It's not easy to see out of a tank (that's the point) but in order to be effective on the battlefield, their crews need to know what's going on around them. Modern tanks often have a variety cameras mounted to their exteriors to help the soldiers ins...
This year’s E3 has not just been about gaming, but also about virtual reality and augmented reality, high-end tech that had a privileged position in the expo.
Fueled by what it could do for gaming, VR has been growing and expanding for years now even outside of the world of consoles. As such, virtual reality is now the next bit thing for consumers, and so important it was one of the center stage themes of E3 thanks to projects by Sony, Microsoft, and Facebook. First comes virtual reality gaming, then changing the way we consume media. These devices are Morpheus (Sony), HoloLens (Microsoft), and Oculus Rift (Facebook), and all appeared at E3 this week showing what they could do.
Sony’s big bet came from the possibility of creating multiplayer experiences, enabling multiple people wearing Morpheus virtual reality gear to play together. This was already teased in an upcoming game, Guerilla Studios’ RIGS – a first person shooter with 3-vs-3 battles, created entirely around the idea of sharing virtual space. Other titles being teased include Battlezone, Headmaster, Wayward Sky, and World War Toons.
In response to Sony’s Morpheus gear, Microsoft has also announced its own virtual reality headset, HoloLens. During Microsof’s E3 presentation, a demo of HoloLens was shown running Minecraft. The demo was well received by the audience since it was a ground-breaking development for both the virtual reality platform and the Minecraft franchise.
Microsoft also showed their vision of the future with HoloLens, a voice reactive headset that users can also control with their hands, Minority Report style. Bill Gates’ team left attendees in awe with an incredible Minecraft demo in augmented reality during Microsoft’s E3 keynote, and how it could display entire worlds on any surface. It’s not that the users will be inside the game, the game can also be brought out and displayed outside of the screen.Although really promising, HoloLens is still under the development and research stages and doesn’t have a set release date.
All of these devices are coming out soon, and with the way consoles are going, they might change not only videogames, but also the way we watch TV shows, listen to music, or interact with media in general.
Windows 10 won’t just be confined to your computer and cellphone, but will be all around us thanks to augmented reality and new hardware.
Just as if we were living in the world of Minority Report, augmented reality is now ready to become, well, a reality itself. Thanks to its holographic technology, Microsoft can now create augmented reality version of their Windows 10 OS to combine real and virtual interface elements for users wearing the HoloLens, their latest wearable headset device. By using it, a new range of possibilities and uses open up, such as engineers seeing instructions overlaid on the actual projects they’re working on, or the layout of a location or project to organize tasks in a team.
This technology has universal support under Windows 10, Microsoft’s latest OS, so users can build once and use everywhere. The Redmond company says holographic technology will work with all kinds of headsets already out there, such as the Oculus Rift or Samsung Gear VR, but it’s their new in-house headset that took our attention: the Microsoft HoloLens is their idea of a headset, and will be available “within the Windows 10 timeframe.”
HoloLens can pair up with all kind of devices running Windows 10, and has its own custom CPU and Holographic Processing Unit (HPU) as to not tax the system it’s interacting with. HoloLens doesn’t require mobile phones or computers, and can be used completely independent of any other gadgets.
Because the life or death of these gadgets depends mostly on what you can do with it, Microsoft is also releasing HoloStudio, which is a 3D modelling tool users can employ to create their own holograms that others can interact with, or even 3D print them for physical use. Now it really feels the future is among us.
It's not easy to see out of a tank (that's the point) but in order to be effective on the battlefield, their crews need to know what's going on around them. Modern tanks often have a variety cameras mounted to their exteriors to help the soldiers ins...
