I don’t think cross play for competitive is worthwhile because either PC players have an advantage in the form of mouse aim, or console players have a wagon-dick-sized advantage in the form of aim assist. Competitive cross play only makes sense if you have input based match making.
You could get a Pico and have it sent to the Chinese government instead. Much further away from home
As far as stand alone HMD’s go, unless they make an android or Linux based system with an unlocked bootloader, none of them are safe for privacy. I was hoping there would be custom ROMs that could be flashed but nope
On that subject, I don’t know how much I’d value a “stand alone” vs just a wireless PCVR headset from valve. I’ve stayed away from the Index because of the need for base stations and the $1000 price point.
I bought a Quest 3 and while I actually really like the hardware, the stand alone games are just meh. Im spending way more time using it as a wireless PCVR headset for flat to vr mods than any dedicated Quest games.
I used LibGDX years ago when developing my own engine on top of it for android gaming, but gave up after a year when it became evident I had to refactor more and more because I didn’t know what I was doing when I started.