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High-Tech Vest Lets Gamers Take a Hit
mytrip passed on a link to a PC World post about a unique accessory for FPS gamers. Called the 3rdSpace Gaming Vest, its goal is to translate in-game impacts into physical sensations. "Designed by a surgeon, the vest was originally created for use in the medical field to poke and prod patients in order to get a sense for what they were feeling. Since then, the vest has been adapted for the game industry, capable of delivering hits and shots exactly where you would feel them. Utilizing air pouches — four on front, four in back — the vest nudges and jabs gamers at eight different contact points."
I predict the porno industry will find a use for it first, always being on the cutting edge as they are.
If you mod me down, I will become more powerful than you can imagine....
Sure wouldn't wanna use this when playing the next version of UT. Wonder what getting blown up into a few chunks feels like... Wouldn't like to know =D
I saw "take a hit" and wondered why /. had an article about gamers playing stoned, only to RTFS and feel like an idiot.
i hope it can be used over the net, so i can finally punch the guy who won't capture the flag.
I'm NOT gonna wear their wired cod piece
Table-ized A.I.
Soon you'll be able to feel me stabbing you in the face in the next vi/emacs flamewar.
Otherwise it would've looked totally stupid...
People generally don't really buy such "specialty gaming peripherals", especially not the mass gaming market. While the idea itself is rather cool (although it would be cooler if it had electric shocks for the masochistic among us), these kinds of devices just never seem to catch on.
The video game market has seen all kinds of niche peripherals throughout the years...octagonal rings to stand in, treadmills to run on, gloves and goggles to wear, scores of vibrating chairs and seats, weird orbs and wheels and hands-free input devices...loads and loads of things. People just don't really buy them because they either don't work as well as intended, they only work well with a couple of different games, or the peripheral is just too damn expensive for most of us.
However, where such oddities really shine is in the arcade. It would be awesome to build arcade game unit that incorporated different input or sensory technologies which would really immerse the player into another world. Arcade games are perfect for that sort of thing because a whole game is built around the external unit.
Terrorists can't threaten a country's freedom and democracy. Only lawmakers and voters can do that.
With no ability to register any shots to your arms, legs, crotch, ass, or headshots... plus only four air bags on front and back, it sounds like it sure can let me feel *exactly* where I'd get hit.
Want to improve your Karma? Instead of "Post Anonymously", try the "Post Humously" option.
Don't forget the headband attachment so you can enjoy every headshot in UT3. :P
first step into realising that ever so popular bash.org quote
:D- i'm going to become rich and famous after i invent a device that allows you to stab people in the face over the internet
get up
get on up
get up
get on up
and DANCE
* nmp3bot dances
Yeah, but that'll last all of five minutes until it's protocol is reverse engineered and they start flooding you with hits or something. Could you imagine the possibilities, if they ever make one of these that actually has any kick in it? Ohh hoho, I have a new perl project.
In more important news, scientists are baffled by the latest reports from the independent research group 3rd Space apparently claiming that there are only 8 spots on the human body where you can actually be hit by a projectile.
Get on the wire. Tell everyone how to shoot these bastards down.
Now that I think about it, I'm pretty sure everything I just said is completely wrong.
The Navy's been working on a system similar to this for years. However, where this system is for gaming, theirs is for pilots, Seals, etc (anyone who might need more info than they can look at). Its not in full use yet, but the website is http://www.namrl.navy.mil/accel/tsas/. Since everything but the homepage is broken, here's a brief rundown: normal vest, pneumatically activated vibrating bumps (about 30 sewn into the vest, each about the size of a dime), air pumps, controller. Program the controller to activate the pumps based on whatever input you want (ie, where is and how far away is the ground, where is the enemy). Each pump is tied to one bump (vibro-tactile actuator, if you want to get all nerdy). With the right controller setup, you can fly blind, land in a snowstorm, or lose sight of an enemy without losing awareness of where they are.
Quickly get on the phone to Ferrari, they are about to go bust, they make a niche product and Paul Hindt claims that means there is no market.
Believe it or not everything has to be mass market to be a success. In fact the only requirement for a product to be successfull is for it to sell for more then it costs to produce. IF this company can produce say a thousand devices and sell them at a profit, they have made a... can you guess it, thats right, a profit.
If they are not, well then they will join a long line of companies that failed, this includes companies with a niche product and companies with a mass-market product.
Just dive into the world of add-ons for MS FLight Simulator. Talk about a niche market, flight sims ain't all that popular, you specialize in a specific product and then produce add-ons that cost a fortune. Yet some companies have been around for ages, selling special hardware designed for ONE game.
If you want to be even more niche, try MS Train Simulator. Even less appeal then a flight simulator, and it too has companies selling special control units.
Since these companies been around for ages now, somehow they must have made that niche market work for them.
As for coding for it, considering that the most popular first person shooters can be heavily modded already, it ain't all that hard to translate impacts in the game that otherwise might be used to alter the HUD to send a message to a usb device.
MMO Quests are like orgasms:
You may solo them, I prefer them in a group.
It just looks like an Interactor with cmo covering to me.
Get one now: http://www.allproducts.com/manufacture98/vrgi/product1.html
You say things that offend me and I can deal with it. Can you?
Cheers. I thought the same thing when I read the summary. How can it claim to let you feel a hit exactly where it hit you, and then turn around and say that it only uses 8 contact points? By what rape of English does that mean "exactly?"
--Obyron
I got a chance to try this out at the GDC in San Francisco this past March. The TN Games guys had the booth next to ours and were really nice.
I'm not much of a shooter player, so I felt pretty confused wearing it. Whenever I got hit in the back I kept physically turning around and looking over my shoulder as if someone had tapped me on the back to say, "You suck, let someone else try" ^_-
Since I'm not used to the conventions of shooter games, it was kind of helpful in telling me when I was being attacked by an off-screen enemy, and (roughly) which way I should turn to look for this thing. Takes a lot of getting used-to to associate the physical sensations with your game presence, though, instead of your actual one.