Sony Interactive Entertainment has patented an interesting PS5 gameplay replay system that presents “what if” scenarios to players who are interested in finding out what the outcome of their actions would have been had they chosen to do something different. The patent, which was spotted by OPAttack, doesn’t mention competitive gaming but the examples provided in the application seems to suggest that this gameplay replay system was designed with esports in mind.
How the PS5 gameplay replay system would work
Sony used the example of an Olympic skiing game in its application, where a player partaking in a half-pipe competition was unsuccessful in a particular segment. Based on the player data available, an AI module will then generate a “what if” scenario for that player and show them what they could have done differently for a different outcome. In this example, Sony mentioned “different ski equipment that was not previously used by the user (e.g., hard snow skis, frontside skis, high performance boots, short ski poles, etc.).”
The patent reads:
Methods and systems are provided for generating an outcome of a previous gameplay. The method includes providing access of a recording of the previous gameplay, the recording is one that was shared by a player for the previous gameplay. The method includes providing an interface that identifies one or more what-if scenarios for the previous gameplay. The one or more what-if scenarios being selected for inclusion into the interface is based on processing the recording of the previous gameplay through a machine learning model to identify what-if scenarios for the user, and options for what-if scenarios are provided to the interface. The method includes enabling the selection of at least one of the what-if scenarios from the options. The selection causes an adjustment to metadata associated with the recording of the previous gameplay. The method includes replaying the recording that was selected using the adjusted metadata to generate the alternative outcome of the previous gameplay.
In other news, rumor has it that Rockstar scrapped plans for a GTA 4 and Red Dead Redemption 1 remaster, and Capcom has said that Street Fighter 6’s modern controls are not an easy mode.
