Wednesday, October 30, 2013

Oculus Rift to cross over to mobile gaming via Android

Oculus VR has revealed plans to bring their celebrated virtual-reality headset, the Oculus Rift, to the mobile gaming market via Android.

The Oculus Rift has gained momentum withing the gaming sphere, and has ushered in a new emerging medium to the industry as a whole. The headset, which is being crafted by Oculus VR, is an innovative new way to enjoy PC titles and has captured the interest of gamers worldwide.

At this year’s Gamesbeat 2013 conference, the firm revealed that it plans to cross-over to mobile gaming with a lighter Oculus Rift headset that runs on the Android mobile operating system.
“We have some exciting plans on the mobile VR side as the PC VR side,” Brenden Iribe, CEO of Oculus VR, said during the conference.

“We’re really looking at hitting the consumer market. We’re very excited about what we’re seeing. Skeptical about how good mobile VR could be on such a small platform. It’s pretty incredible what [John Carmack has] been able to do.”

(Image Source: Popular Mechanics)



This announcement compliments an interesting scenario poised by John Carmack–the former id co-founder turned Chief Technology Officer for Oculus VR–in a recent interview. Carmack’s idea centered around “a head-mounted display that probably runs Android, as a standalone system, that has a system-on-a-chip that’s basically like what you have in mobile phones.”

It will be interesting to see how Carmack facilitates his vision with a prototype, which may very well change the realm of mobile gaming as a whole. In its current state, mobile gaming is geared more towards micro-transactions and free-to-play games, and some gamers might not see the point of have a virtual reality peripheral for on-the-go gaming, and may see it as unnecessary and impractical.

In any case, the idea might not catch on, but it certainly is the kind of out-there thinking that can lead to re-inventing the boundaries of conventional gaming.

It is also worth noting that Oculus VR has no plans to include support for iOS, and is sticking with Android for their mobile virtual reality headset.

The Oculus Rift project started out via a Kickstar campaign, and was successfully funded to the tune of $2 million, and Oculus VR has since acquired $16 million via investor funding. No official release date for the Oculus Rift has been announced, but dev kits have apparently been in circulation since earlier this year.

Via Venture Beat





Read More: http://vr-zone.com/articles/oculus-r...oid/62134.html






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