Sony Corporation

Sony Computer Entertainment Inc.

Sony Interactive Entertainment Inc.

Hiromasa Ohkubo

Hidehiko Morisada

Takayuki Shinohara

Tatsuya Suzuki

Takashi Umeda

Toshiya Ikenaga

Nobuaki Tanaka

Yasuhiro Watari

Eiji Yamada

Takahiro Moriyama

Toshiharu Sayano

Ryota Akao

Akitsugu Komiyama

Kensaku Sanda

Methods and apparatus provide for executing an application program to control a game based on gameplay of a game player; receiving instructions from the game player and forwarding the instructions for controlling the game in order to manipulate the execution of the application program and to affect the game; setting respective viewpoints, from among a plurality of viewpoints, serving as bases for generating respective watching screens for viewing the game during gameplay of the game player, which viewpoints are offered to respective watching players, among a plurality of watching players, different from the game player; and deleting the at least one of the plurality of viewpoints to be the one of the respective positions of the one of the one or more objects when the one of the one or more objects disappears from view due to the gameplay of the game player.

Game system, game controlling method, and game controlling program

Methods and apparatus for controlling a game include: controlling a game based on gameplay of a game player; receiving instructions from the game player and forwarding the instructions for controlling the game; and setting respective viewpoints, from among a plurality of viewpoints, serving as bases for generating respective watching screens for viewing the game offered to respective watching players, among a plurality of watching players, different from the game player, where at least one of: (i) the setting includes employing watching player conditions regarding each of the plurality of watching players for each of the plurality of viewpoints; and (ii) the setting includes employing one or more predetermined conditions in setting one or more of the respective viewpoints.

In a game system, a game managing server includes: a game controlling unit that controls a game; a game player instruction receiving unit that receives an instruction from a game player and forwards the instruction to the game controlling unit; and a watching point setting unit that sets a viewpoint position for generating a watching screen for viewing the game, the watching screen being offered to a plurality of watching players different from the game player.

In a cloud computing system having a plurality of computational resources that are connected via a network, a table display section displays, on a terminal used by a user using the cloud computing system, a table showing a list of thumbnail movies of execution screens of applications that can be provided on arbitrary dates and times to the user, the table assigning the thumbnail movies to specified dates and times. A movie selection acceptance section acquires the user's selection from the thumbnail movies shown in the table. An application provision part provides an application, associated with the thumbnail movie selected by the user, to the user.

Cloud computing system and application provision method

Disclosed herein is an application provision method in a client-server type system providing a game application to a plurality of users via a network. The method causes a computational resource of a server to perform the steps of: providing, to a first user using a client terminal connected to the server, a game application selected by the first user; providing, to a second user specified by the first user, the game application provided to the first user after the game application is ended by the first user; and notifying achievement levels of the first and second users to the client terminals of the first and second users after the game application is ended by the second user.

Application provision server and application provision method

A location error determination unit determines, prior to displaying on a display device stereoscopic images including a parallax image for the left eye and a parallax image for the right eye of a subject, whether the parallax image for the left eye and the parallax image for the right eye are stereoscopic images that can be located as three-dimensional images. An error communicating unit communicates an error when it is determined that that the parallax image for the left eye and the parallax image for the right eye cannot be located as stereoscopic images or when it is determined that the range of parallax between the parallax image for the left eye and the parallax image for the right eye is not accommodated within the predetermined parallax range.

Image processing device and image processing method

A decoding execution unit decodes image data encoded with a resolution higher than that of a display device. A display buffer stores image data decoded by the decoding execution unit. A standby buffer stores image data decoded by the decoding execution unit while the image data stored in the display buffer is being displayed. A reduced image buffer stores image data produced by reducing the entirety of the image data. An image display control unit switches from the image data stored in the display buffer to the image data stored in the standby buffer if the decoding of the image data by the decoding execution unit is completed, and enlarges the image in the reduced image buffer and stores the enlarged image in the display buffer if the decoding of the image data by the decoding execution unit is not completed.

Image processing device and image processing method for displaying high resolution images

A number-of-pixel acquisition unit acquires the number of pixels of the image data stored in a storage device. An aspect ratio acquisition unit acquires the aspect ratio of the image data. A display control unit displays a list of a plurality of thumbnail images of the image data on a display device. Herein, the display control unit displays a thumbnail of image data having more pixels as a larger thumbnail than that of image data having less pixels, while keeping the aspect ratio of the image data.

Image display apparatus and image display method

A first display control unit configured to display in a first display region a list of thumbnail images of image data on a display device. A direction receiving unit configured to acquire a selection by a user for the image data. A second display control unit configured to display a list of one or more thumbnail images of image data that have been selected by the user in a second display region, which is displayed simultaneously with but in a different region from the first display region on the display device where the thumbnail images to be displayed by the first display control unit are displayed. Herein, the first display control unit acquires the selection by the user from the direction receiving unit and displays, on the display device, the one or more thumbnail images of the image data that have been selected by the user and thumbnail images of the image data that have not been selected by the user, in different display modes.

Image processing apparatus and image processing method

In an image display apparatus, an image classification unit generates one or more of image groups by classifying image data to which attribution information is added based on the attribute information. A display control unit displays, on a display device, a list of a plurality of thumbnail images of the image data included in each of the image groups generated by the image classification unit, in a manner in which the plurality of thumbnail images are piled up for every image group. Herein, the display control unit acquires the predetermined number of sheets of image data from the selected image group to display, on the display device, the image data as a background image in which the image data are arranged.

Growing community of inventors

Kanagawa, Japan

Hiromasa Ohkubo