Tecmo's VR Cabinet Has Touch and Smell
By Rob Gordon 07 February 2017
Koei Tecmo unveils a brand new arcade cabinet, the VR Sense, which comes complete with not only Virtual Reality capability, but also with functionality for other senses.
Over the past few years, Virtual Reality has been one of the largest topics of conversation in video games. Indeed, gamers have finally been able to try out VR headsets with ease, courtesy of a large number of home headset releases such as the Oculus Rift and PlayStation VR. As it turns out, Koei Tecmo is planning to push the boat of immersive VR gameplay experiences even further, courtesy of a new arcade cabinet.
The Koei Tecmo cabinet in question is known as the VR Sense. As the name suggests, the VR Sense cabinet includes VR functionality, but that’s not the real allure for gamers here. Instead, the most interesting aspect of the VR Sense is the fact that it aims to utilize the other senses to try and give a heightened gaming experience. Here’s a look at the arcade cabinet in question, courtesy of courtesy of Game Watch Impress.
According to both Game Watch Impress and Famitsu, as translated by Kotaku, the VR Sense cabinet is able to work with all five senses, including touch and smell. The cabinet uses PlayStation 4 technology as its hardware base, utilizing both the PlayStation VR and PlayStation Move controllers. However, that’s not where the intrigue lies when it comes to this cabinet.
Instead, it’s in the way in which it implements other senses. The chair is able to rotate, as well as move up and down, while it’s able to recreate different modes of touch. One such example is that of a wind function, as well as a hot and cold function to change the temperature within the cabinet, and even a mist function to make it seem like it is raining.
Meanwhile, the cabinet also has a touch function, which will make the user feel as if they are being touched, with one such example being insects and rats crawling on the player’s body. The VR Sense cabinet will also have a scent function, to give players a sniff of the scenario that they are in when playing the game. It certainly seems like it has the potential for a fun gaming experience.
So far, three titles have been unveiled for the cabinet: Dynasty Warriors, GI Jockey Sense, and Horror Sense. Whether that library expands will surely depend on the success of the VR Sense in general, but if the cabinet picks up a following, then there’s surely plenty of other great uses for the technology – although a VR experience on the somewhat hardcore Koei Tecmo release Nioh may prove to be a little bit intimidating for users.
