It was March last year HTC announced that their Vive VR system would be in the hands of consumers by the end of the 2015 but that was scuppered in August. The plan was to get more dev kits out at the end of this year and launch the headset in Q1. This release date has now slipped slighty.
In an update on the HTC site they now plan on launching the consumer version of the Vive in April 2016. HTC state:
“We will be starting the new year by making an additional 7,000 units available to developers, followed by commercial availability in April 2016. We are incredibly excited about the future and look forward to sharing more information as we move forward towards launch.”
The VR race is on next year and it’s unclear whether Oculus or HTC will be first to market due to delays from both sides. Based on what we’ve seen within the PC gaming community, there’s a definite shift toward the HTC kit instead of the Rift even though the HTC device is expected to be more expensive when it launches. However, Oculus still plan on a Q1 release so they may just squeeze their release out first.
Thanks Ars Technica
