Holographic Games… If only.

Because the Kinect worked so well…

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aThCr0PsyuA

The excitable side of me wants to think that I can knock down a wall in my house and step into a fantasy world of virtual reality. I want to holodeck from Star Trek.

The realist in me knows that I’ll be saying “XBOX. PLAY!” over and over trying different emphasis on different syllables until the thing finally decides to resume my Netflix show or wonkily holding up my hand until it finally recognizes me.

 

  • They are trying to show a multitude of applications that could be used for the tech, but just like Google Glass, how many of them will actually come to life? I don’t understand how the hand motions will work so precisely to put that next block on your Minecraft house. That’ll probably be really hard to do. It’s another stepping stone towards functional wearable technology.

  • It seems like a neat thing that could have some interesting applications but I doubt I would use it much in gaming. My view on this is the same as my view on the Rift when I first saw it… neat… now show me how this will make my gaming more enjoyable. Rift is starting to get to a point where I am eager to get one with games like Elite and Alien Isolation, but this holo thing seems much more like a non gaming device.

  • I’m actually really excited about this advance. Am I excited about it for gaming? Sure! But it will be the developers who build the games that will get me excited about using it in gaming, not Microsoft. Just like I don’t expect Microsoft to build my games. They build my gaming platform. And I suspect it’ll be v3 that hits the sweet spot.

    But I really like where they’re headed with the HoloLens tech. Will it change gaming? I hope so! I hope someone figures out how to expand my gaming experience into a broader canvas than just the limitations of my screen. If this is “augmented reality” then I hope someone works on how to augment my virtuality with it too in interesting ways.

    What will that look like? Not really sure yet. But I would be happy if it put a little 3D map on my desk or floating to the side of my screen that showed me where I was in 3 dimensions. Maybe it could do that. Or allow me to pop open a friends list/skype session with a friend while we’re gaming off my screen so it doesn’t chew up my gaming real estate. Maybe it could just expand the sense of the landscape into a kind of augmented peripheral vision. I’ve got friends with 3 and 4 monitors who kind of get that in Elite Dangerous, but that’s not something I’m ready to do.

    I’m just glad that companies like Microsoft are innovating on this kind of thing, companies who can take tech like this out on a broad scale.

  • I am excited for this, not because I expect this rendition to be great, but because it is a step forward, and those are needed to create usable progress.

  • This is almost like one of the old kickstarter pitches.
    A glorious non realistic image of the actual product.
    Just a techdemo for the investors.

    What is next? They show a flying car like back in the future and then when the actual product appears.
    Well.. it looks somewhat like the car, even if it does not fly.

    Just like Kinect was gonna be the hot next thing working flawlessly that could do everything you could imagen.

  • Wasn’t this the way things were supposed to be back in the 80’s as well. Lawnmower Man here we come.

  • I really doubt that something like this will ever become functional enough, not to mention commercially affordable for ordinary people, during our lifetime. Maybe close to that for future generations, who knows. We can also just hope that advertisers won’t abuse it like they tend to do, otherwise virtual 3D bears will constantly pop up in front of you saying that you need better tools for your holographic rocket. Would be funny though. But, future devices will definitely be aware of your surroundings. See recent Google instant translation for instance. Like someone already mentioned, it is really hard to make these kind of motion tracking devices and sensors. We’ll see.