MSI’s lead gaming notebook to ship with eye tracking hardware!
The MSI GT72 Dominator Pro Tobii will be the first consumer gaming notebook with integrated eye tracking hardware technology, brought to you in conjunction by none other than Tobii, the leader in eye-tracking technology. Find out more about how it can improve gaming experiences.
The MSI GT72 Dominator Pro now integrated with Tobii eye tracking hardware.
Back in June in Computex 2015, MSI unveiled a refresh of its famous 17-inch gaming machine – the GT72 – with updated gaming hardware such as incorporating NVIDIA’s GeForce GTX 980M and NVIDIA’s G-Sync for notebooks. At the same time, they were showing off demos of another variant of this notebook with eye tracking hardware capabilities. It was however just a prototype and as with many such demos, some may not see the light of day thereafter.
However at CES Unveiled 2016 event, we were proven wrong and the MSI GT72 Dominator Pro Tobii will be the first consumer gaming notebook with integrated eye tracking hardware technology. Brought to you in conjunction by none other than Tobii, the leader in eye-tracking technology, you would have heard about them in our older reports where Tobii Gaze was used to navigate through Windows 8 machines, and then in 2014 where they first showed off Tobii EyeX input device sensor bar, which is now available in retail and works well with Windows Hello for biometric bases sign-in option.
As can be seen in the photo above, the MSI GT72 Dominator Pro Tobii manages to integrate the stand-alone Tobii EyeX controller sensor bar just below the notebook’s screen. However this hardware capability is only as good as the games that support it and we’re glad to hear that the gaming community recognizes its advantages and will see suitable support in due time. The showcase game for the new MSI machine is the soon-to-be released Ubisoft’s Assassin’s Creed Syndicate that comes built-in with extensive eye-tracking support – an advancement from the earlier installment, Assassin’s Creed Rogue, which first came with basic eye tracking support. Yet another famous game series, Tom Clancy’s The Division, will also receive eye tracking input device enhancement.
A demonstrator showed off how Tobii's eye tracking hardware enhances game play.
You can very quickly use your eyes to pick the focus area of choice while your game controller can execute the action of accepting the chosen point of interest. It helps speed up the little things to improve your game pace and game experience - this is akin to not wanting to go back to a non-touchscreen notebook once you're used to the idea of a touchscreen.
The point of using eye-tracking hardware isn’t about replacing existing input device(s) of choice, but to augment them and improve your gaming experience. In the example of Assassin’s Creed Syndicate, you can very quickly use your eyes to pick the focus area of choice while your game controller can execute the action of accepting the chosen point of interest and carry on with the chosen path. This is better as opposed to swivelling your character around towards the direction of focus point before executing that path; sometimes you might be indecisive and you might actually go back and forth the available focus points, thus wasting time and effort. With the eye tracker sensor bar, selecting points of interest is as simple as just looking at it.
It might not sound like much, but it’s one of those enhancements that will steadily improve the gaming experience and open up new game experience and possibilities in time to come.
Don’t forget, this upcoming MSI GT72 Dominator Pro Tobii will also play friendly with Windows Hello for easy login authentication, in addition to improving your gameplay experience. Pricing and availability details to be made known soon.
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