Google Glass and the Future of Wearable Gaming

An anonymous reader writes "Google Glass is now becoming more widely available, but developers are only just starting to tap into the augmented reality specs' potential for gaming. A new report looks at some of the early experiments with the tech — leading the charge is indie developer Mind Pirate, the first studio to release a mobile game simultaneously on iPhone and Google Glass. But will others get on board? Will the explosion in popularity of virtual reality headsets help or hinder it? It's still a wild wild west.

'The potential of wearables will only be realized through thoughtful integration of hardware and software,' says Mind Pirate CEO Shawn Hardin. Right now, 'much of the mature infrastructure of the mobile arena' is missing in the world of wearables. The 'myriad of unique sensor and hardware configurations atop increasingly diverse operating systems' makes it particularly difficult for developers to get started."

Comments

It'd be nice if Glass was unleashed.

[sethstorm]

If not for the intentional block surrounding face recognition and the general lack of availability, Glass would have a better chance at succeeding.

Instead of having a heavily controlled device, how about letting a large amount of users figure it out? That way, you'd have less comments about Glassholes and more people really exploring the bounds of what *can* be done with it, not what *should* be done.

Re:It'd be nice if Glass was unleashed.

[Harlequin80]

I finally got my hands on a pair to play with last week. My initial reaction was "This is sooooo awesome!" after a couple of hours with them though I was a little unsure as to what I would regularly use them for. The GPS map is extremely good while driving, it is far less distracting and intrusive than using a dash mounted gps. Also for those people who like texting while driving (naughty naughty) the voice recognition is amazing. The screen is also amazingly clear - you don't notice it till you look at it but when you do it is brilliant. Speaking of the screen you can very easily tell if someone who is wearing them is looking at something on it. You can clearly see the contrast when the screen is on.

As for taking pictures of people without their knowing or recording everything it's just not happening. You either need to have you hand up near your head tapping it or saying "ok glass, take photo". It is actually a lot easier to take an unobtrusive photo with a phone. Where the camera comes into its own is taking photos while you are holding something with both hands. That and the ability to stream what your phone is seeing to the tethered phone - this means you can get a second set of eyes on things if you wanted.

I wore them for a full day out and about and while they got a few looks nobody said anything at all. That may be thought because in Australia most people haven't really heard of them outside of the geek circles. When people did ask what these weird head piece thing I was wearing was they all wanted to play with it and ask about it. At least here no one seemed to care about the camera.

In the end what I used it for mostly was to talk to the owner of the glasses via hangouts about how I was finding using them. I send a couple of text messages, answered a heap of calls and took photos of things I wouldn't normally just to test the camera. In the same kind of way that you do with a new phone to test the camera. I would be very unlikely to take many pictures with it if I owned one and wouldn't care if they removed the camera to stop people stressing.

Finally I wouldn't recommend someone get this generation. The tech in the glass is obviously getting a little old now. There are a few noticeable instances of lag and it gets quite hot if you are using it. Not enough to be uncomfortable but definitely enough to be noticeable. Give it a modern phones processor and lower the power usage and it gets interesting.

My feedback for google would be - make the screen bigger. It shows a decent amount of info but it is 16:9 now and if it was 3 time taller it would be much more useful. Find a way to have a low power status display that could be there all the time - eg like displaying a clock.

Jealous much?

[Anonymous Coward]

It's good technology to have around. Privacy, in your(and about most Glass Luddites) case, is just an excuse to kill a product you can't get. That, and the anti-Glass signs are more like announcements of being Luddites.

The same argument could have existed for many other devices, but they've found their places.

What a hoot!

[Ol Olsoc]

'The potential of wearables will only be realized through thoughtful integration of hardware and software,' says Mind Pirate CEO Shawn Hardin.

Awesome corporatespeak Hardin. You must be the guy who conceptualizes, initializes, and brings action items to fruition

In a synergistc way that leverages market impact of course.