The new virtual reality headsets Oculus Quest and Oculust Rift S | Technology
If this year the bell in the Game Developers Conference (GDC) has given Google with its streaming video game platform Stadia, the other winner has been Facebook with its new virtual reality headset Oculus Quest and Oculust Rift S. The first is a separate helmet, without wires or need to insert the mobile to immerse yourself in a virtual world and that will be available in a few months. The Oculus Rift S is a helmet for PC that presents several updates with respect to the previous model, such as a motion sensor for the hands, a more powerful lens and better resolution. However, these improvements also contribute to making the new Rift a heavier and more motley-looking device than its predecessor.
Every year at GDC, hundreds of developers indie they come together to present the best video games not associated with large companies. The section dedicated exclusively to this type of video game is called Indie Megabooth and brings together independent developers who do not have large budgets such as giants like PlayStation or Nintendo.
As Kelly Wallick, developer and founder of Indie Megabooth, explains, without this kind of developers there would not be the explosion of mobile games of the last decade. "Indie developers are essential for this industry and are the ones that bring more diversity, because there are tools available such as Unity and UnReal, more people can access the creation of video games," says Wallick during the GDC. A greater diversity of developers, including women and minorities, greater number of stories and plots that may interest a wider range of users. "Not everyone wants to destroy and see viscera in video games," says Wallick.
This year, the winner of the Independent Games Festival, within the GDC has been The return of Work Dinn, an adventure and mystery video game about a ship lost at sea.
For its part, Tencent extends its huge arm to the Unity video game creation engine, offering its cloud services to China. This means that thousands of Unity developers will now be able to enter the immensely lucrative Chinese market. For now, Unity announced this week, the first video game that will leave this association will be Call of Duty for mobile
The juicy market for mobile games in China, it covered more than 600 million people in 2018 and generated almost 38 billion dollars, according to video game market analysis company Newzoo.
This year some thirty Chinese companies have gone to the GDC and it is expected that the number will not stop growing in the next calls, especially now that the Chinese authorities have opened their hand to the development of more video games in their territory, given the enormous economic possibilities for the country.
Another section dedicated exclusively to mobile games, the Mobile Summit, has given the prize for the best mobile game to Florence, an interactive game from the Australian study Mountains. Each year, the space devoted to mobile video game developers increases in this conference and the advance of technologies such as the 5G predict an even greater growth for this market. Platforms like Stadia are going to boost it even more, thanks to the fact that you can play any title that is available through Chrome, without downloads.
