Microsoft Patents Multiplayer Gaming Headset, Could Rival Oculus Rift

Microsoft has filed a patent application for a new multiplayer gaming headset which features voice interaction, eye tracking, facial recognition, accelerometers and gyroscopes, which effectively sounds like a mixture of Google Glass and Oculus Rift.

Now this doesn’t mean Microsoft will be bringing the product to market, they could simply protecting a crazy prototype they made to stop their competitors cashing in on the ideas they used. Yet there is no smoke without fire and this information is the first confirmation of the headset since it was originally leaked in the Microsoft documents about Xbox One from a few months ago, although this headset clearly goes beyond the living room environment of the Xbox One, as the picture above shows people out and about with the set in use.

The patent application hits upon the topic of natural  speech voice recognition, multiplayer gaming and connectivity. It makes sense that Microsoft would be looking into this sector, especially since Oculus Rift seems set to run the market with no solid competition as far as consumer grade VR tech is concerned.

I wouldn’t expect anything from Microsoft any time soon, but it’s nice to see they do still have a few mad scientists left at their R&D department.

Thank you Tech Crunch for providing us with this information.

Image courtesy of Tech Crunch.