Andrew Rogers
BBC Newsbeat
BBC
Racers, start your engines, and may the best smell, win!
Modern video games look and sound more realistic than they ever have.
But there’s one sense developers have yet to exploit – smell.
Imagine playing as Mario, pirouetting through the Mushroom Kingdom as a waft of a Fire Flower power-up hits you.
Or dropping into a hallway in the Last of Us crawling with Clickers – the deadly, stalking enemies mutated by an extinction-level fungal pandemic.
James, a member of the Nuneaton Nitros esports team, says he’s curious about some of those weird aromas.
“I could definitely say I’ve wanted to smell things in Call of Duty”, says James, who also wonders about the whiff of aliens in Warhammer: Space Marine 2.
But he does admit they’re likely to be “pretty grim”.
Gamers like him are currently being used to answer a question – can smelling a game make it more immersive, and make you better at playing it?
The Legend of Smell-da
That’s what researchers demoing experimental tech at Warwick University’s Festival of Innovation are hoping to find out.
They’ve developed a custom-made headset that delivers tiny doses of smell pumped through a tube and dispersed via a fan in front of the player.
Developed in conjunction with Hollywood Gaming, it uses bottles of essential oils to replicate a range of different aromas.
BBC Newsbeat played arcade classic Daytona Racing on the demo rig.
When we tried it out the the sickly smell of petrol wafted in front of our noses while racing around the track.
Hit the brakes, and you’re suddenly getting a blast of plasticky rubber. You also get the faint scent of “new car smell” while you’re playing.
As anyone who’s ever had a wet dog in their house will know, it’s not easy to get rid of a smell once it’s there.
According to the researchers behind the project, the real challenge is quickly switching between scents as a game progresses.
That can be especially tricky if you’re facing a sudden transition between two contrasting scenes such as a flashback from a post-apocalyptic scene to a pre-doomsday memory.
Previous technologies, like the infamous smell-o-vision, have struggled with this issue but the researchers believe their “micro-dosing” method will overcome it.
But is there a point to all of this?
Some smells you’ll recognise, but maybe not want to sniff
Prof Alan Chalmers, of Warwick University, tells Newsbeat the tech could be especially useful for simulations, allowing trainee pilots to use all of their senses.
“We’re trying to create environments that are as close to reality as we can,” he says.
“Smell is a key part of it,” he says.
He says using gamers to test this out works well because “there’s no shortage of volunteers who want to do it”.
But he also says he can see potential used in consumer games, too, especially with the use of artificial smells to represent fantasy worlds.
“People want more immersive experiences.”
Sense check
Big gaming companies are already sniffing out new ways to make games more immersive.
At this year’s CES tech showcase in Las Vegas, Sony showed off its Future Immersive Entertainment Concept – a room with screens on every surface creating a 360-degree view.
The PlayStation maker said the experience included smells being pumped in to match the game being played.
Last year also saw the launch of the GameScent, a box designed to sit next to gaming PCs or consoles and release bursts of smell.
Its makers claim it uses AI to work out what smells to release and when to unleash them – including a metallic gunfire aroma, or flowers in a forest.
It’s been marketed as a consumer product, but is still pretty niche tech.
And more broadly there are questions over how much gamers care about making worlds more realistic and immersive.
While more Virtual Reality games and headsets are being developed, they’re still far from the main way people play games, and Sony has been criticised for neglecting software support for its own VR2 headset.
The popularity of lower-spec machines like Nintendo’s Switch also show it’s not always the most realistic graphics that sell games.
Up, up, down, down, left, right, left, right, B, A, sniff
Shoubna says the smells helped to make the game more immersive
But what’s the verdict from gamers?
When Newsbeat speaks to some of the volunteers from the esports course at North Warwickshire and South Leicestershire College, the reaction is generally positive.
Esports lecturer Shoubna Naika-Taylor says it does make games seem more realistic.
“I think it’s interesting and really immersive, and would work with a lot of games,” she says.
“It’s a really cool piece of technology.”
Student Juris Kozirev says he couldn’t always work out what the smells were supposed to be. The motor oil smell could have been the smell of flowers, he says.
And instead of feeling like he was in a high-adrenaline race, he also says the smells actually make him feel more relaxed.
“You don’t feel like being competitive, you just feel calm.
“It’s there, you’re not too bothered, but you can definitely smell it.”
Listen to Newsbeat live at 12:45 and 17:45 weekdays – or listen back here.
