Sony is on the verge of taking the gaming experience and virtual reality a step further with the PlayStation 4. Sony unveiled its virtual reality device called “Project Morpheus” during the Game Developers Conference (GDC) in San Francisco, United States.

After an exhibition explaining the internal efforts of the company in this field and showing various prototypes since 2008, Shu Yoshida, president of SCE Worldwide Studios, has presented what he calls the culmination of three years of efforts to launch a business and affordable product like these Virtual Reality (VR) glasses.

Yoshida said the industry has grown by creating technological advancements for video game players. Advancements that people maybe weren’t expecting or thought was possible. Sony is pushing the boundary of play and it’s this focus that drives how the company innovates and creates the gaming experiences to gamers.

The company said that Project Morpheus is in development for over three years and will be provided to the developers of video games accompanied by software tools to create titles in virtual reality for PS4.

Specification

Project Morpheus is just a prototype from Sony and features a five inch LCD display with a resolution of 1,920 x 1,080 pixels, which corresponds to the current 1080p resolution of the PlayStation 4 along with accelerometer, and gyroscope. The field of view is 90 degrees wide, the tracking is performed at a frequency of 1,000 Hz – as much as at Oculus Rift. Furthermore, Morpheus may recognize complete rotations within an area of ​​about three meters. For this, the system works closely with the PlayStation Eye camera together, captures the light elements at the edge of the glasses, and with PlayStation Move, the more advanced tracking is employed.

Project Morpheus virtual reality headset from Sony, image credit Sony

The device incorporates various sensors to record the movement and orientation of the user’s head. For audio, Morpheus incorporates 3D sound for the user to have the feeling of receiving sounds from different directions.

“The prototype for Project Morpheus is the culmination of our work over the last 3+ years as we’ve refined our vision for VR,” Shu Yoshida, president of SCE Worldwide Studios, said on the company’s PlayStation blog. “This prototype will serve as the first development kit for PS4 developers that are as enthusiastic about this new medium as we are.”

Sony’s big plans

Sony will demonstrate Project Morpheus at GDC, making the prototype headset and a handful of demos playable at its booth. Richard Marks, senior director of research and development at Sony Computer Entertainment America, said Project Morpheus will be used both for games and non-games, adding that he’s been working with NASA and its Jet Propulsion Lab on an exploratory project.

Sony’s expertise in camera technology will give PlayStation an advantage when it comes to sight, adding that sound is equally as important to the virtual reality experience. Morpheus will use Sony-developed 3D audio technology that recreates positional sound, such as footsteps climbing up stairs below them, or engine noises of helicopters flying overhead.

The head mounted display must be connected by cable to the PS 4; a wireless version is not yet planned. Nevertheless, the VR headset is far from finished. For now, the Japanese firm did not give a release date for the VR device, but noted that the prototype is not in any final form and will seek to improve the device with respect to audio, images, controls, content, among other areas.

Sony promises to have the most important games and apps from modern virtual reality catalogs added the VR device. The company said has already been associated with a number of studios and developers, including Epic Games, Crytek, Autodesk, and Unity. Sony will show Project Morpheus on the GDC 2014 show with games like London Studio’s The Deep, CCP Games’ Eve Valkyrie, and Square Enix’s and Eidos Montreal’s Thief. The Unity engine is also supported, as well as Havok (physics simulation) and Autodesk (3D design) tools. As of now, Project Morpheus is designed for PS4 only and is therefore not compliant with PC or Vita.

Virtual reality devices of this type began to gain relevance from the presentation of the Oculus Rift, the virtual reality device from California start-up Oculus. The latest development on Oculus Rift was exhibited at the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) 2013 and 2014, which captured much of the attention of the event.

Having a major player get behind virtual reality in a big way opens the door for more developers to build VR content. One thing is certain, virtual reality seems particularly well underway and the arrival of Sony in this market should logically push more developers to make their games compatible for PS4. The more developers are excited about virtual reality, and the bigger the audience is, the more likely they are to build VR content.