WWDC 2017: Apple's new AR Tool ARKit Coming to 'Pokemon Go'

By Prei Dy, | June 05, 2017

'Pokemon Go' will be supporting Apple's new augmented reality tool ARKit. (YouTube)

'Pokemon Go' will be supporting Apple's new augmented reality tool ARKit. (YouTube)

Apple is developing an advanced augmented reality tool called ARKit for iOS, and Pokemon Go is reportedly one of the several apps to support it, the iPhone maker announced during the opening presentation of the Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC) 2017.

ARKit is an early developer toolkit that offers tools that unlock the iPhone's augmented reality potential. Features demonstrated at the conference in San Jose on Monday included surface detection and other SLAM/computer vision capabilities, and one of the cases where this is deemed useful is in entertainment apps like Pokemon Go.

Like Us on Facebook

ARKit commits to give users a more immersive version of augmented reality, featuring a "fast, stable motion tracking," a plane estimation with basic boundaries, ambient lighting estimation, scale estimation, Xcode app templates, and a more enhanced technology than what is displayed in Pokemon Go.

At the conference, Apple showed off how ARKit would better enhance players' Pokemon Go experience. It featured a Pikachu character anchored to the ground and would also ricochet and bounce off realistically instead of merely floating around.

"The Pokemon is so real, he's right there on the ground," Craig Fderighi, Apple's head of software, said. Apple CEO Tim Cook said that he visions augmented reality playing a huge part on the company's future. Apple said that hundreds of millions of iPads and iPhones will soon run new apps created with tools, helping ARKit become the world's biggest augmented reality platform.

However, Apple did not specify how Pokemon Go will work with ARKit or when will the said technology be launched. But ARKit will also receive support for development tools Unity, Unreal Engine, and Scenekit.

Meanwhile, other apps that are slated to feature more sophisticated tech include one from Ikea and another one starring Lego Batman.

This is the first time that Apple's hardware and software is officially going to support augmented reality. ARKit will be supported inside iOS 11, which is expected to launch this fall.

©2024 Telegiz All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission
Real Time Analytics