Plans that were in the works for Minecraft to have an Oculus Rift-supported version have now ground to a halt, following Oculus Rift's confirmed buyout by social media giant, Facebook. Markus "Notch" Persson wasn't shy about expressing his thoughts on the matter, saying that Facebook creeps him out, and would not be working with them any time soon. He went on to say that he felt Facebook - while excellent pioneers of social networking - were not good for a device he hoped to see grow in the gaming world, having little background in the field of game design.
Quote fromDon’t get me wrong, VR is not bad for social. In fact, I think social could become one of the biggest applications of (Oculus Rift). Being able to sit in a virtual living room and see your friend’s avatar? Business meetings? Virtual cinemas where you feel like you’re actually watching the movie with your friend who is seven time zones away?
But I don’t want to work with social, I want to work with games.
Notch was a strong early supporter of the Oculus Rift, donating $10,000 towards the project's Kickstarter, and personally flying out to meet the Oculus team, to discuss the device, and potential development ideas for its future.
While Oculus support is off the table, a number of competitors have been surfacing in the VR industry of late, any of which may be viable alternatives for Minecrafters eager to see a fully immersive version of the game.
While no official plans to support Oculus currently exist, there is a working (with version 1.6.2) mod that is currently available to the public, called Minecrift, which boasts a number of support features for Oculus users.
I know that feel dude, it make me head-ache for an hour...
All Hail the Glorious Creator.
uhhh no =-= doctors hide behind media enough to get out of crap I would rather have VR games but as for notch not working with facebook i do agree that's best
That's funny because I met my fiancee online from another country who I would've never met otherwise, some of my old school-friends I still keep in touch with in real life simply because of the internet, I've got a hugely varied bunch of friends met online (a lot FROM GAMES) from all over the world with incredibly different lives and viewpoints yet many of which better friends than anyone met in "real life", and this is coming from an agoraphobic nerd who would otherwise only have two friends. Does that make me antisocial? Far from it, I have a happy and healthy social life, just in a different format to what you might consider normal. This isn't redefining social, it's redefining human interaction and that's been happening constantly since the invention of writing, art, and symbolism, all technically unnatural things yet you don't call those obscene do you? Would having a conversation with Stephen Hawking be considered obscene?
I think the issue here is that you're blinded by your own old-fashioned opinions.
If they had any care for their customers and future gamer customers, then they would have ran away from this offer like a bat out of hell.
But, hey, it's money and money means business. Now though, with other solutions cropping up to take Oculus' place, I don't thing any gamer will spend his money on something that will support Facebook.
I don't think too many people would pay $350 to put on a headset and VR goggles just to chat with their friends on Fb.
Facebook, will you ever understand that nobody really likes you? You're an OK platform, but a bad company.
May I ask, how many of your friends would pay around $350 plus the markup from facebook plus the headset just to chat with you or anyone else on Facebook?
I'd love to have a virtual skype call, but I don't have the money or the care to pay that much to do it.
It;s also where a whole lot of cyber-bullying goes on. So really, Facebook has been responsible for some peoples deaths.
Well done Markus, you have made the Minecraft community proud.
It won't. Zuckerberg's team would have done this because it gives them the jump on the competition when virtual reality becomes affordable. He's sunk a massive chunk of money into an investment that will return it hundred- or even thousandfold to his company over the course of time. More, this means that if he and his play their cards right, they can subtly steer the rudder of VR communications technology to enforce methods of data mining/privacy invasion as a standard practice of the industry as a whole, effectively dooming the technology before it even hits the market.
I don't know about the rest of you, but I will never, ever touch VR if Facebook's treatment of personal information becomes common practice.
Sorry to be the one to break it to you, but you're arguing against the wind. The hurricane of change is upon the world, and like it or not, its passing will mark the collective transition into digital culture.
That's not to say people won't still talk on the streets, in their homes, at work, at the shops. It does mean they will do so less. But it also means that people will have more avenues through which to meet.
Let us hope, my dear monkey... let us hope.