Driving Simulator Archives

Mercedes-AMG Project ONE hypercar stars in new Forza Horizon 5 game (w/VIDEO)

At the all-digital gamescom 2021 this week, Microsoft’s Xbox Game Studios are showcasing an all-new Forza Horizon 5 gameplay with the Mercedes-AMG Project ONE ‘Forza Horizon Edition’ as the star. The unique Forza Horizon Edition possible has an exclusive body livery that emphasises its unique character and makes it clear that this car will not be available for purchase in the real world. In addition to the Forza Horizon Edition, the AMG hypercar can also be configured in other equipment and colours.

The virtual counterpart of the hypercar with Formula 1 drive technology is presented in extremely detailed graphics and the currently highest fidelity in the digital world. Players are immersed in a hyper-real open world in which the landscape of Mexico is recreated.

The special experience of driving the ultimate top model from the high-performance subsidiary of Mercedes-Benz is also amazingly realistic. Virtual acceleration, braking, steering and agility as well as active aerodynamics correspond to the features of the actual model which has yet to be launched.

Close cooperation between Mercedes-AMG and Microsoft’s Forza team has enabled hyper-realistic representation of the special features of the unique 2-door car. With the different ‘Track’ and ‘Road’ driving programmes, dusty tracks in Mexico can be mastered just as dynamically as asphalt highways. The active aerodynamics of the hypercar are also meticulously recreated. The gaming community can look forward to breathtaking driving performance, with more than 1,000 ps of virtual power and a digital top speed of over 350 km/h.

“The Mercedes-AMG Project ONE is strictly limited to 275 units in the real world. We’re delighted that there’s now a perfect digital variant exclusively in Forza Horizon 5. Thanks to our close cooperation with Microsoft, we can now virtually offer the unique driving experience of our hypercar to a large group of enthusiasts in the best and most impressive way currently available on the gaming scene,” said Philipp Schiemer, Chairman of the Board of Mercedes-AMG GmbH.

“We have featured Mercedes-AMG vehicles in every Forza game; however, this is the first time we’ve partnered to feature a Mercedes-AMG vehicle on the cover of a Forza game. I cannot imagine a more exciting car to start with than the amazing Mercedes-AMG Project ONE,” added Alan Hartman, Vice-President of Forza Racing Franchise, Xbox Game Studios. He added that other performance vehicles from Mercedes-AMG are also available in Forza Horizon 5.

Forza Horizon 5, the follow-up the popular simulator released in 2018, the open-world Forza Horizon 4 driving, takes the Horizon Festival to the very realistic and vibrantly presented Mexico. Featuring the largest, most diverse open world ever in a Forza Horizon game, Forza Horizon 5 is set against a vibrant, ever-evolving landscape with nearly limitless driving action across living deserts, lush jungles, historic cities, hidden ruins, pristine beaches, vast canyons and a towering snow-capped volcano – the highest point ever in a Horizon game. The game will be available globally on November 9 for the current consoles of the Xbox family, including Windows PC.

Revealed in 2017, the Mercedes-AMG Project ONE is still under development. It will be a road-legal hypercar with only 275 units to be produced, Each one is priced from 2.28 million euros (around RM11.38 million) and all have already been booked.

Increased track testing for Mercedes-AMG Project ONE prototype

The ultimate driving simulator for Volvo engineers

What would the ultimate driving simulator be like? For gamers, it would be a set-up with a seat that moves and a steering wheel with haptic feedback that gives the same feel as driving a car, bumps and all. And of course, and a crystal-clear virtual reality headset with all the ambient sounds to provide total immersion.

For the engineers at Volvo Cars, the ultimate simulator is simply one where it is hard to tell reality from simulation. They have developed a ground-breaking mixed-reality simulator that is at the next level, used to take new strides in safety and autonomous driving technology.

Driving on real roads
Using cutting-edge technology from the leading real-time 3D development platform Unity and Finnish virtual and mixed reality experts Varjo, the simulator involves driving a real car on real roads. It combines life-like, high definition 3D graphics, an augmented reality headset, and a full-body Teslasuit that provides haptic feedback from a virtual world, while also monitoring bodily reactions.

This combination of software and hardware allows the engineers and researchers to endlessly simulate traffic scenarios on a real test track road while using a real car, all in total safety. They can gain important insights on the interaction between people and the car for development of new safety, driver assistance and autonomous driving features.

Testers can be exposed to imagined active safety and driver assistance features, upcoming autonomous drive user interfaces, future car models and many other scenarios. It can be used on real test track roads or in the test lab, and every scenario is fully customizable. The possibilities are literally endless and importantly, safe.

Driving with a mixed reality headset
Last year, together with Varjo, Volvo Cars became the first carmaker to make it possible to drive a real car while wearing a mixed reality headset. Now that collaboration has been expanded to include Unity and full-body haptic suit maker Teslasuit.

According to Casper Wickman, senior leader of User Experience at Volvo’s Open Innovation, this enables Volvo Cars to study authentic human reactions in a safe environment and at a fraction of the cost of a real test.

“Working together with great companies like Varjo, Unity and Teslasuit has allowed us to test so many scenarios that look and feel totally real, without having to physically build anything,” said Wickman. “It lets us test drive actual cars in through traffic scenarios that look and feel real, but can be adjusted at the touch of a button.”

Testing safely
When developing safety systems for cars, like collision-avoiding technologies, testing is crucial. But testing these systems in reality can be dangerous, time-consuming and expensive. Virtual and mixed reality simulations, however, allow for perfectly safe testing in authentic environments, without having to build any physical prototypes or set up complex scenarios.

“By using this cutting-edge technology, we are exploring and leading the development for creating safe cars in the future. It’s great to play a part in that,” said Wickman.

When Volvo drove a car off a building for a crash test (w/VIDEO)

Cruden thinks simulator is best for testing autonomous cars

Following the recent UK budget announcement by The Chancellor of the Exchequer, Philip Hammond regarding driverless cars, Cruden announced a cost effective way forward. This is a big deal considering that the UK government is set to make bold reforms that will see developers test vehicles on UK roads nationwide without a human operator by 2021.

Cruden is a well-known designer, manufacturer and integrator of open architecture driving simulators for the automotive, Motorsport, marine and motorcycle industries. And it believes that the most cost effective and risk-free way for companies to test their autonomous systems, is by using a driving simulator.

Doing so, will keep public motorists and pedestrian out of harm’s way. Currently, in states like California in the USA, autonomous cars are tested and driven on public roads. Should the unthinkable happen, and an autonomous car decides to go rogue, it could potentially cause a great deal of harm to those in the vicinity.

This is why Cruden believes that testing driverless technology in a repeatable and highly effective environment, without risking human injury, can only be accomplished with the use of a driving simulator. In fact, Cruden’s own machines can be used to test advanced driver-assistance systems (ADAS) and autonomous vehicle systems.

“We believe that extensive testing of the interaction between the driver and the car, with many different types of people, is required to get the necessary acceptance of the car’s decisions in handover moments and emergency scenarios, ” said, Jelle van Doornik, development engineer at Cruden.

“Yet this is dangerous, expensive and time consuming to do with real people in real cars with real traffic. The only way to achieve this while processing large numbers of different drivers through a test programme is to use an advanced driving simulator,” he added.

The company is adamant that testing driverless cars on UK roads isn’t possible because of the inconvenience and risks that they would pose to motorists and pedestrians. That said, automakers like Volvo, Tesla and Google have made massive strides in this area with only minor setbacks. But we shall have to wait and see if automakers decide to heed their warning or ignore it completely.

Piston.my