I tend to collect a lot of old gaming magazines, and have kept every mag I have ever had. My friend also donated a bunch of them to me, and among them was PSM's 100% Unofficial Launch Guide. On page 24 of the guide, I found this interesting little piece that has seemingly went unnoticed for years. I've been meaning to scan it for a long time.
Caption 1 reads:
A motion sensor that works with a web cam is currently in development. The sensor tracks a wand that can act as a sword during gameplay.
Caption 2 reads:
Waving the wand in front of the web cam controls onscreen weapons. Imagine this technology translated into Ready 2 Rumble or Tekken Tag Tournament. Punches and kicks could be translated through special sensor gloves.
It appears that Sony was working on some sort of motion technology around the time of the PS2's launch. My guess it the project was either scrapped altogether, or eventually became the Eye Toy. The only real difference is they dropped the sensor, and went purely with the camera.
Either way, it's just one of those interesting things that have been forgotten over the years. The PSM guide is actually the only place I have ever seen this technology covered. I don't remember hearing about it anywhere else, so chances are, the majority of gamers had no idea about this.
So what does this prove? Absolutely nothing. the new PlayStation Move has nothing to do with this technology, but it does show that the idea of motion control in games has been around for a lot time (the most obvious example being the Power Glove on the NES of course). It's just goes to show that if an idea is too far-fetched to work in the current market, wait a while.
Like the Eye Toy, if they had released this technology, it would have only had a niche market, and wouldn't have done that well.
Caption 1 reads:
A motion sensor that works with a web cam is currently in development. The sensor tracks a wand that can act as a sword during gameplay.
Caption 2 reads:
Waving the wand in front of the web cam controls onscreen weapons. Imagine this technology translated into Ready 2 Rumble or Tekken Tag Tournament. Punches and kicks could be translated through special sensor gloves.
It appears that Sony was working on some sort of motion technology around the time of the PS2's launch. My guess it the project was either scrapped altogether, or eventually became the Eye Toy. The only real difference is they dropped the sensor, and went purely with the camera.
Either way, it's just one of those interesting things that have been forgotten over the years. The PSM guide is actually the only place I have ever seen this technology covered. I don't remember hearing about it anywhere else, so chances are, the majority of gamers had no idea about this.
So what does this prove? Absolutely nothing. the new PlayStation Move has nothing to do with this technology, but it does show that the idea of motion control in games has been around for a lot time (the most obvious example being the Power Glove on the NES of course). It's just goes to show that if an idea is too far-fetched to work in the current market, wait a while.
Like the Eye Toy, if they had released this technology, it would have only had a niche market, and wouldn't have done that well.
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