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Sony have patented a way to turn a Banana into a controller (and Oranges too!)

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modiz

modiz

Member
Oct 8, 2018
17,844
www.gamesindustry.biz

Sony's controller tech is literally bananas | Patent Trawling

Games industry patents are an interesting mix of futuristic ideas, practical applications, and utter nonsense. They can…
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Link to patent:

Patent Public Search | USPTO

appft.uspto.gov appft.uspto.gov

"It would be desirable if a user could use an inexpensive, simple and non-electronic device as a video game peripheral," the application reads. "The present disclosure seeks to address or at least alleviate some of the above-identified problems."
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banana.jpg



The banana will be tracked via a camera:
A camera gets images of the items in users' hands, and tracks the items based on pixels, contours, and/or colors in the images rather than QR codes or other such tracking techniques. A game could either be trained to recognize objects as controllers, or pre-configured such that users are told ahead of time what could be used as a controller. The application doesn't mention it specifically, but this latter application sounds like a more cost-effective way to approximate toys-to-life functionality in games.
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Potential use cases of the new BananaSense:
The application goes on to discuss ways to infer the banana's movement in 3D space, which might be used to control the in-game camera, replace a flight stick, or pause the game if the banana were to be set down out of the camera's view.
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You can also dualwield the banana controller:
There's also a nice section on a "Two-Object Controller," which instantly translates to us as, "Yes, you can dual-wield bananas."
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banana_dual_wield.jpg

Oranges too:

The patent application also raises the possibility of holding two oranges and pretending they're a steering wheel, or using them for Battlezone-style tank controls.
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unknown.png


Of course, sometimes motion controls aren't going to get the job done. And that's when this patent application proposes mapping virtual buttons onto the banana, possibly with the help of a camera mounted in a virtual reality headset.
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OyUDmPd.gif
 
Raonak

Raonak

Banned
Oct 29, 2017
2,170
Interesting that the patent has the camera angle from the player's POV.

PSVR2 has a camera maybe?
 

Polk

Avenger
Oct 26, 2017
4,235
camera%201.jpg


But people were using bananas as controllers for years now? That's my photo from 2013.
 
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