Oculus Rift Consumer Version Release Date Confirmed! What Can Fans Expect From Facebook And Oculus VR Merger?
As soon the news broke out the Facebook bought the Oculus Rift, a lot of fans weren't happy with it. There is a silver lining throughout all the bad hype the news is getting as the Oculus Rift consumer version release date may be released sooner due to the buy-out.
Cyberland noted that the Oculus Rift consumer version release date has been tentatively set for Fall 2015.
Not long after the announcement, Oculus co-founder and VR visionary Palmer Luckey took to Reddit to defend the decision to join a large and controversial company like Facebook. Luckey had this to say about the benefit of the acquisition:
"The partnership accelerates our vision, allows us to execute on some of our most creative ideas and take risks that were otherwise impossible. Most importantly, it means a better Oculus Rift with fewer compromises even faster than we anticipated."
With more working capital given to the company, Oculus VR will improve the Oculus Rift faster than it could have before and bring it to market sooner.
It should be noted that Facebook has shown to be able to grow businesses as well.
When Facebook acquired the photo sharing service Instagram nearly two years ago, there were 30 million active users. Today, that number is over 200 million. Did Facebook do this by fundamentally changing Instagram? No. If Zuckerberg's statements to investors earlier today are to be believed, Instagram has continued to operate independently since it was purchased. That doesn't mean that Facebook isn't leveraging Instagram as a product, but apart from reducing it's functionality on Twitter, Instagram has benefited from the partnership with Facebook because it's largely been left alone.
The association with a company like Facebook, whose proliferation of users is admirable, will expose Oculus VR and the Rift to a wider audience. With more people interested in VR, there's a greater chance that game publishers will take VR seriously, and the medium will grow faster than it otherwise would have.
