Oculus SDK Update - v0.2.1

We've released a new version of the Oculus SDK, v0.2.1 on the Oculus Developer Center. Highlights for this release include:

- Basic drift-correction using the magnetometer.
- Platform support for OS X.
- Chromatic aberration shader sample.

The drift correction is still very much in beta as we continue to tweak and improve it. Also, the Unity and Unreal integrations do not include these new features yet, but they will in the next release.

We've updated the documentation and samples as well. If you’re interested, you can read the full build notes for the release here.

Michael’s GDC Session

Michael, chief software architect and co-founder of Oculus, gave a talk with Nate at GDC entitled ‘Running the VR Gauntlet’. It’s a great primer for tackling the technical challenges behind developing games for VR, particularly around rendering and performance.

Last-minute Address Changes

We receive quite a few support emails from backers asking to change/update their shipping address after we've shipped their rewards.

Once your order status has advanced to "Processing", you can no longer update your shipping information via the Oculus Order Manager. “Processing” means we've allocated your rewards and we’ve started the shipping process. At that point, there's no turning back -- your rewards are headed straight for that doorstep.

If your order isn’t “Processing” yet, please take a few minutes to verify and update your shipping information via the Oculus Order Manager right now. We can't stress this enough. Changing your address after your order has begun "Processing" will cause your rewards to be delayed. Sorry for the inconvenience, but please, update your shipping information now.

Quick Shipping Update

As of May 1st, we've shipped roughly 3,700 development kits backers worldwide (and we have more units in transit from the factory to our global warehouses).

The breakdown thus far:
~500 to Asia and Oceania
~700 to Europe
~2,500 to North America

Our production rate continues to improve, and we're currently building around 1,250 development kits each week. We're now setup with new fulfillment centers in Europe and Asia, which should reduce delivery times for international backers.

We’ve also finished signing the t-shirts and posters, which have already begun shipping to backers. If you haven’t received all your rewards yet, hang tight -- they’re coming soon!

EVE Fanfest 2013

We continue to be blown away by the creativity and enthusiasm of the developer community.

The latest ‘made-for-VR’ game comes from our friends (and Kickstarter backers) at CCP Games. EVR is a multiplayer space dog-fighting game based in the EVE Universe. The entire demo was built in just 7 weeks using the Oculus Unity integration by a small team of CCP devs working in their spare time. You can check out the trailer below:

With gorgeous visuals, engaging sound, intuitive controls, and a well-thought-out cockpit, it’s hands-down one of the best demos that we’ve played yet. The EVR dev team at CCP designed the whole experience exclusively for VR, and it really shows.

Over 1,000 pilots had the chance to try it at EVE Fanfest 2013 last weekend, and the response was overwhelmingly positive. A few people waited in line 5+ times for a chance to dominate the space battle. CCP hasn’t announced what they’re doing with EVR going forward, but we’re hoping everyone has a chance to try it soon.

6v6 space dog-fighting in VR null-sec. Photos by Arnaldur Halldórsson.

We’re really looking forward to seeing what the community comes up with next. As always, keep us posted on your new projects and demos.

We’ll see you in the game!

-- Palmer and the Oculus team

For those of you that couldn’t make it to Palmer’s talk and Q&A session at GDC, “Virtual Reality - The Holy Grail of Gaming,” we’ve posted the recording for your viewing pleasure!

Team Fortress 2 in the Rift

The exclusive Team Fortress 2 Rift development kit hat (TF2VRH) is now available to Kickstarter backers via the Oculus Order Manager.

You can claim your hat right now by logging into www.oculusvr.com/sales and following the instructions there. If you pre-ordered after the Kickstarter campaign but before April 1, 2013, you’ll be able to claim your hat as soon as your dev kit has shipped.

Now that Rift development kits are out in the wild, we thought it was time to bring Oculus developers together for a Team Fortress 2 VR throwdown. With that in mind, we've opened an official Oculus TF2 VR server!

You can connect to the Oculus server starting today using the address ‘tf2.oculusvr.com’, or by searching for “Oculus” in the TF2 Server Browser. You can also connect using the TF2 console with the command ‘connect tf2.oculusvr.com’.

We strongly encourage you to play using the Rift! The Oculus team will be in there from time to time to defend our VR turf. Palmer’s most-played Steam game is TF2, so be ready for some stiff competition.

To celebrate the Oculus server’s grand opening, we’re hosting the first (of many) Oculus VR Gaming Night this Friday, April 19th from 6 - 9pm PDT!

We’ll square off with the community in Capture/Payload gametypes, all in virtual reality using the Rift development kit. This could be your chance to blow up Palmer with a rocket launcher as a Soldier or save him from near-death as a Medic! We’ll also be streaming the event on TwitchTV so you can watch the mayhem live.

Even if you don’t have your dev kit yet (sorry!), don’t hesitate to jump in and show us what you're made of!

"Holy Mackerel!"

And just in case you missed it, “My 90 year old grandmother tries the Oculus Rift.”

We’ll see you (and grandma) in the game!

-- Palmer and the Oculus team

Now that Rift development kits are in the wild and the Oculus SDK is live, game developers have started creating amazing VR experiences. We’re really enjoying checking out the community’s latest samples and demos. Keep them coming!

If you have an awesome, new VR experience to share, let us know via Twitter, Facebook, or the Oculus Forums. We’d love to try it!

With all the energy in the community, this weekend felt like the right time to put together an update on all things Oculus.

GDC Recap

Phill Ryu, GDC attendee, tries the Oculus Rift for the first time at GDC.

For Oculus, GDC 2013 was nothing short of incredible. Virtual reality made a huge splash -- you could feel the excitement in the air. We loved every minute we spent brainstorming the possibilities for the next generation of VR gaming with some of the best game developers in the world. It was really special to be a part of.

Photo from the front of the Oculus booth looking back at the line.

An enormous thank you to everyone who waited in that line just to get a glimpse of the Rift or to meet the team. It means the world to us.

It’s hard to capture that same excitement and energy from GDC in words, but here are a few of our favorite pictures, videos, and articles from the show:

“Piloting a Mech in Hawken in virtual reality is a very different experience; you are acutely aware that you are a person inside a large piece of thudding, heavy, violent machinery... The illusion of actually being there, inside the Mech, was hard to shake.” - Ben Kuchera, Penny Arcade Report

Palmer demoing Hawken VR with the Rift dev kit.

“Oculus VR's Oculus Rift virtual reality headset was the runaway star of GDC... The line to test drive the mech combat game Hawken on the Rift was at least a hundred strong for the entire show—two-hour wait times were not uncommon and I personally witnessed people literally running to the Oculus booth to get a head start on the line when the exhibition floor opened...” - Damon Poeter, PCMag

The additional line area for the Oculus booth. People waited through this (thank you!), then moved to the line around the actual booth. Shout-out to the amazing GDC CA staff who helped us throughout the show.

Patient fans waiting for a demo, drawing on the booth’s walls.

Between the crowd at the booth, media, developer meetings, our GDC talks, remotely launching the Developer Center, and shipping the first batch of dev kits, GDC was a thrilling week. Special thanks to all the backers who came out and shared a few drinks with us at the Thirsty Bear.

We recorded both of our GDC talks, which we’ll be posting online soon. Palmer’s “Virtual Reality - The Holy Grail of Gaming” will be available early this week, then Michael and Nate’s talk on the challenges of designing great VR games should be ready in the next week or two.

Palmer during his talk, “Virtual Reality: The Holy Grail of Gaming.”

Michael and Nate discuss the challenges of building a great virtual reality experience in their talk, “Running the VR Gauntlet.”

Thank you to everyone who came up and spoke with us during the show. It was a pleasure meeting all of you! And again, a special ‘Thank you’ to our backers for making this possible. We couldn’t have done it without you.

Shipping Update

The Oculus logistics team is 100% focused on getting dev kits to your doorstep. Here’s the latest on our progress:

We’ve shipped roughly 1,850 development kits worldwide so far (~500 internationally). Up next, we have another ~2,000 arriving around April 26th, but it could be a few days earlier or later depending on international customs.

Of the upcoming ~2,000 unit batch, ~500 will be EU, ~500 will be Asia/Oceania, and the rest will be the Americas. These units will also be the first delivered via our new EU/Asia/Oceania fulfillment network, which should help reduce delivery times and costs.

Nirav laying claim to a few of the units delivered to Oculus HQ.

If you’d like to learn more about our international shipping plans, Nate provided a detailed breakdown over in the official Oculus Forums, which you can read here.

A handful of international backers have reported a few speed bumps with European and Canadian deliveries related to customs and tax charges. Sorry for the inconvenience, we’re working on sorting these issues out now. If you have any problems with your delivery, please let us know by emailing support@oculusvr.com!

If you’re one of the generous backers who has received their Rift and shared the experience with your friends, neighbors and community: Thank you! Keep spreading the word and sending us your feedback. We’re really looking forward to seeing what you come up with!

T-Shirts and Posters

The ever-elusive Oculus Kickstarter t-shirts and posters are finally ready! These will be shipping worldwide starting next week.

Oculus-ready UDK

The Oculus-ready Unreal Development Kit (UDK) is now available from the Oculus Developer Center! A handful of developers have already started exploring UDK scenes in VR. If you haven’t downloaded it yet, you can grab it here. 

Unity Trial Extensions

The Unity Pro Trial Extensions aren’t available yet, but they will be soon. We’re just nailing down the details on how to deliver the extension codes to you. As soon as we have that figured out, we’ll let you know.

Building for the Future

While the logistics team manages moving 10,000+ Rifts around the world, the engineering team is heads-down on the Oculus SDK and the future of the Rift.

Team meeting, plus a birthday celebration for Andres, Peter, Lee, and Nikolay (note the delicious Oculus-themed cupcakes).

If you’ve received your development kit and you’d like to send us feedback, talk to other Oculus developers, or just discuss virtual reality, head over to the official Oculus Forums! The team reads and replies to questions/discussions there whenever they can. It’s also the best place to keep up to date on all things Oculus.

Thanks for the continued support!

-- Palmer and the Oculus team

Rejoice fellow VR pioneers: the day has finally arrived. Oculus Rift development kits are officially shipping! In fact, the very first kits have already started arriving.

We actually started shipping on Wednesday, but we haven’t shared tracking information yet because the team is still tied up at GDC in San Francisco. Sorry about that! This means the earliest backers may actually find Rift’s on their doorsteps before they receive tracking numbers. A little surprise to keep things interesting.

This day has been a long time in the making. We'd like to thank you again for your patience, support, and enthusiasm for virtual reality! We couldn't have gotten here without you.

It'll take time for us to ship 10,000+ development kits. Hold fast -- they're coming. When you do receive your Rift, let us know what you think @Oculus3d on Twitter!

Oculus Developer Center Now Open

With development kits on their way, it’s time to open up the Oculus Developer Center. You can dive in right now at http://developer.oculusvr.com.

You’ll find everything you need to start building VR content with your Rift development kit including the Oculus SDK, Unity and Unreal Engine integrations, samples, documentation, videos, the developer wiki, and community forums.

The dev center is the place for Oculus developers to come together and collaborate on virtual reality. There are plenty of tough problems to solve, which is why it's so important for the community to come together to really bring virtual reality to life.

We wanted to empower the community to build the next generation of gaming. All of the source code for the core Oculus SDK is available under the Oculus License and full source for the samples is available under Apache 2.0! This also makes the Oculus SDK much easier to integrate, debug, port, and build on.

Go forth, developers, and seek out our virtual future.

Developer Showcases

Once your Rift arrives, we recommend that you download the Oculus SDK from the Developer Center, and try the World Demo, a simple Tuscany-esque environment we showed at SXSW.

After that, the possibilities are endless. Play Team Fortress 2’s “VR Mode” in the Rift. Experiment with world building in Unity and Unreal Engine. Share game prototypes with the community. Or, build a “Made for VR” game that defines a new genre.

The Rift lets you experience games in completely new ways. Whatever you decide, have fun.

Looking for a little inspiration on where to begin? The full recording of our SXSW panel, "Virtual Reality: The Holy Grail of Gaming" with Cliff Bleszinksi, Paul Bettner, Chris Roberts, and Palmer is online now:

Day Zero

We want to hear from you. Remember, the Rift, the SDK, and the Dev Center will be shaped by your feedback. If you have suggestions, please let us know!

This is just the beginning. Virtual reality, as a technology and as a medium, is still in its infancy. It will improve in all aspects, opening up even more ways to be immersed in virtual worlds. With virtual reality, the possibilities really are limitless.

Thank you for joining the revolution.

We'll see you in the game!

-- Palmer and the Oculus team