Unity's Game Development Tools for Vision Pro Now Available in Beta

[MacRumors]

Unity's "PolySpatial" development platform for visionOS is available in beta as of today, providing a way for developers to create and port over 3D experiences like games to Apple's Vision Pro headset.

PolySpatial has been developed in collaboration with Apple and was announced at WWDC earlier this year, offering familiar workflows to those who have already used the Unity Engine to reduce friction in the development process. Unity's authoring and simulation capabilities are combined with RealityKit's managed app rendering to ensure that content feels familiar. PolySpatial provides access to technologies like pass-through and Dynamic Foveated Rendering, as well as popular Unity features like AR Foundation and XR Interaction Toolkit. Unity Create general manager Marc Whitten told TechCrunch:

We had to work, ground up, to make sure we could make it easy for our creators to unlock capabilities. Primarily that's things like Unity application existing in a shared space with other applications, being able to integrate with Reality Kit and the visionOS. It's not just "you can put Unity up in the slate" (which is supported on day one), but you can actually put it inside of real space and with other experiences at the same time — whether they're Unity, Reality Kit or other Apple experiences.

Most importantly, PolySpatial can be used to port existing games to visionOS. For example, the crowdfunded Apple Arcade game "What the Golf?" is already being ported to visionOS using PolySpatial. Apple vice president of the Vision Products Group Mike Rockwell commented:

We know there is a huge community of developers who have been building incredible 3D experiences using Unity’s robust authoring tools, and we're so excited for them to build apps for Apple Vision Pro. Unity-based apps and games run natively on Apple Vision Pro, so they have access to groundbreaking visionOS features, including low latency pass-through and high-resolution rendering. This enables Unity developers to take full advantage of the powerful and unique capabilities of Apple Vision Pro. We can't wait to see what incredible experiences are created.

Unity has not yet offered a time frame for the public release of PolySpatial, but developers who signed up for the beta are being given early access in waves starting today. See Unity's spatial webpage for more information.

Article Link: Unity's Game Development Tools for Vision Pro Now Available in Beta

 

[DailySlow]

This is a significant development (pun intended – or not). I do not game on my Macs, well except for Bakgammon, but now will look at "What The Golf?"

 

[JosephAW]

It'll be interesting to see what games and apps are ported over.
Apple will probably feature them in the next Keynote.

 

[MacWiz_007]

Every time I see this hideous thing, I cannot believe it is an Apple product. #Cook

 

[al256]

Apple needs to buy a game studio.

 

[Apple Fan 2008]

Cool! I can’t wait to see which games get released!

 

[timber]

No Unreal Engine?

 

[MuppetGate]

Every time I see this hideous thing, I cannot believe it is an Apple product. #Cook

That’s odd. He speaks so highly of you. 🤔

 

[SoldOnApple]

Apple needs to buy a game studio.

Or a publisher. They could afford EA if they really wanted it…

 

[MacWiz_007]

No Unreal Engine?

That's just...unreal!

 

[Verified Whiskey]

This is huge!! I can’t wait to see what comes from this.

 

[MacWiz_007]

This is huge!! I can’t wait to see what comes from this.

TWSS

 

[Mr_Ed]

Cool! I can’t wait to see which games get released!

I am under the impression Apple itself has steered away from gaming as a core use of the Vision Pro. They seem to be painting it as a different computing paradigm (Spatial or whatever it was) so as to NOT be seen as a competitor to existing gaming VR tech.

Not saying you couldn’t do games with the Vision Pro, but using voice, eye tracking, and hands as input might not translate easily into games.

 

[spaz8]

No Unreal Engine?

Ya, well Apple was pretty much stuck with Unity because of the feuds with Epic.. just like we were stuck with AMD GPU's with the Nvidia fallout for the last 8? yrs.

 

[techfreak23]

This still doesn't make any sense without the support of motion controllers. Most of the VR games worth playing require them. Very few games can get away with hand tracking only. Playing 2D games in VR is also incredibly ridiculous and uncomfortable. I tried it with my Quest 2 and Steam, but it was pointless. My 4k monitor is always better.

Edit: The motion controllers also add tactile feedback. Anyone who has ever played Vader Immortal on a Quest 2 will know that the vibrations from the controller make it feel like you are holding a lightsaber.

 

[seek3r]

Apple needs to buy a game studio.

Yes, or at least throw money at a game studio to make Mac games

Or a publisher. They could afford EA if they really wanted it…

No! EA is the garbage fire of gaming! ugh

 

[crsh1976]

Is it VR gaming? I thought the AVP was not a VR device - or at least tried to avoid getting compared to VR headsets as much as possible because it's nothing alike.

So what is it then? Gaming on Macs is pretty limited, other than Arcade/iOS games but would they just get displayed as a floating 2D slab in a 3D space?

 

[topdrawer]

Apple needs to buy a game studio.

they need to buy a game engine or develop a cross platform one. i was at a unity presentation for this last night. windows gets lots of support because every developer tool is on windows.

 

[wilhoitm]

With Unity I just cannot do C#, I think I am going to stick with Apple's RealityKit!

 

[Unregistered 4U]

No Unreal Engine?

There will be. There’s no way Epic is going to allow for ANY room for Unity to get a foothold in an area and grow faster. They’re not first out of the gate, but they’ll have some version ready before it ships… the publishers that depend on them are counting on it.

 

[szw-mapple fan]

Or a publisher. They could afford EA if they really wanted it…

Or at the very least, put in some real effort to start publishing some AAA games themselves through Arcade and such, even if it's more selective like Apple TV+ content.

 

[ChrisA]

Unity is used for much more than just games. Things like visualization for robotics programming. It is hard to justify $3,200 for a gaming headset, but $3,200 is pocket change for many industrial use cases. Unity is used for research
into self-driving cars, robots and, I'm sure, other things.

Medical imaging comes to mind. An MRI machine makes a 3D model. A developer could import the MRI data into Unity and then give the radiologist a game-like interface to hold the organ his/her hands, turn it over, cut and open up the organ and have it look either realistic or maybe color coded by density. Unity is a very useful and general purpose graphical tool that, yes, gets used in games but so many other places too.

 

[obviouslogic]

I am under the impression Apple itself has steered away from gaming as a core use of the Vision Pro. They seem to be painting it as a different computing paradigm (Spatial or whatever it was) so as to NOT be seen as a competitor to existing gaming VR tech.

Not saying you couldn’t do games with the Vision Pro, but using voice, eye tracking, and hands as input might not translate easily into games.

It's too bad the Vision Pro doesn't support Bluetooth, so you know, someone could build motion controllers, game controllers, keyboards, mice, etc., for it if an application/game supported it. /s

Apple hit the nail on the head when it comes controlling the VP in a more natural and intuitive way. Adding support for physical controllers and other peripherals is trivial compared to what they've accomplished.

 

[wilhoitm]

It's too bad the Vision Pro doesn't support Bluetooth, so you know, someone could build motion controllers, game controllers, keyboards, mice, etc., for it if an application/game supported it. /s

Apple hit the nail on the head when it comes controlling the VP in a more natural and intuitive way. Adding support for physical controllers and other peripherals is trivial compared to what they've accomplished.

I agree 100%, we need to move forward and not backward! AI is the future and the possibilities are almost unlimited! Physical game controllers are way too limiting!

 

[topdrawer]

With Unity I just cannot do C#, I think I am going to stick with Apple's RealityKit!

i went to a unity presentation for polywahteverit'scalled last night and got to ask questions. an apple employee that works on xr was there and i asked him if the package created with unity would have some exposure of the entities in it to xcode, he said it may be possible, it is still new. but then the guy form unity told me this would not be the case, the whole emulation and input would be handled in unity and you would have no control of it in xcode.

i really wish apple would push swift onto engines. godot has a tiny swift community but without apple's direct support it isn't going anywhere. the apple rep told me they are looking for developer input on tools they use and workflows, so speak up.

but yeah, for me i'm still on scenekit. i was looking into porting my game from scenekit to realitykit but hit a roadblock with the new realitykit composer only supporting xrOS. i wanted to build a mac game and xr experience in tandem. the apple guy told me realitykit might support mac in the future, again he iterated that it is very early in development and they didn't want to break things in support for multiple platforms.

i was excited for unity but now i'm looking forward to sticking to apple frameworks and hope they make them more robust.