Hi everyone! I just wanted to give you guys a quick heads-up that I’ll be giving a keynote presentation at the sixth annual Games for Health Conference in Boston next month.
For those of you who aren’t familiar with the Games for Health Conference, it is an event that’s held in partnership with the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation’s Pioneer Portfolio, which focuses on funding ideas that may lead to significant breakthroughs in the future of health and health care. The conference creates opportunities to develop innovative solutions that empower individuals to better manage their personal health. I’m honored and excited to take part in the event so I thought I’d give you a sneak peek at some of the things I plan to talk about.
The title of my talk is “The Mind-Body Experience of PlayStation Move – Relationships between Gaming, Play, Exercise, and More.” I plan to discuss the development of PlayStation Move, with a focus on what I call “somatic gratification” (I didn’t coin the term, but I think I’m the first to apply it to video games). In short, I’ll be talking about how the physicality of an interface can connect the body and the mind to really enhance an experience. Sometimes, the interface is only a means to an end, but often, the interface becomes an integral part of the experience. I’ll be analyzing the similarities and differences this has for gaming, for play, and for exercise, and why different interface choices may be appropriate for each domain.
I’ll also be talking about the design of PlayStation Move, highlighting why many of the design choices are the way they are. Many of the seemingly arbitrary stylistic choices are not cosmetic; they are actually functionally and ergonomically important. Finally, I’ll share my thoughts about the subtle yet profound differences between a true position-sensing device vs. a motion-sensing device, and describe some of the applications that are enabled as a result of having position information.
If you happen to be attending the event, be sure to say hello. To learn more about the Games for Health Conference, be sure to check out the Games for Health site.
Cant wait!
i don’t want Health-care game.
i don’t want a shape game.
i want some amusing and inspiring game.
not wii fit or any health-care game, especially when Sony can do some great action game.
i don’t want an exercise game neither, this is horrible please, don’t follow that step, don’t let your fan down like Nintendo did
Well when all is said and done, all we can hope for is something spectacular. If not then we’ll have another piece of crap that will be added to the pile of peripherals that sony has come out with.
Please don’t follow Nintendo, instead make the more developments on the PS Eye. The EyeToy had a lot of potential.
You guys realize this and the PS eye work together right? That is unless they changed their planning from the videos I watched from the PS store. My suggestion if you don’t like the games their releasing go to school learn how to make video games…and make some video games!
All you guys saying don’t follow Nintendo needs to grow up… I’m not 100% fan of Sony for what they did to the update 3.21 taking away my Linux BUT this PS Move is a good approach to create similar software for the PS3. I know some games on the Wii gets tiring with the Wii remote but it did open up new ways to play games and I’m all for it. Also if it helps some people health wise it’s a good thing. At least unlike Nintendo you can use the regular controller for all other games, this is just another option to enjoy other games.
…Aside from fixing Linux support… wondering if you say have 2 PS Move’s do you need 2 PS eye??? can 1 track multiple players?
Hi,
I’m the person who invited Richard to speak and I just want to make clear…
The idea isn’t to make one game vs. another. It’s to talk about how all sorts of games can be used to help people with various needs be it having fun, or healing from injury, or staying in shape, etc. Sony has made some great exergames like Kinetic and even many of their fun EyeToy games are used by people helping others recover from injury. There are lots of regular off-the-shelf games being used to help in health including efforts to help soldiers with brain injuries, autistic children, and much more. No one healing from injury or trying to lose weight wants bad or boring games either.
I don’t think anyone has to worry too much that Sony’s about to make a game as boring as a stay in the hospital but I do think we should be interested in using all the tools companies like Sony and others create for everything we can… Sony Move has incredible potential and we’re honored they’re coming to share their insights. Don’t worry we’ll send Richard back in one-piece ready to make lots of great games and new interfaces for everyone.
Thanks everyone for their interest.
Ben Sawyer
http://www.gamesforhealth.org
Hi all. This talk won’t be about Sony making a fitness game or any particular game for that matter. It’s a study into how interfaces affect the experience and how physical interfaces in particular represent an opportunity for a deeper experience in some cases.
I think it’s useful to look at the domains of gaming and play and exercise and see what works and what doesn’t in each domain. The term ‘exercise’ seems to be a hot-button for some people, maybe because it brings up images of repetition and tedium. For some of the new physical experiences we want to enable, it’s actually important to make sure we don’t overtax people physically and the exercise experts have studied that subject very carefully. With respect to ‘play’, the free-form spatial nature of new interfaces offers a great potential for new experiences that could be very rewarding if done right.
One of my roles in R&D is to think about the potential impact of our technologies beyond our immediate application. I’ll be very happy if our technology can be leveraged by others, and I think the Games for Health conference is a great place for those ideas to be explored.