Palmer Luckey and other employees of Oculus VR have confirmed that they are now shipping out Oculus Rifts to backers and customers who put in pre-orders.
Rifts are finally shipping to both pre-orders and Kickstarter backers! Getting ready to flood our servers with Rifters.
— Palmer Luckey (@PalmerLuckey) March 24, 2016
Palmer Luckey made a formal announcement in a tweet. Brendan Iribe of Oculus also shared a picture of the first Oculus Rift package to be shipped out, giving us a good idea of what the box will look like.
The first Oculus Rift has shipped, deliveries begin Monday 3.28.2016. pic.twitter.com/C0MMKmezun
— Brendan Iribe (@brendaniribe) March 24, 2016
Of course, Oculus VR is starting shipping units to serve their scheduled March 28 release date. Oculus has been careful about demand and supply for the Oculus Rift, such that they did not even open pre-orders until January of this year. As this first batch gets sent out, Oculus will make and ship more units as demand warrants.
It’s also an ending of sorts for the company. To be specific, this represents a closing of all of Oculus VR’s obligations from that initial Kickstarter they held to create the device, as far back as four years ago. It may seem strange that the now Facebook-owned Oculus Rift was once pitched as an independent project, and gained support from Cliffy B, John Carmack (who promised copies of Doom 3 BFG with the bundle), and Gabe Newell. Although the circumstances have changed, Oculus VR has committed that backers from as far back as the Kickstarter were eligible to receive the final kit that they are now going to sell.
Did you pre-order or back the original Kickstarter for the Oculus Rift? Are you looking forward to getting your headset? Share your thoughts with us in the comments.
