Hands-On: The Peregrine Gaming Glove
January 25, 2011
Dozens of customizable macro keys in the palm of your hand. Literally.
An Editorial By: Ten Ton Hammer
In 1989, the console market saw the launch of the first peripheral to attempt to use motion-based controls to allow you to issue commands to your game. This marvel of modern technology was known as the Power Glove. It was featured in the video game cult classic movie, “The Wizard,” and eventually even reached the vaunted heights of becoming an internet meme. Because it bombed. “It’s so bad.” Yes. Yes it is.
Critics of the Power Glove said that it actually decreased the gamer’s ability to accurately control the games you played with it. This bulky, poorly designed and ill-fitting device took up most of your right arm from the elbow on down, and really did… nothing. Only two games were ever released that specifically supported its use, and the company that built and distributed it in Japan actually went out of business as a result of this ill-conceived device.
Given such a rocky history, it’s no wonder that Brent Baier, CEO of Iron Will Innovations, bristles a bit when folks call his invention – The Peregrine – a modern-day Power Glove. And truth be told, the two have almost nothing in common, even right down to which hand they are equipped on. Although, he did admit when interviewed that the NES Power Glove was one among many inspirations for coming up with The Peregrine Gaming Glove.
The Peregrine is a lightweight glove that fits on your left hand. Three different sizes are available, so you don’t have to worry about the perils of a “one size fits none” predicament. Along the back of the hand, and up the fingers, are a series or sensors that, when they contact the touch pads on the thumb or palm, execute a keyboard-based command. That’s right – this device is recognized by your OS as a keyboard. Meaning that any commands (or combinations thereof) that could be issued by typing, can instead be issued using The Peregrine.
Commands are executed each time a contact circuit is created by touching one of the three sensor pads to a specific point along the spring-like ‘traces’ that run the length of all four of your fingers. The pod on the back of the glove is able to sense the exact point you’ve touched along the traces, and execute the appropriate pre-programmed command or macro based on the choices made during configuration and calibration. In total, I count a possible 32 combinations of macros with this device, ranging from thumb-tip and index tip (the classic “OK” symbol) down to a complicated hand contortion that would put my thumb knuckle in contact with the base of my ring finger. The latter is hardly intuitive, but may make a good position for one of those last minute “OH CRAP!” buttons that you rarely need to fire, and would be a lot easier than something like Shift-Alt-7.
The quality of the physical device is top-notch. The fabric breathes nicely and has extra ventilation points sewn in at strategic locations, and the unit is also completely hand washable! The connection point on the back features gold-plated contact points for extra reliability, and the contact cables that run over the length of the glove are stitched tightly to the glove and run no apparent risk of coming detached no matter how rigorously you play.
The Pod is detachable, magnetic, stores your profiles and features a customizable LED.
The connection pod also features a standard USB 2.0 connection and a snap-away magnetic connection that reduces the risk of injury to you or the device due to sudden movements. As a very subtle added feature, the pod’s “always on” status removes those pesky connected/disconnected sound effects that some other devices spam you with when their magnetic connections are broken. A wireless model will “eventually” be produced, but since The Peregrine is currently targeting an audience of pro-gamers that rarely use wireless devices (latency and battery death are unacceptable!) the device only comes as a wired model.
Included with the glove is a copy of their easy to use GloveBox software which is used to calibrate and customize the touch sensitive areas of the device. I was surprised at the ease with which I could set up commands through a simple series of intuitive clicks. The icing on the cake however, is that any changes made to your calibration profiles are actually stored within the device itself, instead of writing to your system. Meaning that you can take The Peregrine with you wherever you game, and never have to worry about having to recalibrate it upon arrival at your destination. The “Pod” on the back of the glove can store many different profiles, each with up to 5 different keymaps.
So… it looks great, and it’s easy to calibrate. But how does it actually work?
The Peregrine is designed to be a keyboard replacement for games that don’t actively require typing. With the growing popularity of voicechat, the list of games that fall under this umbrella is growing rapidly.
According to Brent Baier, the glove was initially intended to be an interface device for use with strategy games (such as Starcraft, Defense of the Ancients, or the Civilization series) but has seen a growing popularity among MMOG players, primarily among high-end raiders and PvPers where shaving a quarter- or half-second off of your reaction time can mean the difference between success and failure.
I was also surprised to learn that this device is seeing an upswing in adoption among 3D graphic artists and architects, as well as video and sound editors. The availability of having over 30 commands mapped to your fingertips can, in some software suites, completely eliminate the need for a keyboard during the bulk of the creative process.
To continue reading visit: http://www.tentonhammer.com/editorial/the-peregrine
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