Starship, the Liverpool-based entertainment startup launched publicly last year by Evolution Studios founder Martin Kenwright, confirmed plans to develop a cross-platform virtual reality social network called “vTime” and roll it out to Android phones this fall.
While Starship bills itself as a multi-purpose firm, the company has its roots in game development: Kenwright is chiefly responsible for Motorstorm and only founded Starship five years after selling both Evolution Studios and its satellite company BigBig Studios to Sony in 2007.
A number of people who previously worked on games like WipeOut, Project Gotham Racing and Blur now serve at Starship, which has released the mobile game Playworld Superheroes alongside other non-game apps.
With vTime, the studio aims to “transform the smartphone into a passport to the metaverse” by allowing users to create virtual avatars and host gatherings in virtual environments to share conversations, music, images, video and “spherical media.” It’s yet unclear if VR games are also on the vTime docket.
“Unlike console and PC headsets, the barrier to entry for mobile VR is low. People are already carrying the devices that will propel VR forward in their pockets,” stated Kenwright in a press release for vTime. “VR is for everybody, and vTime brings social VR to virtually everyone, from virtually anywhere on virtually any device.”
To get people without VR headsets onto the platform, vTime is also being designed to work in a 2D “mono mode” which allows spectators to “view public exchanges happening within vTime” on their phones or tablets and request invites to private chats.
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2015