It's a bizarre experience, but I don't feel sick, because the Symbioz is transmitting real road motion to the headset. That data is then subtly adjusting the virtual image to be in sync with the real-life car movements. I even see simulated versions of the cars and trucks on the road fed in by LiDAR and other sensors. After a few minutes, the headset shows a dramatic eclipse, and the faux Symbioz leaves the road and soars over a canopy of trees.

All of this is part of the "mind off" driving experience that Renault is exploring with the Symbioz. With fully autonomous vehicles just around the corner, the company is trying to imagine how we can spend our free time once we surrender the wheel to robots. VR may not be your personal entertainment choice, but it exhibits that idea in a vivid way.

"This demo really shows you that when your mind is off, it's really off," Redzik told me. "If we give people back time, I don't think we should be judging what they are going to use this time for, whether it's gaming, VR or office work."

Renault sees future cars as more than just A-to-B transportation. As showcased during my tour of the concept, the Symbioz can drive into its own purpose-built house with a matching interior, sit on a special charging pad and backup your solar panels like a rolling PowerWall. With HiFi and video systems (supplied by Devialet and LG, respectively), it could even become a mini-room in your home for work or entertainment. Even the exterior of the Symbioz, dreamed up by Renault's Senior Design VP Laurens van den Acker, is about the space inside. "The lines of the Symbioz demo car were designed to showcase the interior's innovations," said Patrick Lecharpy, Renault-Nissan's head of advanced design.

The body, built with carbon-fiber panels and a metal chassis, has an extreme cab-forward design to maximize space and is low, long and very wide. The styling is an acquired taste, thanks to the weird mix of a low, curvy front end, and high, windowless, squared-off back.

There is no tacked-on sensor array like you've seen on Waymo and other self-driving rigs. LiDAR units are hidden in the front headlight covers and rear bumper. Radar and ultrasonic sensors are placed inside the body, and a front camera is fitted at the top of the windshield. There's also a rear camera hidden in the Renault logo, and side cameras cached in the door handles.