Oculus announces its first VR gaming showcase

The Facebook-owned virtual reality powerhouse Oculus has announced its first ever event dedicated to showcasing the VR games on its platform – the aptly titled Oculus Gaming Showcase.

According to the company's announcement post, the event will be taking place on April 21 at 3pm PT (6pm EST, 11pm BST, and April 22, 8am AEST) and will be streamed on Twitch, Facebook and YouTube.

Interestingly, the announcement mentions that it will only be streamed "in the US and Japan", although we don't suspect other regions will be locked out of watching the event.

While the VR company has been running its Oculus Connect event annually since 2014, the Oculus Gaming Showcase will be the first to exclusively focus on gaming titles on the platform, rather than including other apps, software, firmware, and hardware updates.

According to the release, those tuning in to watch the event "can expect new updates to fan-favorite titles, never-before-seen footage from some unreleased games, and a few surprises in store".

Developers Cloudhead Games, Ready At Dawn and ILMxLAB all get a specific mention for the presence of their respective titles Pistol Whip, Lone Echo II, and Star Wars: Tales from the Galaxy's Edge.

Ready At Dawn Studios (makers of the popular Lone Echo title) gave us our first glimpse of the hotly anticipated sequel at the 2018 Oculus Connect event, but the team has suffered from development delays since – partially due to the pandemic – and so we're still left without a solid release date.

The studio was acquired by Facebook halfway through 2020, which may well have helped enough with its production woes that we'll be seeing an official launch date be announced at the April 21 Oculus Gaming Chowcase event.

While details are currently thin on the ground, we'll have more info on the event and what it promises closer to the date itself.