A growing number of virtual reality game developers have announced that they are withdrawing their support for VR headset Oculus Rift until its founder Palmer Luckey stands down from his current role at the company, now owned by Facebook. A few days ago, a report by The Daily Beast revealed that Luckey has been secretly funding pro-Donald Trump meme machine Nimble America that had been spreading viral images of Hillary Clinton considered by many to constitute bigotry and hate speech.
Now, a raft of developers – including Insomniac Games, Tomorrow Today Labs, and Polytron – have vowed to cease developing games for Oculus Rift until Luckey walks or is pushed from the company.
“You may have seen the news yesterday that ties Oculus Founder Palmer Luckey to Nimble America, a Trump-endorsing organization Luckey started to defame Clinton via “the power of Internet memes”,” Polytron wrote in a statement on Pastebin. “In a political climate as fragile and horrifying as this one, we cannot tacitly endorse these actions by supporting Luckey or his platform.”
In light of this, we will not be pursuing Oculus support for our upcoming VR release, SUPERHYPERCUBE,” the statement continued. “If you are a voting citizen of the United States, please remember to register and make your voice heard this November 8th. Do not let bigotry, white supremacy, hate and fear win.”
SUPERHYPERCUBE will not be supporting Oculus. https://t.co/sqtAzZ8hJZ
— Polytron (@Polytron) September 23, 2016
“Insomniac Games condemns all forms of hate speech,” the makers of Ratchet & Clank told Vice Motherboard. “While everyone has a right to express his or her political opinion, the behavior and sentiments reported do not reflect the values of our company. We are also confident that this behavior and sentiment does not reflect the values of the many Oculus employees we work with on a daily basis.”
Hey @oculus, @PalmerLuckey's actions are unacceptable. NewtonVR will not be supporting the Oculus Touch as long as he is employed there.
— Tomorrow Today Labs (@TTLabsVR) September 23, 2016
A couple of developers, though, remain defiant; one has said it will continue to work with Oculus, despite feeling uncomfortable about it, while another has branded the boycott “nonsense.”
“I’ve had a great experience working with Oculus over the years (including working with a lot of good people), and I like the products that they’ve built,” E McNeill told Vice Motherboard. “I don’t think I’m going to boycott the company based on the politics of its founder. I’ll keep working with them. But this sure as hell doesn’t make me feel better about it.”
“This backlash is nonsense,” James Green, co-founder of Carbon Games, added. “I absolutely support him doing whatever he wants politically if it’s legal. To take any other position is against American values.”
The bad PR has hit at a pivotal time for Oculus, which faces stiff competition from the HTC Vive, PlayStation VR, and the upcoming Google Daydream in the emerging VR market.
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