This is a very exciting time for those who like to spend their downtime exploring virtual worlds. The graphics in some big-budget titles are easily approaching photorealism, and immersive multi-channel sound can really make you believe you’ve been transported to another place or time. With another generation or two of GPU development and VR hardware, the line between gaming and reality is bound to get awful blurry.
That said, we’re still a far way off from the holodeck aboard the Enterprise. A high-end PC and the latest in VR can fool your eyes and ears, but that still leaves your other senses out of the fun. That’s why [Jatin Patel] has developed this clever force-feedback mouse using an array of solenoids.
The idea is pretty simple: a Python program on the computer listens for mouse click events, and tells an attached Arduino to fire off the solenoids when the player pulls the virtual trigger. It’s naturally not a perfect system, as it would seem that clicking in the game’s menus would also start your “gun” firing. But as you can see in the video after the break, when it works, it works very well. The moving solenoids don’t just vibrate the mouse around, the metallic clacking actually accentuates the gun sound effects from the game.
With this kind of tactile feedback and an omnidirectional treadmill to keep us moving, we’d be pretty close to fooling our senses into thinking we’re actually somewhere else. Which frankly, sounds quite appealing right about now.
[Thanks to Mason for the tip.]
Love it, I wonder how many matches til the relays wear out?
They are solenoids, not relays. They dont wear out
But they do get stuck. Although the constant banging on the desk should free them should that happen.
Put a dab of grease on the shaft before you start using it.
The schematic shows relays that drive the solenoids ;)
First, get it in sync with the in game weapon.
Second, put a diode across the coils and a cap. It generates so much electrical noise, it kills the monitor.
Don’t be so harsh man.
the diode is kind of important if you want your electronics to not die.
Go home Odie, you’re the embarrassment
If there are relays instead of FET’s there will be enough lag to spoil the fun. Get a solid state line voltage relay. Get an electric nail/stapler gun, add mass to it’s end and wire it’s guts for some heavier kickback. The nail gun may have a switching driver instead of brute force spst trigger, which makes it easier.
All those solenoids are in a weapon’s sense unbalanced maybe that’s like the real thing? It would be great to have an inertial sensing “gun” where kick would effect aim like real better than on a desktop. Never mind the 15 amp cable and connection.
This is going to be harsh on the finger joints after aa few hours. I wonder. Mini TENS machine built into the mouse. Full body suit? Maybe a half dozen of those joke shocking pens that run on a couple of watch batteries. :D
If you use the plunger as a switch, you can get away with much less code. When the plunger pulls in it disconnects the power and the spring retuns it.
Then it acts like an electric bell. Just apply power and it’ll bounce. Add a capacitor and it’ll slow it down.
OK, somebody did the mouse.
Now lets see the force feedback moose.
Your project is not bad but it would be better for you to apply it in virtual reality so that the gameplay of this new industry is more realistic.
Logitech used to have a mouse with force feedback like over 15 years ago!
Yes, there were several Force Feedback devices built back then. The first was the CH ForceFX joystick. It used an API known as IForce. Games that supported it had force feedback effects. But in addition to that, there was a small utility program that came with it that enabled you to download “effects” into the joystick itself, and those effects could be tied to certain buttons on the joystick. That way you could kinda add force feedback effects into games that didn’t even support it. Later microsoft made a force feedback stick, added support in DirectX and later killed it off, just like they seem to do with every interesting new technology. They take it over, run everybody else out of business, then kill it and bury it.
This looks really fun but the solenoids look like they’re about to stab you in the hand.
This is going to seriously increase the amount of recoil as a result of mouse jolt. Mouse is much more sensitive than the actual hand movements IRL.
People have been doing this literally for DECADES. But, with much more effective implementations…
Here’s a though…a rumble device when you move the cursor to the edge of the screen, and it gives you haptic feedback stating that you’ve reached a border. Just a though.
I read that as “Force Fed Mouse Really Backs Things Up”. Too much Benadril?