Lucky explains that the Oculus Rift has added a great deal of additional technology since the days of the DK1 and DK2.
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Oculus founder Palmer Luckey won’t yet commit to a price tag for the Rift’s consume launch in early 2016, but has said it will be upwards of the $350 or so a dev kit costs. I’m certain there’ll be a game or two and a few tech demos, but it’s going to take years before VR is widely integrated in games, assuming it achieves critical mass at all. “You know, I’m going to be perfectly honest with you“, Luckey told Road to VR. But the final version of the Oculus Rift will be made with custom parts designed specifically for the headset. Now, players will have to decide which one might be capable of providing them with the best and most enjoyable experience.
They don’t want that “little better” logic entering the conversation about the Oculus Rift, and that means consumers will be spending a little more.
It’s not a matter of “Oh we’re selling more, we can make more money!” As such, the company is starting to talk a little more about the price point for the retail version of their virtual reality hardware.
“We need to put a stake in the ground and say: this is the best possible experience that we are able to make”.
‘We could have made trade-offs that had… honestly like 90% of the tracking quality we had now, and we chose to do things that would bump that quality up a little bit more even though it raised the cost of the headset.
However, Luckey has stressed that the price isn’t down to Oculus feeling greedy, it’s about getting consumers the best virtual reality experience it can offer. “Do you try to say “you know what, this is the first consumer VR headset that we’re going to be pushing out to people”.
Luckey added that Oculus collaborating on products like the smartphone-powered Samsung Gear VR, which costs $199.99 for an “Innovator Edition“, also makes the virtual reality experience accessible for more people.
Luckey says he’s confident VR will exist at multiple quality points and price points, but the Rift’s focus was, first and foremost, quality.
Starting with the PlayStation VR, which will obviously be used in concert with the PlayStation 4, this particular headset will be providing gamers with a 5.7-inch full HD display.
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According to an new interview published by RoadtoVR, Lucky has now stated that the kits will be more than $350, though he’s not willing to state how much.
