Vision Pro games developers can now apply for access to PolySpatial

It’s as yet unclear how many Vision Pro games we can expect. Apple very much positioned its spatial computer as a productivity and communications device – and the price certainly makes it an expensive proposition for gaming use – but the company did mention during the keynote that Unity would be providing a visionOS games development platform, PolySpatial.

Unity is now inviting visionOS developers to apply for access to a beta, making it easy to port existing Unity-based games to the headset …

Apple’s developer site for visionOS lists Unity as a key tool.

Now you can use Unity’s robust and familiar authoring tools to create new apps and games or reimagine your existing Unity-created projects for visionOS. Your apps get access to all the benefits of visionOS, like passthrough and Dynamically Foveated Rendering, in addition to familiar Unity features, like AR Foundation. By combining Unity’s authoring and simulation capabilities with RealityKit-managed app rendering, content created with Unity looks and feels at home in visionOS.

Unity has today announced a beta version of the PolySpatial tool, though you have to apply for access to it.

Unity is excited to collaborate with Apple to bring familiar and powerful authoring tools for creating immersive games and apps for this new spatial computing platform, Apple Vision Pro […]

With a deep integration between Unity’s new PolySpatial technology and visionOS, your apps can sit alongside other apps in the Shared Space. By combining Unity’s authoring and simulation capabilities with RealityKit’s managed app rendering, content created with Unity will look and feel at home.

Unity says that you’ll be able to use PolySpatial to bring existing games to visionOS, as well as create new ones with help from tutorials, templates, and sample apps.

Unity Create general manager Marc Whitten told TechCrunch that integration with other tools, like RealityKit, was key to the creation of PolySpatial.

[W]e 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.

There’s no word yet as to when access will be granted, the company saying only that developers will be contacted via email. Unity recommends that you prep by downloading Unity 2022 LTS.

Apple’s Vision Products Group VP Mike Rockwell said that the platform makes things as easy as possible for developers to take full advantage of Vision Pro’s capabilities: “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.”

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