Whether by haptic claws or well-designed VR controllers like the Oculus Touch, there’s a mission to bring an intricate level of control to VR involving natural interaction with our hands. Since kids, we’ve emulated different devices with our hands like making a gun for cops and robber with index finger and thumb extended from a fist. The CaptoGlove, a wearable piece of tech fully funded on Kickstarter, is taking that idea and bringing gesture-based gaming and computing to life.
The glove itself includes multiple sensors and connects to other hardware wirelessly via Bluetooth 4.0. With it, players are able able to swing, aim, and fire weapons, pilot vehicles, and more with intuitive gestures. The glove also has capacitive ends for the index and thumb so you can manipulate touch screens without having to remove it. With all of these things, it also is said to offer up to 10 hours of continuous play time. There are already quite a few meant to show off the glove in action, most of them involving first-person shooters. There are a few other intriguing demos as well, like using the glove in a handle-bar fashion to steer a speeder bike in Star Wars Battlefront or swiping through menus on your cell phone by just doing a swipe gesture with the glove-equipped hand.
As designed, the CaptoGlove is going to work with old and future games out of the box and include multiple preset control options while remaining fully customizable. It will also work with every VR headset on the market, which is where the device will likely be most impactful. The Vive and Rift have solid controllers, but the CaptoGlove would be a welcome wearable that boosts the immersion of the growing number of virtual experiences.
The CaptoGlove still has more than two weeks left for its funding campaign at the time of this writing, but it has already reached its $50,000 goal. The glove is expected to retail for $250 but promised for $160 via Kickstarter via an early bird special.
