The Mindwave Mobile headset lets you play games using your mind powers. Photo: Ariel Zambelich/Wired
When you think of mobile gaming, you probably imagine Cut the Rope or Angry Birds — tapping, flicking and touching your device’s capacitive screen. But now there’s a new way to play: with your mind.
The Mindwave Mobile Brainwave Headset is a $130 EEG headset that’s compatible with iOS devices, Android phones, and, yes, even desktop computers. The headset measures brainwaves from your forehead — changes in electrical activity, really — which it then filters with complex algorithms to eliminate any interference from other electronic sources, and narrow down what those brainwaves really mean. Currently, the system can detect concentration, meditation and blinks, and uses these cues to control simple iOS and Android games.
When you put on the headset, you look like a dork. I don’t think even Brad Pitt could make this thing look cool. It’s definitely not the sort of thing any sane person is going to wear in public, but it actually works.
With the system properly situated on your head, you begin your Mindwave experience by pairing the headset over Bluetooth with your mobile device’s free MindWave Mobile Tutorial app. If the headset isn’t correctly positioned, an alert switches from “Connected” to “Check fit.” It took me about 20 minutes to get the fit just right.
Get a hang of focusing or relaxing with the MindWave Mobile Tutorial.
Once it’s on, it’s (theoretically) pretty easy to use. With the tutorial app loaded, you can focus on a math problem or an image onscreen, and watch your concentration levels rise via in-app meter. Conversely, if you relax and take deep breaths, you can monitor how well you can control your meditation levels. The system can also track blinks of different intensities. You can then use these techniques to play one of around 100 compatible desktop and mobile apps via mind control.
I checked out a few games, and overall the system was intriguing but not a replacement for other forms of gameplay control. Yes, the technology does work. It’s just not very fun.
Within the MyndPlayer app, there’s a product-placement title for Red Bull (the future of advertising, perhaps?) where you have to focus just enough to open up the can. If you focus too much, the can blows up. I blew the can up. MyndPlayer also includes a game of Tug of War, in which different opponents can be defeated by either relaxing or focusing as much as possible. Another app, W.I.L.D., offers a variety of different brain-controlled mini-games and challenges, all focused on “navigating waking dreams using the powers of meditation and attention.”
Put out a fire using your mind in the W.I.L.D. app.
Although many of the compatible apps cost money, they look robust enough to justify their prices. Plus, you have to justify the cost of your headset, right?
The headset itself weighs about 3 ounces, plus the weight of a AAA battery, which it uses for power. It’s mostly made of plastic, with an approximately three-quarter-inch-wide band that fits across your head, a rubber “loop” that slots behind your ear, and a rotatable arm that houses the EEG sensor on its tip. A second sensor is housed in a plastic clip below your left ear. You clip it onto your ear to act as a ground and reference for the EEG sensor.
The headset is adjustable, but it’s still tricky to keep it properly positioned on you head — especially if you’ve got hair. And once you do establish the correct fit, the headset sometimes slips from its position, which can be both frustrating and uncomfortable.
The Mindwave Mobile has potential — there are a lot of different games available, and many have varying levels of difficulty to keep you on your toes. After a stressful day of school or work, I could possibly see coming home, sliding the headset on, and playing a few games to relax my mind.
And who doesn’t enjoy pretending they have telekinetic powers? The hardware-fit issue can make the experience a bit annoying, but it’s not a deal breaker. Still, considering you have to fork up $130 for the headset, plus the cost of the apps, we don’t think something like this will catch on until the price drops.
Or until you don’t feel like a complete fool wearing the headset, even alone, in private.
Source: http://www.wired.com/gadgetlab/2012/05/mindwave-mobile-hands-on/
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