ElectroCutscenes: Realistic Haptic Feedback in Cutscenes of Virtual Reality Games Using Electric Muscle Stimulation

Abstract

Cutscenes in Virtual Reality (VR) games enhance story telling by delivering output in the form of visual, auditory, or haptic feedback (e.g., using vibrating handheld controllers). Since they lack interaction in the form of user input, cutscenes would significantly benefit from improved feedback. We introduce the concept and implementation of ElectroCutscenes, where Electric Muscle Stimulation (EMS) is leveraged to elicit physical user movements to different body parts to correspond to those of personal avatars in cutscenes of VR games while the user stays passive. Through a user study (N=22) in which users passively received kinesthetic feedback resulting in involuntarily movements, we show that Elec-troCutscenes significantly increases perceived presence and realism compared to controller-based vibrotactile and no haptic feedback.

Force Sensation Induced by Electrical Stimulation of the Tendon of Biceps Muscle

“…On the other hand, the stimulus above the tendon might eventually become a muscle stimulus and cause a weak muscle contraction, affecting the Golgi tendon organ and muscle spindles and producing force sensation. However, according to the conventional EMS work [5][6][7][8][9][10][11] that stimulated the same muscle to mimic an external force, they produced a force sensation opposite to the one produced by stimulating the tendon organ. In order to investigate whether our proposing method is based on muscle stimulation or not, we placed electrodes not only on the tendon but also on the muscle belly of the biceps muscle (Figure 1a) as a condition that actively induces muscle contraction.…”

“…Our hypothesis is as follows. Stimulation of the tendon will increase force sensation, while stimulation of the muscle belly will decrease it because the stimulation will act as a force driving in the direction of elbow flexion (in the opposite direction to the force due to the weight) as in the conventional method [5][6][7][8][9][10][11].…”

“…Indeed, some studies showed that one actuator could cover a multi-dimensional haptic feedback motor system [3,4]; however, the situation where the technique is available is limited, and a heavy motor is still required for a large degree of torque. On the other hand, a method to present force by controlling human muscles with electrical stimulation (EMS) has been proposed [5][6][7][8][9][10][11]. This method requires only a tiny electrical circuit board for power supply, one for stimulus control, and electrodes to be placed on the human body, the net size of all of which is much smaller than the devices using electromagnetic motors.…”

“…Here, [gf] stands for the unit of gram force and 1.0 gf = 1.0 × 10 −3 kgf = 9.8 × 10 −3 N. However, it has not been investigated in detail whether this method also works in other upper limb joints. The muscles in the upper arm are mostly used for lifting and supporting objects, and many wearable interfaces have presented force to the upper limb and elbow joint [10,11,15,16].…”

International Workshop on Cross-Reality (XR) Interaction

“…He published 70+ papers related to HCI and publishes regularly at CHI. He is active in security and privacy for virtual reality [8][9][10] interaction in VR [19] and novel VR applications [21].…”