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Control Video Games with a Camera
sEEKz writes "ToySight is set of cool games and toys to play using your iSight or similar FireWire camera. Using a system of object and motion detection to track your position, Toysight allows you to control buttons, sliders and perform gestures on the screen, putting you right in the action." I played it with my DV camera, and it worked OK, but I couldn't crash the little parachute guy. I want death and maiming in my video games.
I've tried it and it's just like the PS2 EyeToy camera/game combo (with different games and all but based on the same idea). However it still remains a very funny game and is something to boast to your Windows friends.
It wants its stuff back.
Death and Maiming are critical parts of any video game. In fact Sex and Violence form the basis of human psyche. Even in Chess, the sense of competition comes from the enormous pleasure of defeating the enemy, same in soccer.
Now you can change the graphics in counterstrike to replace the players with cylinders and remove the blood, but thats not really gonna make it any less violent. Youre still out hunting people and taking them down for pleasure.
The horsemen of Afghanistan play Buzkashi... where they fight over a goat carcass.. and the players whip each other. If the california govt existed there thousands of years ago to block that game, they would invent something new and just as bloody to replace the mens sport and bring back the spirit of competition.
Games really are no more violent than Rugby or Boxing. It is the extreme narrowmindedness that connects games with Columbine, but not with the general human history of competition and survival psychology. I've seen toddlers smack each other a good one, and thats all instict. You cant iron out people into good law abiding citizens. Surround them in a cucoon of peace and happiness, and they'll look desperately for Marilyn Manson and listen to Eminem.
Violence in video games is a reflection of us, not something that can affect us. Banning it is a bit like banning sex.
"Give orange me give eat orange me eat orange give me eat orange give me you." -Nim Chimpsky
The intel 'Create and Share' cameras used to come with a few little games that you operated with the camera - like bouncing the basketball into the hoop, that kind of thing.
This was back in 1998 or 1999.
Shame they never went further with the technology - Sony were the first to put some really polished games together with it.
Just thinking about the minority report interface. This game interface isn't too far off from what I saw in minority report, it's a lot more than I has expected in terms of applicaitons I could use with my iSight. The only negative is that my arms tend to get sore very quickly; however, I still managed to land my parachute guy within 47Meters of the target. Overall its a very cool app. Shows a lot of promise with physical gestures and things like that in Interface usage.
An editor:
I think Pudge is the new anti-Michael! Whoo-hoo!
Somebody get that guy an ambulance!
iirc, there was a similar product for the Amiga.
I don't recall the name, but you could hook up a video camera to the Amiga and interact with objects on the screen. I believe that one game let you play virtual instruments.
This is the Constitution.This is the Constitution under the Bush administration. Any questions?
Of course, I appreciate a dig at Michael as much as the next guy though, so we can classify him as anti-Michael as well.
Lasers Controlled Games!
Mandala.
at the Game Developers Conference in San Jose last year. A groupd of guys threw an Indie Game Jam and most of the games were of this type. Interesting stuff.
The amiga had something like this back in 86-87. It was called live! from a company called a-squared. Simple 4fps capture, but you could use it to control gadgets on the screen or set off program events. There was a music display using it in some museum in Washington DC until recently. I believe it let you play drums or something like that.
Umm.... ToySight is for Mac...
And the Xbox doesn't have standard USB-shaped ports, which means they would have to design specialized cameras, or at the very least special connectors, to make it work. Unless you have one of those messy mods.
StarManta
I don't think BMW has ever complained about their 2% marketshare. Neither has Apple.
You've been warned