Niantic Labs is giving everyone the chance to get their hands on the technology behind Pokémon Go and Pikmin Bloom so they can create their own augmented reality and “real-world metaverse” apps. Developers can start using the Niantic Lightship platform today. The company also announced a $20 million investment fund to support developers who “share our vision for the real-world metaverse and contribute to the global ecosystem we’re building.”.
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Developers can use Ninatic’s toolkit to create real-time 3D mesh maps so that apps can understand the surfaces and topography of the world surrounding a device. Other APIs will help apps tell the difference between different aspects of an environment, such as ground, sky, water, and buildings. The toolkit also allows developers to create apps that allow up to five players to participate in the same AR session, keeping all their content and interactions in sync.
The tools are mostly free. The multiplayer APIs will be available at no cost for the first six months, regardless of how many users an app has. After that, Niantic will charge a fee if the APIs are used in an app with more than 50,000 monthly active users.
Several notable brands have participated in a private beta of the development kit, including Universal Pictures, PGA of America, and Warner Music Group. Coachella has created an AR that festivalgoers will be able to watch next year. They’ll be able to see a large version of the Coachella butterfly landing on the seven-story Spectra rainbow tower.
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Meanwhile, Shueisha is working with developer T&S to bring characters from One Piece and other manga into the real world using AR. This app will be available in 2022.
Niantic’s vision for the metaverse is very different from the virtual reality-centric future that Facebook parent company Meta has in mind. In a post in August, CEO John Hanke said that the “real-world metaverse” is about connecting the physical and digital worlds, rather than existing purely as a virtual experience. With that in mind, the company has been working on AR glasses with Qualcomm for the past two years.
Information source: engadget.com
