SANTA MONICA, California—I could not stop giggling.

I had just watched a pitch for a new single-player stealth video game from Oculus Studios, titled Phantom: Covert Ops, and was intrigued. The video looked like an interesting game’s opening sequence, in which players slip into a defended terrorist compound by paddling beneath its steel belly in a very quiet kayak. That’s a cool, REI-style way to begin a VR version of Metal Gear Solid, I thought. I was sure we’d soon see a hero hop onto land and get down to VR-espionage business.

Then the 30-second video ended, and a producer for the game gestured to a series of Oculus Quest demo stations while talking at length about this “military kayak” system and how it enabled “free and comfortable exploration” within the confines of VR.