Watch a guy play Skyrim on a treadmill
Is this the future of virtual reality video gaming?
Sure, the Nintendo Wii and Xbox 360 (with Kinect) systems have done a pretty good job at creating games that get people to move around and get some kind of exercise, but what people really want to do is to get immersed in the game with virtual reality.
Good news for those people! Check out this demonstration video from the folks at Virtuix Omni, in which a guy plays the role-playing game "The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim" while walking on the company's Omni treadmill. The player's character walks based on how slow or fast the player is walking on the treadmill, and a head-mounted unit tracks the character's viewpoint as the player moves his head left and right:
Do you think we could soon be seeing these as an official Xbox accessory any time soon? What astounds me is that in the demo, the player's character didn't grab the wolf pelt from the dead wolves. You can turn those into leather, dude!
Keith Shaw rounds up the best in geek video in his ITworld.tv blog. Follow Keith on Twitter at @shawkeith. For the latest IT news, analysis and how-tos, follow ITworld on Twitter, Facebook, and Google+.
