Above: Amazon's new phone will, of course, have games.
Nintendo isn’t the only company doing 3D portable gaming anymore.
Amazon introduced its new Fire Phone today, which is its long-awaited smart device capable of displaying a 3D-like image. Alongside the Fire Phone, Amazon chief executive officer Jeff Bezos also showed off a mobile game called Angry Tofu that developer HotGen reworked for the new handset. This game has players guiding a piece of mashed soybeans around levels to collect items and rescue a character called Fortune Kitty. The game debuted previously on iOS as To-Fu: The Trials of Chi, but it’s a bit different on the Fire.
While To-Fu and Angry Tofu are essentially the same, players on the Fire Phone can move their head around and tilt the device to get a different look at the levels. This is because the Fire Phone has four built-in front-facing cameras that track your head and eye movement. The game can then change the perspective based on where you are looking from to create a 3D-like effect. This means that developers could create 3D games where you’ll need to look around obstacles to find something important.
Watching Jeff Bezos play Angry Tofu and rescue Fortune Kitty made my day. #AmazonEvent http://t.co/5nU0jpIFU2—
BraveNewBookshelves (@BraveNewBks) June 18, 2014
“The idea of Angry Tofu delights me,” said Bezos during his presentation.
The Fire Phone’s technology is fundamentally different technology than Nintendo’s 3DS, which requires gamers to keep their eyes in a fixed “sweet spot.” That’s because that handheld shoots out two different images intended for the left and right eyes into an area that is always a few inches away from the screen.
Amazon’s Fire Phone doesn’t have the same limitation. You can move your head anywhere, and the image will adjust dynamically to fit your perspective.
So far, Bezos only showed this working with one game, and we’ve reached out to ask if other games will support this feature when the phone debuts July 25.
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