HTC is reportedly laying off 1,500 employees in its Taiwan manufacturing division, something Bloomberg’s Taipei bureau chief Samson Ellis reports to be around 22% of HTC employees.
German ESA astronaut Alexander Gerst is participating in a study aboard the International Space Station (ISS) that’s designed to give Earth-bound researchers a better understanding of how sight, sound, and gravity impacts hand-eye coordination. Using a modified Oculus Rift, Gerst isn’t strapping in for fun and games though (even if Echo VR or Space Junkies would take on a whole new level of immersion).
Using state-of-the-art photogrammetry technology with millimeter accuracy, Simon Che de Boer of Reality Virtual and Experius VR have digitally scanned Nerfertari’s tomb, letting owners of Vive, Rift, and Windows VR headsets step inside the fabled burial site and learn about the over 3,000 year-old Egyptian queen’s life, religion, and culture.
The monthly Steam hardware survey is out again, and while June hasn’t revealed any major upsets in the balances of usership between HTC Vive and Oculus Rift, the survey shows that Windows “Mixed Reality” VR headsets are making slow, but steady headway on the platform.
Last October Oculus announced its ‘Oculus Rift for Business‘ bundle, offering for the first time a package which included a warranty and license officially sanctioned for commercial use. This week the company dropped the price of the package and announced availability in four new regions, but China still isn’t on the list.
Space Junkies, Ubisoft’s upcoming VR arena shooter fro Rift and Vive, is now in closed beta, which goes until July 2nd. I called Space Junkies VR’s spiritual successor to Unreal Tournament in our preview, but you can check out some of the real action here in a complete match played by yours truly.
Unreal Tournament (1999) was one of the staple arena shooters of my youth. It’s simple; find the best gun you can, stock up on as much health and armor as possible, always keep moving until you die, respawn, rinse and repeat. In this respect, Ubisoft’s latest foray into VR has replicated much of this, which paradoxically leaves me undecided if I really like Space Junkies or not from what I’ve seen from the closed beta.
Pimax today announced they’ve headed into the mass production phase of the Pimax “8K” VR headset.
Niantic, the developer behind Pokémon Go and the upcoming Harry Potter AR game, announced they’ll be opening up access to their latest work in AR, dubbed the ‘Niantic Real World Platform’, to third-party developers soon. To boot, the company also introduced a few key AR technologies that will have you salivating over the possibilities of actually chasing down pocket monsters on your commute to that next Pokéstop.
Medium, Oculus’ first-party VR sculpting and modeling tool, today gets a major update in version 2.0, bringing better performance, improved tools, and the ability to export your creations into your own Oculus Home space.
Oculus and Sanzaru Games today announced their upcoming co-op VR game for Rift, MARVEL Powers United VR, finally has a release date. The game, which lets you take on the powers of a number of Marvel superheroes, is slated to launch on July 26th. To boot, the studios also announced they’re including Black Panther to the lineup of playable characters.
First Contact Entertainment today announced on the PlayStation blog that Firewall Zero Hour, the upcoming multiplayer VR shooter for PSVR, finally has a release date, and that a special PS Aim bundle will be available at launch.
High Fidelity, the social VR platform founded by Second Life founder Philip Rosedale, today announced it’s successfully closed a $35 million Series D financing round. The company says it’s using the funds to continue development on its global infrastructure for VR experiences, to accelerate hiring, and to open a new office in Seattle.
Bloomberg reported this week that the $500 million penalty levied at Oculus in last year’s case brought by ZeniMax has been reduced to $250 million. A motion seeking to prevent sales of Oculus products using code attributed to ZeniMax has been rejected, according to the publication.
HTC and China Mobile Communications Corporation today jointly announced a partnership to “accelerate the proliferation of 5G infrastructure and devices in China.” Further, China Mobile, the country’s massive state-owned mobile phone carrier, will help HTC push its VR devices into more retail channels.
