How Video Game Designers Leveled-Up the Ford Bronco Raptor
Ford turned to gaming to program some fun into the 2022 Bronco Raptor’s 12-inch screen. The addition aims to make the Bronco experience more immersive.
If your new truck comes loaded with more tech than a fleet of space shuttles, why limit it to showing your speed or displaying a song title?
In the 2022 Ford Bronco Raptor, the Detroit automaker took the best tech it has to offer and let a group of video game developers have at it. The result? A Performance View system that is fun to watch and that will make you a better driver off-road.
It begins with startup animation that’s good enough to be in a movie. The Bronco Raptor’s grille flashes with life before the camera zooms out to show you the full vehicle.
GOAT Modes Get Animated
Flip through the seven GOAT (Goes Over Any Type of Terrain) terrain management system modes using the center console dial. Each one has a unique animation that lets you see at a glance which mode you’re in.
Normal uses a subtle blue. Sport moves to a “track environment” red and white. Tow/Haul shows a trailer behind your Bronco and has construction-yellow gauges.
Slippery mode uses light blue to simulate rain, while Off-Road shows a brown background and mud to let you know that 4×4 is locked in. Baja mode has desert orange highlights and shows a Bronco sliding sideways through the sand.
Lastly, Rock Crawl puts a Bronco on-screen on a flat rock surface. (OK, maybe that one’s a little behind the rest as far as cool points.)
Color, speed, and camera angle all seek to display each mode’s animation represent its purpose. Ford brought in former game designers to help give each mode a personality of its own to make the experience just a little bit more special for every driver.
It’s all thanks to Ford’s spacious 12-inch digital display. More than just a fun thing to look at, Ford Performance View takes advantage of the screen to give you race-car levels of critical information.
Essentials: Info You Need
Performance View swaps the display’s layout to show you the essentials. The tachometer is front and center, taking up the whole height of the screen. Rotated to put the redline in the 12-o’clock position, it makes the tach easier to see when powering through the desert.
On the left, the critical data. Water temperature, oil pressure, transmission temperature, and remaining fuel are all big and easy to see. The gear and suspension, steering, and exhaust modes are below that.
On the right side, the dash shows pressures for all four tires. Spot a tire going flat or signs that you’re pushing the engine too hard long before they leave you stranded in a tight spot. The system will even tell you if the rear differential is locked and if the front sway bars are disconnected.
“Performance View changes a driver’s impression of how to use the vehicle, with an intuitive layout that puts redline at the 12 o’clock position and uses a drivetrain avatar to really get the focus on optimizing the performance of the drive,” Ford digital design manager, Mark Sich, said. “The entire focus is to provide the driver with important information as efficiently as possible.”
Ford said that it designed the view for “off-road racing in Baja mode.” The information, though, is important for any driver pushing the limits of the Bronco, in the desert sand, crawling over rocks, or charging through thick mud.
System Upgrades Keep It Fresh
Screen animations like this are hardly new. Most vehicles with a digital dash offer you some attempt at a flourish when you get in.
But this goes beyond what we’ve seen before. Integrating more vehicle systems and putting more effort into the animations and modes should make for a more immersive experience.
The team in charge of the cluster also worked on the center stack screen to make sure that both work together instead of giving you two different experiences.
Plus you can save your custom settings and even upgrade the system. Ford Power-Up software updates have the potential to add new off-road features, new capabilities, and even new animations, to help make your Ford Bronco Raptor display stay both cool and fresh over time.
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