Wii / DS voice recognition

[Spaff]

http://www.mozlapunk.net/homepage/?p=860

Interesting piece which reports on rumours that the Wii (and DS later) will feature a quite complex voice recognition system, with interesting voice to text features that will recognise the way in which you speak and translate it to appropriate text - EG shouting "I PWNED YOUR FUCKING FACE" would be translated into huge red caps or something.

Also, I have been speaking to a 'source' who claims that this Nintendo tech exists, and has seen some of it working first hand.

I wonder if it will know how to spell Pwned.

[brkl]

I think it'd be more important to develop actual functional voice recognition first, red text in bold later.

[Spaff]

Oh I think that's very much part of it.

the text stuff is just a by product, as far as i can tell this will recognise voices accuratley in any accent or speaking volume etc etc.

and then be able to turn that into accurate text.

[Oath]

Yup, those things always work. Seems like a pretty unnecessary feature honestly, unless they go the way of Final Fantasy XI and have some limited automatic translation built in.

Slightly Wii-related: this thread over at NeoGAF. Some rumblings about a lower retail price than expected, 19800 yen instead of 25000 yen. One can only hope.

[Spaff]

We are all clawing at the wii news wagon in desperation

Just release the damn thing already

[brkl]

Oh I think that's very much part of it.

the text stuff is just a by product, as far as i can tell this will recognise voices accuratley in any accent or speaking volume etc etc.

and then be able to turn that into accurate text.

I don't have *that* much faith in Nintendo. They're not gods.

[Spaff]

ok fine then, poo poo the news i bring to you

it was interesting to me ¬¬

[Thrik]

I fail to see how you crackpots can not think this is good news if true. It might be largely shit and lame in single-player games, but let's not forget that the Wii is going to have multiplayer games too.

This would be great for those without the connection speed or equipment for voice comms. Instead of simply hearing nothing in games where people make use of it frequently for whatever reason (taunting, coordinating teams, etc), they'd see text. You know, just like in PC games where textual communication has been a staple of multiplayer games for years.

[Erkki]

If it works, it's definitely very cool. But for how many years have they* tried to get voice recognition working without much success.. or maybe there has been little success step-by-step that's just not that noticeable?

* whoever

[baconian]

I don't have *that* much faith in Nintendo. They're not gods.

hmm. So, for that reason, you mean, it's impossible that nintendo, with their billions of dollars, couldnt possibly get it working? Because they're not gods. OK.

HOLD IT!

That statement is clearly contradicted by, mmm, eh. THIS!

[brkl]

Working, proper, reliable voice recognition seems like a Holy Grail of sorts. We never seem to quite get there. Same with handwriting recognition. I'm not sure we'll ever have voice recognition that works nearly as well as in the movies.

[elmuerte]

Yes we will, but it's going to take a while.

In fact voice recognition works very well on a limited set of keywords. It starts to get difficult for wildcard matching (required to dictate a letter or something).

Something like "Computer, main screen turn on" works well enough

This would require effort from both sides, you would need to learn the key set of commands. This has been working quite well for quite some years.

[brkl]

Oh that's baby stuff.

[Erkki]

hmm. So, for that reason, you mean, it's impossible that nintendo, with their billions of dollars, couldnt possibly get it working? Because they're not gods. OK.

You're quote has it wrong. brkl said that, not me.

[brkl]

I'm going to Tallinn next week.

[SpiderMonkey]

It's certainly not something I'd expect from Nintendo:

- This seems to run counter to their pre-existing philosophy. The whole Friends code thing is about protecting you from idiots.

- Is there really enough space on a 480p screen to start throwing loads of text up? Maybe it will just let you send one word at a time. FAG.

- It's pretty computationally expensive, and while the Wii won't be slow, it's not the system I'd expect to have extra power lying around for these niceties.

But you know, I'm not gonna take a dump on the concept itself. They pay people good money to know more and figure shit out better than me, the random guy on a message board. It sounds cool.

If they are working on it, I'd expect them to be doing it with a particular game or two in mind (either something new built around it, or something like Animal Crossing), rather than simply to add to multiplayer FPSs.

[baconian]

- This seems to run counter to their pre-existing philosophy. The whole Friends code thing is about protecting you from idiots.

It seems like it could work to that aim, editing swearwords from speech and stuff like that.

You're quote has it wrong. brkl said that, not me.

oh yeah, sorry.

[SpiderMonkey]

You're quote has it wrong. brkl said that, not me.

oh yeah, sorry.

Your quote has it wrong. Erkki said that, not me. LOL

It seems like it could work to that aim, editing swearwords from speech and stuff like that.

Probably, but it just seems to me that getting rid of swearwords and getting rid of idiots isn't really the same thing.

[Thrik]

Wait, what? How is the friend code system about protecting you from idiots? Does it have some kind of idiot detection system then, or are you implying that by selecting players randomly you remove the chances of an idiot cropping up? I say this because as far as I'm aware no Nintendo Wifi game has come with ingame communication yet, so I'm not sure how exactly you're defining idiots and what's making you think the system is about protecting you from idiots.

Now if you'd said it's to protect people (kids) giving out their personal details and basically guaranteeing anonymity, then yeah, I'd agree. That certainly appears to be what Nintendo's going after with the friend code system and is a good argument against ingame communication, further backed up by the fact that Metroid Prime Hunters has two levels of friends:

There's the ones you add manually by friend code in which case you'd have to know them outside of Nintendo's system, and you can chat to these using the DS microphone. There's also a second type that're known as "rivals" which you can add at the end of a game, but for some reason reviewers couldn't work out you cannot voice communicate with these people (or people not on your list at all). Preventing you from sharing info without an external connection would indeed be the most logical reason for this.

[Erkki]

I'm going to Tallinn next week.

Hmm... are you trying to intimidate me?

[brkl]

I'm bringing a big ol' knife.

[miffy495]

Probably, but it just seems to me that getting rid of swearwords and getting rid of idiots isn't really the same thing.

Heh. Never saw that before. Funny as all hell. This is why I don't play online anymore.

[elmuerte]

wtf....

since when is it possible to get that many hits in a Rainbow Six game? That's bullshit.

as for the girl... didn't know Erica Cartman actually existed

[nsps]

Hasn't anyone played Mario Party 6?!? Nintendo already mastered voice recognition!

"Four."

"Sorry, please repeat your answer."

"Four."

"Did you say five?"

"No."

"Did You say three?"

"No."

"Sorry, please repeat your answer."

"Four."

"Sorry, please repeat your answer."

"Fuck you."

"Sorry, two is incorrect."

[n0wak]

In addition to the above, I take it none of you played Lifeline. I guess you should consider yourself lucky.