Stjerneprogrammøren Michael Abrash har forladt Valve for i stedet at arbejde på virtual reality-brillen Oculus Rift hos Oculus VR. På Oculus-bloggen skriver han om, hvordan det var at udvikle Valves egen virtual reality-hardware sammenlignet med Oculus Rift, og forklarer at den sidste brik i puslespillet faldt på plads da Facebook købte Oculus VR i sidste uge:
"The final piece of the puzzle fell into place on Tuesday. A lot of what it will take to make VR great is well understood at this point, so it's engineering, not research; hard engineering, to be sure, but clearly within reach."
"However, it's expensive engineering. And, of course, there's also a huge amount of research to do once we reach the limits of current technology, and that's not only expensive, it also requires time and patience - fully tapping the potential of VR will take decades. That's why I've written before that VR wouldn't become truly great until some company stepped up and invested the considerable capital to build the right hardware - and that it wouldn't be clear that it made sense to spend that capital until VR was truly great. I was afraid that that Catch-22 would cause VR to fail to achieve liftoff."
Abrash fortæller også, at han forventer at arbejde med virtual reality-hardware gennem resten af sin karriere.
"That worry is now gone. Facebook's acquisition of Oculus means that VR is going to happen in all its glory. The resources and long-term commitment that Facebook brings gives Oculus the runway it needs to solve the hard problems of VR - and some of them are hard indeed. I now fully expect to spend the rest of my career pushing VR as far ahead as I can."
Michael Abrash er måske ikket navn med den samme genkendelighed som for eksempel John Carmack, men bærer en stor del af æren for teknologien i det første Quake, og har skrevet flere indflydelsesrige bøger om programmering.