A system for generating video game inputs is provided. The system comprises an input unit operable to obtain images of a passive non-luminous object being held by a user as a video games controller. The system also comprises an object detector and object pose detector for detecting the object and its respective pose in the obtained images. The pose detector is configured to detect the pose of the object based on at least one of a (i) contour detection operation and (ii) the output of a machine learning model that has been trained to detect the poses of passive non-luminous objects in images. A user input generator is configured to generate user inputs based on the detected changes in pose of the passive non-luminous object and to transmit these to a video game unit at which a video game is being executed. A corresponding method is also provided.

The present invention is a system and method for providing an online game implemented by means of a computer system. The method includes the step of storing a plurality of images in at least one computing device. The method then includes the step of obtaining content data from the plurality of images stored in the computing device through a content extraction module. The method includes the step of facilitating the users to initiate a challenge for each other to create a game session over a game networking system through a challenge creation module. The game session includes a friend game session and a date game session. The method includes the step of initiating the game session created by the challenge creation module over the game networking system through a gaming module.

A method is provided, including the following operations: capturing images of an interactive environment by an image capture device; analyzing the captured images to track motion of a user's head in the interactive environment; providing a view through a display screen of a three-dimensional (3-D) information space, wherein the view of the 3-D information space is defined from a perspective that is determined by the tracked motion of the user's head in the interactive environment, the perspective being dynamically updated in response to the motion of the user's head; wherein the 3-D information space includes a plurality of predefined content regions that are configured to present respectively assigned visual content, the content regions being visually accessible through the display screen based on the provided view of the 3-D information space.

A gamified application is provided for users to feed animated virtual characters with images of real-world food items. The images fed to the virtual characters are to be uploaded to a data store in a cloud environment, for use in training a custom machine learning model. A server in the cloud environment receives a photo of a food item fed to a virtual character in an augmented reality environment in the gamified application executing on a user device, invokes the custom machine learning model to generate classification information for the photo, sends the classification information to the user device for verification by a user, and stores the verified information to the data store used for periodically training the machine learning model. Over time, the data store would include a large volume of food images with label data verified by a large number of users.

An animation processing method is performed by an electronic device. The method including: obtaining a terrain feature in a graphical user interface at a current moment, the graphical user interface including a virtual character, and obtaining state information and task information that correspond to the virtual character in an animation segment at the current moment; performing feature extraction on the terrain feature, the state information, and the task information using an animation processing model, to obtain joint action information corresponding to the virtual character at a next moment; determining a joint torque according to the joint action information; and obtaining gesture adjustment information corresponding to the virtual character from the current moment to the next moment based on the joint torque, and updating the animation segment according to the gesture adjustment information to render the updated animated segment in the graphical user interface.

Systems and methods for facilitating secret communication between players are described. One of the methods includes receiving image data of a first player to identify one or more gestures and receiving input data indicating a response of a second player to the one or more gestures. The method further includes training a model using the image data and the input data to generate an inference of communication between the first user and the second user. The method also includes generating additional inferences of communication between the first user and the second user. The method includes generating a recommendation to the second user based on the inference of communication and the additional inferences of communication.

A server device that incorporates teachings of the present disclosure may include, for example, a memory and a processor. The processor can identify first and second players present at first and second physical locations, to identify first and second boundary and topographical information of the first and second physical locations, to map the first and second boundary and topographical information of the first and second physical locations to a virtual gaming space, to capture first and second position and orientation information for the first and second players, to map the first and second position and orientation information to the virtual gaming space, to generate first and second virtual players corresponding to the first and second players, and to transmit to first goggles information representative of the second virtual player for display superimposed onto a transparent viewing apparatus for viewing of the virtual gaming space. Additional embodiments are disclosed.

One embodiment is directed to a system for enabling two or more users to interact within a virtual world comprising virtual world data, comprising a computer network comprising one or more computing devices, the one or more computing devices comprising memory, processing circuitry, and software stored at least in part in the memory and executable by the processing circuitry to process at least a portion of the virtual world data; wherein at least a first portion of the virtual world data originates from a first user virtual world local to a first user, and wherein the computer network is operable to transmit the first portion to a user device for presentation to a second user, such that the second user may experience the first portion from the location of the second user, such that aspects of the first user virtual world are effectively passed to the second user.

A server device that incorporates teachings of the present disclosure may include, for example, a memory and a processor. The processor can identify first and second players present at first and second physical locations, to identify first and second boundary and topographical information of the first and second physical locations, to map the first and second boundary and topographical information of the first and second physical locations to a virtual gaming space, to capture first and second position and orientation information for the first and second players, to map the first and second position and orientation information to the virtual gaming space, to generate first and second virtual players corresponding to the first and second players, and to transmit to first goggles information representative of the second virtual player for display superimposed onto a transparent viewing apparatus for viewing of the virtual gaming space. Additional embodiments are disclosed.

A gamified application is provided for users to feed animated virtual characters with images of real-world food items. The images fed to the virtual characters are to be uploaded to a data store in a cloud environment, for use in training a custom machine learning model. A server in the cloud environment receives a photo of a food item fed to a virtual character in an augmented reality environment in the gamified application executing on a user device, invokes the custom machine learning model to generate classification information for the photo, sends the classification information to the user device for verification by a user, and stores the verified information to the data store used for periodically training the machine learning model. Over time, the data store would include a large volume of food images with label data verified by a large number of users.