| SONY COMPUTER ENTERTAINMENT EUROPE LIMITED Patent applications |
| Patent application number | Title | Published |
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| 20120129600 | ENTERTAINMENT DEVICE AND METHOD - A server for administering an on-line virtual environment comprises a data communication arrangement and a processor. The data communication arrangement receives a signal from a first entertainment device in communication with an instance of the virtual environment. The signal indicates that a user of that device has performed a predetermined action. The processor determines the availability of a second entertainment device, and is operable to switch the second device from a second instance of the virtual environment to the first instance of the virtual environment. The data communication arrangement is operable, if the second device is available, to transmit a signal to the first device indicating that a software controlled avatar within that instance should change modes to represent a user of the second device. The processor is operable to transfer control of a previously software controlled avatar within that instance of the virtual environment to the second device. | 05-24-2012 |
| 20120116767 | METHOD AND SYSTEM OF SPEECH EVALUATION - A method is provided for user speech performance evaluation with respect to a reference performance for which a phoneme mark-up is available. The method includes capturing input speech from the user and formatting it as frames. For a respective frame of the input speech, the method generates probability values for a plurality of phonemes, generates a probability value for a phoneme class based upon the generated probability values for a plurality of phonemes belonging to that phoneme class. For a plurality of frames of the input speech, the method further includes averaging the phoneme class probability values corresponding to the plurality of frames of the input speech. The method also includes calculating a user speech performance score based upon the average. | 05-10-2012 |
| 20120115597 | APPARATUS AND METHOD OF MODIFYING AN ONLINE ENVIRONMENT - An entertainment device comprises a display generator arranged to generate for display a representation of an on-line virtual environment, that on-line virtual environment being able to host interactions between a user of the entertainment device and other users of one or more remote entertainment devices, a network communications arrangement operable to receive data representative of the actions of the other users within the on-line virtual environment and to receive data indicative of any supplementary data files interoperable with the on-line virtual environment that are associated with one or more remote entertainment devices of one or more of the other users, a data file searcher operable to search the entertainment device for any supplementary data files indicated by the received data, a data file acquisition arrangement operable to acquire, from a networked device, a copy of a supplementary data file indicated by the received data that was not found on the entertainment device, and a data file integrator operable to incorporate relevant elements of the or each supplementary data file into the representation of the on-line virtual environment. | 05-10-2012 |
| 20120108332 | Entertainment Device, System, and Method - An entertainment device comprises an image receiver operable to receive, from a video camera, images captured therefrom, and display logic for displaying the images captured by the video camera together with one or more selection icons. Each selection icon corresponds to a game object. The entertainment device further comprises an image processor for detecting the presence and position of an augmented reality marker in images received from the camera, a detector for detecting the presence of an augmented reality marker at an image position corresponding to a selection icon for at least a predetermined selection time period, and associating logic, responsive to such a detection, for associating the game object corresponding to the first one of the selection icons with the augmented reality marker, so that the display logic displays the game object so as to move the game object with the detected position of the augmented reality marker. | 05-03-2012 |
| 20120105611 | STEREOSCOPIC IMAGE PROCESSING METHOD AND APPARATUS - A stereoscopic image processing method for a stereoscopic image pair forming a 3D image comprises the steps of evaluating whether the distance of a user is closer or further than a preferred distance from a 3D image display upon which the stereoscopic image pair is to be displayed, and if the evaluation indicates that the user is further than the preferred distance from the 3D image display, adjusting the respective displacements between corresponding image elements in the stereoscopic image pair, thereby changing the stereoscopic parallax in the 3D image. | 05-03-2012 |
| 20120086729 | ENTERTAINMENT DEVICE, SYSTEM, AND METHOD - An entertainment device generates a composite image with a combiner that combines camera-captured images with a computer-generated image of an object resting on a virtual surface. The device also includes a detector that detects image movement in the captured images in one or more contact point regions corresponding to image positions at which the object contacts the virtual surface. The device further comprises an initiator for initiating movement of the object to a new position with respect to the virtual surface in response to detected motion in the contact point regions. The detector detects whether a first image area corresponding to a captured image feature is greater than a predetermined proportion of a second image area corresponding to a full field of view of the camera. If the first image area is greater than the predetermined proportion, the initiator initiates movement of the object to an avoidance position. | 04-12-2012 |
| 20120081394 | SYSTEM AND METHOD OF IMAGE AUGMENTATION - A method of image augmentation for an image of a book includes capturing an image of the book, detecting at least a portion of at least one fiduciary marker of the book within the image, estimating placement of the book's spine based upon the detected portion of the fiduciary marker, hypothesising possible positions for edges of a rigid leaf being turned in the book based upon estimated placement of the spine, processing the book image to identify edges within the image, comparing elements of the identified edges with the hypothesised positions for edges of the rigid leaf, selecting one of the hypothesised positions that best coincides with the compared elements of the processed image as representative of the position of the rigid leaf being turned in the book, and augmenting the book image with a virtual graphic element arranged in accordance with the selected representative position of the rigid leaf. | 04-05-2012 |
| 20120071244 | ENTERTAINMENT DEVICE AND METHOD - An entertainment device operable to connect to a first on-line virtual environment comprises a group membership selector operable to select members of a group of entertainment devices connected to a first on-line virtual environment comprising a plurality of connected entertainment devices, a server evaluator operable to evaluate a plurality of servers of a second on-line virtual environment according to one or more criteria whilst the entertainment device is connected to the first on-line virtual environment, a server selector operable to select at least a first server of the second on-line virtual environment based upon the evaluation whilst the entertainment device is connected to the first on-line virtual environment, and a storage arrangement operable to cause the storage of server selection data defining the selected server. | 03-22-2012 |
| 20120040757 | APPARATUS AND METHOD OF AUDIO REPRODUCTION - A wearable loudspeaker unit comprises a loudspeaker, an audio reproduction processor, a wireless communications unit operable to communicate wirelessly with a base unit using a protocol that distinguishes the wearable loudspeaker unit from any other wearable loudspeaker units in communication with the base unit, and a user input interface operable to select one of a plurality of wearable loudspeaker unit wearing positions on a user's body; and the wireless communications unit is operable to transmit the selected wearing position of the wearable loudspeaker unit to the base unit, and is operable to receive audio data corresponding to the selected wearing position of the wearable loudspeaker unit from the base unit, and the audio reproduction processor is operable to output the received audio data through the loudspeaker. | 02-16-2012 |
| 20110302609 | ENTERTAINMENT SYSTEM AND METHOD OF COMMUNICATION - An entertainment system comprises a receiver operable to receive broadcast programmes and electronic programme guide data, a display generator operable to generate an image for display, a user interface generator operable to use received electronic programme guide data to generate an electronic programme guide indicating one or more programmes on a broadcast schedule, for display as some or all of the image, a user input operable to receive an input indicating a programme selected by a user from the electronic programme guide, and a network communicator operable to communicate with one or more remote entertainment systems over a network. The entertainment system is arranged to obtain information based upon the electronic programme guide data corresponding to the user's selected programme, and the communicator is arranged to transmit a message comprising the obtained information to one or more remote entertainment systems, thereby indicating to each remote system the user's selected programme. | 12-08-2011 |
| 20110298824 | SYSTEM AND METHOD OF VIRTUAL INTERACTION - A system for virtual interaction, comprising two or more portable electronic devices, is provided. Each device comprises, in turn, coordinate referencing means operable to define a coordinate system common to the portable electronic devices with respect to a physically defined reference position, position estimation means operable to detect a the physical position of its respective portable electronic device with respect to the reference position, virtual environment generation means operable to generate a virtual environment, and communication means operable to transmit positional data using the common coordinate system from that portable electronic device to another portable electronic device. The virtual environment is shared in common between the portable electronic devices. The virtual environment uses the common co-ordinate system within which each portable electronic device defines a position for itself responsive to its physical position with respect to the reference position. | 12-08-2011 |
| 20110296295 | APPARATUS AND METHOD OF VIEWING ELECTRONIC DOCUMENTS - A method of generating an e-book document comprises representing some or all of a page of an electronic document as a graphic textures sequence derived from the document page. The sequence comprises successively smaller graphic textures, arranging them to form a first mip-map suitable for use by 3D graphics hardware, and outputting an e-book document comprising the first mip-map representing some or all of the document pages. A method of reading an e-book document includes accessing at least a portion of the mip-map comprising the sequence of graphic textures, constructing a surface in a 3D virtual space comprising one or more polygons, applying to the polygon surface a graphic texture derived from the accessed part of the mip-map responsive to scaling of the polygon surface with respect to an e-book reader display, and displaying the textured polygon surface on the display, thereby displaying some or all of the page. | 12-01-2011 |
| 20110283362 | DATA STORAGE DEVICE AND METHOD - An entertainment device, comprises a communication arrangement operable to receive audio segment data from an audio segment data source and to receive audio segment selection data from an audio segment selection data source in connection with an interactive audio segment data selection session as between the entertainment device and the audio segment selection data source; an audio segment selector operable to generate audio segment selection data in response to selections made by a user interacting with a user interface of the entertainment device; and a storage arrangement operable to store the received audio segment data; in which: the storage arrangement is operable to limit the duration of storage of audio segment data which was received from the audio segment data source and which was selected according to either the received audio segment selection data or the generated audio segment selection data. | 11-17-2011 |
| 20110269540 | ENTERTAINMENT DEVICE AND METHOD - An entertainment device comprises a detector operable to detect whether a representation of a game feature of one or more games associated with the entertainment device should be obtained from the one or more games in response to a predetermined game event of the one or more games, a processor operable to obtain the representation of the game feature from the one or more games, a storage arrangement operable to store the representation of the game feature obtained from the one or more games, and a renderer operable to render the obtained representation of the game feature stored in the storage arrangement as a game feature within a virtual environment associated with the entertainment device, the rendered game feature within the virtual environment being a trophy object. | 11-03-2011 |
| 20110246576 | NETWORKING SYSTEM AND METHOD - A networking system comprises a data communication network, an entertainment device operable to communicate over the network and to run a first application, a social networking server operable to supply a second application to a social networking client over the network, the client being operable to run the second application once received from the server. In response to a first predetermined event during operation of the first application, the entertainment device can communicate an alert message to the server identifying a user of the client to receive the second application. The social networking server is arranged to supply the second application to the client in response to the alert message. In response to a second predetermined event during operation of the second application, the client is arranged to communicate an acknowledgement message to the entertainment device. In response, the entertainment device is arranged to modify operation of the first application. | 10-06-2011 |
| 20110237331 | ENTERTAINMENT DEVICE AND METHOD OF INTERACTION - A method of interaction for an augmented reality environment comprises the steps of capturing an image of a drawn picture comprising one or more drawn shapes, identifying the or each respective drawn shape as corresponding to a component of an archetypal model and generating a three dimensional virtual model representing the archetypal model using generation rules associated with the archetypal model, wherein components of the three dimensional virtual model generated from components of the archetypal model corresponding to the or each respective drawn shape have the appearance of the or each respective drawn shape. | 09-29-2011 |
| 20110221748 | APPARATUS AND METHOD OF VIEWING ELECTRONIC DOCUMENTS - A method of generating an e-book document comprises representing some or all of a page of an electronic document as a graphic textures sequence derived from the document page. The sequence comprises successively smaller graphic textures, arranging them to form a first mip-map suitable for use by 3D graphics hardware, and outputting an e-book document comprising the first mip-map representing some or all of the document page. A method of reading an e-book document includes accessing at least a portion of the mip-map comprising the sequence of graphic textures, constructing a surface in a 3D virtual space comprising one or more polygons, applying to the polygon surface a graphic texture derived from the accessed part of the mip-map responsive to scaling of the polygon surface with respect to an e-book reader display, and displaying the textured polygon surface on the display, thereby displaying some or all of the page. | 09-15-2011 |
| 20110216206 | MEDIA VIEWING - A portable electronic device comprises a display facing in a first direction, a video camera facing in a second direction substantially opposite to the first direction, and a wireless communications receiver operable to receive supplementary image data from a remote image source, the supplementary image data comprising an indication of where a supplementary image is positioned with respect to a reference image. The portable electronic device is arranged in operation to display a captured image from the video camera on the display of the portable electronic device. When the captured image comprises all or part of the reference image as displayed on a separate display associated with the remote image source, the portable electronic device is arranged in operation to display the supplementary image positioned with respect to the reference image, instead of the corresponding part of the captured image. | 09-08-2011 |
| 20110185057 | Apparatus And Method Of Administering Modular Online Environments - In a modular on-line virtual environment, in which each module of the on-line virtual environment has a plurality of parallel instances each able to host a limited number of users, a server arranged to administer the modular on-line virtual environment comprises a network communications arrangement operable to receive data representative of the actions of users within an instance of a first module of the modular on-line virtual environment, and to transmit to each user within that instance of that module data representative of the actions of each other user within that instance of that module, behaviour analysis means operable to analyse user behaviour within that instance of the first module, in which if the behaviour of two or more users satisfies a predetermined criterion then the two or more users are classified as belonging to a social group comprising the two or more users, module instance selection means operable to select an instance of a second module for a user when that user moves within the modular on-line virtual environment from the first module to a second module, in which the module instance selection means is operable to select an instance of the second module that has the capacity to accommodate the greatest number of the common social group once one member of that social group moves within the modular on-line virtual environment from the first module to the second module and the server is operable to place a subsequent respective member of the social group in that same selected instance of the second module if that member moves within the modular on-line virtual environment from the first module to the second module. | 07-28-2011 |
| 20110157055 | PORTABLE ELECTRONIC DEVICE AND METHOD OF CONTROLLING A PORTABLE ELECTRONIC DEVICE - A portable electronic device comprising a display arranged on a first side, the display having a first touch sensitive surface. The device also comprises a second touch sensitive surface separate from the display and a processor responsive to a plurality of user control commands. The device further comprises a touch detector, responsive to a user touching at least one of the first and second touch sensitive surfaces, for detecting touch input regions each corresponding to a respective one of the user control commands and for initiating a response, by the processor, to a user control command corresponding to a detected touch input region. The touch input regions are assigned to corresponding user control commands so that at least one subset of the commands corresponds to touch input regions on the first surface and at least another subset of the commands corresponds to touch input regions on the second surface. | 06-30-2011 |
| 20110157053 | DEVICE AND METHOD OF CONTROL - A portable electronic device comprises a display on a first, front side of the device, a touch sensitive surface on a second, rear side of the device substantially opposite the first side having a similar shape and orientation to the display, and a touch input mapping means arranged to map a position of a detected touch on the touch sensitive surface to a position on the display and, a tapping detection means. The tapping detection means is arranged in operation to detect a tap as when there has been a loss and reacquisition of touch from a user on the touch sensitive surface. And the tapping detection means is arranged in operation to detect the position of the detected tap on the touch sensitive surface as being the position at which touch was lost. | 06-30-2011 |
| 20110157017 | PORTABLE DATA PROCESSING APPARTATUS - A portable data processing apparatus is provided. It has at least one data processing function which depends on detected motion of the apparatus. The apparatus comprises a video camera operable to capture successive images of a part of the real environment around the apparatus; a video motion detector operable to detect motion of the apparatus by analysis of image motion between pairs of captured images; a hardware motion detector operable to detect motion of the apparatus, whereby the data processing function depends on motion detected by the hardware motion detector; and a controller operable to adjust the operation of the hardware motion detector if the motion detected by the video motion detector and the motion detected by the hardware motion detector differ by at least a threshold difference. | 06-30-2011 |
| 20110145883 | TELEVISION RECEIVER AND METHOD - A television receiver, comprises an optical character recognizer to identify text in a received video image and a hypertext link generator to generate a hypertext link responsive to respective identified text, wherein the television receiver is operable to form a connection to a network in accordance with the hypertext link, in which the hypertext link has a default target that comprises as an argument at least part of the content of the respective identified text, and the default target is selected according to the context of the received video image. | 06-16-2011 |
| 20110141301 | IMAGE PROCESSING METHOD, APPARATUS AND SYSTEM - An image processing method comprises receiving, from a camera, a camera captured image comprising a user drawn image. At least part of the user drawn image is within a field of view of the camera. The method comprises applying an image processing operation to the camera captured image so as to generate an image feature within the camera captured image which corresponds to the user drawn image, and thinning the image feature to a line width which is smaller than a line width associated with the image feature so as to generate a modified width image feature. The method further comprises generating vector data from pixels associated with the modified width image feature so that the vector data substantially represents the modified width image feature. | 06-16-2011 |
| 20110064375 | IMAGE PROCESSING METHOD, APPARATUS AND SYSTEM - An image processing method comprises receiving a sequence of image frames from a video camera. The method includes generating a computer generated object, and combining the computer generated object with the sequence of image frames so as to generate a sequence of augmented reality images. The method further includes dividing each received image frame into a respective array of image motion cells, detecting inter-image motion in successive image frames for each motion cell, and generating a motion object comprising one or more image motion cells. The image motion cells in the motion object correspond to a set of image motion cells detected as comprising inter-image motion over a threshold number of image frames. The method includes detecting a relative distance between the computer generated object and the motion object within the augmented reality images, and generating a point of interest within a current image frame in dependence upon the detected distance between the computer generated object and the motion object so that the computer generated object can be caused to appear to interact with an image region corresponding to an image motion cell at the point of interest. | 03-17-2011 |
| 20110060434 | AUDIO APPARATUS AND METHOD - A method of audio processing an ensemble of sounds for output to a plurality of audio channels comprises the steps of evaluating an overall level of audio detail generated by the contributing sounds of the ensemble by analysing metadata associated with respective sounds of the ensemble, the metadata being indicative of the contribution of a respective sound of the ensemble to an overall level of audio detail across the plurality of audio channels, and comparing the overall level of audio detail to a first threshold; and in which if the overall level of audio detail exceeds the first threshold, altering the ensemble of sounds to reduce the indicated contribution of the ensemble to the overall level of audio detail. | 03-10-2011 |
| 20110055320 | APPARATUS AND METHOD OF DATA TRANSFER - A data transfer system comprises a server and a plurality of devices each operable as a client of the server. The server in turn comprises a notification arrangement to notify a device that it is to become a member of a peer group comprising other clients of the server. The server further comprises a client/server data transmitter to send data to the respective device upon such notification. Each device in turn comprises a client/server data receiver to receive respective data from the server, and a peer-to-peer communicator to send respective data received from the server to one or more peers, and to receive from one or more peers respective data that was sent to it or them by the server. | 03-03-2011 |
| 20100323793 | System And Method Of Audio Processing - A method of audio processing for an entertainment device operable to communicate with a game controller, the method comprising the steps of generating a source sound for reproduction by a plurality of loudspeakers at a current position where acoustic signals from the plurality of loudspeakers are coincident (hereafter referred to as a ‘sweet spot’), requesting that the user steers the sound using the game controller until the user considers the sound to be centred upon them, and interpreting user inputs from the game controller to adjust the output timing of the source sound data signals for reproduction by respective ones of the plurality of loudspeakers in accordance with the user directional inputs so as to move the sweet spot. | 12-23-2010 |
| 20100296699 | APPARATUS AND METHOD OF IMAGE ANALYSIS - A method of analysing a captured image comprising an instance of a target object comprises the steps of: for each of a plurality of different brightness threshold levels, generating contours from the captured digital image that indicate where in the captured digital image the pixel values of the captured digital image cross the respective brightness threshold level; identifying instances of a contour corresponding to a characteristic feature of said target object, the instances being detected at substantially similar image positions in the contours derived using at least two of the respective brightness threshold levels; and estimating a homography which maps the characteristic feature of the target object to its representation in the captured image, based upon the two or more instances of that target object's corresponding contour. | 11-25-2010 |
| 20100250864 | Method And Apparatus For Compressing And Decompressing Data - One embodiment of the invention provides a method and apparatus for decompressing a compressed data set using a processing device having a plurality of processing units and a shared memory. The compressed data set comprises a plurality of compressed data segments, in which each compressed data segment corresponds to a predetermined size of uncompressed data. The method includes loading the compressed data set into the shared memory so that each compressed data segment is stored into a respective memory region of the shared memory. The respective memory region has a size equal to the predetermined size of the corresponding uncompressed data segment. The method further includes decompressing the compressed data segments with the processing units; and storing each decompressed data segment back to its respective memory region within the shared memory. | 09-30-2010 |
| 20100235166 | APPARATUS AND METHOD FOR TRANSFORMING AUDIO CHARACTERISTICS OF AN AUDIO RECORDING - A method of audio processing comprises composing one or more transformation profiles for transforming audio characteristics of an audio recording and then generating for the or each transformation profile, a metadata set comprising transformation profile data and location data indicative of where in the recording the transformation profile data is to be applied; the or each metadata set is then stored in association with the corresponding recording. A corresponding method of audio reproduction comprises reading a recording and a meta-data set associated with that recording from storage, applying transformations to the recording data in accordance with the metadata set transformation profile; and then outputting the transformed recording. | 09-16-2010 |
| 20100203971 | ENTERTAINMENT APPARATUS AND METHOD - An entertainment device comprises communication means for communicating with a remote device over a network; program code and resources for running a full version of the program, the program code being operable to interact with remote devices also running a full version of the program; and program resource classification means, and in which when communication with a remote device indicates that the remote device is running a demonstration version of the program code; the program code on the entertainment device restricts the use of program resources to those identified by the program resource classification means as being available to or compatible with the demonstration version of the program, thereby restricting the full version of the program to operate substantially as a demo version of the program for the purposes of interaction with a demo version of the program being run on the remote device. | 08-12-2010 |
| 20100203968 | Apparatus And Method Of Avatar Customisation - An entertainment device comprises skeletal modelling means to control placements of a three dimensional mesh representing some or all of a user avatar in response to the position of one or more skeletal components of the user avatar, skeleton modification means to modify one or more physical properties of one or more skeletal components of the user avatar via a user interface, and rendering means to render the user avatar responsive to the modified user avatar skeleton. | 08-12-2010 |
| 20100203933 | ENTERTAINMENT SYSTEM AND METHOD - An entertainment system comprises a remotely controlled toy having a video camera operable to capture video images of a real environment and an entertainment device operable to communicate using a data communications link with the remotely controlled toy, in which the device comprises transmitting means operable to transmit, via the data communications link, control data to the remotely controlled toy that relates to the control of the remotely controlled toy, receiving means operable to receive, from the data communications link, video images captured by the video camera—of the remotely controlled toy, detecting means operable to detect a real environment feature within the real environment, processing means operable to generate a virtual image feature in dependence upon the detected real environment feature, and displaying means operable to generate a combined display of the captured video images and the virtual image feature such that the virtual image feature is arranged with respect to the video images so as to correspond to the position of the real environment feature within the real environment. | 08-12-2010 |
| 20100197411 | Interactive Media - A removable storage medium comprising media content, and further comprising supplementary data for use with interactive toys, the supplementary data being categorised according to one or more criteria selected from the list consisting of: i. physical capabilities of an interactive toy; ii. target age-range of a user of an interactive toy; iii. licensing type of an interactive toy; iv. personality type of an interactive toy; v. the apparent gender of an interactive toy; and vi. the apparent age of an interactive toy. | 08-05-2010 |
| 20100167623 | INTERACTIVE TOY AND ENTERTAINMENT DEVICE - An entertainment system comprises an entertainment device and an interactive toy. The entertainment device comprises a wireless receiver arranged in operation to receive data descriptive of the physical capabilities of an interactive toy from an interactive toy, processing means to generate interaction signals, and a wireless transmitter arranged in operation to transmit interaction signals to the interactive toy, and in which the generated interaction signals are responsive to the data descriptive of the physical capabilities of the interactive toy. The interactive toy comprises a wireless receiver arranged in operation to receive a query signal requesting information about physical capabilities of the interactive toy, data provision means for providing data descriptive of the capabilities of the interactive toy, and a wireless transmitter arranged in operation to transmit the data descriptive of the physical capabilities of the interactive toy in response to the query signal. The entertainment device is arranged in operation to transmit interactive control data to the interactive toy responsive to media content being played by the entertainment device, the interactive control data being further responsive to physical capabilities of the recipient interactive toy previously transmitted from the interactive toy to the entertainment system. | 07-01-2010 |
| 20100146283 | ENTERTAINMENT DEVICE - An entertainment device comprises communication means operable to receive media data from a media data source, storage means operable to store the received media data, in which the storage means limits the duration of access to the media data which was received from the media data source. | 06-10-2010 |
| 20100105484 | APPARATUS AND METHOD OF ON-LINE REPORTING - An entertainment device comprises a display generator arranged to generate for display a representation of an on-line virtual environment comprising one or more avatars corresponding to users of one or more remote entertainment devices each interacting with that online virtual environment, a network communicator operable to receive data representative of the actions of other users within the on-line virtual environment and to receive content sourced from one or more users of the one or more remote entertainment devices interacting with that online virtual environment, an input device operable by the user to instigate a reporting event and a content identifier operable to generate information indicative of content sourced from one or more users of the one or more remote entertainment devices and that was available to the entertainment device when the reporting event was instigated, and in which the network communicator is operable to transmit a report to a remote device comprising said generated information. | 04-29-2010 |
| 20100035678 | VIDEO GAME - Video game apparatus in which a game object acts within a game environment of a video game under the control of a user controller, the video game ending in respect of that game object when a game continuation variable reaches a game end amount; comprises: means for adjusting the game continuation variable towards the game end amount in response to time spent-playing that instance of the game; means for detecting game actions in respect of the game object; means for maintaining a game style variable indicative of the manner in which one or more predetermined game actions are carried out by the game object; means, responsive to a game action carried out successfully by the game object, for adjusting the game style variable to indicate a greater game style; means, responsive to a game action adverse to the game object, for adjusting the game style variable to indicate a lower game style or, if the game style variable reaches a level indicative of zero game style, for adjusting the game continuation variable towards the game end amount; and means for enhancing the ability of the game object to perform a game action in dependence on the level of the game style variable. | 02-11-2010 |
| 20090318228 | APPARATUS AND METHOD OF INTERACTION WITH A DATA PROCESSOR - A method of interaction with a data processor such as a games machine comprises the steps of capturing a wide angle image of an environment, obtaining image features from the wide angle image, and then interpreting these image features as inputs to software running on the games machine. The step of obtaining image features from the wide angle image further comprises the step of mapping one or more regions of the wide-angle image to corresponding one or more flat image planes, and obtaining image features from one or more of said planes of the mapped wide-angle image. Advantageously, the planes can be arranged to reflect the topology of a room or the positioning of players, and allow a consistent representation of image features and consequently of input motion to a process such as a game, without position dependent distortions of the features inherent in the wide angle image. | 12-24-2009 |
| 20090318224 | ENTERTAINMENT DEVICE AND METHOD - An entertainment device comprises a display generator arranged to generate for display a representation of an on-line virtual environment corresponding to a first instance of a plurality of substantially similar on-line virtual environments and to generate for display within the representation of the on-line virtual environment an avatar controlled by the user of the entertainment device and one or more software-controlled avatars; a data communications arrangement operable to transmit an alert signal in response to a predetermined action of the user of the entertainment device within the first instance of the on-line virtual environment, said signal serving to request interaction with a human operator, the data communications arrangement being further operable to receive a notification signal; the display generator being arranged to respond to the notification signal by changing the mode of a software controlled avatar to represent an additional user of another entertainment device in data communication with the entertainment device, wherein the additional user is an operator whose entertainment device has been switched to the same first instance of the on-line virtual environment as that of the entertainment device in response to the transmitted alert signal; and the data communications arrangement being arranged to exchange information between the user of the entertainment device and the operator within the same first instance of the on-line virtual environment via their respective avatars. | 12-24-2009 |
| 20090158220 | DYNAMIC THREE-DIMENSIONAL OBJECT MAPPING FOR USER-DEFINED CONTROL DEVICE - A computer-implemented method is provided to interactively capture and utilize a three-dimensional object as a controlling device for a computer system. One operation of the method is capturing depth data of the three-dimensional object. In another operation, the depth data of the three-dimensional object undergoes processing to create geometric defining parameters for the three-dimensional object. The method can also include defining correlations between particular actions performed with the three-dimensional object and particular actions to be performed by the computer system. The method also includes an operation to save the geometric defining parameters of the three-dimensional object to a recognized object database. In another operation, the correlations between particular actions performed with the three-dimensional object and particular actions to be performed by the computer system in response to recognizing the particular actions are also saved to the recognized object database. | 06-18-2009 |
| 20090066690 | SELECTIVE INTERACTIVE MAPPING OF REAL-WORLD OBJECTS TO CREATE INTERACTIVE VIRTUAL-WORLD OBJECTS - A method for interactively defining a virtual-world space based on real-world objects in a real-world space is disclosed. In one operation, one or more real-world objects in the real-world space is captured to define the virtual-world space. In another operation, one of the real-world objects is identified, the identified object is to be characterized into a virtual-world object. In yet another operation, a user is prompted for user identification of one or more object locations to enable extraction of parameters for real-world object, and the object locations are identified relative to an identifiable reference plane in the real-world space. In another operation, the extracted parameters of the real-world object may be stored in memory. The virtual-world object can then be generated in the virtual world space from the stored extracted parameters of the real-world object. | 03-12-2009 |
