A new Meta patent uses clever engineering to open the door to gaming gloves, smart garments, and more designed for use with VR and AR.
Recent patent filings by Meta indicate that the company could be working on a new generation of wireless, wearable technology designed for use with VR and AR. As more gamers begin exploring the growing field of virtual reality gaming, these devices could usher in a whole new way of experiencing these virtual worlds.
Meta has been very vocal about its desire to create more intuitive ways for users to interact with VR and AR, and earlier this year even showed off a prototype wrist controller developed after the acquisition of the brain-computer interface company CTRL-Labs in 2019. But a new patent published this month indicates that Meta may have even more ambitious plans for the next generation of control options for AR and VR. From wireless AR glasses to gaming gloves with built-in haptic feedback, the patent shows a variety of options for interacting with devices like the upcoming Meta Quest Pro VR headset.
Rather than focusing on a specific control option, the patent details how wireless data can be transmitted from a wearable device to a VR headset or other computer. Although wearables like the Apple Watch have become common in recent years, most current wearables emit radio and electromagnetic signals in a way that results in much of the signal being sent back through the wearer. This results in both a weaker signal being sent to the user’s device, such as a phone when using a smartwatch, and more radio frequency radiation being absorbed by the user. In contrast, Meta’s new patent uses an antenna sandwiched between two layers of material designed to direct signals away from the user and towards a device like a VR headset. This new technique can allow for smaller, more powerful, and more versatile wearables.
The small size of the antenna outlined in the patent opens the possibility of embedding them into a wide variety of wearables designed for everything from gaming to medical devices. Drawings submitted with the patent show examples of wireless gaming gloves that could send and receive haptic feedback to a VR headset, AR glasses with antennas built into the frames, and a wrist-mounted device similar to the one Meta showed off earlier this year. Wearable devices like these could allow gamers to actually feel the handle of a virtual sword in their hand, or let them swipe through in-game menus with the flick of a wrist.
As VR and AR become more common in everything from the world of gaming to the world of business, users are going to need more than just analog sticks and buttons to get the most out of these technologies. This patent gives gamers a glimpse of how they may interact with their favorite titles in the future, and could represent the next step towards the type of full-body immersion seen in films like Ready Player One.
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