Facebook Just Bought Oculus For 2 Billion

[shindig]

I don't really get this whole thing. So are things like Skype going to become truly 3D sometime in the future? For example, if I'm in Canada, am I going to be able to meet up with someone who's in London at a house in Rome?

We just put out headsets on, choose the house in Rome, and both meet up there for a bullshit? Or I guess we're still quite a ways away from that technology, eh?

You'd control 3d characters in a virtual MMO world... for 2d like watching a TV or something I don't think it's good.


The benefit from the oculus is it has 2 cameras offset from each other in a game world, then in the actual headset there are 2 lenses that flip and compensate for the projected views and blend the two camera views into 1 image with 3d depth....So if you're facing a dragon, it's head is way closer than it's tail...or architecture actually has depth like a real building. You are "immersed" in the environment.


The normal use is for games...it's way better than a monitor, and you can turn and look around in the scene, look behind you, without any lag in the view vs the head position, it has an accelerometer who's output is used to control the camera in game.. problem with the oculus overloading your visual sensors without affecting your body is you can get motion sickness without "haptic feedback" through fans or those flight simulator boxes that actually twist and turn you in sync with the game.

 

[malloc]

I pre-ordered the second dev kit almost immediately on the announcement and now this. Elation to confusion. As a dev kit 1 owner the second version ought to solve all the issues I had with it. My hope is, that is also true enough for most people to gain more mainstream acceptance of the tech. Then if FB screws it up at least someone will have the will to keep going. I know others are working on this but if the rift fails I think it will add a few years onto the process.

 

[r3p1v]

Finally read the press release. This is why they bought it.

Facebook plans to extend Oculus’ existing advantage in gaming to new verticals, including communications, media and entertainment, education and other areas. Given these broad potential applications, virtual reality technology is a strong candidate to emerge as the next social and communications platform.

“Mobile is the platform of today, and now we’re also getting ready for the platforms of tomorrow,” said Facebook founder and CEO, Mark Zuckerberg. “Oculus has the chance to create the most social platform ever, and change the way we work, play and communicate.”

 

[_poto_]

This has been the weirdest fucking week.

First at GDC Epic Games shook up the game dev world by releasing their Unreal Engine 4 full source code access for a $19 subscription with no term commitment + 5% royalty on earnings. Previously it had charged hundreds of thousands of dollars and only big studios could use it.

It has oculus rift support that ships with it built in. Only game I can think of that used it is the latest Gears of War.

After that announcement Cryengine3 announced they would no longer charge hundreds of thousands of dollars either! And they would charge $9 subscription with NO royalties!

I think I understand the moves to make the game engines subscription based.

I've been playing around with the free Cryengine SDK for a week or 2 now just to mess around with the game assets from Star Citizen. It's interface is pretty easy to use once you learn what you're doing. It's damn easy to make maps, place/manipulate objects and not too much harder to put in pathed AI and animations.

Basically anybody could build almost a full game with this engine without really having to do any coding. It's fucking drag and drop for the most part. Just takes a lot of time to sit there and put everything in and play with it until it looks right.

Because these engines are so developed with so many features and so easy to use, it's opening up new markets for people to both mod existing games and for those basement dwelling neckbeards to make full games they've always wanted to make.

The only major roadblock for the small time peeps I can see is the art and models. But, there's an ever growing sphere of artists, free art and models for sale out there. For a guy just building something for fun and not looking to have unique art, or just tweaking some art himself, there's a lot of possibilities.

If they promote these engines enough, they'll probably make far more on subscriptions than they were before. Cryengine will probably get dozens, maybe hundreds of subscriptions just from the Star Citizen modders and fans making cut scenes, and that's just one game.

 

[SkyFire]

Facebook wants Oculus for social of the future.

I'm boxing up my Oculus in the morning and putting it on ebay.

Fuck Facebook.

 

[SkyFire]

First at GDC Epic Games shook up the game dev world by releasing their Unreal Engine 4 full source code access for a $19 subscription with no term commitment + 5% royalty on earnings. Previously it had charged hundreds of thousands of dollars and only big studios could use it.

That is incorrect.

Unreal has been available to indies for several years for free upfront and a 25% royalty on produced games. Antichamber is on of the most successful indie titles under that agreement.

 

[wolfedog]

I once had the occasion to sit next to an aluminum siding salesman at a bar. he proceeded to explain to me how he "conditioned" his prospective buyers. Upon arriving at the prospects home the husband and wife would almost always usher him into the living room. He would tell them it would be easier to see his samples in the kitchen light, and all would move to the kitchen. He would then tell the husband to sit "here", and the wife to this "there". And they would obey. He would then ask the housewife for a glass of water, and she would oblige. They were being conditioned to obey his commands, so that when he produced the sales agreement and told them to "sign here", they would sign.
It was not unlike the Catholic Masses' which I attended when I was a child and a believer. A bell would be rung and all the people would stand. The bell would ring again and all would kneel. And again the bell would command all to sit. Stand, kneel, sit, believe. Stand, kneel, sit, believe. And, with rare exception, the tinkle of a little bell made them all believers.

 

[shindig]

That is incorrect.

Unreal has been available to indies for several years for free upfront and a 25% royalty on produced games. Antichamber is on of the most successful indie titles under that agreement.

Unreal engine is much different from Unreal Development Kit - UDK which was available...Unreal engine is much much better.

 

[shindig]

I think I understand the moves to make the game engines subscription based.

I've been playing around with the free Cryengine SDK for a week or 2 now just to mess around with the game assets from Star Citizen. It's interface is pretty easy to use once you learn what you're doing. It's damn easy to make maps, place/manipulate objects and not too much harder to put in pathed AI and animations.

Basically anybody could build almost a full game with this engine without really having to do any coding. It's fucking drag and drop for the most part. Just takes a lot of time to sit there and put everything in and play with it until it looks right.

Because these engines are so developed with so many features and so easy to use, it's opening up new markets for people to both mod existing games and for those basement dwelling neckbeards to make full games they've always wanted to make.

The only major roadblock for the small time peeps I can see is the art and models. But, there's an ever growing sphere of artists, free art and models for sale out there. For a guy just building something for fun and not looking to have unique art, or just tweaking some art himself, there's a lot of possibilities.

I got a job using Unity 3d game engine. It has the best workflow(most productive) of all of them and interfaces with just about everything you could want, scripting is in C#. It uses Xamarin to port your C# to android, ios, mac, xbox(if you could get in MS dev program), etc.

Problem is it costs $4500 to get the pro features on android and ios which enables all the postprocessing effects and polish, which they don't include in the free version.

You should check out their asset store, if you ever wanna give it a spin I can throw you some assets...the top asset sellers make a living selling stuff there.

This is one of the best artists selling models for cheap:
https://www.assetstore.unity3d.com/#publisher/585

Some screenshots in game of his stuff in Unity. His "underworld" pack is my favorite with the oculus:

It's even not that hard to do multiplayer with it.

 

[_poto_]

^I've looked at Unity before and it seems pretty nice. The price tag is a bit high though if you want to get serious with it. If I ever take a stab at making some mobile games Unity is probably what I'd go with.

I'm not a game developer. I'm just a guy who got bored waiting for a game to come out and decided to start tinkering around with the game engine since they had a free version available and I had some time to kill. It seems like if I had a few hundred hours I could make neat maps and stuff.

I'm not good at writing code, not good at art or modeling either... so doubt I could make anything beyond some basic stuff without buying everything or hiring a bunch of people. I was just impressed at how easy it was to manipulate things and mess around in Cryengine compared with some of the stuff that I tried to mess around with years ago.

 

[Rage9]

Dunno if this post was aimed at me, but when I said kill it, I meant Oculus and not VR in general. Though, I think if Oculus died it would be a setback for VR.

I totally agree that there's been a revival of VR tech, which is kind of exciting to see.

You comment made me make my comment, but based on not just your comment is the reason for my comment. Places such as reddit or hacker news are blowing up over this, so it's more of a general comment aimed at anyone that thinks otherwise.

 

[_poto_]

You comment made me make my comment, but based on not just your comment is the reason for my comment. Places such as reddit or hacker news are blowing up over this, so it's more of a general comment aimed at anyone that thinks otherwise.

Yeah, I've seen some the massive outflow of nerd rage over this too.

 

[SkyFire]

Unreal engine is much different from Unreal Development Kit - UDK which was available...Unreal engine is much much better.

No, it's not. UDK is Unreal 3.

 

[SkyFire]

I got a job using Unity 3d game engine. It has the best workflow(most productive) of all of them and interfaces with just about everything you could want, scripting is in C#. It uses Xamarin to port your C# to android, ios, mac, xbox(if you could get in MS dev program), etc.

You should check out their asset store, if you ever wanna give it a spin I can throw you some assets...the top asset sellers make a living selling stuff there.
[/url]

Some screenshots in game of his stuff in Unity. His "underworld" pack is my favorite with the oculus:
It's even not that hard to do multiplayer with it.

To clear up a few inaccuracies;

Xaramin doesn't "do" anything of the sort. Mono is the .net implementation that allows unity projects to be cross platform. I think you might be confusing Xaramin studio and MonoDevelop, and conflating the two with Mono (or perhaps you're confused because Xarmin the company leads the development of Mono). http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mono_(software)

Scripting can be c#, but also boo (python inspired) and unityscript (which looks and feels like js). There are a few other languages implemented by the community to, but I don't keep up.

The asset store is crazy handy, I agree. I use probuilder almost every day for it's CSG type operations. Lack of CSG in unity is one of the things that makes Unreal so appealing, and probuilder fills that gap well.

^I've looked at Unity before and it seems pretty nice. The price tag is a bit high though if you want to get serious with it. If I ever take a stab at making some mobile games Unity is probably what I'd go with.

I'm not a game developer. I'm just a guy who got bored waiting for a game to come out and decided to start tinkering around with the game engine since they had a free version available and I had some time to kill. It seems like if I had a few hundred hours I could make neat maps and stuff.

I'm not good at writing code, not good at art or modeling either... so doubt I could make anything beyond some basic stuff without buying everything or hiring a bunch of people. I was just impressed at how easy it was to manipulate things and mess around in Cryengine compared with some of the stuff that I tried to mess around with years ago.

Indie is free, and you can go pro for $79 a month.

Cyengine is sick, I did a little work with Crytek back in the day. Don't confuse a fantastic level editor with the ability to really build a game. Don't let that deter you though, I got into games by fucking around with QuArK for Half-Life. Some of the best times of my life.

Valve had been collaborating with Oculus about VR, seemingly letting Oculus have the public lead despite reports that Valve has a better headset already. I wonder how this will change their relationship and whether or not Valve will move ahead with their own headset.

And to those who would question whether VR would be dead, unlikely. As mentioned Valve has their own headset, that it didn't seem they where going to launch themselves. Also Sony has unveiled their own as well. I would think VR will live on and kick ass regardless.

I'm pretty stoked to see the Sony implementation in person, friends tried it out at GDC and said it was really promising.

 

[Fatbat]

I've never seen anything turned out by Cryengine that looks as good as this...

[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dORoTIEOyEg]Snowdrop Engine @ GDC 2014 [US] - YouTube[/ame]

[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R2NJSAvuiQ0]Snowdrop Next-Gen Engine | Tom Clancy's The Division [UK] - YouTube[/ame]

[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SQng7EkJHOI]Assassin's Creed Unity Sneak Peek Video [UK] - YouTube[/ame]

 

[kryaa]

It is quite funny to see WF turbo-capitalists cry in light of this news. Just ridiciolous. Best business decision for oculus and facebook. The thing is, oculus needs a cash injection to fasttrack Screen development and more resources to beat the new player (Sony). Facebook has recognized the potential of the rift as a game changing communication device. Mark my words...if facebook VR truly hits, there is no chance in hell google will stay #1. This is groundbreaking, paradigm changing technology if it delivers its promises...

- Entertainment industry CHECK (riftmax, the proposed 360 sport events)
- Communication CHECK (Whatsapp VR, Facebook VR etc etc)
- Travel/Vacation CHECK (pretty obvious)
- Education CCHECK (Virtual Classrooms)
- Computer Hardware CHECK (multiple virtual displays, the real advantage is saving space in urban environments)

And the list goes on and on and on...if facebook plays its hand right, they'll be the biggest company in this world. They have the tech and resources to disrupt several extremly profitable industries at onceand gaming is just ONE of them. ...yeah, leave that to Valve and their VR box or whatever. Facebook will do communication/travel and earn a 5000% roi in the next 10 years.

 

[Fatbat]

And this looks promising...

[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4dnw9dWISvw]Get Even 'What Is Real' Teaser - YouTube[/ame]

[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oxLMOscTZRk]Better Reality 3D scan - YouTube[/ame]

 

[splok]

That is incorrect.

Unreal has been available to indies for several years for free upfront and a 25% royalty on produced games. Antichamber is on of the most successful indie titles under that agreement.

BUT you did't get source access with UDK.

 

[blank_czech]

I just realized Oculus now has all the money they need to make their own screens and parts if they need to. Good times are ahead if the Zuck keeps his nose out of it (as I suspect he will). A lot of people are mad now, but IMO it will mostly blow over.

As far as Unity goes, I get the impression from other devs that it's good for prototyping stuff but not as good for making actual games as nearly any other commerical engine. It got as popular as it did because it had good licensing for indie devs at the time, is very easy to use, ports to many platforms, and has the built in asset store for buying assets.

 

[kryaa]

I just realized Oculus now has all the money they need to make their own screens and parts if they need to. Good times are ahead if the Zuck keeps his nose out of it (as I suspect he will). A lot of people are mad now, but IMO it will mostly blow over.

Completly agree with you. These hurt fanboys are lacking vision. They can't see beyond their feelings of betrayel. This will soon change, after Palmer announces a 250$ CV1 with a non pentile 1440px display shipping before the end of the year....or something similiar. He's already confirmed that they did this in order to be independent from the cellphone industry, to get their own custom made displays manufactured. He also confirmed that this will make development considerably faster and the end-product less expensive.

Has anyone seen that video in which a random guy destroys his DK1? Fucking ridiciolous. I mean i dislike facebook just like any other guy but...