Technologies

Meow Wolf Enters the Mini-Golf Metaverse

Exclusive: Walkabout Mini Golf is adding a new VR course designed by immersive art pioneer Meow Wolf. The designers gave us hints of what’s to come.

Walkabout Mini Golf, one of the best multiplayer apps for VR headsets, is adding a course made by art collective Meow Wolf and based on the group’s real-world experiences. It’s Meow Wolf’s first big dip into virtual reality, and it’s scheduled to arrive later this year.

It’s not as strange a move as you might think for Meow Wolf, the group behind the cult hit House of Eternal Return, in Santa Fe, New Mexico, and a growing bunch of other in-person destinations (Omega Mart in Las Vegas, Convergence Station in Denver).

Or maybe it is.

But in a VR/AR landscape that still doesn’t really know what a metaverse is supposed to be, this collaboration could point toward creative teams actually trying to figure this out ahead of a wave of new headsets coming later this year.

Let me back up a bit. I find well-built, custom-crafted VR experiences wonderful. I also love immersive physical spaces and theater experiences that take similar care with how groups of people explore strange new worlds together.

VR and AR’s metaverse push of the last couple of years, however, has tried to just create big open social tools with no real guidance or superstructure. These places — VRChat, the soon-to-be-closed AltSpace VR, Meta’s flailing Horizon Worlds, Rec Room — seem to either be spots where fun stuff emerges, or confusing and poorly run experiments that feel empty or alienating unless you know who you’re meeting with and where you’re going.

Sometimes, I find that it’s the in-person experiences that can craft what the virtual ones can’t yet. Meow Wolf’s in-person, multilayered, maximally dense art collective spaces struck me as the sort of way to guide more-elaborate social virtual worlds of the future. The Meow Wolf–Walkabout collaboration sounds like a bizarre and whimsical mirror-world experience that’s also a foot in the door for Meow Wolf’s future explorations in VR and AR.

meow-wolf-walkabout-vr-2 — Meow Wolf’s course will involve an intelligent alien world called Numina that plays with reality.

Meow Wolf

Weird golf

«We’ve been dreaming about making mini-golf forever,» Caity Kennedy, one of Meow Wolf’s co-founders and the group’s senior creative director, said to me during a Zoom chat. «Since a lot of our exhibits are a big thing compartmentalized with a bunch of little things, mini-golf is like a pretty hilarious and very accessible version of that.»

Another Meow Wolf co-founder, Vince Kadlubek, had been playing in VR games and experiences for years, which led to the collaboration with the team at Walkabout Mini Golf. Meow Wolf had made its own AR companion app for the House of Eternal Return installation years ago, but translating some of those designs into a VR mini-golf course is a different type of crossover experience.

Kennedy already uses some VR art tools, including Gravity Sketch, to work on designs for Meow Wolf’s physical installations. Gravity Sketch was also used as a collaborative place to dream up the VR course. «We have VR artists, we have VR developers that are working on things,» Kennedy hinted, suggesting that Walkabout’s relatively contained structure might be a good starting point.

If you haven’t been paying attention, Walkabout Mini Golf has already become one of the best social VR destinations if you have a small group of friends. This game, and Demeo, are where I tend to join a few old friends for a casual game that lasts about an hour, allows us to chat and explore, and then stop. It feels like going for a walk, or getting coffee, or going to a museum. Or playing mini-golf. Unlike more-intense VR games, or way too open social worlds with no real focus, it gives us something to do while we’re talking. It works.

«It aligned a lot with our sense of humor,» Kennedy said of the collaboration. «You can be good at golf, you can be bad at golf, you can just not play golf and go explore.»

Golf as a strange doorway

Walkabout’s golf courses have already been getting a lot more immersive over time, becoming more like walk-through theme parks or stories than just a bunch of golf holes. A course based on the classic Jim Henson film Labyrinth is like a tour of the film’s plot, and even has a side labyrinth to wander around in. There are Jules Verne courses. There’s a Myst course.

The Meow Wolf course, based on the living other-dimensional jungle world of Numina that’s part of Meow Wolf’s in-person Convergence Station experience in Denver, is meant to be a sort of parallel virtual visit, or maybe a golf course that ends up being visited by and mutated by Numina.

Kennedy hints that the way Meow Wolf’s course will work is a lot stranger and more whimsical than even previous Walkabout courses, which of course excites me. Also, the presence of Numina as a character will loom large over the experience, a «living universe that is curious about us simple animals that are wandering around, falling down stairs and things.»

«It’s not just a duplicate,» Kennedy said of the VR version of Numina versus the physical creation in Denver. «There will be a familiar experience that is twisted and freed by the mechanics of virtual reality. People who’ve been to Numina in real life [at Meow Wolf] will see a lot of things that they got to see in real life, but a lot of people who have only seen pictures will get to wander around something akin to the pictures they’ve seen.

«But, lots of differences: I mean, gravity doesn’t exist in VR. We can make things slip. We don’t have to have electrical wires, or speakers or a lot of the things that limit what we’re able to do. And we’re able to have animation that we can’t do. There’s so much fluidity that is really only possible at the moment in VR.»

A massive furry art creature sculpture in a dim jungle world room — One of the areas in Numina at Meow Wolf’s Convergence Station in Denver. The VR experience will refer to the real-world place in strange ways.

Scott Stein/CNET

Virtual and real winking at each other

Disney has explored crossovers of the virtual and real. It’s created a Star Wars Tales From the Galaxy’s Edge VR game that’s set in the outer realms of the same planet Batuu as the real-life Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge parks. In theory, visiting the virtual game could inspire you to go to the actual park, or the game could be a living souvenir.

Future planned metaverse-ish explorations could have a similar vibe. Meow Wolf’s own physical spaces communicate with each other via telephones, and a ton of merchandise already extends the stories into some take-home souvenir directions. You can buy Omega Mart merchandise from the alternate-universe store’s gift shop, for example, or get books and artifacts, much like you can at Disney’s stores in Galaxy’s Edge. In some ways, Meow Wolf’s virtual spaces may aim to do the same.

«Mini-golf is not a collective world, so there can’t be live feeds into anything, but having connections between the two, where people can at least see one from the other, or use something they found in one to affect the other… this is going to be kind of our test case,» Kennedy said. «This is our first foray into connecting a real world exhibit with virtual reality.»

Lucas Martell, the director of Walkabout Mini Golf, said the Meow Wolf course «is going to be much more of an experience,» admitting that the company is starting to flex out with more experimental designs that start becoming more like one-hour excursions for groups, as opposed to just a casual sport.

Even though Walkabout is a VR game, the company has also released a phone-based version that’ll use augmented reality, sort of: Courses can be seen through the phone screen, and swings happen by moving your phone like a real putter. The phone version is arriving ahead of Meow Wolf’s course, meaning more people could try it out.

«The irony is that a lot of people playing probably haven’t even been to an actual Meow Wolf,» Martell said. Considering Meow Wolf is still an organization some people haven’t heard of, much less seen, a little mini golf game like Walkabout could be a chance to open up awareness to a whole bunch more people. As someone who’s been lucky enough to check out the real-world Meow Wolf spaces, I’m looking forward to visiting a small virtual shard of it in my home.

Meow Wolf’s course isn’t available until later this year, but I can’t wait to play it with a few friends. We could explore those strange spaces together in VR as we talk, just like we’d do in the real world, too.

Before You Order a $20K Home Robot, There’s Something You Should See

It’s designed to do your chores — with some help from folks behind the curtain.

The robot stands 5 feet 6 inches tall, weighs about as much as a golden retriever and is nearly the price of a brand-new budget car.

This is Neo, the humanoid robot. It’s billed as a personal assistant you can talk to and eventually rely on to handle everyday tasks, including loading your dishwasher and folding your laundry.

Neo doesn’t come cheap: it’ll cost you $20,000. And even then, you’ll still have to train this new home bot, and possibly need a remote assist as well.

If that still sounds enticing, preorders are now open (for $200 down). You’ll be signing up as an early adopter for what Neo’s maker, a California-based company called 1X, is calling a «consumer-ready humanoid.» That’s opposed to other humanoids under development from the likes of Tesla and Figure, which are, for the moment at least, more focused on factory environments.

Neo is a whole order of magnitude different from robot vacuums like those from Roomba, Eufy and Ecovacs, and embodies a long-running sci-fi fantasy of robot maids and butlers doing chores and picking up after us. If this is the future, read on for more of what’s in store.

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What the Neo robot can do around the house

The pitch from 1X is that Neo can do all manner of household chores: fold laundry, run a vacuum, tidy shelves and bring in the groceries. It can open doors, climb stairs and even act as a home entertainment system.

Neo appears to move smoothly, with a soft, almost human-like gait, thanks to 1X’s tendon-driven motor system that gives it gentle motion and impressive strength. The company says it can lift up to 154 pounds and carry 55 pounds, but it is quieter than a refrigerator. It’s covered in soft materials and neutral colors, making it look less intimidating than metallic prototypes from other companies.

The company says Neo has a 4-hour runtime. Its hands are IP68-rated, meaning they’re submersible in water. It can connect via Wi-Fi, Bluetooth and 5G. For conversation, it has a built-in large language model (LLM), the same sort of AI technology that powers ChatGPT and Gemini.

The primary way to control the Neo robot will be by speaking to it, just as if it were a person.

Still, Neo’s usefulness today depends heavily on how you define useful. The Wall Street Journal’s Joanna Stern got an up-close look at Neo at 1X’s headquarters and found that, at least for now, it’s largely teleoperated, meaning a human often operates it remotely using a virtual-reality headset and controllers.

«I didn’t see Neo do anything autonomously, although the company did share a video of Neo opening a door on its own,» Stern wrote last week. 1X CEO Bernt Børnich reportedly told her that Neo will do most things autonomously in 2026, though he also acknowledged that the quality «may lag at first.»

The company’s FAQ says that if there’s a chore request Neo doesn’t know how to accomplish, you can schedule an expert from 1X to help the robot «learn while getting the job done.»

What you need to know about Neo and privacy

Part of what early adopters are signing up for is to allow Neo to learn from their environment, so that future versions can operate more independently.

That learning process raises questions about privacy and trust. The robot uses a mix of visual, audio and contextual intelligence — meaning it can see, hear and remember interactions with you in your home.

«If you buy this product, it is because you’re OK with that social contract,» Børnich told the Journal. «It’s less about Neo instantly doing your chores and more about you helping Neo learn to do them safely and effectively.»

Neo’s reliance on human operation behind the scenes prompted a response from John Carmack, a computer industry luminary known for his work with VR systems and the lead programmer of classic video games, including Doom and Quake.

«Companies selling the dream of autonomous household humanoid robots today would be better off embracing reality and selling ‘remote operated household help’,» he wrote in a post on the X social network.

1X says it’s taking steps to protect your privacy: Neo listens only when it recognizes it’s being addressed, and its cameras will blur out humans. You can restrict Neo from entering or viewing specific areas of your home, and the robot will never be teleoperated without owner approval, the company says.

But inviting an AI-equipped humanoid to observe your home life isn’t a small step.

The first units are expected to ship to customers in the US in 2026. There is a $499 monthly subscription alternative to the $20,000 full purchase price, although it will be available at an unspecified later date. A broader international rollout is promised for 2027.

Neo’s got a long road ahead of it to live up to the expectations set by Rosie the Robot in The Jetsons way back when. But this is no Hanna-Barbera cartoon. What we’re seeing now is a much more tangible harbinger of change.

Technologies

I Turned Off These 3 iOS Settings and My iPhone Battery Life Tripled

If you want your iPhone battery to last longer, these are the settings you should disable immediately.

Your iPhone is a crucial part of your routine. From staying in touch with friends or family, navigating around traffic snarls and snapping cute photos of your pets, you’re likely using it all day long. However, that can become tricky if your battery is down to low levels before you even leave the office. While phone batteries will degrade over time, it doesn’t mean you need to employ low power mode just to keep your phone from dying.

Your iPhone has a few key settings that are notorious for draining your battery in the background. The good news is, you can turn them off. Instead of watching your battery percentage plummet at the worst possible moment, a few simple tweaks will give you hours of extra life.

Before you even think about buying a new phone, check your Battery Health menu (anything above 80% is decent) and then turn off these three power-hungry settings. It’s the easiest way to make your iPhone battery last longer, starting right now.

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Turn off widgets on your iPhone lock screen

All the widgets on your lock screen force your apps to automatically run in the background, constantly fetching data to update the information the widgets display, like sports scores or the weather. Because these apps are constantly running in the background due to your widgets, that means they continuously drain power.

If you want to help preserve some battery on iOS 18, the best thing to do is simply avoid widgets on your lock screen (and home screen). The easiest way to do this is to switch to another lock screen profile: Press your finger down on your existing lock screen and then swipe around to choose one that doesn’t have any widgets.

If you want to just remove the widgets from your existing lock screen, press down on your lock screen, hit Customize, choose the Lock Screen option, tap on the widget box and then hit the «—« button on each widget to remove them.

Reduce the motion of your iPhone UI

Your iPhone user interface has some fun, sleek animations. There’s the fluid motion of opening and closing apps, and the burst of color that appears when you activate Siri with Apple Intelligence, just to name a couple. These visual tricks help bring the slab of metal and glass in your hand to life. Unfortunately, they can also reduce your phone’s battery life.

If you want subtler animations across iOS, you can enable the Reduce Motion setting. To do this, go to Settings > Accessibility > Motion and toggle on Reduce Motion.

Switch off your iPhone’s keyboard vibration

Surprisingly, the keyboard on the iPhone has never had the ability to vibrate as you type, an addition called «haptic feedback» that was added to iPhones with iOS 16. Instead of just hearing click-clack sounds, haptic feedback gives each key a vibration, providing a more immersive experience as you type. According to Apple, the very same feature may also affect battery life.

According to this Apple support page about the keyboard, haptic feedback «might affect the battery life of your iPhone.» No specifics are given as to how much battery life the keyboard feature drains, but if you want to conserve battery, it’s best to keep this feature disabled.

Fortunately, it is not enabled by default. If you’ve enabled it yourself, go to Settings > Sounds & Haptics > Keyboard Feedback and toggle off Haptic to turn off haptic feedback for your keyboard.

For more tips on iOS, read about how to access your Control Center more easily and why you might want to only charge your iPhone to 95%.

Technologies

Today’s NYT Mini Crossword Answers for Sunday, Nov. 23

Here are the answers for The New York Times Mini Crossword for Nov. 23.

Looking for the most recent Mini Crossword answer? Click here for today’s Mini Crossword hints, as well as our daily answers and hints for The New York Times Wordle, Strands, Connections and Connections: Sports Edition puzzles.

Need some help with today’s Mini Crossword? It includes a Jimi Hendrix reference, which I appreciated. Read on for the answers. And if you could use some hints and guidance for daily solving, check out our Mini Crossword tips.

If you’re looking for today’s Wordle, Connections, Connections: Sports Edition and Strands answers, you can visit CNET’s NYT puzzle hints page.

Read more: Tips and Tricks for Solving The New York Times Mini Crossword

Let’s get to those Mini Crossword clues and answers.