Sony and Honda’s new electric car, Afeela, was shown during Sony’s recent CES Las Vegas conference. The new vehicle will have the ability to playPlayStation 5games andHorizon Forbidden Westwas seen running on a digital screen in front of the car backseats.
Afeela is the name of the new company founded by the two old Japanese tech giants after they signed amemorandum of understandingin March 2022 to deepen their ties in the mobility field. Sony has been pursuing the mobility initiative for some time now since it first showed itsVision-S car conceptback in 2020, and though the concept never went into production, Afeela seems to have inherited Sony’s goals of incorporating as many of its technologies as possible inside or outside the electric vehicle.
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The Vision-S’s proof of concept originally had 33 sensors, including radar, light detection, and cameras, along with Sony’s immersive 360° audio technology and reality audio. As for the Afeela concept car, it comes equipped with a larger number of 45 cameras and sensors on the interior and exterior of the vehicle, and it will employ the Snapdragon Digital Chassis to ensure a rich driving experience with E-mirrors, 3D navigation, natural language processors, and intelligent UI.
Moreover, Unreal Engine graphics technology is slated for designing the interface of this digital chassis, and thanks to Sony, the Afeela car will not be able to only run PS5 games, but provide many other intuitive technologies such as customizing the display to the driver’s taste as was seen with the Spider-man theme that was briefly shown during the presentation.
Afeela will start taking pre-orders in 2025, while deliveries to North America will start in the spring of 2026. The new car will be initially manufactured at Honda’s North American factory, and it will feature level 3 automated driving capabilities along with the integration of external media in the in-cabin experience. There are six levels of car autonomy (from zero to five), with the third level enabling cars to have environmental detection and some leeway for making informed decisions.
Sony also intends to explore the potential of cloud gaming in Afeela in cooperation with Epic Games and its Unreal Engine. Epic is also planning to help Sony and Honda with the VR/AR aspect of the driving experience.Epic also stated thatthe in-car information and entertainment systems are becoming more relevant to customer purchase decisions in the era of five-vehicle autonomy, and it is designing Unreal Engine with next-generation driving experiences in mind.
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