‘Fortnite on steroids’: the virtual gaming worlds transformed to train British soldiers
Inside Skyral, part of a consortium that won a £2bn MoD contract to help forces game out complex decisions On a sunny July day in Riga, Latvia, a Nato convoy drives down a street lined with kebab shops and a pharmacy. At a downtown intersection, there is the sound of an explosion and the lead tank bursts into flame. These are real streets in Riga – Lāčplēša iela and the downtown corridor of…
Inside Skyral, a consortium led by a UK company has secured a £2 billion Ministry of Defence contract to help train British soldiers in virtual gaming worlds. On a July day in Riga, Latvia, a NATO convoy drives down familiar streets, with explosions and fleeing pedestrians modeled after the city's real inhabitants. Skyral, part of this consortium, aims to recreate entire cities and countries for the purpose of training soldiers and tacticians on the consequences of their decisions.
While modern armies have been using virtual environments for decades, Skyral offers intricate, layered models that capture second-order effects, such as the impact of a missile strike on a crowded city or the behavior of a population during a power outage. The technology allows militaries to train key skills on repeat, without the high costs and risks associated with live combat drills.
Skyral's co-chief executive, Naomi Hulme, describes their platform as "Fortnite on steroids," but emphasizes that it goes beyond gaming, offering a faithful and usable model of real cities and battlefields.
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