BMW has announced a new partnership with AirConsole, an “online video game console”, to bring “casual gaming” into new BMW vehicles equipped with the marque’s new Curved Display infotainment system. Presumably to make charging EVs less boring, the partnership is slated to kick off sometime next year.
According to the German carmaker, the games will run directly inside the vehicle’s entertainment system, and players will have to use their own smartphones as game controllers. Of course, like most things in new cars these days, the system will be delivered to the vehicles over-the-air.
“With AirConsole we will leverage innovative technologies combined with a broad variety of fun and multiplayer games,” said BMW Group Senior Vice President for Connected Company Development. “This will make every waiting situation inside the vehicle, such as charging, an enjoyable moment.”
AirConsole is part of the BMW Startup Garage programme, the carmaker’s incubator for new tech that can be used in its future vehicles.
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This isn’t the first time a carmaker has experimented with on-board gaming. Most notably, Tesla cars already come bundled with a handful of games on-board to let you kill time at an EV charger. Unlike BMW, however, Tesla’s games will even let you utilise the car’s actual steering wheel to control your in-game characters.
With EVs getting more and more prevalent these days, expect to see more of these time-killing features being added into cars. Charging, no matter how fast, will still take more time than refuelling, after all.
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