System and method for creating and streaming augmented game sessions

• US 10,137,376 B2
• Filed: 12/31/2012
• Issued: 11/27/2018
• Est. Priority Date: 12/31/2012
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Activision Publishing Incorporated (Microsoft Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Activision Publishing Incorporated (Microsoft Corporation)
• Inventors: Kohler, Johan, Nandakumar, Bharathwaj
• Primary Examiner(s): Myhr, Justin
• Application Number:
  US13/731,661
• Publication Number:
  US 20140187317A1
• Time in Patent Office: 2,157 Days
• Field of Search: 463 30- 34, 463 40- 42
• CPC Class Codes: A63F 13/00 Video games, i.e. games using an electronically generated display having two or more dimensions gaming systems which provide a financial reward G07F17/32
• CPC Class Codes: A63F 13/497 Partially or entirely replaying previous game actions
• CPC Class Codes: A63F 13/5252 using two or more virtual cameras concurrently or sequentially, e.g. automatically switching between fixed virtual cameras when a character changes room or displaying a rear-mirror view in a car-driving game
• CPC Class Codes: A63F 13/86 Watching games played by other players
• CPC Class Codes: A63F 2300/577 for watching a game played by other players
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4402 involving reformatting operations of video signals for household redistribution, storage or real-time display details of conversion of video standards at pixel level H04N7/01; video transcoding H04N19/40; adapting incoming signals to the display format of the display terminal G09G5/005; media handling at the source in data packet switching networks H04L65/764
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/632 using a connection between clients on a wide area network, e.g. setting up a peer-to-peer communication via Internet for retrieving video segments from the hard-disk of other client devices broadcast-related systems characterised by transmission among terminal devices H04H60/80; distributed application using peer-to-peer [P2P] networks H04L67/104

Abstract

An approach is provided for streaming of media streams (e.g., from a game console). In one implementation, a media stream that includes a secondary view of the game world may be generated at the game console. The secondary view may be of a lower-quality version of a primary view of the game world. The generation of the media stream may include: prefetching, to a cache of the game console, portions of the primary view and/or instructions for encoding the portions; and encoding, based on the prefetching, the portions to produce the secondary view. In another implementation, game play information may be executed to reproduce previous game play of a previous game session during a reproduction of the previous game session. Augmentation content may be added to the reproduced game session during the reproduction of the previous game session, creating an augmented game session having one or more views for streaming.

Claims

1. A system for facilitating streaming of augmented game sessions created via augmentation during reproduction of previous game sessions, the system comprising:

one or more physical processors programmed with one or more computer program instructions which, when executed, cause the one or more physical processors to;

obtain game play information associated with a previous game session of a game, wherein the game play information defines previous game play of the previous game session, and the previous game play includes one or more first in-game actions that were executed on behalf of a first player in the previous game session based on one or more first user inputs received from the first player;

execute the one or more first in-game actions to reproduce the previous game play of the previous game session after the previous game session, wherein execution of the one or more first in-game actions creates a reproduced game session;

add augmentation content to the reproduced game session based on one or more second user inputs received from a user during the reproduced game session, wherein the addition of the augmentation content to the reproduced game session creates an augmented game session; and

stream one or more views of the augmented game session, wherein the one or more views of the augmented game session are streamed, in real-time, to one or more viewers as the augmentation content is added to the reproduced game session.

2. The system of claim 1, wherein the one or more physical processors are further caused to:

generate, based on the execution of the first in-game actions, one or more views of the previous game session during the reproduced game session for presentation to the user.

3. The system of claim 1, wherein the one or more physical processors are further caused to:

generate, based on a viewpoint different than a first viewpoint of the first player, first views of the previous game session during the reproduced game session;

receive a selection of the user to generate views from the first viewpoint of the first player; and

generate, based on the selection and the first viewpoint of the first player, second views of the previous game session during the reproduced game session,

wherein streaming the one or more views of the augmented game session comprises streaming the first views of the previous game session and the second views of the previous game session.

4. The system of claim 1, wherein the one or more physical processors are further caused to:

enable the user to control one or more in-game properties that were accessible to the first player in the previous game session during the reproduced game session.

5. The system of claim 1, wherein the one or more physical processors are further caused to:

enable the user to control one or more on-screen objects that were accessible to the first player in the previous game session during the reproduced game session.

6. The system of claim 1, wherein the augmented game session includes a plurality of players, and the plurality of players includes the first player and the user as a second player, and wherein the one or more physical processors are further caused to:

execute one or more second in-game actions based on the one or more second user inputs; and

generate content related to the one or more second in-game actions based on the execution of the one or more second in-game actions,

wherein adding the augmentation content to the reproduced game session comprises adding the generated content to the reproduced game session.

7. The system of claim 6, wherein the one or more first in-game actions include in-game actions that are available to players of a first player type, and the one or more second in-game actions include actions that are available to players of a second player type.

8. The system of claim 6, wherein the one or more second in-game actions include actions not available to players during the previous game session.

9. A method for facilitating streaming of augmented game sessions created via augmentation during reproduction of previous game sessions, the method being implemented in a computer system that includes one or more physical processors executing computer program instructions which, when executed, perform the method, the method comprising:

obtaining, by the computer system, game play information associated with a previous game session of a game, wherein the game play information defines previous game play of the previous game session, and the previous game play includes one or more first in-game actions that were executed on behalf of a first player in the previous game session based on one or more first user inputs received from the first player;

executing, by the computer system, the one or more first in-game actions to reproduce the previous game play of the previous game session after the previous game session, wherein execution of the one or more first in-game actions creates a reproduced game session;

adding, by the computer system, augmentation content to the reproduced game session based on one or more second user inputs received from a user during the reproduced game session, wherein the addition of the augmentation content to the reproduced game session creates an augmented game session; and

streaming, by the computer system, one or more views of the augmented game session, to one or more viewers, in real-time, as the augmentation content is added to the reproduced game session.

10. The method of claim 9, further comprising:

generating, by the computer system, based on the execution of the first in-game actions, one or more views of the previous game session during the reproduced game session for presentation to the user.

11. The method of claim 9, further comprising:

generating, by the computer system, based on a viewpoint different than a first viewpoint of the first player, first views of the previous game session during the reproduced game session;

receiving, by the computer system, a selection of the user to generate views from the first viewpoint of the first player; and

generating, by the computer system, based on the selection and the first viewpoint of the first player, second views of the previous game session during the reproduced game session,

wherein streaming the one or more views of the augmented game session comprises streaming the first views of the previous game session and the second views of the previous game session.

12. The method of claim 9, further comprising:

enabling, by the computer system, the user to control one or more in-game properties that were accessible to the first player in the previous game session during the reproduced game session.

13. The method of claim 9, further comprising:

enabling, by the computer system, the user to control one or more on-screen objects that were accessible to the first player in the previous game session during the reproduced game session.

14. The method of claim 9, wherein the augmented game session includes a plurality of players, and the plurality of players includes the first player and the user as a second player, the method further comprising:

executing, by the computer system, one or more second in-game actions based on the one or more second user inputs; and

generating, by the computer system, content related to the one or more second in-game actions based on the execution of the one or more second in-game actions,

wherein adding the augmentation content to the reproduced game session comprises adding the generated content to the reproduced game session.

15. The method of claim 14, wherein the one or more first in-game actions include in-game actions that are available to players of a first player type, and the one or more second in-game actions include actions that are available to players of a second player type.

16. The method of claim 14, wherein the one or more second in-game actions include actions not available to players during the previous game session.