Topic: Valve wants to do eye-tracking for camera movement and other stuff

[MysterD]

Joystiq -> Valve wants to do eye-tracking for basically allowing you to move in-game camera around and other stuff.

Valve is no stranger to experimenting with new ways of communicating and tracking data within games. Whether it's something as simple as closed captioning and customizable controls, or something a bit more niche like a colorblind mode, many of Valve's games have been celebrated for being more accessible. Mike Ambinder of Valve Software spoke with Gamasutra and explained how company's pursuits enables it to "improve the experience of both able and disabled gamers."

In addition to previously documented research into sign language, Valve's Ambinder also expresses interest in "the potential of eyetrackers and the eventual ability to let gamers use their eyes as active controller inputs." With this method, you may be able to control a game completely hands-free ... without having to use your entire body as an input device. "It may be possible in the future to let the eyes act as a proxy for the mouse cursor, letting gamers transmit navigation and targeting inputs via eye movements. If you couple this approach with the use of blinks or other proxies for button presses, you may remove the need for a mouse and keyboard (or gamepad) all together," Ambinder added.

[idolminds]

Kinect 2: STOP WATCHING PORN

[MysterD]

So, basically Valve's telling us why HL3 and Portal 2 are gonna be delayed indefinitely, maybe?

[Quemaqua]

Whatever Valve wants to do, I automatically don't care about.

[Pugnate]

hehehe

[scottws]

LOL, people seeing gamers playing this way would think they have Tourette Syndrome.

[idolminds]

If you couple this approach with the use of blinks or other proxies for button presses, you may remove the need for a mouse and keyboard (or gamepad) all together

Honestly, have you ever heard anyone complain about buttons? Why are we trying to replace probably the simplest and most well understood method of input? PUSH BUTTON, SHIT HAPPENS.

"Look at object, then blink twice quickly" is not going to make things any easier to get to grips with. Not to mention it has to figure out the difference between "Blink to do something" and "Blink because this is a natural function you do thousands of times each day."

[Xessive]

I like exploring the possibilities but I'm certainly not ready to give up my buttons.

Ha, I just remembered Alone in the Dark, push button to blink!

[Ghandi]

I hope that the first game they put out with this doesn't have a woman with glorious breasts, because we won't do well.

[Cobra951]

Honestly, have you ever heard anyone complain about buttons? Why are we trying to replace probably the simplest and most well understood method of input? PUSH BUTTON, SHIT HAPPENS.

"Look at object, then blink twice quickly" is not going to make things any easier to get to grips with. Not to mention it has to figure out the difference between "Blink to do something" and "Blink because this is a natural function you do thousands of times each day."

I've got to give props to Google, again.  Your post made me think of an awesome comment on all of this last night, but my searches on joystiq (where it was posted) proved fruitless.  On Google, "Kinect mouse efficient" brought up the right link at the top of the results.

@vidguy The reason we still use the mouse is because it's so undeniably efficient. Moving the mouse a quarter inch can move the cursor across half the screen. Scrolling is fast. At the same time, it's highly accurate and precise because it easily switches between wider movement gestures smaller pointing ones.

Touch-screen is nice on small devices, but wholly impractical on larger displays or for extended use, as you would only ever want to touch downwards, not forwards, so mounted displays suffer. Touchscreens also have a 1:1 efficiency. Each inch of movement across them is an inch of movement you must do, which adds up.

These gestures suffer from the same problem. They are neat to watch but too wide for extended use. Why would you want to wave your arms like that when you can move your wrist a quarter of an inch, or your index finger across a wheel?

The only solution to this is extremely advanced finger tracking. If a sensor could be mounted beneath a laptop screen, for instance, and merely raising your index finger gave you mouse control, that would be impressive and useful. The tiny degrees of difference between different gestures would be absurdly complicated to map - I don't think impossible, but absurdly complicated, and Kinect isn't precise enough to make those sorts of differentiations.

Also, FPS gamers are never giving up that mouse. You'll have to pry it from their cold, arthritic, Alzheimers-ridden hands.

http://www.joystiq.com/2010/12/09/kinect-hacks-mit-gets-minority-report-ui-to-work-look-at-those/

[gpw11]

Honestly, have you ever heard anyone complain about buttons? Why are we trying to replace probably the simplest and most well understood method of input? PUSH BUTTON, SHIT HAPPENS.

"Look at object, then blink twice quickly" is not going to make things any easier to get to grips with. Not to mention it has to figure out the difference between "Blink to do something" and "Blink because this is a natural function you do thousands of times each day."

I agree with you, but this isn't for us.  Going off of what Vavle's been researching lately, I'd imagine that this is to make games more accessible to the disabled. Specifically, quadriplegics.

[Pugnate]

If that is their true intent, then it is really noble.