SPACE INVADERS: World Defense

Why

In 2023, it commemorates 45 years since SPACE INVADERS initially transformed arcade gaming. To honor its original release and showcase the advancements in technology, TAITO and Google collaborated to re-envision the classic game, enabling fans to engage in battles with 3D Invaders in real-world settings.

What is this...

SPACE INVADERS: World Defense is a captivating mobile gaming experience that merges augmented reality and 3D gameplay, transforming reality into a digital realm. It represents a thrilling progression of the beloved franchise onto a fresh platform, seamlessly blending vintage 8-bit aesthetics with cutting-edge technology.

HOW…

Driven by Google's ARCore and Geospatial API, it draws inspiration from the original gameplay premise, tasking players with safeguarding the Earth from SPACE INVADERS, now within their local surroundings in augmented reality.
Google’s Geospatial API enables precise anchoring of digital content in the real world, leveraging the user's immediate physical environment with sub-meter accuracy. Collaborating seamlessly with geometric data sourced from Google Maps Street View, it fosters an immersive AR gaming encounter intricately linked to the tangible world, spanning across the globe. Furthermore, the game capitalizes on the recently introduced Streetscape Geometry API, furnishing terrain, building, and structural geometry within a 100-meter radius of the user's position, allowing SPACE INVADERS to emerge from all directions.

CLIENT: TAITO

DESIGN: UNIT9

ENGINEERING: UNIT9

MY ROLE: Tech Lead