over 40 games and this package is one of the best VR entry points out there. Families looking for holiday gifts or anyone trying VR for the first time will find plenty to justify the grab.

Meta built the Quest 3S as a direct replacement for the five-year-old Quest 2 but with enough upgrades to feel new without breaking the bank. The headset runs on the Qualcomm Snapdragon XR2 Gen 2 chip, the same one in the more expensive Quest 3. That means twice the graphics power of the Quest 2 so load times are quicker and action is smoother in demanding games. Games like Asgard’s Wrath 2 or the bundled Batman: Arkham Shadow look great and move fast without hitching even on this budget model. Battery life is about two and a half hours per charge, enough for a solid session of swinging through virtual jungles in Gorilla Tag or slicing beats in rhythm games. The whole setup weighs just over a pound and the included elastic strap distributes pressure evenly for sessions that go past an hour.

Passthrough cameras get all the attention when you talk about mixed reality and the Quest 3S delivers with full color views of your room. Six RGB sensors capture everything at 18 pixels per degree, allowing you to see furnishings and family members vividly as digital items overlay the scene. Place a floating chessboard on your coffee table or watch cartoon characters run about the living room floor without taking off your headset. Setup takes minutes. Put it on, let the cameras scan your environment, and you’ll be ready to overlay virtual exercises over your yoga mat or transform movie evenings into private theaters with wall-to-wall screens.