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Scent-Enabling ...

Started by PhoenixRisn 29 replies 3.8k views
Original Post
PhoenixRisn
PhoenixRisn
How about video/online gaming being “Scent-Enabled”? It would bring a complete new dimension to the serious game players enabling him/her to enjoy the complete juice of the game.
cozman
cozman
It's an interesting idea but as far as I know the scent "creating" devices which are available have a very limited number of scents they can create.. I don't know the details about how they work but I'd assume they would probably need to be replaced/refilled after a certain amount of time

I just can't imagine paying extra money for a peripheral that would allow me to smell a few smells, let alone when I'd have to get a different one for each game.

It seems to me like it'd be a little bit over the top for something that most people wouldn't really want (but of course might try out for the novelty of it)
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sanch3x
sanch3x
Imagine smelling the burning rubber in Need For Speed or the rotting bodies in Doom...


uuugh then again nevermind, not sure I want those smells :P
Moe
Moe
Well, I have been toying around with the idea of using scent in a game. Rather than having the player actually smell the smells, I was thinking about having an icon appear on the screen with a description of the smell below it (of course, this is for a first person view game. I am not quite sure how well it would work otherwise).

Eg: The player is running into a forest, and the icon gradually appears with the words "Damp pine forest" below it...

Just a thought though...
Radiostorm
Radiostorm
Sounds a bit superfluous. Honestly, I don't even think the existance of 'rumble packs' in console controllers is warranted, let alone 'smell packs'. It wouldn't really add much to the gameplay.

Moe's idea seems more practical.
Kest
Kest
I think we're just going about it the wrong way. We need to stop working through the middle machine and go straight to the source. Hard wire the brain and plug straight up. No need for displays, speakers, control devices, or scent machines :P
cozman
cozman
I just got an email from these guys like I'm assuming quite a few of us in this thread did (or is it a weird coincidence?)

That's basically what I imagined reading this, it takes cartridges and emits the scents from them while it's controlled via the computer. I still just don't think that there's anything that would make me want to buy this, most smells I'd associate with games are not pleasant, so I'm not sure why I'd want to pay to smell them.

(Of course if it were SimBakery or something maybe I'd buy one [grin])

edit: on closer inspection the OP is from Savannah where this trisenx company is from, and they just registered to ask this question it seems, I'd say this is market research not a real post
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Moe
Moe
Quote:
Original post by Radiostorm
Moe's idea seems more practical.

Ah, I am glad to hear that someone likes the idea (or at least thinks that I'm not entirely off my rocker). I think it could be done, but doing it well and doing it so it doesn't distract the player could be tricky. I was just doing a little thinking about it - if you can get the player to remember times/situations where they have smelled a certain scent, it could have an amount of emmotional pull associated with that smell. If they think they are smelling that smell, then the game might be able to hook into that users emotions and pull the player into the game that much more.

Moe
Moe
Any other thoughts on my idea?
Roboguy
Roboguy
Quote:
Original post by Moe
Any other thoughts on my idea?


It sounds a little like something from an adventure game. You could use the system for showing dangerous gases (such as an almond-like smell for hydrogen cyanide). Of course you might also want to have some safe smells, so people don't just run when they see the smell icon out of the corner of their eye.
Kest
Kest
What do you call a person who can't smell? I mean we have blind and deaf words. So what about disabled noses? I'm sure there's a word for it, but the point is that smelling is just not anywhere near the same level of usefulness for humans as our 'main' senses. Especially sight. Anyone can survive well without smell.
EdR
EdR
I've seen one of these things. It's like a printer that prints scents onto an absorbent card...or something like that, at least. A close description.

It worked great for Quake III Arena. The gunpowder smell was spot-on. Every other smell it had sucked. :p
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Zaxx
Zaxx


Just so you know, some people (like me) are allergic to artificial scents. A "smell pack" is probably not a good idea, unless you made the smells entirely from all natural ingredients like fruit juices and real flower nectar. [rolleyes]

As for Moe's idea; unless smells were important to the game, I probably wouldn't care.
Gyrthok
Gyrthok
Quote:
Original post by Kest
What do you call a person who can't smell? I mean we have blind and deaf words. So what about disabled noses? I'm sure there's a word for it, but the point is that smelling is just not anywhere near the same level of usefulness for humans as our 'main' senses. Especially sight. Anyone can survive well without smell.


The term (after alot of digging) is "Anosmia: in which the sense of smell is reduced or lost entirely.".

The sense of smell is just as important as your eye's and ears, though alot of people don't seem to have much regard or sensativity towards it. Here's a link to a whole lot of information on the Sense Of Smell.

To the OP, i'd say scent cartridges have limited market appeal for as neat as they would be to have. Smokers, Asthmatics, Alergic individuals, and alot of other factors to consider that would all limit its usefulness. If the devices were very efficent and didn't need to be refilled often, and were already incorporated with the hardware when i bought it (or packaged with it) i would probably be more likely to use it, and provided the selection of smells for the games were good, would continue to use it.

I could see a headset with nasal and oral dispensors being more efficient, both in cartridge usage and delivery (and potentially useful in a VR setting), could be interesting with some testing.
Kest
Kest
Quote:
Original post by Gyrthok
The sense of smell is just as important as your eye's and ears

Do you really believe that? Personally, if I had lost my sight or hearing, I would trade my sense of smell to get either back, any day of the weak.

Without sight, things can get really messy. Without hearing, all kinds of unspectacular deaths await you. Without feeling (and without pain), humans would most likely have an average life span of 13 years. I would probably classify taste under the same sense as smell. I'm not saying smell and taste are not important. They play a huge role in everything we do. But personally, they are secondary senses. They are much less important to me.

Sorry for the off-topicness. But I still say this is the biggest reason smell and taste devices are not as popular as one might expect. Even speakers are completely optional in your average games.
PaulCesar
PaulCesar
You must have not upgraded your smeller like the rest of us, the 3ghz model came out a few months ago, it provides the same interaction of sight and sound purely through one orfice! I heard a dual core version is coming out in early november, so dont uprgrade just yet though.

No seriously though, other then a novelty item I dont see this going anywhere anytime soon. Did you see the prices per cartridge? Not to mention limited number of smells. I am more interested in intels (or was it ibms...) work on atomic rearchitecture through electro-physics, or better yet controlling the various neurotic sensors via electronic wave patterns. Sense of smell can be a very usefull tool, but not if you only have a few smells to work with, and not worth the price that is at.
Moe
Moe
I think the thing that we need to keep in mind is the power that the sense of smell can invoke. I have heard that the sense of smell can trigger memory better than seeing or hearing things (Think about it - when you smell a particular smell you can be easily reminded of assocated memories with that smell). I think it would be interesting to try and tap into this using the icon-for-a-smell idea. Use a visual aide to try and trigger a sense of smell and bring back user-specific memories associated with that particular smell. If properly implemented, it could have a greater emotional effect on the player.

Just a thought at this point though.
Nypyren
Nypyren
"Smells like rotton meat, but looks like the lost Deimos base."

Yuck.

'nuff said.
Kest
Kest
I'm not so sure an icon would serve the same purpose, Moe. Smell brings back memories because of our brain chemistry. An icon is still using sight to send signals. It's not using scent. No different than a doom head turning red because of damage. I'm actually having trouble imagining where or how a scent icon could improve a game. I mean in some games, such as The Sims, there are icons that represent feelings or conversation topics. This is vital to the game. But when will scent be a vital part of any game?
hplus0603
hplus0603
Something like five years ago, there was a device called the "iSmell" (believe it or not :-). It was a $99 USB device, with scent cartridges. They claimed that they could create a pretty good facsimilie of almost any smell, using about 10 base compounds (much like you can do pretty much most colors with the R, G and B colors in a display).

I think they went under, which is too bad, because the price was low enough that I was very tempted to get one just to play with. They had a port of Quake II with scent additions -- mostly burnt scents and gunpowder.

The Scenx device seems much more expensive, and for some reason doesn't seem as appealing. They also don't claim the 10 "base scent" story.
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