With the proliferation of streaming and gameplay sharing recently, Sony is looking into a function that allows spectators to interact better with streamers and Let’s Play-ers in real-time.
Sony Interactive Entertainmentfiled a patent filed with the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO), titled “Player Feedback To Increase Spectatorship in a Video Game.” The patent was filed in March 2021 but was officially published and made public on October 7th.
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The patent filing features rough sketches for the basic idea of what they want to do. On one side, there are boxes apparently overlayed on top of gameplay that look like the players can ask questions to the spectators and the spectators respond, allowing the streamer to see how they voted. On the other side is a box saying “Spectator Profile Data” with graphs showing viewer age, region, and player level distribution. These as just stand-in graphs just to show the idea of what Sony would intend on doing with this patent.
Further description of the patent details the systems that would run in the background. Additional information includes the interaction between the game system,streaming or cloud gaming services, more specific player metrics, and many more highly technical charts, graphs, and descriptions. This information is detailed in supplementary figures, pictures, text, and graphs throughout the rest of the document.
The general idea of the patent seems to be improving the quality of streamer and spectator interactions onSony products and services. There are some functions on other streaming platforms that aim to do similar things, but this patent looks to add this at the hardware or firmware level. It seems that this function will also allow watchers to view content with specific gameplay styles, like playing more aggressively or stealthy, and things of that nature. Think of games that are popular with streamers liketheLife is Strangeseriesand other narrative games that can be focused on player choices with spectator inputs. This function stands to improve activity and engagement between the streamer and their audience if used as intended.
Patent filings such as this are standard in the techs space in case the technology develops that allows for it progress into a tangible asset. It joins a longlist of proactive Sony patents. The WIPO patent is just for Sony to hold on to in case they do develop the technology to implement it. It does not mean that this function will move forward in this form or if the company will even be allowed to move forward with the idea.
