A new patent has leaked online, showing PlayStation’s plans to create additional sensing apparatus for the company’s famous controller.
These sensors could be slipped over the grip sections of your controller – or placed on buttons – where they would measure your heart rate and sweat levels. Once the controller determines just how sweaty and nervous you are it will feed that info into your console, which then switches-up your experience accordingly.
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In the patent, the example of a horror game is given. You’d expect someone to be a bit nervous if they’re creeping round a zombie-infested wasteland – but you don’t want them to be too nervous, according to PlayStation, otherwise they might stop playing. The patent reads:
“It is advantageous to be able to detect when a user is becoming increasingly frightened and to modify in-game parameters (such as number of enemies, type of enemies, environmental lighting levels, or the sounds which are played to the user) so as to reduce the intensity of the gaming experience and put the user more at ease.”
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As some of us are a lot sweatier than others, there would need to be a set-up process to measure your normal sweat and heart levels – something which is outlined in the patent. The patent also mentions future plans to team the controller with a VR headset for an uber-immersive experience.
Another recurring key themes in the patent is the importance of low cost. One of the opening paragraphs reads: “there is a need to provide a low-cost peripheral that is able to provide increased functionality for a range of different applications.”
Hopefully, this means that the new feature won’t push up the price of the next DualShock. Fingers crossed.
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Editorial independence means being able to give an unbiased verdict about a product or company, with the avoidance of conflicts of interest. To ensure this is possible, every member of the editorial staff follows a clear code of conduct.
Professional conduct
We also expect our journalists to follow clear ethical standards in their work. Our staff members must strive for honesty and accuracy in everything they do. We follow the IPSO Editors’ code of practice to underpin these standards.