15 May 2006
Ferry

Novint Falcon shows 3D touch in gaming

At an E3 dominated, in large part, by the Nintendo Wii and its motion tracking controller, innovative physical interaction with games has become the next-big thing in gaming. A Novint Falcon hardware demo at E3 placed a three dimensional ball on screen, covered with a variety of lumps and bumps. The falcon grip controlled an on-screen hand that ran over the surface of the ball. As the hand went up and down over the lumps the resistance increased and decreased accordingly, which produced a rather believable sensation of touch. Here’s a PC demo video by Gizmodo:



Another demo involved shoving a hand through a ball of goop. Movement was free and easy until touching the surface, at which point the resistance became much stronger as the hand penetrated the ball until it suddenly popped out the other side and once again became free. Another fun demo allowed users to draw back the string of a bow and arrow, with resistance becoming increasingly strong as the bow became taught. Arrow release resulted in the sudden disappearance of all resistance and an incredibly realistic sensation of the release of a great deal of physical tension.

IGN mentions words can only do so much in describing something so intrinsically physical, but rest assured, the effects we experienced were extremely impressive. Even cooler is the fact that Novint seems to have a real understanding of what gamers will demand of their product. The grip, which is a door-knob looking bulb in the pictures, is easily removable, and can be swapped with any conceivable design, such as a pistol grip. Even better, Novint promises that the Falcon will launch in 2007 for less than $100.