looxid link

WHY IS IT GOOD FOR VR?

Looxid Link is supposedly allowing the users to control all of their VR games without any movement or the need of using a controller. However, the product is still in its early stage where it only supports few applications and games that are available on its website. So why this product is good for VR even though it is just in early development? There are several reasons where I am going to list down below.

ACCESSIBILITY FOR PEOPLE WITH DISABILITY

We all know that having support for people with disability is a common practice for most of the product out there. For example, Microsoft’s Xbox gaming console has released a special controller called Xbox Adaptive Controller for people with disability so that they can enjoy their favorite games. However, this feature is hardly to be seen in the virtual reality industry. After I done my research, the only disability supporting product is a software called WalkinVR which allows the user to rotate their views using their controller. This really helps people who are using a wheelchair that are unable to turn while using a VR headset, but it doesn’t really solve the problem since there are a lot of people out there who simply cannot use a controller provided by the manufacturers. This product will essentially solve the entire accessibility issue for disabled people since people can control the everything would out the need of physically move their body.

MALFUNCTIONING CONTROLS

Have you ever experienced a time where the control fails you in the middle of a VR game, and you constantly pick up the wrong thing or even fails to pick any thing up because of the controller is not working? All of these can be prevented in the future with technologies like Looxid Link because it uses a brain-controlled interface. The device simply uses your brain signal to control things happing in games without the need of you actually grab something, or more realistically, it might be able to detect your brain signal to identify what you are trying to do and make small adjustment to the input from your controller. Even though this level of technology might not be easy to achieve at the moment, it still gives us some amazing insights on how virtual reality could become in the future.

CURRENT APPLICATIONS

At this point in time, this product does not have a lot of complete applications or real usage, however, it does have serval demo and applications that illustrates its potential and directions for future developing.

One of the applications it has is to visualize the brain activities of the user into a 2D or 3D graphic interface. This application utilizes the device’s EEG nature to showcase its ability to detect the user’s brain activities, the interface contains ‘mind index’ information for users who do not have any prior knowledge on brain waves so that they can still get a general idea on their brain activities. It also contains information such as raw signals for expert who understand the scientific concepts. Another application is called interact playground where the users are placed in a virtual playground with boxes. The device monitors your brain activities and levitates the boxes depends on the intensity or the level of your brain activities, the boxes will also change colors when they levitate to let you know that you are doing something. The third application is called “Mind Master: Pyrokinesis” which is probably the most interesting software among all of them. This is a VR game that allows users to control with their brain, sounds incredible? It is. In this game, you are a wizard who has the ability of pyrokinesis and cast fireballs. Your goal of the game is to defeat the dragon in the scene using the fireball you casted, and guess what, the fireball is casted with your brain power. When the user concentrate, the fireball will grow bigger thus dealing a larger damage. When the user loses concentration, the fireball shrinks and eventually disappear. The fourth and the last application is called “VR Mind Care” and it is an application that helps the user to relax and release stress. The application will give instruction based on the user’s brain activities to guided the users with actions that they need to perform to become relaxed which could really become something that help people with their quality of life.

Furthermore, companies or healthcare facilities can use this device to collect useful data and analyze the user’s mind to get a better understanding of either the user’s health or the potential markets. For example, they the conduct research on people and gather data such as the active part of the users’ brain or track users’ mental status.