It pays to be an early adopter.
Oculus VR is thanking the original backers of its Kickstarter project, which introduced the virtual reality headset to the world in 2012, by giving them each a final version of the Oculus Rift. This Rift will be a special edition, meant to thank the 6,855 backers that ordered the original development kits from the company's Kickstarter campaign.
In a letter to Kickstarter backers, Oculus CEO Brendan Iribe, founder Palmer Luckey, VP of Product Nate Mitchell and CTO Michael Abrash wrote, "You were there at the beginning of our journey -- we couldn’t have done it without you."
Oculus is making the gesture to Kickstarter backers just one day before the completed, consumer-ready version of the Oculus Rift goes on sale. While plenty of people have had an Oculus Rift already, those were all iterations of the development kit intended for people interested in creating virtual reality experiences.
Since Oculus's Kickstarter beginnings, the company received several major rounds of funding before being acquired by Facebook in March 2014 for $2 billion. During the Facebook acquisition announcement, some backers were upset that a product they had helped fund had been sold for so much.
Kickstarter backers will receive a form they'll need to fill out before Feb. 1, 2016 in order to claim their special-edition Rift. It will also come bundled with the same pre-order games: Lucky's Tale and EVE Valkyrie.