#1064288
- Thu Jun 11 2009 03:52 PM
motion control
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Rob Kamphausen
cobra kai
Registered: Wed Oct 18 2000
Posts: 44382
Loc: in the dojo without fear
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so, motion controls have been around for a while. power glove, dance revolution pads, eye toy, etc. up until this generation, they've all been add-on accessories; mostly dismissed as gimmick's with less than 5 pieces of software attached to them.
this generation, nintendo changed the game, building their entire console experience around the idea of motion controls (with the wii, and to some extent, the DS). imagined shell controllers aside, this took the idea out of the "gimmick" realm and brought it to the no-longer-ignorable forefront of the industry.
at this year's e3, the home of future gaming tech, we see microsoft's project natal (distant future), sony's wand-n-camera (near future), and nintendo's motion control plus (this week). clearly, motion control is going to play a large part of future gaming, or at least the gaming experience; microsoft took special care of indicating how their control could be used for more than just the actual gaming (flipping through menus, conferencing, etc).
question is... what do you think of it, overall?
obviously, many of you don't like the wii because of the scientific evidence that "it sux0rz", but as video game players, is the idea of a new level of interfacing intriguing? annoying? do you prefer playing games as lazily as possible? do you find the movements imprecise?
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#1064290
- Thu Jun 11 2009 03:54 PM
Re: motion control
[Re: Rob Kamphausen]
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Rob Kamphausen
cobra kai
Registered: Wed Oct 18 2000
Posts: 44382
Loc: in the dojo without fear
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of sony and microsoft's showing, i thought the 360's motion was really cool. a lot was "demo purpose video", so potentially (likely) faked, but still - i thought some of the ideas involved, the instant recognition and all, were awesome. but when sony did their presentation, the speakers mentioned something that resonated with me; the physical need to actually push a button.
natal was neato n'all, in that you could just steer with open hands, and it would translate that to a wheel. but actually pulling a trigger in a gun game, or swinging an object in a tennis or baseball game, to me, gives a much realer sensation of being involved. sony's idea of tying together a camera and a controller/wand might be the best way to go -- at least in terms of game playing.
for some of the other aspects, such as visual recognition, voice-commands, etc, 360's project natal really nailed it. being able to shout out a command or answer is pretty cool, and i can see a lot of game-integration with that (ordering AI troops around, game show answers, etc).
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#1064418
- Fri Jun 12 2009 05:30 PM
Re: motion control
[Re: MisterJLA]
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Nöwheremän
Thumb head
Registered: Mon Oct 08 2001
Posts: 45930
Loc: Fuckingham Palace!
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Quite frankly the whole motion control thing doesnt interest me.
The PS3 has had a form of it since it came out, and while its a novelty, its not something I particularly care about or like.
In fact sometimes, its downright annoying when you have to use it for certain things and cant turn it off.
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#1064419
- Fri Jun 12 2009 05:52 PM
Re: motion control
[Re: Nöwheremän]
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rex
Left blank because most people don't get references from TV shows other than Doctor Who
Registered: Sun Jun 13 2004
Posts: 40654
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Quite frankly the whole motion control thing doesnt interest me.
The PS3 has had a form of it since it came out, and while its a novelty, its not something I particularly care about or like.
In fact sometimes, its downright annoying when you have to use it for certain things and cant turn it off.
I haven't played that many Wii motion control games but I agree with the ginger poof.. It only works well with a handful of games and most the time its forced into games when its not needed.
One
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#1064632
- Sat Jun 13 2009 06:26 PM
Re: motion control
[Re: rex]
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Rob Kamphausen
cobra kai
Registered: Wed Oct 18 2000
Posts: 44382
Loc: in the dojo without fear
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The 3 motion technologies compared: Sony
Ashutosh Chhibbar
- Sony have not been very forthcoming about how their controller works, but it seems fairly straightforward. Despite the obvious visual difference to the Wii Remote (primarily due the light source on its tip), the technology inside PS3’s motion controller is likely similar to the accelerometer and gyro in Nintendo’s controller. The PlayStation Eye’s raw specs strongly suggest that by itself, it cannot be used to track the controller accurately enough for motion controlled games. The Eye’s camera has a maximum resolution of 640×480 - not nearly enough to track the light source with the sub mm accuracy that was demonstrated so effectively on stage. This is especially true when sitting at the typical viewing distances 44″+ tvs require, and gets worse as distance increases. Also, the Eye’s highest resolution limits it to 60fps, which is not fast enough to track regular motions, let alone fast ones. The combination of the controller’s easily identifiable light source and the Eye are likely primarily used to place objects in the player’s hand in realtime on the screen, and also to track the controller at a coarse level to supplement the data sent by the accelerometer and gyro.
A revealing moment was the bow and arrow demo - particularly when the arrows were being pulled from behind the demonstrator’s back. The controller’s light would not have been visible to the PlayStation Eye at that point (it was occluded), but the system was still able to track the controller and update the webcam feed without a hitch - a sign that the sensors inside the controller are the main way it tracks motion and that they work largely independently of the Eye. All in all Sony’s solution to motion control appears very elegant, and with the PlayStation Eye it has some significant advantages over Wii MotionPlus. Things holding it back are the lack of a Nunchuk equivalent and perhaps a lack of resolution for pointer based games.
Pros - Extremely accurate and very reliable if accelerometers and gyros are being used.
- Due to it sharing many similarities to MotionPlus, the ability to make cross-platform games will mean the peripheral has a better chance of 3rd party support.
- With the light source and the PlayStation Eye, the system can capture the gamer and put him in the game. MotionPlus cannot do this, and even if the DSi’s camera were used, the Wii Remote has no distinctive light source to make it easy to track.
- The analogue trigger adds a degree of sophistication over the plain Wii Remote and MotionPlus combination.
Cons - The controller looks like a Fisher Price designed sex toy - not exactly a match for aesthetics of the PS3 and its peripherals (u: though yes, this is not the final design).
- At this point in time, it doesn’t have access to an analogue stick - a limiting factor when it comes to traditional games.
- The controller seems to have been designed to compete directly with Nintendo’s technology, whereas Microsoft’s solution appears more radical and innovative.
- Another thing that traditional games benefit from is a pointer, something that will be tricky with Sony’s new controller. Essentially Sony have reversed the setup of the Wii - the camera is placed near the tv, and the light source is on the controller. The disadvantage of this is that the camera does not have enough resolution to track the light as a pointer, unless the player makes large movements. This is because when pointing on the Wii, the player pivots the camera which radically alters the position of the sensor bar in its field of view. On the PS3 however, players will be pivoting the light source which will alter its position relative to the Eye very little, meaning the PS3 will have very little spatial resolution for a pointer if used in this way. A good example of this is the famous Johnny Chung Lee headtracking demo, where he taped the sensor bar to his head and used the Wii Remote as a static camera.
The equivalent of a pointer will have to be tracked through the gyro and the accelerometer, which is not as straightforward as the Wii’s IR setup. This is why Sony went to such great lengths to demonstrate the sub mm accuracy of the controller - because it has no equivalent of the Wii’s IR pointer. Can the crosshair in a traditional FPS games be controlled accurately enough this way? Or will drift errors mean the player will have to calibrate the controller often so that the crosshair can remain in the right position? Only time will tell.
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#1064633
- Sat Jun 13 2009 06:26 PM
Re: motion control
[Re: rex]
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Rob Kamphausen
cobra kai
Registered: Wed Oct 18 2000
Posts: 44382
Loc: in the dojo without fear
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The 3 motion technologies compared: Nintendo
Ashutosh Chhibbar
- There’s very little mystery here, MotionPlus adds a gyro to the Wii Remote, allowing it to be accurately tracked 1:1. The lengths to which Nintendo went to achieve the level of accuracy and sensitivity they wanted can be read about in an Iwata interview with his engineers. It explains that the gyro outputs data in two modes, one that is very sensitive to small changes, and one that can measure very large changes in rotation. This means in theory that the controller should be able to replicate a paint brush that uses small, delicate strokes as well as act as a sword that uses hard fast swings.
Sony’s demonstration of its controller’s sub mm accuracy was very effective - technically those same things should be achievable with MotionPlus; the lack of a webcam is not a hindrance in this respect. The fact that Nintendo’s solution lacks a webcam though means there’s no way for the player to be captured and placed inside a game. Even if Nintendo were to use the DSi’s camera in this fashion, the Wii Remote contains a camera at the front and not a distinctive light source, therefore tracking the Wii Remote and placing a virtual object in the gamer’s hand would be almost impossible. MotionPlus can make use of the existing IR pointer and Nunchuk.
Pros - Much like Sony’s technology, MotionPlus provides data directly about the position of the gamer’s hand. There’s no fancy recognition and detection going on here of 2D and 3D data like in Microsoft’s solution, so the potential for errors is far less. It’s proven and reliable.
- Ironically, because MotionPlus can make use of the Nunchuk’s analogue stick and the IR pointer, it makes it more suited to traditional games than either of its two competitors. Despite its sensitivity to lights and distance, the IR pointer has become a very strong feature in many traditional games. Additionally the Nunchuk provides players with direct control over their character that would be very hard to mimic with just a motion controller. The design is typical Nintendo, in that it has the capability to satisfy all types of gamers, whereas Sony and Microsoft seem to have conceived of their devices primarily for the expanded audience.
- Software support already looks strong from both Nintendo and 3rd parties.
Cons - The biggest flaw with MotionPlus is the lack of a webcam. Being able to see yourself inside a game holding different virtual objects has huge potential for both Sony and Microsoft. For the expanded audience in particular it would seem to have enormous appeal. Due to the design of the Wii Remote, simply adding a webcam to the Wii Sensor Bar would not be enough to implement this feature either. Miyamoto must be particularly envious.
- Having seen Microsoft’s Natal, MotionPlus begins to look rather unambitious in comparison. The addition of a gyro, no matter how well implemented, seems like a fix to the original Wii Remote design rather than a real jump in technology after E3. Nintendo are in danger of becoming the laggards in the space where they were once the innovators, and it’s tough to see how a Vitality Sensor can overcome this.
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#1064634
- Sat Jun 13 2009 06:26 PM
Re: motion control
[Re: rex]
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Rob Kamphausen
cobra kai
Registered: Wed Oct 18 2000
Posts: 44382
Loc: in the dojo without fear
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The 3 motion technologies compared: Microsoft
Ashutosh Chhibbar
- By far the most ambitious of the three devices, Natal combines a webcam, a time of flight camera, an IR projector and an array microphones in a single strip. In order to capture 3D data about its surroundings, Natal’s projector emits pulses of IR light (invisible to the human eye) whose time of flight is then measured and used to create a distance map of the objects directly in front of it - occluded surfaces will not be measurable. The device will then use the data from the webcam and the time of flight camera to recognize the the number of people on front of it, their positions, and how those positions are changing. The microphones in Natal also seem capable of triangulating where noises are coming from, and may be able to assign the voices it is hearing to the people it has detected.
This is all relatively new technology and unproven especially when compared to Nintendo and Sony’s solutions. While the hardware in Natal is all fairly straightforward, its real gamble is in the algorithms it will be running internally to make sense of what its army of sensors will be seeing and hearing. If these algorithms work accurately, the device would be light years ahead of the competition. However if the recognition runs into problems when faced with the typical clutter of a living/bedroom, it could end as a costly error for Microsoft.
Pros - In 5 years time, gamers may look back at this gen and laugh at the number of silly looking, plastic peripherals we’ve collected in our living rooms. With Natal, Microsoft could be bringing the age of the peripheral to an end by giving gamers everything they need inside the game rather than forcing it down there throats in real life.
- With no controller required, Natal has one-upped Nintendo’s intuitive tv remote and set a new standard for accessibility.
- A genuinely innovative and ambitious design that seems able to recognize what multiple gamers are doing on a far broader level than the competition. Where Sony can be accused of once again copying Nintendo’s controller, Microsoft have chosen to take their own path.
Cons - Typical time of light cameras are able to measure differences in depth of about 2cm. If the webcam in Natal has a horizontal resolution 640 pixels, and if everyone on a 6-foot sofa is in the picture, each pixel will represent about 0.3 cm. Double the resolution and this figure becomes 0.15 cm - better, but there is also the webcam’s frame rate to consider. 60fps should be the minimum, but 120fps would be better for games that require fast, complex movements. While Natal is able to capture and track multiple bodies, it will not be able to track a gamer’s hand position with the accuracy an accelerometer and gyro combination can. A lack of precision could prevent the device from being successful in traditional games.
- Just how reliable are the algorithms that the device is using? Apparently the skeleton mapping that Natal employs is able to capture 48 points of interest on the human body, but will it work well when faced with a typical living/bedroom environment? Although Natal’s potential is boundless, there is the worry that its reliance on in interpreting 2D and 3D data will not be as reliable as the competition’s equivalent.
- Some of the demos Microsoft presented with Natal seemed questionable at best. Most of what people were impressed with in the Milo demo could have been accomplished with any webcam and microphone. What stunned was that Milo responded to questions asked with real answers and emotions - but that seems more to do with Lionhead’s AI (maybe not) than Natal. How comfortable is it in reality to hold your hands in midair to steer a car? How much of what was presented was real, and how much was merely smoke and mirrors?
- Natal’s unique technology will mean that it will be very difficult for 3rd parties to make crossplatform games that include the device. Whereas games will likely be made for both Sony and and Nintendo’s controllers, each Natal game will be a forced platform exlcusive - something that may hinder 3rd party support.
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