We’re well over a month past the ‘launch’ of the Oculus Rift now and some customers still don’t feel any closer to getting their pre-ordered kits. Strangely, though, Microsoft seems to have surpassed that issue for some.
Rift units on sale at the online Microsoft Store, which were made available this past weekend, currently state that they’ll be shipped out by May 31st. If you were to order a unit from Oculus itself right now it wouldn’t ship until August. That’s around a three month difference, but there is one very big setback; Microsoft is currently out of stock of its supply, and there’s no indication of when it will have more in. We wouldn’t be surprised if this month’s allocation is already gone, but it’s worth keeping an eye on.
Either way, it looks like some people will have been able to slip by the Rift’s lengthy waiting line this way. There’s no getting around it now, however, as even the Oculus Ready PC bundles that the company was offering are now sold out. The same goes for listings of the Rift and its bundles on Amazon, while listings on Best Buy are currently tagged as “Coming Soon”. What we don’t know, is the status of stock in physical Best Buy outlets across the US, which were rolled out earlier this month too.
This all adds to the increasingly bizarre situation that surrounds the Oculus Rift’s shipping. The company came under fire last week when it announced that units would be going on sale in Best Buy while some even still wait for their Kickstarter edition units, which were meant to be arriving around the end of March. Oculus has remained tight lipped as to the nature of the delays, citing agreements with manufacturers and other partners as to why it can’t share more details.
The simple fact is that this is going to be a long waiting game for many, one that will hopefully be fully resolved around August time. In the meantime, we’ll keep an eye out for any other retails that might offer up an early chance to get your hands on the device.
