Immersion unveils next-gen rumble tech

Force feedback technology firm Immersion Corporation has fired off the latest in a series of potshots aimed at Sony's decision to drop the rumble function from its PS3 pads, with the unveiling of a new rumble system which is fully compatible with tilt sensors.

The firm's TouchSense technology for next-gen systems is described as offering "greater realism" in its force feedback, and Immersion claims that developers will be able to create a far wider range of effects with the system.

The key point, however, is that it's fully compatible with tilt sensing functions - a fact that Immersion is keen to tout as an embarrassment for Sony, whose PS3 pads lack rumble functions because, the platform holder says, they would have interfered with the tilt sensors in them.

Sony is currently appealing against a court decision which agreed that it violated Immersion's force feedback patents with the Dual Shock controllers which were used by the PSone and PS2 consoles, and its decision to drop force feedback from PS3 has been widely interpreted as an attempt to avoid paying licensing fees to Immersion.

"The new TouchSense technology is compatible with motion control and tilt sensing that allow players to control certain game actions by moving or tilting a handheld controller," Immersion's statement about the new technology explains.

"Because the speed at which a user moves the controller is much slower than the frequencies generated by TouchSense technology, the two signals can be differentiated using filtering and other techniques," it continues. "Immersion also offers engineering services to implement the technology within a particular console system."