Augmented Reality Archives | Otaku No Culture

The Promise and Pitfall of Augmented Reality Games: Why Jedi Challenges Sits on the Shelf

Jedi Challenges promised a galaxy far, far away in your living room. A month of lightsabers later, the thrill faded—and so did the headset. There are not a lot of augmented reality games still around. Without updates, community, or real-world hooks, it’s still a tech spectacle stuck on the shelf.

The Allure of Immersion

Not everyone wants to play augmented reality games. You can’t interact with a digital environment without strapping on a headset or waving a device around to reveal what’s there. On paper, these experiences promise to blur our physical and digital lives into one seamless reality. In practice? They’ve delivered dazzling moments—Gorillaz’s virtual concerts and Hololive’s worldwide VTuber frenzy—but more often than not, they feel like flashy sideshows rather than daily habits.

At its core, AR overlays digital visuals onto the real world.

Pop culture has long imagined it in bigger, bolder ways. Back to the Future II had Marty McFly nearly leap out of his skin when a 3D Jaws lunged from a theatre marquee. Star Trek: The Next Generation gave us the holodeck, where you could wander inside the illusion and feel every detail. That’s the kind of immersion people crave—the kind that doesn’t remind you that you’re holding a phone like a glorified window.

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Look Out! Space Invaders: World Defense is Taking Over the Skies!

I can’t help but be reminded of the climatic moment from Independence Day in the fancier levels in Space Invaders: World Defense.

Released July 20th, 2023
Atari and TAITO

Available on Android and iOS

Space Invaders: World Defense has the feel that players should don AR glasses while shooting down the titular pixel aliens in the real world. That’s because, to spin around and search for them means they’re after you rather than to destroy a city! Fortunately, this game limits the area where you can move around in, so you’re not running around the block in search of their entry point to our realm.

Although this game isn’t fully designed to have you witness monsters and UFOs blasting away at city buildings, I have to wonder when digital reality will replace our own. That’s assuming that we are not living in The Matrix; the more structures that are around means more work for the game to internally weave these invaders around. It’s a novel concept that will have most gamers loving this product’s mechanic as a lot of the animation and interaction is truly seamless.

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Looking Back and My Hopes for Pokémon Go in 2023 (After its First Community Day)

Despite problems from last year, Niantic’s Pokémon GO is still a game played around the world. Hopefully it’ll fare better this year.

Niantic’s Pokémon GO had quite the mish mash of hits and misses back in 2022. From massive coding gaffes that made gameplay frustrating to the release of new pocket monsters with statistics that can break the game, I’m glad this year is off with a good start. This weekend’s Community Day bonus went off without a hitch! Although how the new pokémon is supposed to appear at stops is said to be a bug by this software developer, I hope they can leave it alone because it makes finding them easier.

I’m guessing the coders learned from their mistakes. As I look back at everything they’ve offered in the past, all I did was shake my head. Whoever wrote the code didn’t consider all the permutations, or considered the issues that would go along with “copy and overlaying” one Pokémon’s appearance (and statistics) over another, or where spawns should exist, leading to these pocket monsters disappearing off the map! As a result with the former problem, if placed in a battle environment, there would be unbalanced fights. That is, their biggest gaffe was with Zorua. This mimic was launched at the end of Community Day in early October. The lack of testing caused this Pokémon to get crazy stats and, if used in PvP battle or raids, it would break the game.

As we enter 2023, a new ‘mon for completionists is finally released! This weekend released the elusive Kecleon, and it likes hiding. Thankfully, it does not copy the abilities of another pocket monster. But, it won’t pop up unless gamers touch every spinner in hopes this invisible wonder is there.

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What’s Next Niantic, After Daring to Cancel Transformers: Heavy Metal?

The shakeup at Niantic Inc. cannot go unnoticed. Despite making billions one year, they’re laying off the next, and cancelling titles, like Transformers Heavy metal too.

Pokémon Go creator Niantic announces Transformers: Heavy Metal AR game - Polygon

The shakeup at Niantic Inc. cannot go unnoticed. As published on Entrepreneur 360, Tristan Rose wrote, “According to Niantic’s Crunchbase profile, Niantic, the developer of Pokémon GO, has raised $770 million over 5 rounds giving them a post-money valuation in the range of $1 billion to $10 billion as of November 23, 2021.”

And eight months later, this company is laying off workers (up to 90, according to Bloomberg) and changing priorities. In other reports, John Hanke wrote in an internal email to say this company is “facing a time of economic turmoil” and had already been “reducing costs in a variety of areas.”

The shift is unusual, and many fans are speculating.

The effect on upcoming products means cancelling them altogether. Not only was Niantic to help market and distribute Transformers: Heavy Metal, a Pokémon GO like game, but also they were to produce three other games using the same engine. Whether that’s a good or bad thing, fans can’t say. Very few people may have seen a demo. I wasn’t too excited myself when I offered my opinion about it, but I’d still try the game out. The website for this game is still online at time of writing.

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Pokemon GO in 2022

Unless players are keeping tabs on the latest news, it’s easy to miss out on when specific pocket monsters will make appearances

Pokemon GO isn’t off to a good start in 2022. Players are getting a mix of both worlds; the developer of the game, Niantic, believes everyone is returning outside to play but not everyone truly is! Some parts of the world are knee-deep in pandemic woes, and are self-isolating. Also, what’s offered in the coming weeks feels tailored towards new players rather than old. Where’s those missing Pokemon for those wanting to complete their PokeDEX? And why can’t we have other options to gather coins?

Two Community Days for grabbing Spheal and Bulbasaur were not terribly exciting. According to reports, this cute walrus type beast is worthless in combat situations. It’s not recognized in the meta and it’s a shame I can’t harvest all that ivory and convert that into coins. I also get the sense the next one won’t be as exciting (confirmed in update: Hoppip? Really?) As for the plant-based pocket monster, I was semi-excited to go grinding for mega candy. I thought the shorter three-hour window made more sense so an entire day is not wasted with a game.

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“No Hope” for a Franchise. Transformers: Heavy Metal AR

Pokémon Go creator Niantic announces Transformers: Heavy Metal AR game - Polygon By Ed Sum
(The Vintage Tempest)

The battle for which faction will occupy Earth is not likely at the core of the upcoming mobile AR game, Transformers: Heavy Metal. The media’s abuzz about bringing this Hasbro property to the videogame world again, and honestly, I’m not excited. I’m more curious in when the reboot will be brought back to the screen again (recent Netflix program notwithstanding).

Niantic Inc is involved in the development cycle, and early images suggest this product may well be another Pokemon GO clone. Seattle-based software house, Very Very Spaceship (known for Truck Stars) is leading the development. This four-year-old business doesn’t have a lot of recognition to get some fans excited.

This company is a self-described, “motley crew of space faring designers, engineers, artists and storytellers from the Pacific Northwest and beyond. For the past three years, under the leadership of BAFTA winning founder Sean Vesce (Never Alone, Tomb Raider Series, Mechwarrior Series), we have been solving the problems of the unknown for incredible partners like Google, Microsoft and others. We are a tight-knit group of makers thriving in our undiscovered future, making shared game experiences in AR, VR, Geolocation, Live Streaming and more. In addition to our client work, we develop and release original indie experiments like the recent Knife 2 Meat U, available at our itch.io page.”