In addition to a lawsuit from Fallout parent publisher ZeniMax, Oculus VR continues to face a second suit from a company, Total Recall Technologies, which claims founder Palmer Luckey took confidential information and passed it off as his own.
As reported by Reuters, US District judge William Alsup recently ruled that Total Recall’s breach of contract claim against Luckey could move forward, though civil claims–including fraud–have been tossed out.
The Hawaii-based Total Recall says in its filing that it hired Luckey in 2011 to create a prototype virtual reality headset; he even signed a confidentiality agreement, the lawsuit says.
“Throughout the latter half of 2011 and into 2012, Luckey received feedback and information to improve the design of the display,” Reuters reported back in May. “However, Luckey used information he learned from his partnership when he launched a Kickstarter campaign for his own head mounted display called the Oculus Rift, according to the lawsuit.”
For his part, Luckey called the lawsuit opportunistic. The claim is “a brazen attempt to secure for itself a stake in Oculus VR’s recent multi-billion dollar acquisition by Facebook.”
An Oculus VR representative declined to comment.
Facebook acquired Oculus VR in March 2014 for the sum of $2 billion. After years of development, the first consumer Rift model will start shipping in March, priced at $600.
As for the other lawsuit Oculus VR is facing, ZeniMax has accused Oculus VR of stealing virtual reality technology that would later become the Rift. As part of this case, Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg must take part in an oral interview outside of court that could be used in the case.
Disclosure: Leslie Moonves, chief executive of GameSpot parent company CBS, is a member of the ZeniMax board of directors.
