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"Virtual Motion" for Future Video Games?
Piete writes "The BBC's Tomorrow's World has just shown an item on MotionWare.
It looked very impressive.
By stimulating the inner ear, the user feels that they are moving.
Some very impressive shots of children swaying and falling over! "
Wow. Lemme tell you, I have a hard enough time keeping ahead of all the script-kiddie attacks on IRC-- do you really think I'd PLUG something into my HEAD that can make me puke?
...So I'm happily playing Descent 5 some evening, with my linux-supported USB (hey, I can dream) Verti-go-go, when some '7337 haxor-type decides that the Ping of Death isn't enough and sends me an Oversized Packet of Core Dump... but it's not X that barfs, it's me. No way, Jose.
What's next? Virtua Fighter arcade machines with a little springy boxing glove to knock the wind out of you? How about the new ultra-VR goggles from STB that burn your retinas out if you look at the flare from a BFG 9000? Ooh! I know! The ultimate in teledildonics-- USB vice grips so you can get blue balls whilst on IRC!
-- You are in a maze of twisty little passages, all alike.
Think of the horrors for all of the motion sick people in the world.
Keyboards will need to be much more waterproof.
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Max V.
There should be a moratorium on the use of the apostrophe.
Max V.
NeXTMail/MIME Mail welcome
I could see passenger boats carrying a few of these onboard to stick on the heads of those feeling nauseous - after all, if you think you're walking around in whatever virtual world, you'll probably feel better.
I'd probably misconfigure it so it would only make me throw up after I did something like deleting /etc/passwd...
Automated kick-me-while-I'm-down machine.
OTOH, it would be an interesting experiment in negative reinforcement (can you train a good sys admin by causing pain every time he screws the system over?).
by simply increasing the voltage, you can experience ultra-real sensations when you're hit by one of those lightning-bolt guns in Quake 3.
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This is my SIG. There are many like it, but this one is mine.
I wonder if this might have the same problem as VR headsets have had? Speaking with several people who do testing with VR headsets they've noted problems with depth perception and motor skills after using the headsets. They've even had to limit usage to make sure employees can drive home safely.
Very basically put the problem tends to stem from the fact that the simulations are real enough to fool the senses (obviously the intent). However, the physically the body gets out of sync with the senses. They've suited the effect and have found that the effect takes place after only a few hours for a while afterward. While with after a few hours of such exposure the effects are negligible, they've recorded worse problems after exposure of a few hours each day over a few weeks that even employees noticed outside of testing. The effects so far do seem to wear off in a week or so, but studies of regular usage over more than a few months have not been completed (or at least they haven't released them).
Why the hell wouldn't you patent this? It's not like it's some really obvious computer algorithm. It's a thing. It's an invention that other's shouldn't be able to steal until the designer has been allowed to make a fair profit on their R&D.
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DO NOT DISTURB THE SE
Imagine symlinking /dev/null to the usb or serial port with one of those things plugged in. And then give certain files different "signatures." You could set it up so attempting to delete /etc/passwd would make you throw up. Preventative systems administration is here, now :)
Poopdick.
Ok, now all we need is a quake III patch to support this wonderful piece of hardware.
Imagine if you will millions of teenagers across the globe puking their guts, without alcohol being involved.
It's actually two senses:
Rotational accelleration.
Linear accelleration/gravity.
Look at the inner ear and you'll see three loops at mutual right angles, embedded in the skull. At the point where they connect to the rest of the inner ear, there are nerve ending hairs protruding into the channel, similar to those that connect to the membrane down the center of the coclear spiral to sense sound. When you increase/decrease the component of the rotation of your head around the axis of one of the loops, the fluid in the loop lags behind the structure, pushing the hairs.
I think gravity/linear accelleration is measured by similar hairs with a mass on the end embedded in fluid (for damping) in the same structure - but I'm not sure.
You also have position sensors in your muscles and tension sensors in the tendons, which allow you to figure out the position of your body and the force you're exerting/having exerted on your limbs. This is in addition to the pressure sensors in your skin.
There is some question whether people have a weak magnetic directional sense. There's magnetite in some nerve cells in the same region of the nose as the nerve endings which processes smell. This spot is also is fixed to the skull and thus ideal for navigation. It might also be used to smell magnetic dust in the air. Or it might be random evolutionary morpholigic junk or a vestigial leftover of something ancient and now defunct.
The (rest of the?) sense of smell consists of a number of molecular shape detectors, plus sensore for the electric field from ions. The shape detectors seem to be part of the same system that produces antibodies: People with weak senses of smell are sometimes cured when they have a strong immune reaction (such as toxic shock), and smell becomes much more sensitive during a viral prodrome. (Ever notice that your house smells REALLY dusty and everything else smells annoyingly strong the day before the cold/flu hits?)
Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
It's been a while since I dealt with this study, but here are a few different reasons for VRD, or Virtual Reality Dissonance, the problems with people not being able to handle various 3D visuals:
The screen can be 75fps, but if it takes more than about 50ms (1/20s) to register an intended move from peripherals to environment, user can get woozy. (Since we're talking about a write-device, instead of a read-device like a head-tracker, it may have different effects but I bet it still would cause suffering.)
A small monitor does not cover a lot of the wide area of the user's view. The THX movie theatre standard has constraints that a certain number of degrees of arc from left to right be covered by screen; this is for a sense of immersion. Sit closer to a smaller screen, pending the next item...
3D algorithms assume a certain "viewing frustrum," where a given angle of view is assumed. From the angle of view and the size of the monitor, that means the viewer's eyes should be at a specific distance from the monitor. The rendered perspective should match that perspective, or subtle bearing cues the brain has learned are not acting properly. Regardless of the focus, the brain will work to refocus to correct the perspective. Try sitting closer or further away.
One dropped frame at 72fps can tear your brain out of your skull, if it's pretty accustomed to watching the continuous motion of smooth acceleration. Turn off your Apache server or whatever else is chewing unpredictable CPU.
Some people just can't sit in a car if they aren't anticipating the road bumps and curves with their eyes. Same goes for simulations, only more so. If you like roller-coasters, you don't have a strong cochlear sympathy; your brain can decide whether to trust gut or ear or eye on command.
Some people just don't get ill even on the wrong setup. Who knows why?
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