Oculus Rift

FlyingIrishMan

jenjenten wrote: »

lol....they paid 2 billion for a company that has no product on the market, has no idea what retail kits will cost, has no idea how much software will be available, has no idea if VR will even take off, have no idea if everyone will puke their ring up and file lawsuits for motion suckness.........

This entire OR malarky seems like one huge pie in the sky deal, a concept that nobody has any idea if it will make money, Atari Jaguar....yet FB pipe in and throw down 2 billion for a product that dosent exist, a concept np one knows will stick around....like HD DVD or Mini Disc.

The only winners here are the guys who started Occulos....they at least have real cash in the bank and share. They've played a great con, on the kickstarter crowd and now zuckerberg.....this could be the greatest con game in the last 200 years, Houdini....stand aside!

The product exists, you can order one right now. It's been extremely well received and works exactly as designed.

I don't think you realise how much money Facebook makes, $2Billion isn't a lot, if Oculus fails, it won't affect them much. If it pays out on the otherhand, they may very well be the front runner in the next major technology. Worth the risk if you ask me.

Duggy747

jenjenten wrote: »

lol....they paid 2 billion for a company that has no product on the market, has no idea what retail kits will cost, has no idea how much software will be available, has no idea if VR will even take off, have no idea if everyone will puke their ring up and file lawsuits for motion suckness.........

This entire OR malarky seems like one huge pie in the sky deal, a concept that nobody has any idea if it will make money, Atari Jaguar....yet FB pipe in and throw down 2 billion for a product that dosent exist, a concept np one knows will stick around....like HD DVD or Mini Disc.

The only winners here are the guys who started Occulos....they at least have real cash in the bank and share. They've played a great con, on the kickstarter crowd and now zuckerberg.....this could be the greatest con game in the last 200 years, Houdini....stand aside!

The product already exists, I have one where I was and still am sold on the fact that it works and works very well even in it's 1st development kit phase.

I think it's more than a gimmick and has realistic potential even beyond gaming, has (had :pac:) a strong community developing all sorts of tech demos games, mods for AAA games and software, support from big companies like Valve and professional developers releasing games this year with native support..................all for a kit that is still in it's first iteration of a development kit.

This new deal supposedly promises even cheaper kits with better hardware than what was originally promised by Oculus so we could very well see a consumer kit below the €300 mark, which was the original aim for a price, give or take a few euro.

It's iffy how this acquisition will work, I still find Facebook an odd choice, but if it works out, it'll work out really well.

Seedy Arling

johnny_ultimate wrote: »

I....
No...
But...


Wow.

Just like the opti-grab.

Pushtrak

jenjenten wrote: »

lol....they paid 2 billion for a company that has no product on the market, has no idea what retail kits will cost, has no idea how much software will be available, has no idea if VR will even take off, have no idea if everyone will puke their ring up and file lawsuits for motion suckness.........

This entire OR malarky seems like one huge pie in the sky deal, a concept that nobody has any idea if it will make money, Atari Jaguar....yet FB pipe in and throw down 2 billion for a product that dosent exist, a concept np one knows will stick around....like HD DVD or Mini Disc.

The only winners here are the guys who started Occulos....they at least have real cash in the bank and share. They've played a great con, on the kickstarter crowd and now zuckerberg.....this could be the greatest con game in the last 200 years, Houdini....stand aside!

FUD.

rey8px2m7altcs

jenjenten wrote: »

lol....they paid 2 billion for a company that has no product on the market, has no idea what retail kits will cost, has no idea how much software will be available, has no idea if VR will even take off, have no idea if everyone will puke their ring up and file lawsuits for motion suckness.........

This entire OR malarky seems like one huge pie in the sky deal, a concept that nobody has any idea if it will make money, Atari Jaguar....yet FB pipe in and throw down 2 billion for a product that dosent exist, a concept np one knows will stick around....like HD DVD or Mini Disc.

The only winners here are the guys who started Occulos....they at least have real cash in the bank and share. They've played a great con, on the kickstarter crowd and now zuckerberg.....this could be the greatest con game in the last 200 years, Houdini....stand aside!

VR not taking off? Come on man it is huge and you know it. We've been waiting for it since it first appeared in sci-fi books! It is a huge development into what will be widely available and wanted by consumers.

You say it is just a concept however CCP made an entire game for it, there are occulus rift head sets in 02 stores around the UK to exhibit some rugby crap. It moved beyond concept and into reality. Many people have the dev builds and they are working on games for it as we speak.

Icyseanfitz

or you could look at in as in people whos day to day business is technology have put their stamp on the rift as an up and coming heavyweight piece of tech, these lads arnt stupid you know?

AlmightyCushion

FlyingIrishMan wrote: »

The product exists, you can order one right now. It's been extremely well received and works exactly as designed.

I don't think you realise how much money Facebook makes, $2Billion isn't a lot, if Oculus fails, it won't affect them much. If it pays out on the otherhand, they may very well be the front runner in the next major technology. Worth the risk if you ask me.

Facebook make a lot of money but $2b isn't just pocket change to them. Last year they made $1.5b in profit so this is worth more than they made last year. Relatively speaking, it's the equivalent of apple buying a company for $50b just for an example. It's the reason their purchases are made up of large amounts of stock, it'd eat up too much of their war chest and cash flow otherwise.

Doge

jenjenten

jenjenten wrote: »

lol....they paid 2 billion for a company that has no product on the market, has no idea what retail kits will cost, has no idea how much software will be available, has no idea if VR will even take off, have no idea if everyone will puke their ring up and file lawsuits for motion suckness.........

This entire OR malarky seems like one huge pie in the sky deal, a concept that nobody has any idea if it will make money, Atari Jaguar....yet FB pipe in and throw down 2 billion for a product that dosent exist, a concept np one knows will stick around....like HD DVD or Mini Disc.

The only winners here are the guys who started Occulos....they at least have real cash in the bank and share. They've played a great con, on the kickstarter crowd and now zuckerberg.....this could be the greatest con game in the last 200 years, Houdini....stand aside!

What con? Development kits sit in rooms all over the world. The second kit will be shipping soon and by this time next year we should see the finished kit. VR is going to be huge, only a complete idiot can fail to see the possibilities for the tech. From the ability to be completely immersed in a game to watching a cinema sized screen from the comfort of your couch to re-enacting the hacking scene from Johnny Mnemonic.

If you bothered to read before posting then you wouldn't come across as a complete idiot. The product exists, unless of course the media, posters in this thread and gamers worldwide have been lieing to us. To restate the obvious, You'd have to be incredibly short sighted not to see that the possibilities for this tech are endless.

And btw, you puking comment is one of the oddest things I've ever read and think I dropped three IQ points after reading it. That you think a person can sue a company because a product gave them motion sickness is farcical. I assume you also think that those people who get headaches from 3D are prepping a class action lawsuit

FlyingIrishMan

AlmightyCushion wrote: »

Facebook make a lot of money but $2b isn't just pocket change to them. Last year they made $1.5b in profit so this is worth more than they made last year. Relatively speaking, it's the equivalent of apple buying a company for $50b just for an example. It's the reason their purchases are made up of large amounts of stock, it'd eat up too much of their war chest and cash flow otherwise.

My bad so. I was under the assumption that since they paid 19 billion for what's app, and another billion for instagram that this would be not much. Didn't realise that paid mainly in stock.

Still wouldn't be enough to put Facebook in any danger if it all falls apart.

Taylor365

jenjenten wrote: »

lol....

...aaaand account closed.

Hoping this acquisition doesn't put off developers.

Surely they(the suits) realise any association with actual facebook will destroy the device.

Player 2

http://http://www.trueplayergear.com

More VR!
First Sony announced an Oculus Rift competitor, now these guys..

Thargor

I suppose with the total lack of patents anyone can whack a 1080p screen into a headset now, There will probably be as many brands as there are for smartphones some day.

Player 2

You're right - and what I'd be curious to see is if LG / Panasonic / Samsung, etc, made a VR headset; based on their experience in the tv (and smartphone) worlds.

Perhaps with so many competitors in future, including Oculus Rift, Sony's effort and a handful of others they'll all up their game to the point where we get to the "minumum required specs for VR" that Valve reached their conclusions on.

ScumLord

Thargor wrote: »

I suppose with the total lack of patents anyone can whack a 1080p screen into a headset now, There will probably be as many brands as there are for smartphones some day.

Oculus have a head start on most in many ways though, they have the technology but probably just as important they have the brand awareness. When people talk about VR now they talk about the rift.

It doesn't seem to be as simple as just stick a motion tracker and a screen in a headset, they've talked about how they have to predict head movement to overcome the lag from sensors.

o1s1n

ScumLord wrote: »

Oculus have a head start on most in many ways though, they have the technology but probably just as important they have the brand awareness. When people talk about VR now they talk about the rift.

It doesn't seem to be as simple as just stick a motion tracker and a screen in a headset, they've talked about how they have to predict head movement to overcome the lag from sensors.

Hardware wise, there isn't too much there which couldn't just be reverse engineered by a competitor with a dev kit. I'd say if the right minds got together it wouldn't be too difficult to get up to where Oculus are now.

The brand awareness is an interesting one. The awareness you speak of was mainly among gamers - they've now crapped on that awareness among much of that community, ruining their image.

However, the merger with Facebook will undoubtedly create a whole other kind of awareness among a different demographic.

It really does remain to be seen what happens. I'd say the next few months will be really crucial for them. If a competitor jumps out soon with something truly great they may usurp them from the VR throne.

J_E

o1s1n wrote: »

It really does remain to be seen what happens. I'd say the next few months will be really crucial for them. If a competitor jumps out soon with something truly great they may usurp them from the VR throne.

The Sony Morpheus will be this, if they do it right.

ScumLord

o1s1n wrote: »

Hardware wise, there isn't too much there which couldn't just be reverse engineered by a competitor with a dev kit. I'd say if the right minds got together it wouldn't be too difficult to get up to where Oculus are now.

Most their hardware is off the shelf at this point but I'm sure it's told them what bespoke hardware would need to be made. Reverse engineering isn't an exact science, it's possible to make a copy but without knowing why the product is the way it is, or how they got to that stage it's easy to mess up and not know why you've messed up. The company doing the copying is a step behind because they don't know how to advance that product and have to rely on oculus to make their next step and then copy again, all they can do is make a cheap knock off, they're still some way off making their own product and understanding the product they're making.

The brand awareness is an interesting one. The awareness you speak of was mainly among gamers - they've now crapped on that awareness among much of that community, ruining their image.

You know what they say, "there's no such thing as bad publicity", if the rift works out and they deliver on their promises even the negative press will work in their favor because it'll keep them in peoples blogs and discussed on message boards until the product is ready.

I don't care what anyone thinks about Facebook, if the oculus delivers what everyone that originally wanted one expected, everyone will get one.

Kiith

Is there anything stopping Facebook pattenting the **** out of all the tech currently in the OR?

ScumLord

Kiith wrote: »

Is there anything stopping Facebook pattenting the **** out of all the tech currently in the OR?

Yes, it's probably already patented or can't be patented. There's nothing new in the rift it just uses current technology really well. I think they have a patent on the overall look of the unit so another company can't make an identical copy but outside of that there's nothing they've created that hasn't been done in some fashion before.

witnessmenow

ScumLord wrote: »

Yes, it's probably already patented or can't be patented. There's nothing new in the rift it just uses current technology really well. I think they have a patent on the overall look of the unit so another company can't make an identical copy but outside of that there's nothing they've created that hasn't been done in some fashion before.

If you can patent "slide to unlock" or "Garment pocket system for securely holding personal items with easy access" there is no way that with how much better they are than anything else available they do not have some patenable stuff, even if it was improvement on something that already exists, which they clearly have(an Improvement patent).

Up to this maybe they weren't interested in patents, and maybe they will continue not to be, but i really doubt they don't have stuff they can patent

Skerries

redditor today

I actually have seen a preview of Facebook's dashboard for Rift. Its pretty terrible, I'll try and describe it to you.

You log in, and on the splash screen there's a slideshow of new releases, and prominent sales going on. This ranges from blockbusters to popular indie titles. I'd expect to see a lot of minor sales in this section, but not so much from the AAA publishers.

To the right (in a smaller thumbnail) is where the real sales will be. cheap **** for 25-50- hell even 75% or more off! Remember it hardly costs FB anything to store this content so they don't care how much you end up paying as long as they still get theirs (all about volume amaright?).

Bellow is where your friends list is. This is the "community" section of the page. its where you see all of that crappy social stuff that we all hate. You know what I'm talking about; It shows what your friends have been doing. Like, what games they've been playing, achievements they've unlocked recently... videos, recomendations, screenshots... you know, all that **** we don't care about because all we care about is playing our own games.

But the worst part is what I've heard Facebook has planned for events. Think of huge weeklong (or longer) Advertisements. No joke advertisements that never seem to end. This is where Facebook is going to plug all this crap like trading tokens, and pressents for in game characters (like new hats!). All of this is going be forced on us behind the guise of a huge sale (probably called something like the "Rift Sunny Time, When People Should Probably Be Outside Anyway Sale!"). And boy will the sales be ridiculous. 75-80% off some of the biggest titles! But really Facebook will just use this sale to push a lot of the crap in their marketplace, since they don't care if you actually play the games in your library, just as long as you've paid for them

ScumLord

That sounds more like they want to go into competition with steam? They couldn't force you into a Steam like facebook client to use the rift??? Could they?

Tar.Aldarion

Dear lord, damn you Oculus.

Dave_The_Sheep

They can't actually force you to do anything.

johnny_ultimate

Open to correction, but even in the event that there's already a Facebook dashboard in existence for Oculus (would be bizarre if the acquisition isn't complete yet, let alone anything resembling the final hardware / UI), I can't possibly imagine it being anything other than a first draft or prototype build that may not even remotely resemble anything that will make its way to consumers. I'd definitely wait for something more than the ranty testimony of an anonymous Redditor before getting outraged.

Grumpypants

Skerries wrote: »

redditor today

I actually have seen a preview of Facebook's dashboard for Rift. Its pretty terrible, I'll try and describe it to you.

You log in, and on the splash screen there's a slideshow of new releases, and prominent sales going on. This ranges from blockbusters to popular indie titles. I'd expect to see a lot of minor sales in this section, but not so much from the AAA publishers.

To the right (in a smaller thumbnail) is where the real sales will be. cheap **** for 25-50- hell even 75% or more off! Remember it hardly costs FB anything to store this content so they don't care how much you end up paying as long as they still get theirs (all about volume amaright?).

Bellow is where your friends list is. This is the "community" section of the page. its where you see all of that crappy social stuff that we all hate. You know what I'm talking about; It shows what your friends have been doing. Like, what games they've been playing, achievements they've unlocked recently... videos, recomendations, screenshots... you know, all that **** we don't care about because all we care about is playing our own games.

But the worst part is what I've heard Facebook has planned for events. Think of huge weeklong (or longer) Advertisements. No joke advertisements that never seem to end. This is where Facebook is going to plug all this crap like trading tokens, and pressents for in game characters (like new hats!). All of this is going be forced on us behind the guise of a huge sale (probably called something like the "Rift Sunny Time, When People Should Probably Be Outside Anyway Sale!"). And boy will the sales be ridiculous. 75-80% off some of the biggest titles! But really Facebook will just use this sale to push a lot of the crap in their marketplace, since they don't care if you actually play the games in your library, just as long as you've paid for them

So just like Steam, Origin, PSN and Xbox Live so.

lmimmfn

So Abrash has now joined Facebook, thats the nail in the coffin for any Valve VR HMD

Dyr

lmimmfn wrote: »

So Abrash has now joined Facebook, thats the nail in the coffin for any Valve VR HMD

ffs, the bollix

Thargor

Skerries wrote: »

redditor today

I actually have seen a preview of Facebook's dashboard for Rift. Its pretty terrible, I'll try and describe it to you.

You log in, and on the splash screen there's a slideshow of new releases, and prominent sales going on. This ranges from blockbusters to popular indie titles. I'd expect to see a lot of minor sales in this section, but not so much from the AAA publishers.

To the right (in a smaller thumbnail) is where the real sales will be. cheap **** for 25-50- hell even 75% or more off! Remember it hardly costs FB anything to store this content so they don't care how much you end up paying as long as they still get theirs (all about volume amaright?).

Bellow is where your friends list is. This is the "community" section of the page. its where you see all of that crappy social stuff that we all hate. You know what I'm talking about; It shows what your friends have been doing. Like, what games they've been playing, achievements they've unlocked recently... videos, recomendations, screenshots... you know, all that **** we don't care about because all we care about is playing our own games.

But the worst part is what I've heard Facebook has planned for events. Think of huge weeklong (or longer) Advertisements. No joke advertisements that never seem to end. This is where Facebook is going to plug all this crap like trading tokens, and pressents for in game characters (like new hats!). All of this is going be forced on us behind the guise of a huge sale (probably called something like the "Rift Sunny Time, When People Should Probably Be Outside Anyway Sale!"). And boy will the sales be ridiculous. 75-80% off some of the biggest titles! But really Facebook will just use this sale to push a lot of the crap in their marketplace, since they don't care if you actually play the games in your library, just as long as you've paid for them

As if they have a UI already, thats just a karma-whore bull****ting like most Reddit comments.