I knew this was coming. I'd predicted it several times in previous threads (not specifically that Sony would patent this controller) that we'd eventually see a combination of a traditional style controller that would separate in to two motion/pointer controllers.

It just made sense with the bridging of the new direction of motion controls and the traditional controller. Now this one is made to work with the existing PS3 and eyetoy, so it ends up having to look a little silly and not nearly as functional as it could be, but imagine in the future (for any company). Having a simple looking controller; we'll use the 360's as an example, and being able to suddenly twist the two sections apart, giving you two wireless motion sensing IR pointing controllers. You'd be able to jump back and forth between different control methods on the fly. I'd be pretty sweet.

Sony had patents on motion controllers way before nintendo made the wii. So by your logic the wii was copying sonys patents.

I agree with stof.....he's one of the few people who's understood the direction sONY want to take.

SO WHAT if its copying.....if SONY copy it, refine it & make it a better product....I'm ALL FOR IT....its better for us gamers.

Remember Nintendo invented the analog stick....but its the Dualshock that utilised it in the best way imho.

And for the people saying its UGLY....these are HAND DRAWN I think.....these aren't how the actual product will look like after polish & re-designs....this is a basic idea.

I just hope its not a PS3 addon but a PS4 de facto controller!

Sony, don't pull a Nintendo, please for the sake of gaming don't pull a Nintendo....

On the other hand, this is Sony we're talking about. So I doubt they would throw Super Kratos Beachball 17: garbage Edition out.

Sounds awesome!

When's the release date?

1st day purchase for me!

Considering that it's meant to be a PS3 peripheral, it's pretty clear the direction Sony wants to take is "me too". Nintendo just changed the game complete

not sure who was it that said that 3d tracking doesn't work with cameras. at university i have worked with a toolkit that does 3d position tracking based on webcam pictures, you just require fixed image tags that can be detected in the picture and then you can calculate the angle under which the tag picture is seen as well as the position of it.
(here is a link to one of the toolkits working with this: http://studierstube.icg.tu-graz.ac.at/handheld_ar/stbtracker.php )

but when lookig more on the patent text it seems that they are going to track just the 2 dimensional position of the spheres (the patent also mentions that it is not limited to perfect speres) in the image which coresponds to a line in 3d space and se ultrasonic to detect the distance of the controller (so you can detect on which position of the line the controller is). this would allow full 3d tracking of the controller position but the resolution will still depend on the resolution of the visual tracking.

to me it looks like a possible way to implement full 3d tracking with rather low processing power requirements.

finally i want to say that sony patenting this doesn't mean it will ever get released to the public in this form, and if it gets released its still not decided if they will use it for ps3 or if it will release with ps4.

God... This made me cry. X'D

 I just hope it vibrates.

"Sony have registered the patent for a wireless motion sensitive controller for the PlayStation 3 that makes use of an "ultrasonic tracking system"."



http://www.gamesindustry.biz/articles/sony-patents-ps3-motion-controller

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can we consider this "official"?