Sony May Be Working on an Interactive Avatar System
Sony has filed a patent that discusses the creation of a 3D avatar that gamers may interact with in order to show their feelings and do other things. The tech giant has a number of technologies in the middle of production as well as patent-level hypotheses, some of which sound like they could provide users with a new kind of media utility, whether through video games or some other form of interaction.
Sony May Be Working on an Interactive Avatar System
While patents in and of themselves don’t always amount to much, they do occasionally give fans an inside look at technologies that may or may not ever see the light of day thanks to the efforts of various companies. Sony seems to be working on a number of different things at once; one of them is developing ways to convey a player’s feelings via their in-game avatar in real time.
Sony is attempting to create a video game avatar that can have its appearance and movements dynamically altered based on the player’s own facial expressions, as detailed in the company’s most recent patent listing. According to the provided documentation, users’ faces would be scanned to determine their emotional state (happy, sad, etc.), and that state would be transferred to their in-game avatar. It’s worth noting that this latest filing may or may not be related to Sony’s prior AI-based face animation patent.
The ad also notes that customers would be able to utilise their own likenesses to create 3D models for incorporation into virtual worlds and games. Sony’s picture-in-picture patent could be implemented here, allowing for emotive pop-up screens to appear in response to events in the game like wins and losses. A few more examples include the inclusion of speech bubbles, animated gestures, gesticulations, and the like.
With the foregoing in mind, it stands to reason that Sony would require a thorough method of capturing data about the users’ respective faces prior to using them in video games and 3D interfaces. There is no mention of what kind of hardware would be used in conjunction with the system to provide such information, but it is implied that this is the case. One such example is the shockingly expensive PS VR2 headset.
In a related development, Sony is planning to implement “what-if” gameplay features that will give users more insight into the potential outcomes of their actions within a game. Sony believes this will help with short-term player retention by making players aware of more advanced progression goals in their games.
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