Ford’s new car may be playing games with you.

Seth Porges recently spoke to Ford about the way games are making their way into car design—a new development in the “gamification” pandemic.

Achievements? Badges? Of course, this will all sound very familiar to anybody who’s ever logged onto Xbox Live or Foursquare. And Rork is unashamed to say that Ford drew inspiration from these services. From Xbox, the company borrowed the long-tail rhythm with which accomplishments are distributed over time. The first few accomplishments involve little more than logging on and hitting the ignition. Others — such as racking up 100,000 oil-free EV miles — will only be earned by the most hardcore users.

Could games incentivize us to become better drivers, or is this only a passing trend? From the sounds of it, Microsoft may be getting in on the action already.

[via Mashable]