Oculus will shut down its award-winning cinematic VR division, Oculus Story Studio. The announcement was made in a blog post by Oculus VP of Content Jason..
Oculus will shut down its award-winning cinematic VR division, Oculus Story Studio. The announcement was made in a blog post by Oculus VP of Content Jason Rubin.
“After careful consideration, we’ ve decided to shift our focus away from internal content creation to support more external production, ” Rubin wrote. “As part of that shift, we’ ll be winding down Story Studio.”
At the Oculus Connect developer conference in October, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg detailed that the company had already invested more than $250 million in original VR content and would be putting another quarter billion into original content plays as it looked to give Rift and Gear VR users something to watch on their headsets.
Rubin details that $50 million of its committed funds will now be set aside for the company to invest exclusively in non-gaming, interactive content.
Oculus Story Studio was founded in 2014 to explore creating original cinematic content for the virtual reality company. Last year the studio won an Emmy for its animated short Henry, a Pixar-esque story about a prickly hedgehog that loves to give hugs.
In the midst of creating its latest project, Dear Angelica, the Story Studio team created an extensive VR painting product called Quill which allowed users to create content inside virtual reality. As a part of the shut down, Quill will continue to be available for download in the Oculus store, but will no longer be receiving updates, though Oculus plans to open source the software.
The sudden shutdown comes as the studio is in the midst of producing its fourth major project, The Wolves in the Walls, which the company confirms has now been cancelled.
About 50 people are currently employed at Oculus Story Studio. An Oculus spokesperson tells TechCrunch that the company plans to find new roles for these employees elsewhere inside Oculus or Facebook.
