Janine "Iris Ophelia" Hawkins' ongoing review of gaming and virtual world style
There are some interesting experiments with biometric feedback and games going on these days, including one created at the University of Udine and shared today by Alice O'Connor over on Rock, Paper, Shotgun. It's a very simple demonstration of a player's own emotions influencing the actions of their character, and it's promising.
Horror gaming enthusiasts have been dabbling with biometrics in pursuit of the perfect nightmare-inducing virtual scare, but personally when I watch a demo like this (or read the words of those working with biometric input) I can't help but think about series' like Mass Effect or Dragon Age, where the player is given choices that not only define their character's morality but their personality and reactions as well.
While I absolutely wouldn't want to lose the ability to make those choices deliberately, I'd still be interested to see where biometric feedback of my own emotions would lead things. It's in games like those that a flash of very real player anger could result in an equally knee-jerk reaction from their character and completely turn the story on its head in an exceptionally human way. Likewise a game could become a great deal more immersive when there's less of a disconnect or delay between what the player feels and how the character responds. That's a type of peripheral-augmented gameplay that I could really get behind.
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