When the Oculus Rift virtual reality (VR) head-mounted display (HMD) launches on 28th March 2016 it will come with a host of extras bundled in. Those that pre-order the kit between now and that time will get a free copy of EVE: Valkyrie, while everyone that picks one up will also get Lucky’s Tale and an Xbox One controller. One important item that won’t be included, however, is Oculus Touch, the company’s pair of position tracked controllers. When discussing the decision not to include the upcoming kit, Oculus Rift creator Palmer Luckey noted that it would ‘significantly raise the cost’ of the $599 USD set.
Luckey said as much in a recent interview with Business Insider, citing Microsoft’s own bundle of the Xbox One and its Kinect sensor and the subsequent removal of that bundle as a reason not to do it.
“That’s kind of one of the things that we looked at when we thought about bundling Touch,” Luckey explained. “Do we really want to bundle this thing that is significantly raising the cost, and making the barrier to entry higher, when a lot of people are going to say ‘Why did you bundle this stupid s—, I don’t want it.’ Now I might think it’s super cool and important, but a lot of people wouldn’t want it, and what we wouldn’t want to do is promise developers we were going to bundle Touch, get them worked up around building Touch games, and then say ‘Just kidding, we’re not bundling it.’ That would have led to fallout. So we’ve been kind of executing on the same plan for a long time, and we have an aggressive timeline, but it’s a realistic timeline.”
Oculus VR hasn’t yet announced the price of Oculus Touch, though Luckey’s comments certainly seem to suggest that it won’t be cheap. The device is set to release in the second half of 2016, having been delayed from its original Q2 2016 window at the end of last year.
For the latest on the Oculus Rift and Oculus Touch, keep reading VRFocus.
-END-
The post Luckey: Bundling Oculus Touch with Rift Would ‘significantly raise the cost’ appeared first on VRFocus.
