DRIVR Part 11: Ghost in the machine

The promised potential of virtual reality is based on trust. You cannot allow yourself to become fully immersed in a virtual world if you feel the need to constantly monitor the real world for dangers. This is the primary reason why a DRIVR vehicle is software-controlled. This shift in responsibility comes with three benefits for free:

• Since the player's input is not physically linked with the vehicle's actuators, input can come in many different forms, depending on the needs of the player

• Players of all abilities can safely and confidently operate the vehicle

• The player can be given all sorts of tasks unrelated to driving

Today we're focusing on the second aspect: creating experiences for players of many different abilities. In this case, we're demonstrating the means to drive around a track without ever seeing it. But first, a disclaimer:

I don't know what it's like to live with a disability. I certainly won't claim to have started DRIVR as a philanthropic endeavor. But as the technology began to take shape, it became clear that we were building a vehicle that nearly everyone would be able to drive. At some point DRIVR has to make money, but I'm betting that by creating an experience for as broad an audience as possible, we'll find success as well as satisfaction.

Alright, first let's see the video, and then we can talk about it. For context, our driver is navigating according to the tone they hear, which is coming either from the left or right speaker depending on which way the steering wheel needs to be turned. The higher the pitch, the greater the steering angle required. I like to refer to this approach as "stereo navigation", mostly because that's what I thought everyone called it (nope).

So how does the vehicle know what sort of tone to produce? If you've seen one of our previous videos, you know that the vehicle is capable of navigating the track by itself. In that case, it's computing a commanded steering angle based on the lateral error from the desired path's centerline. With stereo navigation, the player is in control, but we're taking that steering angle and converting it to a tone in a two-octave range (of course, those of you with perfect pitch already knew this).

For the demo we took one of our existing game levels and converted the control to stereo navigation. Clearly, the boxes and targets are pointless if you can't see them, so the game would need to be tailored for a player who was not looking at the screen. But I have no doubt that it's possible to create fun and challenging scenarios for players of many different abilities. Furthermore, it might be a compelling experience for any player to undertake a familiar task without the use of their vision.

The more I work on DRIVR, the more excited I get. We've started getting some people behind the wheel, and it's becoming clear that this is a special type of fun. If you or someone you know might want to help take DRIVR to the next level, I'm always looking to connect.

-Greg