April is a big month for some people, kicking off with an unofficial holiday where people expose themselves as fools. Hey, whatever gets you through the day. This year though, the month is big for a different reason. It’s the final nail in the coffin of the Oculus brand name, which we still prefer to Meta.
The end of a console, or a VR headset in this case, is always sort of a sad thing. It’s one thing to stop developing games for it, but this kind of ending means a loss of support entirely. There will be no new official games coming, and the device will become even harder to get your hands on. It’s often a loss for gaming preservation efforts, but time must move forward.
The original Oculus Quest headset marked an important change in the VR market. After all, it brought about the end to the cables tethering VR to a PC. The headset showcased a new wireless world, and virtual reality felt more accessible than ever. It helps that it was also a fair bit more affordable. It didn’t just drop the cost of another machine to run the games, the headset packed a load of value. That’s all ending on April 30th, though, as explained in a report from Forbes.
After that date, devs won’t even have the option to release games on the original Quest. “If an app is available on other Quest devices, the update can roll out to those headsets, but the Quest 1 support will be denied.” It’s a very firm stance, but it’s likely due to the potential security issues of having an older device.
That said, Meta will apparently keep updating the security of the Oculus Quest 1 until the end of August 2024, which is a mere four months away. Once that’s up, Meta is going to be saying goodbye to the headset in full. Any future support for the device will be entirely unofficial. We imagine there’ll be a dedicated group of people out there keeping it alive. For those who want to enjoy VR, you’ll need either Meta Quest 3, the budget Meta Quest 2, or a device from another brand in the VR arena.
