Intel, Oculus, and ESL come together for a $200,000+ VR Challenger League to promote VR eSports.

Intel, Oculus, and ESL come together for a $200,000+ VR Challenger League to promote VR eSports. This brand new competitive VR gaming league will feature two exciting VR titles - “The Unspoken” and “Echo Arena”. The competition will feature a prize pool of over $200,000 and includes multiple stops at key eSports events around the world, eventually concluding with the grand finals at the Intel Extreme Masters Katowice in 2018.

Potential Wizards and Space battlers will be able to qualify for the offline events by taking part in ESL's online competitions starting on July 12th on ESL Play.

On top of the VR Challenger League qualifiers, there will also be weekly ESL Play cups, where you can compete for weekly points and prize money. 

The competitive titles in the VR Challenger league are two of the best demos I played at Oculus Connect 3 last year. Lone Echo had one of the biggest lines there.  http://www.catsandvr.com/blog/oc3

Insomniac's The Unspoken will lead players into a world of spellcasting where they face up against opposing mages in dynamic 1v1 duels. Cast powerful spells and utilize the destructible environment to gain an advantage over your opponents on your way to becoming an unrivaled arch-mage. You can find more insights into the classes, spells and maps on the official website.

The second title of the VR Challenger League will be Echo Arena, Ready At Dawn Studios’ face-paced multiplayer action title set in outer space. The game will be released on July 20th as a free download for all Oculus Rift owners and you can keep an eye on new gameplay reveals as they become available on their website.

catsandvr.com/blog/

Omnigames announces VR MMORPG Age of Heroes VR for Vive and Rift.

Have you ever faced down World of Warcraft's Lich King and wished you could be in the action yourself? Now you can with Age of Heroes VR, an all new multiplayer action RPG focused on taking on MMORPG style raids in virtual reality. Set in a fantasy world, Age Of Heroes pits players against challenging enemies in multiplayer raids. Utilizing actual body movement, players can sling fireballs, summon creatures and heal allies in an engrossing multiplayer virtual reality experience.

In development by Omnigames who are avid fans the MMORPG genre, Age of Heroes looks to capture the raid combat experience in a VR setting allowing players to experience adrenaline-pumping combat in VR alongside their friends. "With Age of Heroes, we integrated the traditional role-playing features and first person boss battles into the VR genre to create an immersive and refreshing game experience. We look forward to receiving player feedback in the upcoming closed beta and then sharing the game with the world upon full launch.” Said YongMing Wang, the senior producer at Omnigames.

Closed beta dates will be announced soon with registration sign-ups beginning shortly.

Introducing Actual Body Movement...

 Age Of Heroes VR is set to include life-like body movement for combat to help the combat experience feel more natural, reduce motion sickness and increase immersion into the game world. "We were thinking about how to make the combat more immersive and thrilling in VR. One of the answers is Actual Body Movements: you are not only playing the game with VR controllers but also using your own body." Said Omnigames. "In Age of Heroes, you need actually move your body like squatting or quickly side-stepping to avoid attacks and boss abilities. If you worried about room size or other problems, you can set different game configurations to finish all these movements in a slight body reaction. It will be fun and feel real!"

CatsAndVR.com/blog

Oculus Story Studio wins Emmy for VR animated short Henry.

Henry, the charming VR film from Oculus Story Studio, has won an Emmy® for Outstanding Original Interactive Program! This award recognizes creative achievement in interactive media and comes from the juried Emmy categories, where winning entries must earn unanimous approval from a panel of Interactive Media Peer Group professionals. Henry is the first VR original narrative movie to ever win an Emmy.

“When we set out to make Henry, it was a step into the unknown world of making an emotional VR movie. While we didn’t know what the outcome was going to be, we were excited about the possibilities. We never anticipated that one of our first projects would be given such a distinction and this recognition is not only a testament to our team’s creative and technical achievements, but also a validation for the VR storytelling community as a whole. While Henry is just one step in the long journey ahead, we hope this moment inspires storytellers to bring their ideas to this new medium and help shape the future of VR storytelling.” - Ramiro Lopez Dau, director of Henry

High Voltage Software launches excellent VR FPS Damaged Core, purchase now for access to the Dragon Front beta.

I have been following the work of High Voltage software since Conduit 2 and I recently had the chance to play Damaged Core three weeks ago at High Voltages office right outside of Chicago. The game is down right amazing and is a high-water mark for the still infant world of VR gaming. The ability to jump from robotic body to body smoothly showcases that you can capture a large and dynamic VR combat experience without the need for Room Scale VR. 

With a compelling 10+ hour campaign against the networked artificial intelligence known as the Core, you will be immersed in a war against robotic armies bent on destroying mankind to further their own evolution. 

Damaged Core is available now for 29.99 https://www.oculus.com/experiences/rift/660396644063513/

  
Key Features
•        10+ hour story-driven campaign written by Drew Holmes, one of the minds behind the Bioshock series. 
•        Wholly unique control system that is rooted in the fiction of this future earth, and only possible in VR.
•        Take the fight to 17 unique enemy types as form of sentient software virus that can take control over the enemy.
 
In Damaged Core, you won’t just fight your foes, you become them.

Purchase before September 6th and gain guaranteed access to the Dragon Front closed beta, also by High Voltage Software.

10/10

The first collectible card game built for VR is here! Developed by High Voltage Software, and produced by Oculus Studios, Dragon Front combines traditional high fantasy with a dieselpunk aesthetic for a one-of-a-kind experience. http://ocul.us/DragonFront Official Oculus Channels: Oculus: ocul.us/Oculus Facebook: ocul.us/Facebook Twitter: ocul.us/Twitter Instagram: ocul.us/Instagram

Oculus Connect 3 will be in October.

Save the date for Oculus Connect 3, coming to San Jose, California, October 5-7! more than 50 technical talks and opportunities to experience new Oculus hardware and content. Featuring signature keynotes from Brendan Iribe, John Carmack, and Michael Abrash.

Oculus Connect is  the Oculus annual developer conference where engineers, designers, and creatives from around the world come together to learn about the future of the Oculus platform and push virtual reality forward. https://www3.oculus.com/en-us/blog/announcing-oculus-connect-3-and-rift-availability-update/

 Applications open to attend OC3 at 9am PST, August 2. Visit the Connect site to learn more about the conference and to register.

Check out the Keynotes from 2015.