Sony Interactive Entertainment has been busy lately. Filing multiple patents in the past few months. The most recent one I covered was the company’s use of AI for localization which impact voice artist jobs.
Now, another tech is patented by Sony that will allow the makers of PlayStation to monitor your excitement levels to adjust difficulty level, in-game visuals, brightness, colors and frame rate.
The gameplay experience will be tailored by adjusting game settings based on the player’s real-world excitement levels, tracked through their mobile device.
This patent, titled “Controlling Game State,” aims to make games more responsive to the player’s mood and physical state.
An entertainment device comprising processing circuitry to identify a game to be processed and process a game state of the game, and communication circuitry to receive activity data recorded by at least one mobile device, the activity data relating to one or more activities performed by a user. The processing circuitry is configured to control, in dependence on the received activity data, at least one aspect of the game state.
So how does it work? Well, the tech gathers “activity data” from the user’s mobile device (fitness device or controller is more likely), which might include data points like movement, heart rate, and other indicators of the player’s physical and emotional state.
While the patent mentions mobile device, it is far more likely that this tech will be integrated into future PlayStation controllers. That makes far more sense than a mobile device, but we’ll see.
The flowchart provided in the patent (Figure 5) outlines the main steps in this process:
- Receive Activity Data: The system begins by receiving activity data recorded by the player’s mobile device.
- Determine Excitement Level: The system then calculates the player’s excitement level based on the data.
- Select Game: Based on this excitement level, the system identifies which game to process or, potentially, suggests a different game that better suits the player’s current state.
- Adjust Game State: Finally, the system modifies one or more aspects of the game’s state, such as difficulty or visual elements, to align with the calculated excitement level.
The obvious concern here would be data breaches, and it is also pretty common these days to use user data for targeted advertising or marketing, even if the data is not explicitly gathered for the purpose.
Sony has a history of serious data breaches so this kind of tech gathering such data might not be a great idea.
