The term Metaverse has caused a stir over the past few years, and awareness of this topic skyrocketed when Zuckerberg, CEO of Facebook, announced the transformation of his creation into Meta, focusing all attention on the genesis of what will be known, indeed, as the Metaverse.
But what does this name actually mean in practical terms?
The Metaverse is essentially the next evolution of the Internet, a network of interconnected, navigable experiences in 3D, rather than linear, that goes beyond the concept of virtual reality to become a world with a digital population that can coexist with the real one. This development, which has always sparked our imagination (think of science fiction stories and video games), could indeed become a reality, transforming many aspects of daily life: from work to leisure, from education to personal relationships.
Although this transformation requires years, technological advancements, and extensive research, many existing platforms have seized the opportunity to rebrand themselves as pioneers of the Metaverse, giving us a taste of what the digital experience of tomorrow will be like and investing in the changes that could fuel this almost science-fiction vision. One such platform is, indeed, Spatial.
Spatial is an immersive social platform that allows users to create and participate in real-time immersive experiences, accessible and easy to use on the web, mobile, and VR.
The platform has been designed to be easy to use for both visitors and content creators and has been utilized in various sectors, such as marketing, education, entertainment, and collaborative work.
It was founded in 2016 with the goal of designing high-quality 3D spaces for collaboration and communities, with a particular focus on digital art and the fashion world. It has created the opportunity for artists worldwide to showcase their projects through exhibitions and fashion shows, and soon its use expanded to include social interaction, gaming, and music. Over the past year, it has reached a vast audience, becoming one of the most used platforms in the Metaverse, positioning itself as a free platform that allows anyone to sign up, create an avatar (thanks to the support of ReadyPlayerMe), and shape their own space, making it accessible to all.
Recently, Spatial announced the introduction of its Creator Toolkit, a software development kit (SDK) based on Unity, which will allow developers to create even more immersive experiences using the well-known rendering engine underlying various metaverse platforms, leveraging the interactive dynamics and graphical rendering that result from it.
Il ruolo di Unity
The crucial turning point is the support that Unity will provide for real-time rendering, as it will finally allow Spatial to achieve rich photorealistic rendering, less distracting, and with significantly more realistic lighting, requiring less effort from developers and devices. This will add value not only to experiences but also to collections and digital artworks, enabling a true enhancement of architectures and making digital and creative professionals even more crucial in creating not just spaces, but actual immersive and spectacular experiences.
With the new implementation of Sketchfab libraries (https://sketchfab.com), thousands of 3D models will be available for import, making space creation accessible to everyone.
Unity is a game and interactive application development platform that enables developers to create 3D and 2D content for various platforms, such as PC, gaming consoles, mobile devices, and virtual/augmented reality. Unity offers an intuitive visual editor and a range of development tools to facilitate project creation, including support for rendering, physics, animation, networking, and more.
This toolkit will open the doors for creators to build exciting out-of-this-world places in just a few clicks. […]
This transforms the Metaverse from a static world into dynamic 3D spaces where we can actively participate.Jinha Lee, CPO and co-founder of Spatial.
Spatial represents a free and open alternative for creating environments, with the goal of making immersive platforms easy and accessible for anyone who enters and starts building, without prior knowledge in digital design, making it the inclusive and open metaverse platform it is today. As a result, it has managed to establish itself in no time, amid the buzz surrounding the advent of the Metaverse, as one of the leading social platforms based on 3D navigation through avatars, with over 500,000 registered creators, 2 million unique users, and 127 million hours spent on the platform in the last 12 months. With the news of this integration, the limit of static space, where the user is merely a passive visitor, will finally be surpassed.
Environments will become more experiential thanks to the implementation of Triggers (A Trigger is an element of a system that is activated by an event or a specific action that triggers a certain action or response from the system), which will allow environment creators to design true internal functions linked to the models inhabiting the space. This doesn't just mean turning on a light when a user passes by, but rather the opportunity to modify the entire space in which the user is located, fully leveraging the imaginative potential of the virtual.
The animations of the space will be synchronized among users, meaning that when we see an animation, the streaming will be the same for everyone. Although this feature is still experimental, its introduction, combined with physical simulations (such as collisions and object movements), is an incredible innovation for a platform like Spatial, which could offer artistic experiences that are not only immersive but even ephemeral, allowing us to experience and share them only at the moment we are present, immersing us in the hic et nunc of digital works. This could create a new form of exclusivity within immersive experiences.
A new renaissance, in every sense.
This renaissance of Spatial clearly speaks to a new vision for the platform. Freedom of expression and creation, as well as the imagination of experiences, are an important step toward realizing a Metaverse where every user is free to create and share, tell stories, and impress with unique and high-quality experiences.
Thanks to the reach of its platform and the new updates, we can conclude that Spatial will soon host a vast number of users eager to express themselves, but also likely many brands that have already started investing in the Metaverse and will find in Spatial an additional space for sharing with the public that can significantly resonate in terms of active user engagement.
All of this highlights a growing interest among service providers in implementing new accessories to support the development of interconnected immersive virtual worlds. Despite the challenges involved, the need to move against the tide and confront the audience's sensitivities is clear, bringing innovations that can project us toward an increasingly clear and defined idea of the feasibility of the Metaverse.
Below you will find the link to visit the presentation environment of the new features of Spatial.