Wireless game control system
DC CAFCFirst Claim
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1. A wireless system for video game control comprised of a base transceiver engaged with an electronic game device where:
- the base transceiver communicates wirelessly with one or more wireless controllers concurrently;
the controllers are capable of translating user input into digitally coded data and sending this data to the base transceiver;
the base transceiver is capable of relaying the data received from the controllers to the electronic game device thus allowing the users to remotely control the electronic game device;
the wireless communication can be bidirectional to allow feedback information to be delivered from the electronic game device to the controllers;
the bi-directional wireless communication, when present, can be either half duplex or full duplex;
the base transceiver selects a channel palette of one or more channels to be used for wireless communication between the base transceiver and all controllers;
the channel palette constitutes the collection of channels that the system uses to implement a frequency hopping pattern if more than one channel exists in the channel palette;
the base transceiver and the controllers each check the integrity of all received packets using a checksum method and maintain a ratio of good versus damaged packets to characterize the quality of each channel;
the base transceiver and the controllers each monitor the received signal strength of incoming packets to help identify poor channels;
the base transceiver or the controllers or both collect and store RF channel performance data such as signal strength and channel quality;
the controllers can send said stored RF channel performance data to the base transceiver;
the base transceiver can adjust the channel palette to replace bad channels with better channels which it finds by periodically trying new channels, and by analyzing and interpreting its own measured channel performance data, or channel performance data received from the controllers, or both;
the base transceiver can adjust the number of channels in the channel palette as the number of available good channels varies;
the channel palette adjustments can be used to dynamically optimize communication reliability by avoiding the use of bad channels suffering from interference, obstacle attenuation, multipath nulls, other problems, or any combination of these problems;
the base transceiver uses synchronous time domain multiplexing techniques to communicate with each controller by specifying a synchronous time slot during which each controller can communicate with the base transceiver;
the frequency hopping and synchronous time domain multiplexing techniques are used in conjunction with one another to help ensure that packets are received intact on the first attempt thus circumventing the need to retransmit damaged packets and thereby achieving a small system latency with a small standard deviation and therefore minimizing the user'"'"'s perceived control lag;
the controllers can use the synchronous time domain multiplexing to save power by turning off their radio transceivers when they are not receiving or transmitting data;
the base transceiver can use the synchronous time domain multiplexing to save power by turning off its radio transceiver when it is not receiving or transmitting data.
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Abstract
A wireless system for video game control comprised of a base transceiver engaged with an electronic game device where said base transceiver communicates wirelessly with one or more wireless controllers concurrently and which implements a variety of techniques to achieve significant advantages in the areas of latency, reliability, power consumption, and cross platform compatibility.
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Citations
18 Claims
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1. A wireless system for video game control comprised of a base transceiver engaged with an electronic game device where:
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the base transceiver communicates wirelessly with one or more wireless controllers concurrently;
the controllers are capable of translating user input into digitally coded data and sending this data to the base transceiver;
the base transceiver is capable of relaying the data received from the controllers to the electronic game device thus allowing the users to remotely control the electronic game device;
the wireless communication can be bidirectional to allow feedback information to be delivered from the electronic game device to the controllers;
the bi-directional wireless communication, when present, can be either half duplex or full duplex;
the base transceiver selects a channel palette of one or more channels to be used for wireless communication between the base transceiver and all controllers;
the channel palette constitutes the collection of channels that the system uses to implement a frequency hopping pattern if more than one channel exists in the channel palette;
the base transceiver and the controllers each check the integrity of all received packets using a checksum method and maintain a ratio of good versus damaged packets to characterize the quality of each channel;
the base transceiver and the controllers each monitor the received signal strength of incoming packets to help identify poor channels;
the base transceiver or the controllers or both collect and store RF channel performance data such as signal strength and channel quality;
the controllers can send said stored RF channel performance data to the base transceiver;
the base transceiver can adjust the channel palette to replace bad channels with better channels which it finds by periodically trying new channels, and by analyzing and interpreting its own measured channel performance data, or channel performance data received from the controllers, or both;
the base transceiver can adjust the number of channels in the channel palette as the number of available good channels varies;
the channel palette adjustments can be used to dynamically optimize communication reliability by avoiding the use of bad channels suffering from interference, obstacle attenuation, multipath nulls, other problems, or any combination of these problems;
the base transceiver uses synchronous time domain multiplexing techniques to communicate with each controller by specifying a synchronous time slot during which each controller can communicate with the base transceiver;
the frequency hopping and synchronous time domain multiplexing techniques are used in conjunction with one another to help ensure that packets are received intact on the first attempt thus circumventing the need to retransmit damaged packets and thereby achieving a small system latency with a small standard deviation and therefore minimizing the user'"'"'s perceived control lag;
the controllers can use the synchronous time domain multiplexing to save power by turning off their radio transceivers when they are not receiving or transmitting data;
the base transceiver can use the synchronous time domain multiplexing to save power by turning off its radio transceiver when it is not receiving or transmitting data. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12)
coordination is employed to ensure that no two devices will transmit on the same channel at the same time, and;
the receiver swamping problem is circumvented by synchronizing the time domain multiplexing cycle of each base transceiver so that they all transmit at the same time.
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3. A system as in claim 2 which is capable of having each controller dynamically bond to any one of a variety of different base transceivers at any given time and where each controller incorporates controls that, in a multi-base transceiver environment, enable it to select which base transceiver it is bonded with.
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4. A system as in claim 1 where the system is further capable of having each controller dynamically bond to any one port on a base transceiver at any given time and where:
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the address information that creates the logical link between controller and base transceiver is dynamically generated and shared between the two devices via a radio transmission so that the user does not have to mate a controller to a base transceiver by manually setting addresses;
the base transceiver has one or more logical wireless ports and the controller incorporates controls for selecting which of these ports the control device is bonded to and where said logical ports can be mapped by the base transceiver onto electronic game device control ports corresponding to player 1, player 2 and so forth;
bond indicators on the base transceiver or controllers or both provide a visual indication to the user regarding which logical port on that base transceiver each controller is bonded with.
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5. A system as in claim 1 where in order to further improve reliability while maintaining low latency, wireless data is sent using direct sequence spread spectrum techniques which enables the receiving side to correct bit errors caused by communication problems.
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6. A system as in claim 1 where in order to further improve reliability while maintaining low latency, the base transceiver implements an antenna that receives and transmits radio signals in a plurality of polarizations to maintain a consistently high radio frequency signal margin regardless of the physical orientation of each controller.
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7. A system as in claim 1 where in order to further improve reliability while maintaining low latency, the base transceiver or controllers or both are implemented using a processor or microcontroller incorporating multiple hardware threads to ensure predictable handling of real time events.
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8. A system as in claim 1 where the base transceiver is either a device that is externally connected to the electronic game device or a module that is built into the electronic game device, computer system, television or other appliance.
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9. A system as in claim 1 where the base transceiver is implemented with a single radio transceiver to communicate with one or more controllers.
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10. A system as in claim 1 where in order to further reduce latency, the synchronous time domain multiplexing of said wireless game control system is synchronized with the polling cycle of the electronic game device that is engaged with the base transceiver.
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11. A system as in claim 1 that allows for the upgrade of the firmware of the controllers by downloading the new firmware from the base transceiver via the RF wireless link and where the firmware upgrade can be made available to the base transceiver via plug in media or by the engaged electronic game device which in turn can receive it from a memory card device, game media such as a cartridge or compact disk, or a connection to the internet.
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12. A system as in claim 1 that allows for the upgrade of the firmware of the controllers by downloading the new firmware from a hardware expansion module or upgrade port physically located on the controller.
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13. A radio frequency wireless system for remote operation of an electronic game device where:
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the system is comprised of two types of devices;
a base transceiver comprised of two distinct sub-systems where one provides an interface to an engaged electronic game device and the other provides a radio frequency communication interface to one or more wireless remote controllers;
one or more wireless controllers each comprised of two distinct sub-systems where one provides a user interface to accept input from and deliver feedback to a user and the other provides a radio frequency communication interface to said base transceiver;
the system is designed to enable cross platform compatibility where;
any given controller can bond to any base transceiver and provide seamless functionality of commonly supported features where each base transceiver may be designed to interface to a unique brand or model of electronic game device;
any given base transceiver can bond to any controller and provide seamless functionality of commonly supported features where each controller may be designed with a unique user interface or a unique physical layout of user interface elements;
each base transceiver contains a set of digitally stored records consisting of one record for each input sensor that said engaged electronic game device is capable of receiving data for and another set of digitally stored records containing one record for each user feedback mechanism that said electronic game device is capable of sending control data for;
each controller contains a set of digitally stored records consisting of one record for each input sensor that said controller has and another set of digitally stored records containing one record for each user feedback mechanism that said controller has;
each record contains information about the associated input sensor or user feedback mechanism including the type of the sensor or mechanism and the number of data bits associated with the sensor or mechanism;
each base transceiver and each controller are capable of negotiating a common set of user input sensors and user feedback mechanisms by identifying matching records;
the record matching is performed in a number of passes starting with very strict matching requirements and with subsequent passes being performed on the remaining unmatched records using less strict matching criteria in an attempt to match all fields;
translation information is generated from the results of the record matching process to describe how the data described by one record should be manipulated to make it conform to the data format required by the matched record;
the translation information can include such details as sign conversions, logic conversions, and data resolution scaling instructions;
each controller is capable of using the generated translation information to structure data packets containing data obtained from its input sensors and manipulated to be compatible with the data types acceptable to the electronic game device engaged with the base transceiver;
each controller is capable of sending said manipulated data packets using radio wireless communication to the base transceiver to which it is bonded which in turn delivers them to the engaged electronic game device as though they had been delivered from a physically attached wired video game controller so as to control or manipulate the game;
each base transceiver is capable of using the generated translation information to structure data packets containing data obtained from the engaged electronic game device and manipulated to be compatible with the data types acceptable to the feedback mechanisms on the controller to which it is addressed;
each base transceiver is capable of sending the manipulated data packets using radio wireless communication to the controller to which they are addressed which in turn uses them to control the user feedback mechanisms of the controller as though they were wired to and being directly controlled by the electronic game device. - View Dependent Claims (14, 15, 16, 17, 18)
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Specification