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[Update] Razer CEO Offers To Help Mojang With Virtual Reality Minecraft
Update: We spoke with Razer CEO Min-Liang Tan about his offer to assist Mojang founder Markus "notch" Persson with a Minecraft VR. While Razer isn't willing to discuss upcoming projects, we did speak briefly about VR and how Razer's work intersects the growing trend.
Tan says that Razer will go where the gamers are, and the company is always listening to what the community is interested in. "As long as there is gaming, we are positioned for success, because we are committed to making what our community requires of us – VR included," he says. "This separates us from every other brand in the world. We believe in focusing on gamers, and we don't intend to change that in the future. We have one of the largest in-house teams of engineers in the industry for a reason, and that reason is to innovate responsively."
With regard to his offer to Persson, Tan mentions that Razer's work has helped the company build relationships, which might be positioned well to assist Mojang. "In terms of VR, we are probably the only company with the right expertise, talent and resources to solve the interface challenges in the space, and we’ve been working very closely with some partners to address that," he says. "I won't comment on specific details, but I will say that future VR product launches are definitely interesting to us."
Razer's Hydra motion controller has been used by some VR hopefuls as the go-to controller. When we tested the Sulon Cortex VR display at GDC, we were handed two Hydras that served as guns in the virtual world.
Original Story:
Yesterday, Mojang founder and Minecraft creator Markus “notch” Persson expressed his disapproval of the deal that saw Facebook purchase Oculus for $2 billion. Persson, who backed the Oculus Kickstarter at the $10,000 level said that he was canceling plans for Minecraft on the platform because “Facebook creeps me out.”
In response, Razer CEO Min-Liang Tan reached out to Persson via Twitter. “Perhaps we can help out,” he writes. “Will be in touch.”
At CES, Razer unveiled plans for a modular computing system and a wearable with two OLED screens. It’s not out of the realm of possibility that that the company is considering (or is already in development with) its own VR project. We’ve reached out to Razer for clarification and will update should we receive a response.
[Source: @minliangtan]
Our Take
Razer seems a likely suspect to join the VR race. With VR taking off and the company’s motion-based Hydra controller already in use for some head-mounted display input solutions, I wouldn’t be the least bit surprised for Tan and company to announce its own plans.
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