Oculus Connect, Facebook’s annual developer-focused conference built around their Oculus virtual reality (VR) ecosystem, is heading for its year six event. Oculus Connect 6 (OC6), is date-and-place official: the event will be held September 25th and 26th, returning to the San Jose McEnery Convention Center.
Earlier this year, at Facebook’s other major developer event, F8, virtual reality was one of the linchpins of the event. At F8, the standalone headset, the Oculus Quest, and the Rift S update on the Rift headset, were both announced for pre-order (and have since launched). After these fresh SKU launches, what new hardware, accessories, services or changes in price points might be announced?
Looking further down the line, perhaps there may be an update on the Oculus Half Dome project, which, even without fresh news about it, still appears to be Oculus’ next step forward in virtual reality hardware.
In an official blog post, the Oculus team not only touches on virtual reality but augmented reality (AR) as well, so it’s possible there will be more insight on plans to expand from VR into AR.
One bit of confirmed information about a participating company — from a game developer, no less — was teased in the official OC6 announcements. Respawn Entertainment, the developers who created Apex Legends and Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order, will be showing off “a new AAA first-person VR combat experience.”
As my use of “maybe” wording has demonstrated, there are more questions than confirmed answers about what to expect from this year’s Oculus Connect, but the event is still months away. Speakers and any other event hallmarks have not been announced yet either. If Oculus Connect agendas from previous years are a measuring stick, Facebook’s CEO Mark Zuckerberg is likely to lead the keynote, with other key talks or keynote contributions from Oculus Chief Scientist Michael Abrash and CTO John Carmack can be expected. On the virtual reality and gaming side, Jason Rubin, Facebook’s VP of Special Gaming Strategies will help lead that aspect of the discussion at OC6.
For more info about Oculus Connect 6, swing by the official blog post for a read.
