Earlier this year, Google announced an upcoming AR game, Space Invaders: World Defense, which is designed as a showcase for the company’s latest AR tool. Now you can step in and take down some of the blocky game’s iconic aliens yourself.
Google and developer Taito launched Space Invaders: World Defensereleasing both on android And iOS devices. The game’s titular space invaders spawn from buildings and rooftops, hide behind structures, and hover in the sky, so be sure to play outside.
The studios also released a new launch video, embedded below this update.
Developer Taito has offered a first real look at Space Invaders: World Defense.
The game is now available for pre-registration on the Google Play Store (and “coming soon” on Apple’s App Store), but still doesn’t offer too many details on exactly how the game works beyond pointing and zapping floating enemies.
The SPACE INVADERS are back to conquer the world, this time from another dimension. Join the World Defense team to find and defeat SPACE INVADERS in your neighborhood. As a member of the elite piloting force, you will defend your area against invasion in a one-of-a-kind immersive gaming experience. Take on missions across dimensions, from augmented reality to the parallel world Invader. Success will earn you a place on the high scores as well as special bonuses and power-ups.
To be fair, it’s hard to create compelling AR gameplay that takes place through a phone screen. But games like this will have the opportunity to really thrive as head-worn AR devices begin to proliferate.
The original article, which covers the game’s initial announcement, continues below.
Original article (May 11, 2023): Over the past few years, Google has worked steadily on its set of AR development tools, ARCore. This week at Google IO 2023, the company added a brand new tool to its kit called Geospatial Creator.
Geospatial Creator gives developers the ability to create world-grounded digital content that will appear in the same place for all users. Built on an ARCore and 3D database of Google Maps, it competes with Niantic’s Lightship AR Platformand gets integrations for Unity and Adobe Aero.
To showcase the latest features of ARCore, Google has teamed up with Taito Corporation, the original developer of the arcade hit Space Invaders (1978)to create a brand new city-scale augmented reality game called Space Invaders: World Defense.
Slated for launch later this summer – perfectly aligned with the original game’s 45th anniversary –Space Invaders: World Defense will supposedly have players “defending the earth against Space Invaders in their neighborhood” and will “combine AR and 3D gameplay to deliver a fully contextual and highly engaging immersive experience that connects multiple generations of players”.
Unfortunately, we haven’t seen an actual gameplay preview yet, so it’s unclear exactly how the game will work, but hopefully we’ll find more information about the game eventually. official site.
Additional reporting by Scott Hayden.
