Demeo is one of the first RPGs announced for the Apple Vision Pro

Resolution Games today announced that a version of the Demo—the developer’s popular virtual reality (VR) and mixed reality (MR) tabletop RPG simulator—is in “active development” for the Apple Vision Pro headset. The title is one of the first officially confirmed VR/MR games for Apple’s highly anticipated $3,500 wearable computing device, expected early next year.

Afterward DemoLaunching in 2021, Game Resolution added a Mixed Reality update late last year to superimpose game objects on the real-world view (via pass-through cameras on headsets compatible with Meta’s Quest 2 and Quest Pro as well as the upcoming Quest 3). The “Mixed Reality 2.0” update for the game, launching today, adds support for controller-free hand tracking as well as “co-location” of mixed reality items , can now appear in the same location for multiple users in the same physical room.

Those types of MR features will be useful on the Apple Vision Pro, which doesn’t use a handheld controller and is primarily focused on MR applications that can be layered over real-world views. But Resolution Games says Vision Pro will also support “fully virtual” versions of games that don’t integrate transitional visuals.

Co-Founder and President of Resolution Games, Paul Brady said: “It’s the interaction between the real and the virtual that truly makes MR magical, and there are few things in the real world that interact as well as a table. human hand”. “Advances in hand tracking have made a controller-free future not only possible but incredibly appealing. We are rapidly entering an era where your body is the effective controller.” Much more effective than a handheld piece of plastic ever could be.”

Resolution hasn’t said whether it expects the port to be ready in time for the launch of Vision Pro hardware, which Apple says is expected “early next year.”

“This is something we’ve heard a lot of demand for, so we thought it was finally time to reveal it,” a Resolution Games spokesperson told Ars Technica. “Based on the speculations around [Vision Pro’s] potential as a gaming device, I thought you’d be interested to know that one of the more experienced mixed reality game makers is now officially on board.”

Where are the other games?

Apple’s initial June announcement about Vision Pro included a brief mention that more than 100 Apple Arcade titles would be playable on the headset via traditional handheld controllers and a virtual 2D screen. But examples of VR and MR games were almost completely absent from that exciting announcement event and the hands-on demo that accompanied it.

The closest Apple comes to such is the inclusion of a social play space Entertainment room in the “Apps and games we love” list on the menu in the demo. That “fully immersive experience” (Apple’s term for “traditional” VR apps without a pass) was later confirmed to be coming to the Vision Pro in a tutorial video highlighting how to transfer existing Unity VR applications to Vision Pro. And in July, Unity officially rolled out VisionOS support for its engine in closed beta, making it easier for developers to port existing apps (like those made by Unity). Demo) for upcoming Apple hardware.

Enlarge / VR social play space Entertainment room will also come to Apple Vision Pro.

However, despite that kind of engine support, we’ve yet to see any other VR or MR game makers announce plans to bring new or existing titles to the Vision Pro platform. It’s possible those announcements will become more common as we get closer to the Vision Pro hardware launch date expected next year. It’s possible those developers are simply waiting to see if the Vision Pro platform offers anything more than a niche market for traditional VR applications. Or maybe the VR development community is simply following Apple’s lead and accepting that headsets aren’t really designed for “traditional” VR experiences.

Whatever the case, Resolution Games says it has big plans for mixed reality gaming in the future. The company said in a statement that fully half of its employees’ workload is now focused on MR titles “on select devices from 2024 onwards, including some devices that feature Dedicated play without a controller. Whether some of those experiences make it to the Apple Vision Pro probably depends largely on whether Demo success can be found on Apple’s new platform.