Nate Mitchell, Oculus co-founder and former Head of VR Product at Facebook, has opened a new game studio called Mountaintop Studios. Despite pioneering the first wave of consumer VR, Mitchell says Mountaintop isn’t focusing on VR just yet.
Talking to GamesIndustry.biz, Mitchell said this, responding to whether Mountaintop would ever produce VR games:
“The short version is nothing has changed. The developers working in VR today are trailblazing some incredible gaming experiences—Half-Life: Alyx, for example—and I’m super excited to see what they build next.
“We haven’t left VR behind at Mountaintop—and I doubt we ever will—but it’s unlikely our first title will be VR.”
Mountaintop has a number of positions available, however none of them specify VR/AR experience as a prerequisite. Instead, the studio appears to be focused on creating multiplayer games for traditional platforms.
“Games are a reflection of the teams that make them. So to make the best games, we’re building a studio that puts the team first — one that’s collaborative, anti-crunch, diverse, and inclusive,” Mitchell says in a blog post.
Mitchell left Facebook back in August 2019, representing the final Oculus co-founder to leave the company.
Mountaintop also includes co-founder Matt Hansen, a former Executive Producer at Oculus, Hidden Path’s Mark Terrano, and Naughty Dog’s Richard Lyons—a team seemingly fit for the task of building a VR game, but alas.
