The haptic triggers seen in the PS5’s DualSense controller originated from testing a motion controller in VR, Sony has revealed.
Sony Interactive Entertainment Product Director Toshi Aoki said as much to IGN. Speaking about the DualSense’s design, Aoki revealed that Sony wanted to find new things to do with the L2 and R2 buttons, and that the design team was impressed with testing haptic triggers in VR. “It felt amazing,” Aoki said. “Especially because you can see yourself pulling the triggers in a gun simultaneously with what you were doing with your hands.”
Of course, the haptic triggers are also making it into the official motion controllers for the upcoming PS5 VR headset, expected to launch in 2022. In fact, we first saw the concept introduced in a patent filing for VR controllers published in 2019.
The kit will also integrate the same advanced haptic feedback seen in the DualSense and reports last week also claimed it will have capacitive touch sensors for your thumb, index and middle fingers.
This isn’t the first time the development of a VR platform has influenced Sony’s work on the larger PlayStation platform. PS4’s DualSense 4 controller, for example, specifically featured a light bar so that it could be tracked for use in VR, despite launching three years before PSVR itself. And the company’s work on 3D audio in VR ended up playing a key role in the development of the PS5, too.
Are you looking forward to trying the haptic triggers in PSVR 2? Let us know in the comments below!