OrbusVR, an MMORPG created from the ground-up for VR headsets, is getting a free weekend on Rift starting April 19th to April 22nd. As a part of Oculus’ two-year anniversary of Rift, this is the fourth weekend to feature a one hour-long period that automatically enters you to win some pretty big prizes.

To enter, simply download OrbusVR (free during that period) and play anytime between 1PM – 2 PM PT (local end time here) on Saturday, April 21st.

Prizes include:

  • An OrbusVR Gold Rush achievement
  • 100 Third place winners will receive $25 Oculus Store credit
  • 25 Second place winners will receive one Rift + Touch kit in addition to $100 of Oculus Store credit
  • Two grand prize winners will receive: A Falcon PC, One Rift + Touch & a “Golden Account” – This account will give you access to over 100 of the best titles on the Oculus Store for free

As the result of successful Kickstarter, OrbusVR went into Early Access on Steam last December, and later made its way to Oculus Home in Early Access at the beginning of this year. The game boasts an open world, dozens of hours of story-driven quests, and a host of genre staples such as dungeons, world bosses, and several classes to choose from.

image courtesy OrbusVR

“We expect a lot of traffic, so technical issues may happen but we’ll be ready to respond to the issues as they arise,” says OrbusVR Community Manager Mathieu Dugon in a blog post. “This is a chance to grow the community even more and we hope the community will be happy to answer new player questions. We’ll also be ready and on the lookout to handle player incidents that may arise.”

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The past three weeks have seen several technical issues arise, so make sure to be on time, or even early to take advantage of your free entry.

OrbusVR also recently underwent a content update that now includes dragon breeding, which lets you breed for specific traits, and a teleporting system that lets you use the world’s rune stones to fast travel. So there’s plenty of reasons to get started early!

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Scott Hayden
Well before the first modern XR products hit the market, Scott recognized the potential of the technology and set out to understand and document its growth. He has been professionally reporting on the space for nearly a decade as Editor at Road to VR, authoring more than 3,500 articles on the topic. Scott brings that seasoned insight to his reporting from major industry events across the globe.
  • Riley Prescott

    Honestly, orbus is probably the best vr game out there content wise. Querky art style and the lore of the world is hard to get into, but the classes are super fun. You actually feel like you are in another world. I highly recommend every vr owner to try this game!

    • CazCore

      do you own Skyrim?

      • Riley Prescott

        I mean every way except on VR yea.

    • ShiftyInc

      It could be if it did not crash for a lot of people every 5 minutes. Free weekend showed me i should keep my money, and revisit the game in a year again.

  • Paul Roberts

    Is anyone else starting to get the feeling ‘created from the ground up for VR’ is becoming synonymous with ‘it’s going to have cartoony crap graphics’!

    • JrSlims

      Just as much as “VR port” is synonymous with god awful controls.

    • Jistuce

      Low-fi graphics reduce the render load, ensuring high framerates across a broader spectrum of hardware. It also reduces the subconscious expectation of real-world physics.

      • care package

        I don’t know anything about game development, but I’m guessing these small teams don’t have the experience or expertise to optimize, so the limited graphics (I think) are more of a novice thing. Now if the world of Warcraft team made a game for VR, I doubt it would look like minecraft.

        • Jistuce

          Optimization only gets you so far. Especially in VR, where framerates have to stay unusually high(90 FPS instead of 60 or 30) and you’re rendering two images every frame. A given detail level takes 4x the GPU load.

          And historically, small independent developers have been BETTER at optimization than AAA developers, with the latter just telling people to buy a new video card. That’s faltered in recent years, admittedly, as game consoles became everyone’s target platform.

          • care package

            Yes, I understand that – most VR enthusiasts do, but all VR games with free movement will be subjected to that same limitation, ‘cept they don’t all look like OrbusVR now do they. I’m not sure you really know what you’re talking about.

  • Randy V.

    It seriously sucks that they ran each one of these events on the same day and at the same time…. the time I am at work. Who does that? Change the time up so more people can participate, one fricking hour window… thanks.

    • Suitch

      Unfortunately, corporate America makes up most of their consumer base and most of that base works 9am-5pm, Monday through Friday.

  • Jexx

    Its the best mmo? No probably the only mmo for VR right now that sucks ass!

    Just look at those horrid graphics, we need serious aaa games not mmos. I can’t even imagine playing an mmo in vr its just not built or meant for that.