This video details the workings of the Wii remote and sensor bar by demonstration, setting the record straight on exactly how Wii technology functions in plain English. The more people that watch this, the less likely we are to hear the completely impossible conjectures on future Wii titles.
The more time I spend with the Wii and the remote, the more aware I am of exactly what the machine is capable of. This is the source of many elated what-ifs as well as a number of crushed hopes and dreams. No bother, though. Better to be aware of the hardware's capabilities than be consistently disappointed by software that you think could do better. Educate thyselves!
Excellent. This interfaces well with what I've learned from my own Wii.
The interal gyros on the remote can sense what position the remote is held in (quite accurately) as well as the general direction and speed that the remove is moved. Examples:
* The remote can tell it's being held level, then twisted to the left or right (Excite Truck's steering)
* The remote can track its acceleration (thus affecting the speed of your pitch in Wii Sports Baseball, or your shot in Bowling)
The important thing is that the gyros CANNOT tell where the remote is in space. They don't know where the remote is relative to you, relative to the TV, relative to the Wii... it has no clue WHERE it is.
Thus, IR enters the picture. When the remote's IR sensor is pointed at the sensor bar, it reads the two signals and determines where it is in space. It transmits that (along with its gyro data) over Wifi.
These guys prove pretty handily that the remote reads the sensor bar's signal and transmit it wirelessly (as opposed to the sensor bar reading the remote's IR signal).
Does that make sense to anyone else? It's my current understanding of the tech behind it.
"Thus, IR enters the picture. When the remote's IR sensor is pointed at the sensor bar, it reads the two signals and determines where it is in space."
Seems like it. So basically, it works backwards to how everybody thought it did. Rather than the Wiimote sending a signal to the sensor bar, the opposite is true.
Which leads me to believe that the small and restricting cord is really just a power cord for the bar. Making a wireless sensor bar looks as easy as making the bar battery operated.
So, let me get this straight, it only knows where it is in 3d space when the wiimote is pointed into the screen? How does the wiimote know its orientation in 3d space when it is not pointed to the screen since it cannot read the IR signals sent from the sensor bar?
Hmmm..... Maybe it does not... So swinging a bat relies only on gyroscopic data from the wiimote.
This works VERY similar to the HKEMS www.hkems.com LCD Topgun, a special light gun for use with PS2, Xbox and PC. That thing uses 15 individual IR lights, 9 on one "blade" and 6 on the other (weird), but the Wii's bar has 10 IR lights, 5 left and 5 right. I wouldn't be surprised if Nintendo reverse-engineered HKEMS' system and put it into the Wiimote, but judging from the light number differences, I doubt it.
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Contest:
8:29 PM on 11.21.2006
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The interal gyros on the remote can sense what position the remote is held in (quite accurately) as well as the general direction and speed that the remove is moved. Examples:
* The remote can tell it's being held level, then twisted to the left or right (Excite Truck's steering)
* The remote can track its acceleration (thus affecting the speed of your pitch in Wii Sports Baseball, or your shot in Bowling)
The important thing is that the gyros CANNOT tell where the remote is in space. They don't know where the remote is relative to you, relative to the TV, relative to the Wii... it has no clue WHERE it is.
Thus, IR enters the picture. When the remote's IR sensor is pointed at the sensor bar, it reads the two signals and determines where it is in space. It transmits that (along with its gyro data) over Wifi.
These guys prove pretty handily that the remote reads the sensor bar's signal and transmit it wirelessly (as opposed to the sensor bar reading the remote's IR signal).
Does that make sense to anyone else? It's my current understanding of the tech behind it.
Seems like it. So basically, it works backwards to how everybody thought it did. Rather than the Wiimote sending a signal to the sensor bar, the opposite is true.
Which leads me to believe that the small and restricting cord is really just a power cord for the bar. Making a wireless sensor bar looks as easy as making the bar battery operated.
Hmmm..... Maybe it does not... So swinging a bat relies only on gyroscopic data from the wiimote.