At Oculus Connect last weekend I spoke with the company’s Head of Mobile, Max Cohen, who confirmed that Oculus plans to release its Android mobile SDK in early October. Gear VR, which runs virtual reality games and experienced built with the Oculus mobile SDK, will launch this fall, according to the Oculus website.
In an interview last weekend, Max Cohen, Head of Mobile at Oculus, told me, “…we’re going to be releasing our mobile SDK in October and try to do it on the early end of that.”
Cohen also had some good news to share with Oculus developers who want to make content for Gear VR but aren’t thrilled about dropping the cash needed for the Note 4 and Gear VR.
“Developers will be able to use their DK1s or DK2s to develop for Gear VR as well,” Cohen noted.
See Also: Oculus Head of Mobile – Gear VR is ‘Designed for 5 to 20 Minute Experiences’
Gear VR, a mobile VR headset that’s built by Samsung and ‘Powered by Oculus’, was announced in early September but Samsung has yet to officially confirm a launch date that’s more specific than ‘this year’, nor have they confirmed the price.
Oculus’ own website however tells us that we’ll see Gear VR this fall. An official entry in the company’s Knowledge Base says “The Samsung Gear VR Innovator Edition will be available to developers and enthusiasts starting this fall (2014).” Rumors put the price of the device somewhere around $175.
See Also: Samsung Gear VR Microsite is Live, Listed by Third-party Retailer for $245
With Oculus hoping to release the mobile SDK in early October, and the Galaxy Note 4 that powers Gear VR being released on October 17th, it seems that Samsung is gearing up to get Gear VR out the door in time for the holiday season.
“Anyone who wants to buy [Gear VR] can. [It will be] sold online, it’s intentionally limiting the distribution channel,” Cohen told me. “There won’t be a lot of TV advertising… that stuff will come in time as the product matures a little bit more, but there will be some hiccups, there will be some bugs, this is very much a work in progress…”
Samsung launched an official microsite for Gear VR shortly after their announcement of the product. Specifications from the site confirm that it has impressive sub-20ms latency and a 96 degree field of view. The unit only works with the Galaxy Note 4 and takes advantage of its impressive 2560×1440 OLED display.
