Design Considerations of Game Technology Interfaces

Most technology is culturally intuitive but not necessarily intrinsically or naturally intuitive. That is to say, developers often focus on designing interfaces that are intuitive to someone already familiar with similar devices, but to anyone with little experience in such realms, breaking into the swing of things can be significantly more difficult. The elderly are a prime example of this, as people from dated generations struggle to find their footing in the modern world's technology-centric mindset. It might be such that in the future, this phenomenon of iterative technological advancement is so rapid and intense that an individual is forced to endlessly endure having to keep-up with the current mode of technology so as to not become alienated from society at large. The regularity of this behavior, however, may lead older generations to stay in contact with technology and mainstream culture for longer, as their days of youth would have carried the same demands for them to constantly learn new interfaces and ways of doing things.

All of these considerations render a specific question in my mind: is technological advancement of this nature actually beneficial to society or is it just an object of consumerism? It would seem that perhaps some areas of this phenomenon are indeed beneficial — such as in medical research where gaming technology is now being used by surgeons — while many other cases are created in the wake of fierce corporate competition, with the aftermath of these battles yielding no advantage to society.

Are things steering us in the direction of Aldous Huxley's envisioning of the future as a dystopian society corrupted by technology as in his social-satirist novel, Brave New World? Who knows?

In a way, it is becoming such that the general consumer market, and industrial markets drive a sort of metabolism with which a new form of evolution is encouraged. Products are constantly reiterating upon themselves with new, improved updates and redevelopments. As soon as a new technology becomes feasible to release onto the market, manufactures race against one another to be the first to integrate it into their products. This, in turn, puts pressure on technology researches to find yet more and more advanced technological solutions with which to aid manufactures in this on-going consumerist race between manufacturing giants.

Above, is an image I've slapped together to demonstrate this concept throughout Apple's iPod lifespan; each model delivers the same fundamental function of playing MP3 audio files but each new iteration delivers an additional purchasing incentive to the consumer. It is not uncommon for any given consumer to purchase the same product several times as new iterations are released.

Gimmicks have always existed amongst the likes of technology-centric consumer goods. They are not always necessarily a bad thing, and often, it is little more than the the fact that they are ahead of their time that renders them as gimmicky in the first place. I believe the Wiimote to be a prime example of this; it is a peripheral that could have marked a significant leap in the intricacy by which gamers can interact with games, but instead, we see ourselves in a world where mindlessly waving plastic dildos around and mimicking silly on-screen gestures is about as far as motion-detection technology currently goes. This is simply because we aren't ready to use such technology properly yet. The Wiimote essentially marks a point in limbo, whereby, technology researchers and manufacturers are producing goods that no one can harness the true potential of yet.

But then again, perhaps the Wiimote is a poor example; perhaps the Wiimote's only fault is that motion-detection software hasn't caught up with its respective hardware yet.

The Virtual Boy was the first of its kind to offer 3D graphics. One would imagine that what it promised would have had gamers forming giant queues outside retailers, fighting one another to be the first to get their hands on a copy on the day of its release, but yet, that wasn't the case. The Virtual Boy was an idea that was ahead of its time. Its 3D graphics were poor and the games it offered were even poorer. The funniest or perhaps more-so, tragic, irony of the Virtual Boy was that it brought the illusion of 3D depth to 2D sprites, a redundant task in itself.

A couple of decades later and we have the Nintendo 3DS. It fundamentally promises the same as the Virtual Boy did, but where the Virtual Boy failed, the 3DS succeeds. There are but two reasons for this: our technology is now ready to realise the concept that the Virtual Boy proposed, and so is our society ready to receive it. Whether or not 3D stereoscopy is indeed a gimmick is still up for debate, however. Many would label it as little more than a marketing ploy that does nothing to heighten a game's intuitiveness or immersiveness.

What is clear from looking at dated technology in retrospect, is that the future of gaming interface peripherals will yield a fair share of gimmicks along with the occasional dollop of useful technology. What it is important to realise, is that the gimmicky technology helps pave the path for useful technology; within capitalist society, the two are inseparable. As we venture closer and yet closer to virtual reality, our journey is sure to bear the inevitable texture of poorly executed ideas and marketing gimmicks. It will be interesting to see which of them will one day cultivate into something more substantial further along the line.