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Everything old is new again. Magnetic trackers are fun, but they have been here already for ages.

I used to play with Ascension's Flock of Birds [1]. You can get pretty accurate 3D position and orientation.

Though these older systems were pretty expensive (~$10K), I wonder what would be the price of these new toys.

[1] http://www.ascension-tech.com/realtime/RTflockofBIRDS.php

The article says $100. That's a big difference.

Of course, it will have to come down farther if video game manufacturers are going to consider spending $ developing features for people using these. Right now, spending time designing a game for this kind of interaction means you'll be able to sell it on the Wii.

When the PC, PS3, and XBox start having these kinds of input devices, game (and software) manufacturers will take much more notice.

Ah, I'm blind. For $100 it's well worth it. It's completely different type of interaction, true 3D (actually 6D as you get also orientation). I would get it even without games, just for hacking.

BTW they say it will ship for PC.

I think that means they will ship for PS and XBox, also, since those controllers are pretty much equivalent to USB.

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