EVE: Valkyrie is intrinsically linked to the Oculus Rift in the minds of many. Originally developed as a prototype and VR showcase by a small team within CCP that had supported Oculus’ crowdfunding drive in August, 2012, it debuted at last year’s EVE Fanfest. The reaction was so strong that it was later announced as a full game.
Now Oculus has announced that Valkyrie will be a Rift launch title, co-published by Oculus and CCP. It’s the VR developer’s first publishing venture and the game will be exclusive to the Oculus Rift.
“We strongly believe the best VR experiences are going to be the ones built from the ground up for VR, and we’ve kept that in mind whilst developing Valkyrie,” said CCP programmer Robert Clarke and senior programmer Sigurður Gunnarsson.
“We wanted people to really feel like they were there – to sense the vastness of space, feel the confined area of the cockpit and get that adrenaline rush as you see an exploding fighter whizz past your head.
In a very short amount of time this passion project became a full fledged CCP project which we’re now working on in Newcastle. It’s hard to believe how far we’ve come in a year!”
When Tim saw Valkyrie last year, he was pretty damn impressed. “It’s incredible, but it’s barely a game. It’s a three minute tech demo that shows a vision of one possible future for PC gaming.” And that future is getting a lot closer.
This certainly won’t be Oculus’ only foray into publishing, and it’s already looking for more developers to partner with.