From the earliest arcades, the mechanics of the game world revolves around one principle: pressing buttons and watching the results on a screen. With the evolution of technology, however, new ways to interact with electronic games were developed, including motion controls, such as the Nintendo Wii, and sensors that follow the player’s body, such as Kinect for the Xbox 360 and Xbox One.
Meanwhile, the gaming industry imagines a future increasingly distant from the old arcade cabinets. New devices promise to break not only with the barrier of physical buttons, but to overcome the limits of the TV screen or computer. But what these new technologies can really change the way we play and what will be only accessories with potential
Virtual Reality
The bet Safer industry seems to be the virtual reality goggles. With it, you can have almost 100% of their visual field filled for the content you want, be it a movie or a game. This ensures much more immersion, making our brains react to visual stimuli as if we are within that virtual world.
There are several companies that invest heavily in the sector. From the Oculus Rift, which has emerged as a crowdfunding campaign on Kickstarter site and eventually bought by Facebook, we saw the emergence of Google Cardboard (which is nothing more than a support for smartphone) and PlayStation VR, future accessory Playstation 4.
On the other hand, the safety of this sector has not passed the market test. Cardboard Google has come to the US consumer, but does not seem to have caused a great impact. Meanwhile, Rift and the PlayStation VR have been repeatedly displayed at trade shows and conventions around the world, but must still take a few months to get to the final public.
No data on the response of the market, all these technologies show nothing but propaganda. Issues such as availability in different countries, price, game offering, among other factors, can determine whether the experience of a game in virtual reality actually delivers what it promises.
Holography
While Sony, the PlayStation 4 manufacturer, bet on virtual reality goggles, Microsoft, which develops the Xbox One, longs so-called “mixed reality”. With the headset HoloLens, the company promises to put the user to interact with digital objects in three dimensions, which adapt to the environment by creating the illusion of a presence in the real mudno.
This area brings clear references to the world of science fiction. After all, since before Star Wars, humanity dreams of interactive light projections that have consistency and three-dimensional shapes. More recent works, like the movie “She”, 2013, come to imagine a world where holography no longer depends on a special display.
In practice, however, the HoloLens also has its shortcomings. The main one is the very limited field of vision. Users who tested a prototype claim that the holograms are visible only within a small area in the center of the lens; while the rest of the environment recorded by our peripheral vision remains unchanged.
Microsoft has made it clear that the final version of HoloLens should not present a field of view greater than what has been seen so far . What does not restrict necessarily the practical range display for games and experience the device offers.
virtual reality mats
If only one pair of glasses is not enough, how about a virtual reality platform to put in the room? It is the bet of several startups and crowdfunding projects developed around the world. The idea is to put the player “full body” into the virtual world, allowing complete interaction between user and game.
On the one hand, projects like Virtuix Omni and Virtualizer solve a practical problem of virtual reality headsets – after all, even with the Oculus Rift VR or PlayStation, players still need a traditional control, since the glasses only realize the vision. On the other hand, however, a treadmill like this can mean an unnecessary inconvenience.
At a time when the public prefers to play by mobile phone than on TV, a treadmill that fills about two square meters environment family life is not only a physical barrier as a very high investment. Such projects may even seem surprising, but swim against the tide in terms of practicality. Which brings us to the next item
A safer bet:. The end of the islands
Some believe that the Xbox One and PlayStation 4 may be the last generation of consoles dedicated to games. With advances in cloud computing, it is likely that all graphics processing and calculation that a modern game requires to be done by an external source that plays the game for the consumer by streaming over the internet. Services such as PlayStation Now already realize this.
In addition, the “death” of physical media can also be next. For the industry, it is much more efficient to distribute games through which the web forward to the shops, as the large-scale production of hard copies is more expensive and less practical for both sides. On the other hand, a purely digital distribution system can also facilitate piracy.
The popularity of smartphones also represents a threat to the traditional video game. A study by the US Institute Newzoo, published in January, shows that the mobile gaming market could overtake consoles and PC later this year. Ie it is not a perspective for the distant future
If these devices can even forever revolutionize the way we play video games -. Such as Microsoft’s Kinect promised and not fulfilled – only time will tell. It remains to us to imagine the ways that technology can follow.
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