Last year, we kicked off our third annual Oculus Launch Pad program, quickly followed by our annual boot camp tradition in Menlo Park. At boot camp, we spent two days with over 100 promising VR content creators from diverse backgrounds, sharing best practices, unique perspectives, and inspiring ideas. Launch Pad attendees had four months to build a prototype that could then be submitted for consideration as part of our Launch Pad Scholarship program. Today, we’re excited to introduce this year’s Launch Pad Scholarship recipients and their VR projects that are helping to push the industry in exciting new directions.

Argotian

Jordan Brighton

Employing VR for a new take on language learning, Argotian transforms beginner and intermediate foreign language learners into an undercover detective hoping to advance through the ranks of the Galactic Law Enforcement Agency (GLEA). This open-world adventure game takes place on The Accent starship. Learners will practice and learn new skills by completing quests, solving mysteries, and interacting with AI spaceship guests and co-workers and will ultimately build conversational fluency.

Bizarre Barber

Maria Mishurenko and Gordey Chernyy

Bizarre Barber is a fast-paced, accessible action game for the Rift Platform set in a surreal world where you play as an alien barber providing stylish haircuts for eccentric clientele. Instead of a comfy adjustable chair you’d see in most barber shops, all of your clients move chaotically through the world unable to sit still even for a second. Players will make perfect cuts, dodge dangerous obstacles, catch speed boosts and power-ups, and even earn money to unlock new tools and new worlds.

Fire Together

Danielle Perszyk

Fire Together immerses you in a Total Art performance featuring an exceptionally diverse group of over 20 internationally renowned dancers and athletes. Awash in the modal polyrhythms of acclaimed progressive jazz trio GoGo Penguin (Blue Note/Universal Music), you are transported from a gorgeous theatre into a neural network where the movement artists become one with the music. Audiovisual synchrony causes your brain to fire together with your virtual surroundings, sparking an awe-inspiring empathic connection with the other-worldly performers. In the premium brain-computer interface version, which requires integrated EEG sensors, you can affect the performance in real-time with your own neural activity.

vCoder Hero

Keith and Angela Patterson

In vCoder Hero, the virtual world has been infected by a rogue AI—it’s up to you to locate the bugs, hack the system, and rewrite the code to save it! An epic adventure awaits in this educational puzzle-action game. Build real-world programming mastery while unlocking the secrets of lost dimensions and discovering the depths of your own super-coding-power! Are you ready to become the ultimate vCoder Hero?!

Oculus Launch Pad 2019 applications are set to open this summer. Keep an eye out for more information about the program in the coming weeks. We can’t wait to see what the new year brings!

— The Oculus Team