By Ed Sum (The Vintage Tempest)
In an age where motion-tracking is becoming all the rage, only Microsoft knew how to make the idea work right. They made it nearly hands-free. With the Kinect. players can run on the spot in order to move faster than a speeding bullet or leap tall buildings in a single bound within a virtual world. With Tobii introducing a prototype of an eye-tracking sensor at CES this week with the EyeX, people can start sniping bullets out of thin air or melting weapons with laser beam eyes.
This technology to track eye movement may well be the next evolution to bring virtual reality home to the video-gamer. No date has been announced yet, but when this device is ready, it should be cheaper than the company’s main product, the PCEye that starts at $2k (on Amazon).
Danish gaming manufacturer SteelSeries is helping to make an affordable version that can detect what a person’s eyes is really ogling at on a video screen — female avatars may want to start covering up. Or with games like Duke Nuke’em or Grand Theft Auto, they just may become a little more difficult with all those distractions slowing the player down.
Continue reading “Keeping Eyes on Track for a Video Game Future”
