It’s been a long time coming, but the very first Oculus Rift consumer headset is due to arrive to customers starting this Monday the 28th.
Anticipation is palpable for the first deliveries of the Oculus Rift VR headset which began its long journey as a crowdfunded Kickstarter campaign back in 2013. Back then the company hoped to raise $250,000 to build a development kit version of the Rift to give developers a starting point for creating VR games and experiences. Although it was among one of the most successful Kickstarter projects at the time, the $2.4 million that the company initially raised would pale in comparison to its eventual $2 billion buyout by Facebook, which valued the company at nearly 1000 times that initial crowdfunding.
Suffice to say, it’s been a long journey, but the consumer version of the Oculus Rift is now days away from being in the hands of its first customers. Oculus CEO Brendan Iribe today confirmed that the first units have gone out the door and deliveries will begin on Monday, March 28th. Founder Palmer Luckey says that units now going out the door are both pre-orders and those for Kickstarter backers.
Last week at GDC 2016 Oculus unveiled their launch lineup of 30 Rift games that consumers will have access to on day one. At CES back in January we also got a sneak peek of the nice case that the Rift will ship with.
Oculus said earlier this year that they plan to bring the Rift to retail stores starting in April.