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Jack Lee, wangjb77@gmail.com
Sony's first electric vehicle (EV) "Afeela" appeared at the world's largest IT exhibition, which opened on the 5th (US Western Time), drawing attention from the IT and game industries around the world.
The reason is that Sony unveiled its new concept of electric car, "Afeela", at CES 2023, which ported its video game "PlayStation" platform to suit the car environment for the first time.
Sony is a representative Japanese IT company that divides the global home video game machine market with Microsoft in the United States. The company has sold more than 500 million video game machines over the past 28 years since it launched the "PlayStation" in 1994. The "PalyStation" series is listed in the Guinness Book of World Records as "the world's best-selling video game machine".
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| ▲Sony's first EV, "Afeela," to be released in 2026 / Sony's YouTube screen capture |
Experts in the world's game and automobile industries expected Sony to develop a new EV linking PlayStation and EVs after it announced last year that it would enter the market in a joint venture with Japan's major carmaker Honda.
As Sony and Honda unveiled EVs incorporating "PlayStation" for the first time to the world, the scope of console games, which were limited to homes and game centers, will expand to automobiles, and a full-fledged "drive-ing era" is expected to open in the next few years.
At the Sony Global Press Conference held at the Las Vegas Convention Center (LVCC) on the 4th, Sony Mobility Chairman Yasuhide Mizuno said, "Our first EV, "Afeela," will be made into a "moving entertainment platform."
He then presented 3A as keywords, including Automy, Augmentation, and Affinity, and "Afeela" will draw worldwide attention as the world's most unique EV by making the most of Sony's experience in AI, Entertainment, VR, and AR.
Under this principle, Sony plans to adopt Epic Games' famous game engine "UnReal," which developed the global mega-hit game "Fortnite," to add entertainment features such as movies, music and dramas as well as games.
In particular, Sony has decided to apply "Afeela" to PlayStation 5's cutting-edge technology called "Haptic Feedback" to enable gamers to play more realistic games. This technology allows the game player to feel the vibration and touch directly.
Sony and Honda will launch "Afeela" in the North American market in the spring of 2026. Prior to this, pre-orders for Apila will begin in the first half of 2025. The two companies established a joint venture in March last year to develop and sell "Afeela."
There is one prerequisite for this Sony initiative to be realized. It means that EV's autonomous driving technology should be more dramatically evolved than it is now.
Although autonomous driving technology has been commercialized up to level 2, it is very dangerous for drivers to enjoy Sony's movies or video games in a running car at this level. Many countries regulate not only playing games but also watching movies and dramas while driving.
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| ▲Image of Afeela's internal concept / Sony's YouTube screen capture |
However, as global automakers, IT companies, and major advanced countries are actively pursuing technology development and institutional reforms to fully commercialize self-driving cars, the problem is expected to be solved by the time "Afeela" is released.
Sony's strategic partnership with Qualcomm in the U.S. to apply "Snapdragon Digital Chassis" to "Afeela" is also analyzed as a strategy to further strengthen its autonomous driving function. "Snapdragon Digital Chassis" is a hardware-software integrated platform that combines smart vehicle features and supports a variety of autonomous driving.
Sony also plans to significantly improve its ability to detect objects by embedding 45 sensors, including cameras and radars, in places outside "Afeela" to further enhance its autonomous driving capabilities.
As Sony, the leader of the global console game market, announced the launch of a game-based EV called "Afeela," game companies such as Korea, China, the United States, Japan, and Europe are moving to actively develop console games for automobiles.
A CEO of a Korean console game developer said, "I understand that global IT and automakers such as Sony, Apple, Hyundai, LG, and Samsung are developing various solutions that incorporate games into electric vehicles. If autonomous driving becomes common to level 4 and the console platform is perfectly implanted in electric vehicles, a new very large game market will open."
