Beyond what a TV is capable of!!

[Daggers64]

Have you ever wanted to be able to feel the wind in your hair as you race top nascar names in your favorite video game? Or feel the recoil of the gun in your hand as you shoot all them bad-guy (or good guys, if thats your thing). Or how about tasting a virtual bowl of ice cream, or smell the cherry blosums after you've beaten all the Ninjas in Japan? =3
Ever wanted to play a game that lets you exist in a whole new world?

Current gaming technology is not capable of providing such experiances... And video games, are nearing their limit as far as graphics can go on a TV... After this next generation of systems, whats to come? How will games continue to surpass other games and amaze us? What will the future of gamming be like?

Well it looks like the technology to make things like .Hack and the Matrix is getting ever closer to becoming reality!
The giant entertainment corporation Sony, has officially patented the technology to allow "sensory experiences ranging from moving images to tastes and sounds" via ultrasonic pulses!

"The technique suggested in the patent is entirely non-invasive. It describes a device that fires pulses of ultrasound at the head to modify firing patterns in targeted parts of the brain, creating "sensory experiences" ranging from moving images to tastes and sounds. This could give blind or deaf people the chance to see or hear, the patent claims."

http://www.newscientist.com/article....mg18624944.600

Sony has outlined methods and technologies that will be used to provide us with entertainment in out heads.
There are also many medical applications to the technology, including a way to allow blind people to have sight!

I wonder if this will one day be a feature in say, the PS4? ^_^;
XD I'm a .Hack fan, and I'm sure we'll see this kind of technology with in the next 20, maybe even 10 years... Although, if Sony is truely serious, we may see this kind of thing within 5 years! And because of patents like this, Sony will have complete rights to the technology!

Sony isn't exactly the company I'd like to see using this technology... mainly because they're almost as bad as the "C.C. Corporation". XD

On another note, there is speculation (not official) that Nintendo will be incorporating some form of brain interface with the 'Revolution', that will allow players to controll the games with their minds. ^__^ lol

http://games.slashdot.org/games/05/0...&tid=10&tid=14
http://p2pnet.net/story/4459

[Big D]

Yeah, I saw that article in today's newspaper.

I'm more excited by the possible medical uses for the idea that Sony has just patented. Imagine how useful it would be for people who've permanently lost any of their senses.

I hope Sony actually takes serious steps to develop this idea, though. It'd be terrible if the concept just sat on a shelf and rotted, because no-one could be bothered risking a lawsuit from Sony by developing it themselves.

Totally immersive games would be wonderful, but potentially very dangerous. There could be very nasty side-effects from experiencing a totally lifelike, completely palpable war, survival horror or crime simulator.
Also, what happens when someone goes one step further and adds a pain sensation?

Many possibilities.

On another note, there is speculation (not official) that Nintendo will be incorporating some form of brain interface with the 'Revolution', that will allow players to controll the games with their minds. ^__^ lol

This technology already exists, and is used in some hospitals. Physically disabled patients can use their minds to move a cursor around a screen and select various options. Wonderful stuff.

[Meat Puppet]

Brilliant. Soon we will eliminate the need for the real world altogether.

[Dreddz]

That sounds great

Sony-1
Xbox-0

[Xander]

I'm personally a bit old fashioned and not really into the idea of games simulating reality. After all that's what reality is there for. I just think decent games, played normally with a controller are absolutely fine, and that's how games should be.

[Maxico]

That sounds great

Sony-1
Xbox-0

Uhh, excuse me if I missed something but what has this got to do with the Xbox?

[Old Manus]

This is intriguing.

[Dreddz]

That sounds great

Sony-1
Xbox-0

Uhh, excuse me if I missed something but what has this got to do with the Xbox?

Sony can come up with new things while Microsoft cant. The Xbox will probably be playable on it but wouldnt Sony have common sense to only allow Sony products on it

[Destai]

What can I say? Im very excited.

[Maxico]

That sounds great

Sony-1
Xbox-0

Uhh, excuse me if I missed something but what has this got to do with the Xbox?

Sony can come up with new things while Microsoft cant. The Xbox will probably be playable on it but wouldnt Sony have common sense to only allow Sony products on it

Yes but they've only just gotten a patent on this experimental peice of technology. Its long term effects on health arnt yet known. By the time this technology is available to the public there may well be a completly different set of companys in the console market. Not to mention the costs invovled in developing software for it.

[Daggers64]

On another note, there is speculation (not official) that Nintendo will be incorporating some form of brain interface with the 'Revolution', that will allow players to controll the games with their minds. ^__^ lol

This technology already exists, and is used in some hospitals. Physically disabled patients can use their minds to move a cursor around a screen and select various options. Wonderful stuff.

Lol, I've seen that before ^_^; Although not in any good games... plenty of theropy uses for it... as well the government has been trying to develope something like it to allow jet pilots to fly even better.
Although if Nintendo was to develope a way to use it, you can bet it wouldn't just be a left-right-up-down cursor feature. XD Still thats only speculation.

On the main topic, I'm excited about this new technology Sony's working on, supposedly, some inventor in Cali is helping them. lol
I'd be one of the people waiting in line on the first day if its release when this kind of thing gets release. lol
Can you imagine what they could do with it?
Not only video games/movies, but you'd also see things like dream inducers (you could program in something that would effect the kind of dreams you have).
And being able to give blind people sight and deaf people hearing, used to be the stuff only gods could do. lol

Just hope Sony keep a strong persuit of this kind of thing!!

[edczxcvbnm]

I'm personally a bit old fashioned and not really into the idea of games simulating reality. After all that's what reality is there for. I just think decent games, played normally with a controller are absolutely fine, and that's how games should be.

I agree.

[Tidus Andronicus]

lol, This is gonna be awesome! ^_^/
I hope I live to see this one come to use!

I did some searching, and for anyone interested I found BOTH patents that Sony filled on these topics!
http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-P...&RS=PN/6729337
http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-P...&RS=PN/6536440
I think there might be more, but I didn't bother to find those... lol

"A non-invasive system and process for projecting sensory data onto the human neural cortex is provided. The system includes a primary transducer array and a secondary transducer array. The primary transducer array acts as a coherent signal source, and the secondary transducer array acts as a controllable diffraction pattern that focuses energy onto the neural cortex in a desired pattern. In addition, the pattern of energy is constructed such that each portion projected into the neural cortex may be individually pulsed at low frequency. This low frequency pulsing is formed by controlling the phase differences between the emitted energy of the elements of primary and secondary transducer arrays."
That sounds promising! ^_~ Lots of useful information about how the device will work, and its uses... and even the background of the invention!

[Maxico]

actualy now I think about it this would be one hellva way to get back at the force feedback controlers issue.

[Daggers64]

LOL, This is gonna be like the ultimate force feedback! XD Who needs a rumble controller, when you can feel an earth quake beneath your feet! XD

From reading that patent information... I can say, it surely does sound like Sony is completely serious!
From what I read, there appears to be 2 kinds ultra-sound pulses, the first is to comprise your current (real) sensory input, and the second replaces it with the desired sensory input. Of course the description is much more complex, and I barely understand it! ^_^;