Apple’s new two-player AR arcade game at WWDC is crazy

Augmented reality is everywhere and Apple is a big believer in it. Here at WWDC, Apple doesn't have the headset but they have new AR tech and that takes the form of ARKit 3. They're new air technologies, and we got to play them in a game called Swift Strike. Air kit three has occlusion. Now what that means is that last year we played multiplayer gaming in this space, and we're able to see things and move around and both of us see these virtual objects. This time. Those objects can be in front of us or behind us. And human bodies are appropriately mapped out to look like they're all in that space. It sounds simple but it's actually very complicated. And this is the first time I've ever tried using a collusion in an AR game. So two of us faced off with virtual bowling pins and a giant ball that rose up we had to use the iPads as like paddles. To push forward and try to push the ball into the giant bowling pins, and it's pretty athletic. Yes! Yes! Yes! Yes! So Eli and I went at it, and we tried to see what would happen. You have such joy right now. [LAUGH] Because you beat me three times last time. Now it's really awesome and wild. And it's weird how much it feels like the stuff is in your space. But to be clear, Apple doesn't have an augmented reality headset yet, like magically for like HoloLens. So let's think forward to what this could mean. Apples are kit now has occlusion, but it also has technology like motion capture which could puppet your body and perhaps you have it control virtual avatars are kit also can use the front and rear cameras, which means if you use eye tracking to interact with a virtual Avatar, so we played this game. And it was fine. It's also tiring and sometimes hard to get a sense for where the object is it could end up behind you. But imagine this in 3D. Imagine this with a headset on where suddenly you're able look at objects that persist and then also know where other things are. Now those things have to be human right now. This only works with human beings. Kind of like what the iPhone 10r did for portrait mode with people in the future. This could recognize other things to maybe other objects or pets or who knows what but this super crazy game behind us is a demo for where air is going for Apple this year and maybe we can imagine where it's going in the future. Strike! So what did it feel like to play this game? Tiring. I'm totally exhaused. Eli beat me the first three times and I had to learn how to win it which is basically don't let the ball out of your sight. [LAUGH] Keep the ball in view and don't back up cuz you might score on yourself. Which brings up one of the challenges with AR on a tablet or a phone, is that it's 2D even though you feel like it might be 3D and it's only on the screen in front of you. If you're wearing a headset and you have this view of it all around you, maybe you get a better sense of the virtual bowling pins And no with better cues where it might be behind you. But that feels like the kind of steps that Apple might be heading towards next. Apple also has a new reality toolkit that is meant to create AR content for aspiring air developers on iPhones and iPads. It's 2019. If there is something happening in 2020, maybe these are the very beginnings of thinking about building a more complex AR ecosystem. But occlusion, motion capture, these are the type of things that don't even exist easily on high end AR headsets like magically. So to see this work on the fly on an iPad Is really cool, and we'll see what else comes from Apple with ARKit, in the coming year. Multiplayer has taken a while to get here. Hopefully, we'll see more multiplayer games in AR, including Minecraft Earth, in the months to come. I'm Scott Stein, here at WWDC, and that was a game of Swift Bowling on ARKit 3. It says winner. I would just say that Eli destroyed me in the last game and I feel like at least I won this one. He's a tough competitor. Good game. Good game. Why am I so out of breath? I need to play more air games.