wraggster
March 16th, 2014, 17:16
The Oculus Rift (http://joystiq.com/tag/oculus-rift) headset is doing its best to draw players into the virtual realities it hosts, but traditional or motion-assisted controllers are typically used to interact with these virtual worlds. Thelmic Labs has a different vision for player interaction however - rather than tracking the positioning of a controller in 3D space, Thelmic's Myo armbands build virtual representations of a player's hands and forearms.
According to Thelmic's FAQ page (https://www.thalmic.com/en/myo/faq/), Myo works by measuring the "electrical activity from your muscles to detect what gesture your hand is making." The armbands use a Bluetooth 4.0 connection to communicate with Windows, Mac, Android or iOS devices. Thelmic lists (https://www.thalmic.com/en/myo/preorder/) the beginning shipments of Myo development kits for the "first half of 2014," with the consumer version shipping shortly after that. Both are priced at $149. Potential developers that don't want to wait around for Thelmic's wider distribution shipments can apply (https://developer.thalmic.com/apply/)to join the Thelmic Alpha Developers, a group that will gain access to pre-production Myo hardware.
While a cool concept doesn't promise future developer support for the hardware, it's pretty neat to imagine casting in-game spells with nothing but hand gestures. Besides, whatever amount of gesture functionality the Myo achieves can't possibly dip below the bar that Steel Battalion: Heavy Armor (http://www.joystiq.com/game/steel-battalion-heavy-armor) set on the Kinect, right?
http://www.joystiq.com/2014/03/15/myo-replaces-controllers-with-arm-controlled-oculus-rift-gaming/
According to Thelmic's FAQ page (https://www.thalmic.com/en/myo/faq/), Myo works by measuring the "electrical activity from your muscles to detect what gesture your hand is making." The armbands use a Bluetooth 4.0 connection to communicate with Windows, Mac, Android or iOS devices. Thelmic lists (https://www.thalmic.com/en/myo/preorder/) the beginning shipments of Myo development kits for the "first half of 2014," with the consumer version shipping shortly after that. Both are priced at $149. Potential developers that don't want to wait around for Thelmic's wider distribution shipments can apply (https://developer.thalmic.com/apply/)to join the Thelmic Alpha Developers, a group that will gain access to pre-production Myo hardware.
While a cool concept doesn't promise future developer support for the hardware, it's pretty neat to imagine casting in-game spells with nothing but hand gestures. Besides, whatever amount of gesture functionality the Myo achieves can't possibly dip below the bar that Steel Battalion: Heavy Armor (http://www.joystiq.com/game/steel-battalion-heavy-armor) set on the Kinect, right?
http://www.joystiq.com/2014/03/15/myo-replaces-controllers-with-arm-controlled-oculus-rift-gaming/