Oculus is having a rough launch week. Customers are getting frustrated, Palmer Luckey is getting prickly, and the ongoing silence from the company has only exacerbated the situation. Fortunately, eager Oculus Rift fans waiting for their pre-orders to ship have finally received some concrete news regarding the shipping status of their VR headsets, along with a promise that Oculus is eating the shipping costs for every single order that was made through April 1st.
I woke up this morning to find an email from Oculus regarding my own Rift pre-order, which I made about two hours after sales went live. It was a nice change of pace after staring at that "TBA" status for days.
Hi Jason,
We know you're anxious to receive your Oculus Rift and apologize for not updating your order status sooner. We've been working through an unexpected component shortage, and unfortunately, that issue has impacted the original shipping estimates for some early customers.
We're working hard to get up-to-date ship windows, and you should expect to see your order status updated on oculus.com by Tuesday, April 12. Although many Rifts will be arriving on schedule and in line with original estimates, we'll be covering shipping and handling costs for all orders placed through today.
We're shipping rifts everyday. Don't hesitate to reach out to the Oculus support team if you have additional questions.
While it's anyone's guess specifically which component is causing the hiccup in manufacturing, it's worth mentioning that the CV1 Oculus Rift is no simple piece of hardware, and is altogether more complicated than prior dev kits. For example, the Rift now uses custom OLEDs as opposed to Samsung smartphone displays, as well as custom Fresnel lenses.
Oculus CEO Brendan Iribe has also confirmed that the free shipping applies to international orders too, and anyone who has already received a consumer unit will have their shipping costs refunded.
READ MORE: How An Oculus Rift Made This Industry Veteran Excited About Games Again
Shortages are nothing new to consumer product launches, especially in the realm of video games. But our chief complaint here at Forbes Games has been Oculus' lack of communication with its customers -- arguably many of the same people who helped shape their successful trajectory since 2012, and inarguably an extremely passionate bunch. Communication can solve almost anything, but silence only forces speculation and breeds animosity.
While I doubt this delay will have a seriously detrimental impact on lifetime Oculus Rift sales, in the short term it seems many frustrated customers have already cancelled their pre-orders and have decided to pick up an
For more on the Oculus Rift launch, listen to my new show "Presence: A VR Podcast."
