Oculus Touch Delayed till' Q2

The Oculus Rift has existed on the periphery of the gaming world for the past few years now--an exciting new technology with untold (or extremely limited) potential within the gaming industry that has been toyed with and played at for a long-ass time. But with 2016 rolling in (happy new year, by the way), the technology’s extremely extended beta period is finally coming to an end, and a commercial version of the machine will be made available very soon.

But for the Oculus Rift to live up as it’s potential as a gaming device, it needs more than just a head-mounted camera--which was why the Oculus company announced the Oculus Touch controller in June earlier this year. This piece of equipment gives you virtual ‘hands’ and some pretty simple controls, which kickstarts the experience from ‘full screen in your face’ to ‘I’m living in the virtual world!’

Unfortunately, it seems the Oculus Touch, originally planned for a parallel release with the Oculus Rift, has been delayed. From the official Oculus blog:
 

“On the path to perfecting Touch, we’ve decided that we need more time before release, and we’ll now be shipping Touch in the second half of 2016. Pre-orders will open a few months prior to launch. Rift remains on schedule to ship in Q1 with pre-orders launching very soon. On Touch hardware, we’ve made significant advances in ergonomics, and we’re implementing many changes that make Touch even more comfortable, reliable, and natural. We’re also implementing changes that improve hand pose recognition.”

Now, I guess it’s a bummer about the delay, but really--this kind of motion sensing tech needs to be perfect if it’s going to be worth the money. The Wii’s somewhat-spotty motion controls is part of the reason it never really picked up as a hardcore gaming device, so if the Oculus delivers an even slightly flawed product, well, it’ll be hard to salvage that tech.

So here’s hoping they get it right with the delay.