Sony made funding cuts to PSVR 2 game development, according to a report from Android Central. However, despite reports of funding cuts for games, it seems Sony isn’t done with its VR ambitions.
Sony Interactive Entertainment’s new patent is published in the US this month, originally filed in February, that shows the company’s audio tech that will add real world sounds to VR. The inventors behind this VR tech are:
- Victoria Dorn
- Celeste Bean
- Tatianna Manzon-Gutzman
- Sarah Karp
“Methods and systems are provided for integrating media cues into virtual reality scenes presented on a head mounted display (HMD) is disclosed. The method includes presenting a virtual reality scene on a display of an HMD. The method further includes receiving sensor data from one or more sensors in a real-world space in which the HMD is located.”
“Then, identifying an object location of an object in the real-world space that produces a sound. The method includes generating a media cue in the virtual reality scene presented in the HMD. The media cue is presented in a virtual location that is correlated to the object location of the object in the real-world space.”
Let me simplify what the tech does.
The process begins with displaying a virtual reality scene on the HMD. The system collects data from various sensors located in the real-world space where the HMD is being used. These sensors can include microphones, cameras, motion detectors, etc.
Using the sensor data, the system identifies the location of an object in the real-world space that produces a sound. For instance, if someone speaks or an object falls, the sensors detect the sound’s origin.
The system then creates a media cue in the virtual reality scene that corresponds to the location of the real-world object. A media cue can be a visual or auditory signal in the VR environment that alerts the user to the real-world event.
The media cue is placed in the VR scene in such a way that its virtual location matches the real-world location of the sound-producing object. For example, if someone speaks to the user’s right in the real world, the VR system generates a corresponding cue on the user’s right in the virtual world.
The tech is fascinating for sure, but many patents are filed all the time, not all of them actually get implemented.
Adding real world sounds to games would really boost their immersion but what’s the point if game development funding is being cut?
