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Make in-car games and XR experiences with holoride Elastic SDK

July 21, 2021 in Industry | 6 min. read
Girl in a sedan with black leather interior wearing a grey VR headset playing a Star Wars-esk game
Girl in a sedan with black leather interior wearing a grey VR headset playing a Star Wars-esk game
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Unity community: You can now shape the future of in-vehicle entertainment and create content for a captive audience. Learn how to create and monetize extended reality (XR) applications – from games and well-being to productivity and education – for a completely new media format built for moving vehicles.

As digital displays in vehicles and the technology powering them evolve, the opportunities to create more engaging in-vehicle experiences for drivers and passengers are limitless, from immersive navigation systems to in-car gaming. People around the world spend 400 billion hours riding in cars each year – it’s a captive audience. To date, content creators have had limited access to these consumers, guarded by the auto industry.

Entertaining backseat passengers in a new dimension

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Today at GDC 2021, holoride announced the holoride Elastic SDK to close this gap and empower Unity creators to entertain passengers in new ways. Watch their session here.

“We are thrilled to be building the future of in-vehicle entertainment with Unity and its amazing community,” said holoride CEO and cofounder Nils Wollny. “Together, we will transform the car into a canvas with infinite possibilities for immersive content creation.”

Here’s how holoride works: Passengers install the holoride app on their personal virtual reality devices, such as a Pico Neo 3, Neo 3 Pro, or G2, which will be among the first supported headsets for the holoride experience, and enjoy immersive, motion- and location-synchronized in-vehicle XR experiences.

holoride’s vehicle localization software syncs content with the vehicle’s motion, its position and map data in real-time. As a result, it perfectly syncs with the passenger’s journey, which can reduce the motion sickness that many people experience when consuming visual content in cars.

holoride will be using a fully transparent blockchain-based system that enables creators to distribute content and receive compensation based on user engagement and value. Game studios like Schell Games are already leveraging holoride’s tools to create groundbreaking entertainment experiences. See why CEO Jesse Schell calls holoride “the most thrilling and immersive video game experience that I’ve ever seen.”

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holoride Elastic SDK: Design XR experiences for moving vehicles with Unity

Futuristic looking infographic in purple and blue hues that describes the structure of the holoride ecosystem

At the center of holoride’s new ecosystem for creators is the Elastic SDK powered by Unity. The Elastic SDK draws its name from Elastic Content, holoride’s new content category for moving vehicles. Developers can think of Elastic Content as a creative reinterpretation of real-world Maps and Geo information that is projected into the Unity Scene. During the Game, the Unity camera is controlled by both the VR headset and the car’s sensors.

The Elastic SDK comes with a range of functionalities. At the core is a node graph that defines how objects are placed and what the terrain looks like. It includes two major types of nodes: map nodes (think of these as 2D textures) and pose nodes, which represent containers of position-rotation-tuples and serve as the information where to spawn objects. 

Nodes download and filter maps, extract information, download points of interest and replace them by Prefabs. Extensibility allows Unity developers to write their own nodes and create responsive game objects. The holoride player Prefab supplies the car’s sensor data like acceleration, position and speed.

Image showing how the holoride graph defines where objects get spawned and what the procedural terrain looks like. The image is divided into two sections. On the left there is a landscape and on the right there is a build chard.
The Elastic Graph defines where objects get spawned and what the procedural terrain looks like.
Image showing how Elastic Content is a creative reinterpretation of real-world reference points and map data and is updated as the car moves. Image is split into two sections. On the left there is a landscape and on the right there is a map.
Elastic Content is a creative reinterpretation of real-world reference points and map data and is updated as the car moves.

To make content for vehicles in motion, creators do not need to learn to develop for holoride from scratch. Since spawners instantiate Prefabs, almost everything that can be wrapped into a Prefab can be created the usual way: renderers, animations, rigidbodies, scripts, audio sources, and more.

Learn more about the Elastic SDK in holoride’s Creator Space, which provides all the tools needed for holoride development.

Take a ride

Image of a silver sedan branded with the Holoride logo driving on a road with a mountain range and sunset in the background

Together with holoride and Audi of America, Unity is conducting a California roadshow from Los Angeles to San Francisco in early August. Experience holoride’s technology for yourself and get a demo ride of the holoride experience Schell Games is currently building. Stay tuned to Unity’s social media channels for more information.

Learn more about Unity’s solutions for games and human-machine interfaces

Learn more about holoride and their endeavor to change in-car entertainment forever.

July 21, 2021 in Industry | 6 min. read

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