Oculus VR continues to improve its virtual reality headset ahead of the public launch. The latest developer version is called Crescent Bay, and it includes a better display, 360-degree motion tracking and sound.
New Oculus Rift Crescent Bay
Here at FlatpanelsHD we are truly excited about the Oculus Rift, and have already published in-depth review of the first and second developer editions. Crescent Bay is the latest prototype, but it is still unclear if it will be sold as a developer edition, or if it is actually a close-to-finished consumer product we are looking at.
Crescent Bay uses a better display with higher resolution and lower latency. However, Oculus is not talking about the specifics. The last version had a Full HD OLED display. The biggest news is probably the addition of sound – or headphones. The plan is to simulate “3D sound”, which will improve the feeling of “presence”, says Oculus. The last improvement is 360-degree motion tracking, which means that the camera can now track your movements even if you turn the back to it.
- ”It's as big of a leap as we made from DK1 to DK2,” said Brendan Iribe, Oculus CEO.
The new Oculus Rift is also said to be lighter in weight and has a better fit.
Crescent Bay was unveiled at the Oculus Connect Conference over the weekend. Here, Oculus developers had gathered to showcase and discuss the latest development, including new game engines, games and simulators. One game from Epic Games was described by Iribe as "as close to Call of Duty as I want to get".
Samsung and Oculus recently announced a collaboration to launch the Samsung Gear VR; virtual reality on your smartphone. Oculus used this opportunity to talk a little about the partnership and said that Samsung had been a great partner, and that Oculus had avoided "hell of Android" by focusing on a single device, namely the Note 4. They will continue to focus on bringing VR to phones.
Oculus has yet to announce a release date for the public version of Oculus Rift, but rumors point to 2015.
- Source: Oculus
