Unless Zenimax and Oculus VR kiss and make up, you’re unlikely to play official versions of Doom and The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim on the Rift virtual-reality headset any time soon.
The two companies are continuing their public battle this morning. Oculus VR issued a new statement to “clarify a few key points.” It reiterated that the Oculus software includes zero lines of Zenimax code and that John Carmack, Oculus’s chief technology officer, didn’t take any intellectual property from his former employer. The virtual-reality startup continues to suggest that Zenimax is only making these allegations because of Facebook’s recent $2 billion acquisition of Oculus VR.
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We reached out to Zenimax, and the company referred us to its previous statement where it claimed Oculus “exploited” its technology and intellectual property. The publisher even claimed that Oculus VR founder Palmer Luckey “acknowledged in writing Zenimax’s legal ownership” of the property.
“Zenimax has misstated the purposes and language of the Zenimax nondisclosure agreement that Palmer Luckey signed,” reads today’s Oculus statement. The company did not illuminate the actual purpose or language of the NDA as it is still bound by it.
Oculus also revealed that Carmack decided to depart Zenimax when the company prevented him from working on virtual reality and stopped investing in VR for its games. The publisher even cancelled VR support for Doom 3 BFG Edition.
For now, this case is nothing but public bickering. Zenimax has only sent an official notice to Oculus VR. This may end up in court, or the two companies may end up settling before that. Regardless of how it shakes out, it’s clear that fans of Zenimax’s games that are also looking into virtual reality might lose out on the potential to play some cool games on the platform in the near term.
