Valve has been dabbling in the realm of VR for some time now, and if we’re going to speak about the future of Virtual Reality; the Oculus is as good of a place as any to begin. It’s no secret amongst the gaming community that Facebook’s sudden purchase of the Oculus has left some developers sour. But where there is pessimism, some select prime talents in the industry are beginning to find an optimistic approach to Facebook’s intervention. Michael Abrash is a well-known name when you’re delving into the realm of Virtual Reality, and his perception of Facebook drastically differs from his fellow game developers. One might assume that with all this negative press that patrons of the Oculus might be dashing for cover. In fact, the opposite it true.
As of today, Michael Abrash will be joining the Oculus’ team of developers as Chief Scientist. As an employee at Valve for over three years, the man is mostly known for his contribution to Quake. In a blogpost on Oculus’ official blog Abrash said: “Facebook’s acquisition of Oculus means that VR is going to happen in all its glory. The resources and long-term commitment that Facebook brings gives Oculus the runway it needs to solve the hard problems of VR – and some of them are hard indeed. I now fully expect to spend the rest of my career pushing VR as far ahead as I can.”
He also comments in detail as to his reasoning behind advocating for the Oculus’ choice to advance themselves further by selling the VR set to Mark Zuckerberg earlier this week. As the third member of Valve’s team to jump over to the Oculus; preceding both Tom Forsyth (or the leader behind Team Fortress 2‘s VR support) and VR engineer Atman Binstock. It definitely seems like Oculus is making an attempt to rebuild the support that they’ve lost.
We’ll see what this means for the imminent future of the Oculus, but we can’t promise that the aggression over Facebook’s acquisition will fade.