The Oculus Rift Development Kit 2 started shipping this week, but the company has been forced to suspend orders from China because of "extreme reseller purchases." It's now looking into alternative methods for getting the hardware into the hands of legitimate developers, but says it doesn't have a timeline for when that might happen.
The Oculus Rift DK2 is a "is a development kit meant for developers that want to create virtual reality content for the upcoming consumer versions of the Oculus Rift," according to the Oculus VR support site . Of course, there are quite a number of consumers who wouldn't mind having one too, and that's led to a lot of preorders being placed for the specific purpose of reselling the hardware rather than developing for it—particularly, as it turns out, from China.
"Yes, it is a bummer that we've had to suspend sales in China due to extreme reseller purchases. We need to make sure that we are doing what we can to make sure that resellers that are looking to flip our product for a profit are not taking stock away from legitimate developer purchases globally," an Oculus VR customer service rep confirmed yesterday on Reddit . "Our product, in its current form, is a developer kit, meant for developers that develop VR content. We are looking into alternative ways to make sure that our development kits are getting into legitimate developer hands in China. If you are an enthusiast, we kindly ask that you wait for the consumer Rift. It will be worth the wait."
The rep didn't say how many preorders had been determined to be for resellers but implied that the number was very high, adding in a separate post, "We were forced to suspend an entire country from purchasing. I'll let you put 2 and 2 together." He also noted that while there's no timeline for a resumption of orders, Oculus has "made it a priority."
Oculus VR hasn't commented on the suspension, but the DK2 order page does not currently allow China to be selected for either billing or shipping options.
