"The Oculus Rift" is now on general sale in the UK, and can be ordered from Amazon, as well as purchased in store at retailers including John Lewis, Harrods, GAME and Currys PC World. The device is available at £549, including "Value Added Tax."
To complement the launch, Oculus has set up a series of demo areas at various retail locations, in order to sway undecided customers. To find your nearest demo location and book an appointment, head to the "Oculus Live" page.
"A strong physical presence is important to the company. You have to see it to really believe it, and we feel like once you see it, you're going to want it. Getting it into the broad retail around the world is going to be very important to the success of VR and to the success of Oculus and the Rift," as stated by CEO Brendan Iribe in an interview.
The latest available version of the "Oculus Rift Developer" kit also known as the DK2 was a squat, boxy affair. The consumer model is a much more attractive device, however; it's had a full-on makeover and is looking sleek and polished.
The product has a similarly sleek appearance to the latest photos of "Sony's PlayStation Virtual Reality"; and the device is likely to be Oculus Rift's biggest competitor, with a much more attractive price point that the "Oculus Rift."
The Rift runs at 2,160×1,200 at 90Hz split over dual displays, which equates to a per-eye resolution of 1080p. It also runs at 90Hz, which, while not quite as impressive as the 120Hz claimed by "PlayStation Virtual Reality," is perfectly acceptable. There's no noticeable lag or latency, and motion looks smooth and natural.
"Oculus Touch" is a set of two wireless controllers that feature triggers for sensing grip on the palm and index fingers, as well as having traditional buttons and thumb sticks.
To make it easier for developers to work with, both the "Unreal Engine 4 and Unity 5" game creation tools will be integrated into the Oculus Rift software. This will grant all developers to preview any Virtual Reality experiences they create from within the Rift itself.
To start with, any prospective Rift customers will need a desktop PC with a CPU and graphics card equivalent to or better than an "Intel Core-i5 4590," and an NVidia GTX 970 or an AMD R9 290, as well as 8GB of RAM.
Due to the highly GPU-intensive nature of the Oculus Rift's requirements, the headset will not be compatible with Macs.
