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Oculus Ditches DRM Hurdle, Allows HTC Vive Games On Rift Again (venturebeat.com)
An anonymous reader writes: After changing its DRM to exclude ReVive last month, Oculus has changed its mind again and is now allowing HTC Vive games to play on the Oculus Rift. "We continually revise our entitlement and anti-piracy systems, and in the June update we've removed the check for Rift hardware from the entitlement check. We won't use hardware checks as part of DRM on PC in the future," Oculus VR said. "We believe protecting developer content is critical to the long-term success of the VR industry, and we'll continue taking steps in the future to ensure that VR developers can keep investing in ground-breaking new VR content." VentureBeat reports: "ReVive developers have acted quickly following the removal of the check. An update to the software has been posted on GitHub to bring it back in line, meaning you'll now be able to access the games that were previously available without jumping through extra hoops. Perhaps even more games might work going forward. CrossVR, one of the system's developers, took to Reddit to thank Oculus for the decision. 'I'm delighted to see this change and I hope it can generate a lot of goodwill for Oculus.' CrossVR said."
There still remains that small mater of the user-hostile EULA. No thanks.
Seven puppies were harmed during the making of this post.
Is "Vive" pronounced "vee vee"? Because "vee vee" is slang for "vagina" in many English-speaking areas.
I'd expect as much of venturebeat, but comeon, Slashdot, get it together
I thought the DRM was to prevent the Oculus Store bought titles from playing on the Vive? The article has it written the other way around. I've been able to use my Rift on any title I bought from Steam that was listed as Oculus compatible. Can't say I've tried non-compatible titles besides the Steam demos.
http://www.tomshardware.com/news/oculus-blocks-revive-vr,31862.html
"Oculus was using DRM that checked the validity of your game purchase, but it wasn’t checking for the Rift hardware. Each game had a simple check for the HMD, which Revive was able to emulate to trick the software into thinking a Rift is present when it’s actually an HTC Vive. Late last week, Oculus released version 1.4 of the Oculus app, which includes a check for the Rift directly into the Oculus Platform DRM. "
Oculus isn't 'allowing' anything, at least not directly. They simply removed a check for the Rift hardware in the DRM that checks if an account is allowed to play (i.e. paid for) a particular Oculus Home game. Oculus Home is their store/platform a la Steam. Many programs on Oculus Home don't support the HTC Vive natively, so someone made a program/hack called Revive that allows those to run on the Vive. Oculus' most recent act was to stop the check which blocked Revive from working in most cases. There is no guarantee on Oculus' end that Revive will work as advertised, or bug-free.
The RoadToVR writeup is better
Corruption is convincing someone that the selfless ideal is the same as their selfish ideal.
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It's not just the DRM hurdle, it's the spyware. The product as a service concept.
I think of VR glasses as a type of computer display. I except it to be no more tied to any service or company than my computer monitor is. Why should facebook get to know anything about what I'm doing with my goggles on my computer?
I was waiting years for Oculus CV1. Now I'll buy it after they remove the spyware *and* facebook no longer has anything to do with it (not holding my breath). Amazingly it looks like they're managing to blow VR again, I certainly lost interest after it came out and the media buzz seems to be gone.
Can suck it. My partner surprised me for my birthday in January with the pre-order but 3 weeks ago I said cancel it.
The tech is too immature and fb have royally fuck things up. The vive looks shit but at least has a camera. The hololens is where it's at imo. And I am in a hundred minds about microsoft!
Will wait for gen 2 maybe 3 in a couple of years when the tech is much better, open and cheaper.
The DRM will be back.
Bet on it.
A) You got that backwards. Its Rift Games on Vive.
B) Its wrong anyway. Oculus ARENT ditching DRM. They're removing the recently added headset check (presumably to remove the reason for the ReVive author to continue publishing software that had to break their DRM to continue to work).