The incredible potential of PlayStation Eye

October 4th, 2007, 19:22 Posted By: Shrygue

via Computer and Video Games


We're not usually ones for card-based videogames, but the technology used in The Eye of Judgement has itself grabbed our interest, and we've got videos to show you why.

Sony's card game uses the PlayStation Eye - the PS3 equivalent of the EyeToy - to track the placement of real game cards on a playing mat on your table.

When you place the card down the PS3 reads the special coding on it and summons the corresponding monster on the screen.

We thought it a nice touch that it can identify the cards' facing direction and place the monster the right way - something that plays a fundamental part of the gameplay, as you can see in the gameplay video below, in which we take on the computer.

Yet, even though the game itself is a relatively static, grid-based card game, the tracking tech of this set-up gets even more impressive. The software actually has the ability to accurately track the movement of cards in real-time, and shift the on-screen 3D monster as though it were standing on the card itself.

This doesn't just include movement over a 2D plain, but full 3D motion tracking, meaning if you move the card close to the camera the PS3 makes the monster bigger as it gets closer to the screen. It even tracks the tilt of the card, so tipping it left or right rotates the monster on-screen (until you tilt that card too far and the Eye can't read it).

So in essence you're holding that monster in your hand and can manipulate it in full 3D. That's truly amazing stuff and, with that kind of tracking technology, Sony could come up with some truly amazing gameplay mechanics in future PS3 titles. Especially considering how well the camera can merge interactive in-game objects with real-life scenery.

You could have advanced puzzle games that use real-life manipulation of objects, or Sony could make marked cards that you place around your room so that the PS3 can detect surfaces and objects for, umm... some sort of physics-based game or something (we'll leave the creative ideas to developers).

Check out the video captioned 'EyeToy-ing around' to see the impressive camera tech at work as we use TEoJ's Card Profile mode to demonstrate it's tracking abilities.

The game's intro cinematic is pretty nice too, so we threw a video of that in here for good measure. Dive in...


Video demondstration of it in action here

There are 1 comments - Join In and Discuss Here