Oculus Rift Price Shocks PlayStation VR Boss; Console’s Promo Video Released

By Marijim D.

Mar 22, 2016 11:23 PM EDT

PlayStation VR boss Shuhei Yoshida was surprised at the announced Oculus Rift price. Their VR console is priced around $400.

In a feature by Polygon, Sony has revealed that PlayStation VR is being developed to become a new gaming platform. The company has always described their console's price as "affordable."

Oculus Rift's price at $599, as well as HTC Vive's $799 price tag, came as a surprise to Yoshida. This came after speculations that the Facebook-owned VR headset would fall on a lower range than the announced cost.

One of the main differences between the highly-anticipated VR consoles come from the hardware requirements. Oculus Rift and HTC Vive need PCs that cost around $1000 while the PlayStation VR only requires a PS4, priced at $349, to run.

Sony has also admitted that the Oculus Rift is better than the PS VR. "If you just talk about the high-end quality, yes, I would admit that Oculus may have better VR," PlayStation executive vice president Masayasu Ito said. "However, it requires a very expensive and very fast PC."

Yahoo reported that the Oculus Rift will be the first of its rivals to be released. The first batch of orders will be shipped on Mar.28.

According to Mirror, the Oculus Rift promotional video has been released. It featured actual footage of the upcoming games for the VR headset.

"This incredible lineup represents years of work from a global community of developers who are pioneering the future of VR," the company said. The video has reportedly earned more than 250,000 views on YouTube.

It was previously reported that Oculus Rift games will have three different "comfort" levels: "intense," "moderate" and "comfortable." Intense games are mostly first-person or third-person with a fast-moving camera like in racing games.

Moderate games, on the other hand, are third-person with a slow-moving camera. Comfortable Oculus Rift games have a fixed camera that is able to switch views but not move.

Other Oculus Rift games in development include Harmonix's "Rock Band VR" as well as Insomniac's "Edge of Nowhere. There have been no official announcements for the release of these games yet.