Google reportedly killed off an Oculus Rift competitor project to focus on mobile VR

By Christian de Looper Published July 16, 2016

fox new technology division foxnet oculus rift on matt back2 1500x1000 — Image used with permission by copyright holder

Google is starting to take virtual reality pretty seriously, but according to a recent report from Recode, it’s focusing its efforts uniquely on mobile VR.

In fact, it actually had a more robust Oculus competitor in the works, but ended up killing the project in order to focus its resources on projects like Daydream, its new mobile VR platform for Android.

Daydream was first announced back in May at Google I/O, and it’s a platform for a new wave of virtual-reality software which is far more advanced than the humble Google Cardboard headset. In fact, Google will also be releasing a Daydream headset of its own, showing its growing interest in not just software, but also hardware.

As mentioned, Google had another virtual reality project that was set to be a direct competitor with headsets from the likes of Oculus and HTC. The project reportedly had a 50-person team, and it’s likely that team was largely redirected into the mobile VR effort.

Of course, it’s important to note that this news doesn’t at all mean that Google is giving up on developing a more high-powered headset down the line — all it means is that right now it’s focusing its efforts on mobile. That actually could be a good thing. With a more focused effort on mobile VR, when Daydream is finally available for consumers it will hopefully be a lot more robust.

And there may be no better way to bring virtual reality to the masses than to do it through a smartphone, which we all already own and use regularly. Sure, it might not be as high-powered as a dedicated headset like the Oculus Rift, but most of us don’t necessarily need a high-powered gaming device anyway.

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Christian de Looper

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Christian’s interest in technology began as a child in Australia, when he stumbled upon a computer at a garage sale that he…

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