It made four games in the base-jumping franchise “AaaaaAAaaaAAAaaAAAAaAAAAA!!!,” two of which have been oriented towards virtual reality experiences (one being for Google’s Cardboard standard for Android, the other Facebook’s Oculus Rift for high-powered PCs), and conversation-driven survival riff “Dyscourse” before plunging further into VR through “Job Simulator” (HTC Vive, Oculus Rift, PlayStation VR) and then Adult Swim’s licensed “Rick & Morty Virtual Rick-ality.”
“‘Job Simulator’ was our overnight success many years in the making. We pushed in VR so early and so hard,” explained Owlchemy co-founders Alex Schwartz and Devin Reimer who, together with their team, “spent over a year envisioning what was possible with a tracked head and hands” (owlchemylabs.com).
“Together with Google, with which we share an incredible overlap in vision, we’re free to pursue raw creation and sprint toward interesting problems in these early days of VR,” their company announcement concluded. “We cannot freaking wait to show you what we’re concocting next.”
Google explained the acquisition in terms of its own VR portfolio, which includes video platform YouTube, Street View, Photos on Daydream, Google Earth VR and painting app Tilt Brush.
“Together, we’ll be working to create engaging, immersive games and developing new interaction models across many different platforms to continue bringing the best VR experiences to life,” wrote Google’s VR and AR Director of Engineering, Relja Markovic (blog.google).