Sony is going to make a major Playstation-related announcement in the next few days and all signs point to the official reveal of the Playstation 4. There have already been images posted to the Internet that show what appears to be a prototype for the PS4 controller, which includes a small screen that might or might not be a touchpad.
Now a newly discovered European patent application from Sony shows that the company has worked on a design for a very different kind of game controller, which it calls the "Playstation Eyepad." Yes, this Eyepad does indeed have a tablet-like look to it, based on the drawings that Sony included in its application.
Even with its name, the "Eyepad" doesn"t have much of a resemblance to Apple"s iPad in terms of its look or its features. The application says that Sony"s controller contains two stereoscopic cameras that are designed to scan something that"s placed on top of the device, with the idea that the object could then be translated into a virtual object in a game by being scanned by the cameras.
This is clearly some pretty advanced hardware that Sony has dreamed up and it"s likely that the "Eyepad" will never be released, at least in this form. However, it"s certainly an interesting concept for combining real and virtual objects with a game controller and it"s possible we could see technology similar to the ones described in the "Eyepad" in the future.
Source: FreePatentsOnline.com | Image via Sony
Via: GameChump