The latest Oculus Rift update has now locked out Vive users who were using the ReVive hack to play games from the Oculus Store.
Back in April, the third-party ReVive hack opened up a couple of Oculus exclusive games to Vive users which  included Lucky’s Tale which was released free to all Oculus customers. This hole has now been plugged.
The update from Oculus changed the following:
- Improvements to performance and system stability
- Improvements to sensor tracking under certain circumstances
- Bug fixes and security updates, including updates to platform integrity checks
- AUD, CAD, Euro, Pound, and Yen currencies supported by all games in applicable markets
- With this update, version 16.5.2 of the AMD driver can cause flickering on your computer screen. AMD is working on a fix. If you encounter this issue, use the 16.5.1 driver: https://support.oculus.com/1426791537346223
An update from the ReVive creator explains what this patch has done.
“From my preliminary research, it seems that Oculus has also added a check whether the Oculus Rift headset is connected to their Oculus Platform DRM. And while Revive fools the application in thinking the Rift is connected, it does nothing to make the actual Oculus Platform think the headset is connected.
“Because only the Oculus Platform DRM has been changed this means that none of the Steam or standalone games were affected. Only games published on the Oculus Store that use the Oculus Platform SDK are affected.
“A temporary workaround if you have an Oculus Rift CV1 or DK2 is to keep the headset and camera connected while starting the game. That should still allow you to use your Vive headset to play the actual game, since Revive itself is still working.”
The workaround is not ideal and most DK2 owners will have likely already sold their old hardware.
The move by Oculus to lock-down games ob their platform could end up being extremely damaging to VR’s future. Owners of VR systems struggle to find quality games, whether it’s on the Vive of Rift.  If VR is to succeed, developers will need to develop for both systems, and it’s in their interest to do so if they have invested heavily in VR development. For VR to succeed, exclusivity has to stop.
Oculus will be doing everything they can to protect their platform because as it stands right now it’s the inferior of the two main VR products on the market.
Update: The DRM has been circumvented and ReVive is now working again but with some limitations.
Published: May 20, 2016 08:38 pm