HTC created its Viveport app store as an easy way for users of its Vive virtual reality (VR) system to locate, purchase, and download new VR apps. Viveport also serves as a place for developers to showcase their apps, allowing them to feature their work somewhere other than the crowded Steam store.
The company also kicked off another effort to spur developers to make apps for the HTC Vive, specifically the Viveport Developer Awards (VDA), which honor — and financially reward — the best apps. That contest has now concluded, and HTC announced the winners on its Vive blog.
The first annual VDA offered up $500,000 in award money to the best apps in four categories. First prize was $50,000, second prize was $30,000, third prize was $15,000, and a special community’s choice winner netted $10,000. Each winning entry along with two runners-up also received an HTC Vive system.
Here are the winners:
| First place | Second place | Third place | Runners up | |
| Explore | Apollo 11 VR | Realities | The Body VR | A Chair in a Room: Greenwater, Mars Odyssey |
| Create | Fantastic Contraption | Soundstage | Paintlab | Kodon, Arcade Artist |
| Connect | Cloudlands: VR Minigolf | Altspace VR | Engage | World of Diving, SurrealVR |
| Experience | Allumette | Pearl | Firebird – La Péri | TheBlu, The Night Café: A VR Tribute to Van Gogh |
| Community | A Chair in a Room: Greenwater |
Three of the winners, Penrose Studios, Futuretown, and Northway Games, will join an on-stage discussion panel on March 3, 2017 at the upcoming Game Developers Conference (GDC) in San Francisco. If you’re an HTC Vive user, then head over to Viveport to pick up the first-place apps at a 40-percent discount through March 2, 2017.