Heads up, VR devs: Oculus has released its Avatar SDK and Explore API to the world

Along with revealing a new headset, details about its Santa Cruz project, and a $100 price drop on the Rift bundle, speakers at Oculus Connect took some time today to detail what goodies VR developers can expect from the company in the near future.

Many of the announcements aimed at developers during the event dealt with coming changes to the Oculus platform itself, including a number of new social tools and discovery improvements.

In the social sphere, Oculus has released a new Avatar SDK that opens up the newly redesigned VR avatars to developers, allowing them to bring those digital alter egos to their own games and apps.

Additionally, Oculus is opening up Avatars to other VR platforms, PC, and mobile in 2018 so devs that choose to work the API into their own projects won’t be tethered to an Oculus-only release. 

The new releases also include access to the Explore API that will let developer tap into Oculus’ new ‘Explore’ feed on the Gear VR and (eventually) Oculus Rift. The Explore section itself is toted as a personalized feed of app recommendations displayed within the Gear VR’s Home. Developers are now able to access the Explore API and its related documentation over on the Oculus developer portal. Currently, the API is only open to Gear VR developers but Oculus says both Explore and its API will release for the Oculus Rift in 2018. 

More details on the developer-focused announcements from Oculus Connect, including Mixed Reality Capture and platform-wide safety settings, can be found over on the Oculus Blog.