Tag: video games
Technology: E3 Big on Controllers
by Lee on Jun.08, 2009, under Technology
So this years E3 seemed to be big on controllers. The main focus of these seemed to be to compete with the wii remote. Manufacturers seem to have seen how many units the wii managed to sell to people who weren’t traditionally described as gamers and seem to want to tap into this. I personally don’t think they’ll be quite as successful as the Wii as the type of game available also matters
One of the bigger announcements seemed to be the camera for the Xbox 360 which detects the movement of the whole body without the need for a remote. The video below discusses this and also contains some interesting discussion from Steven Spielberg on the role of video games.
The technology itself looks very impressive in the demos and if it does work like that when out in the real world, will lower the barrier of entry – possibly to even lower than that of the Wii. However, I’m intrigued to see how well this camera is going to work when put into all the different room environments – will it be selecting sofas as people? If someone wants to go to the toilet from the other side of the room, is it going to get confused?
Not wanting to be beaten by this, Sony released something very similar which uses two controllers which work together with the Playstation Eye – an existing product for Sony, but something which hasn’t really come to anything.
New Controller for Sony. Click to view the full size image. Within it you can see the two controllers that are held and used to generate the motion on the screen.
(video available at this link)
With the wii, well, um…. They released an add-on for their wii remote, but it was nothing astonishing. Most of the Nintendo announcements were software related. In regards to their controller, they announced a modification to the Wii Motion Plus, which was the development they announced last year and also a new add-on called the Wii Vitality Sensor.
The Wii Viatlity Sensor
“Just as we enable you to see the centre of your body balance with Wii fit, the Wii Vitality Sensor enables you to see the information related to the inner world of your body,” said Nintendo’s chief, Satoru Iwata, at the event.
