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Excited about the new Apple TV?

Discussion in 'General Discussion' started by imaginaryhuman, Sep 4, 2015.

  1. imaginaryhuman

    imaginaryhuman

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    So next week it sounds like Apple is going to launch a new Apple TV box/upgrade... with a likely app store. New platform, new outlet for games, big screen display, probably a chipset like A8 or A9 (far superior to the likes of Ouya etc)? Likely with siri voice controls and some kind of touch controller maybe? I wonder if it'll have any kind of console-style game controller.... either way, seems like this will compete with all the other micro consoles right off the bat? So, essentially, a new games console with a $149 price tag? Could be interesting.
     
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  2. macdude2

    macdude2

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    I'm stoked! Definitely wish I had an app ready for the store when it opens, but I'll probably be a few months behind unfortunately. Definitely wondering what the performance will look like. If the A9 is twice as powerful as the A8, games could actually be pretty intensive – especially considering the screen will only be 1080p. Gotta wonder what the controller is going to look like though, if I does't have any physical joystick (which I assume it won't) I don't really know what the advantage other than physical screen size the Apple TV will have in comparison to the other iDevices...
     
  3. imaginaryhuman

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    HD 1080p is about 2/3rds (a bit less) the data of a 2048x1536 screen, so yah, some advantage to that - 35% boost.

    I also wish now I had something ready to go since scarcity on any new platform is a major boost to early sales.

    I assume it won't have a game controller as such, unless they might surprise us, probably more of a touchy-feely screen thingy or something? Might be hard to envisage how to actually control fast-action games without some kind of decent buttons etc.
     
  4. orb

    orb

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    There's no real information on the controller, other than it's black. Useful!

    iOS has support for generic Bluetooth controllers though, so it should work out of the box with a standard PS3 gamepad. Not sure if there is any button count we can rely on, but hopefully the stock controller has somewhat more than current ATVs. If it's like the existing Apple Remote there won't be many buttons to spare, since at least one will be for the system menu. The old remote has 7 buttons, including directional ones (and a design that makes it terrible as a game controller).

    Apple seem intent on pushing games really hard now, so it might be a nice device to develop for. They even started a Twitter account for games! Plus the whole actually selling the devices outside the US, rather than dragging their feet like Amazon did with FireTV.
     
  5. RichardKain

    RichardKain

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    It would be nice to see them come out with a more dedicated gaming controller. But baby-steps, I suppose. And having a remote that is slightly more capable is a welcome addition. We will see if anyone is willing to design games specifically for that remote.

    As it is, an App-Store for the AppleTV, as well as a more robust SDK, are definitely a step in the right direction.
     
  6. imaginaryhuman

    imaginaryhuman

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    The one big thing of the tablets/phones is the touch controller interface which has allowed many types of games to be successful, but imagine trying to play games on a 'tv remote' ... really bad... a joke really.... they MUST address that if they want the platform to be succesful with anything other than offering 'applications'. And to expect people to just go to third parties to get a controller, seems like an inconvenience... they should really commit to it being a console and have their own controller.
     
    Last edited: Sep 5, 2015
  7. greggtwep16

    greggtwep16

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    I'm definitely excited but like everyone else am curious about the "touch controller" and wondering if there will also be a game controller. The touch controller will be better than just a TV remote that every other micro console has, and perhaps even open the platform up to supporting normal IOS apps easier (similar to how the fire tv tried to have normal phone apps "just work" even though it didn't go to well) but we'll have to see since until next Wednesday there is just rumors.

    Also curious to see if the API the touch remote uses is the same as normal IOS or if it is more mouse like (guessing it will be since its a separate device).
     
  8. Ferazel

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    I don't think the new AppleTV will have an A9 processor. It is heavily rumored to have an A8. However, I'd love to be wrong (at least an A8X would be nice). The good news is that the A8 supports the current full feature set of Metal, and supports ASTC texture support!

    I don't think Apple is going to seriously invest in top of the line gaming controller. Even if gaming is hugely successful on the platform is targeted to home theater owners first, gamers probably a distance third or fourth market for the product. I think it's going to use a modified interface of the existing AppleTV remote.

    If I had to guess, I would peg the remote/controller looking as follows:
    I'm thinking a smaller Wii-esque controller. Instead of a D pad it would have a touch sensitive scroll wheel with embedded directions on it. You could navigate tapping the scroll pad or ala iPod classic or Apple Watch, with rotational movement on the touch area. The center of the touchpad would also acts as a button. I'm not sure if the center would be a physical button or if the entire area would function like a small version of a touch pad on a MacBook Pro. There are two input buttons and a microphone for Siri (which I imagine by tapping and holding the center/select button) similar to iOS's home button. It will most likely communicate via bluetooth and be useable in vertical for home theater, horizontal for gaming. There is an embedded gyroscope for motion sense/tilt input gameplay.

    Note: I am not claiming to have inside information, just hypothesizing a bit to get in on the fun. :)

    Edit: Wasn't even close.
     
    Last edited: Sep 9, 2015
  9. Not_Sure

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    IDK, it's either a console or it's not. These "kinda-sorta" half consoles never pan out as a viable market for games.
     
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  10. elmar1028

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    They're likely to start selling a gamepad controller. I am not sure if playing games on a small controller would be comfortable...
     
  11. Moonjump

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    Mobile phones were not a big market for games until the iOS App Store. This will be much more visible than the Android micro consoles.
     
  12. Not_Sure

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    Hopefully.
     
  13. theANMATOR2b

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    The controller conversation sounds kind of torturous to the end users - which ever direction they decide.

    A thought - maybe the huge installed customer base already has the controllers they need, all mobile apple devices in existance. Iphone, ipad, iwatch etc.
    This also sounds torturous but conceptually could be the controller solution.
     
  14. imaginaryhuman

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    Yah before iphone etc had an app store people would maybe not have thought of it as being dominated by games but not its heavily a gaming platform. Same thing will happen with apps on appletv, it's natural... provided the input device doesn't suck for gaming. If it doesn't suck, it wont be long before the appletv app store is drowned out with thousands of games. Its kind of too big of an opportunity for Apple to pass up - games on the tv - console territory - I wish they would just sort of turn appletv into a microconsole which is what it really will be, and really integrate the control scheme with not just past audience but future audience in mind, ie people wanting to play lots of games for extended periods of time. And heavens forbid games will all be 99 cents. lol
     
  15. Tiny-Tree

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    will unity ads work on apple tv?
     
  16. imaginaryhuman

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    Not much point asking unity questions at this point is there? They havent said anything about supporting it yet. I would bet if Apple comes out with this app store, then Unity would naturally want to be on that platform, and so anything that works within unity will probably work with it... not sure on the ad service though, but why not.
     
    Last edited: Sep 6, 2015
  17. orb

    orb

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    It's very likely that converting existing games to ATV4 is just a matter of adding an input option via the existing Game Controller framework, then setting the new target. Unity already supports this framework.
     
  18. Troy-Dawson

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    I was super-stoked when the first AppStore was announced in 2008, but that was before I got into Unity, and OpenGL ES was painful and the iPhone's prospect in 2008-2009 was none too certain.

    When the iPad was announced Apple was locking out Unity (and Flash devs) . . . I was pissed at myself for missing the AppStore gold rush but thought I could still make a great iPad app, something simple and fun like Crossy Road (nope!)

    I thought Ouya was a good idea but the hw didn't have enough oomph to do Unity dev.

    I've got an iPad Air 2 and if the TV is as good as that it's going to be a great platform.

    and yes I'm stoked! Too bad I don't have much free time now . . .
     
  19. Shushustorm

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    Sounds pretty interesting. Is there already more information on this concerning developer registration? Is this going to be included in the apple developer program? They did put iOS and OSX together lately, so that you pay once and you can develop for both platforms.
     
  20. goat

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    I would consider that they will make just about the entire iOS App Stores available to the TV/Console.
     
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  21. Shushustorm

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    But then again, wouldn't it be generating more publicity if Apple actually introduced a new store?
    Also, what about the Mac App Store? Apple TV would be pretty much more capable of what iOS devices can do, right?
    Well, we will see soon enough, I guess!
     
  22. goat

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    Publicity with indie game makers only.

    Everyone else that is in the store and successful is going to be asking well if our game or app supports that resolution and your controller can control the game then what is it that we need to add to our games to upgrade them to be worthy enough for the Apple TV / Game Console?

    The same excitement for the Ouya is the excitement here. Namely that you'll get noticed in a sparsely populated game store but the truth is with Unity and games already published on these other platforms publishing is as simply as changing the target and running some tests (and most don't do much testing).
     
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  23. imaginaryhuman

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    That's a thought.... e.g. all iPad games automatically run on the apple tv right out of the box? hmm.
     
  24. angrypenguin

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    For games which are already cross-platform with controller support this is definitely a possibility, but not when porting a touch-based game to a TV. Especially a multi-touch game.
     
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  25. greggtwep16

    greggtwep16

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    That's the biggest piece of information that I'm looking forward to on Wednesday. The remote control (touch support) certainly fuels a lot of speculation and depending on how they do it they can certainly make a good chunk of the existing catalog compatible and that would certainly give them an advantage over fire tv, nvidia sheild, etc. For whatever reason, I think games are on the back-burner of their thought process (with TV subscriptions more front and center) so I don't think we'll see anything that drastic. Time will tell if a touch remote will be a preferred control mechanism over a game controller on the platform.

    The positive side to if it's a new control scheme/API is that there will be a period of time where the number of apps will be low giving indies a chance to get noticed and compete against the bigger fish.
     
    Last edited: Sep 8, 2015
  26. goat

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    But those are few & far between & who's to say the game controller won't hand a multi-touch style pad on it?

    They're not going to just plunk out a console & then try to force their customers to pay again for titles that are on other iOS devices or to use a style of controller from other console makers although they are liable to integrate a lot of similar concepts so that people playing console games or mobile games will be comfortable using the new Apple controller. Well that, and their current game publishers wouldn't be happen with the added expense and having to try and beat other games to the Apple TV game store.

    I'm just saying that based on how the app store search engines already favor the established over noobs to the point you can hardly call them search engines. Apple will do their best to leverage the iOS for iPad and iPhones on the new Apple TV.

    What I'm curious about will Apple TV cost an extra $100 to pub to? Or will it, like the os X store be merged into the iOS pub store membership fees? Expect publishing apps to os X and iOS to merge like these Windows 10 Universal apps, which I really like.
     
  27. goat

    goat

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    I hope they announce a Skylake Mac Mini! os X, Windows 10, & Linux all on one machine and all eventually Vulkan / Direct X 12 compatible. Magnetic media HDs though have had it. Too slow now.
     
  28. Grafos

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    A TV console with nothing new about it. Am I supposed to get excited because Apple is making it? Hardly a reason for me. We are at at the dawn of Augmented/Virtual Reality technologies but Appple is making a TV console! Pulease!

    Nevertheless, if it gets hyped to the max and people buy it, I will have to develop for it I guess
     
  29. angrypenguin

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    Pretty much.
    Hmm...

    Look how much of a splash Apple made when they made a portable music player. They irrevocably changed the music industry.

    Then look at how much of a splash they made when they entered the phone market. And then tablet/slate computers.

    I'm not saying that they'll necessarily have a similar level of impact with everything they touch - they don't. But Apple as a tech company approach things differently enough to other tech companies, and have a high enough strike rate, that it's interesting to see both what they do next and, more importantly, how non-techy people react to it.
     
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  30. greggtwep16

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    The touch screen on the remote control is a first as far as I know so it will not be a total copycat product. However, it remains to be seen if that will actually be that viable for games due to size and other factors we'll have to wait and see. If it's not viable for games and they just go the normal game controller route then from a gaming perspective it will be just another me too product in the micro console space and I'd agree not that exciting. If that touchscreen controller works well for mobile type games I'm pretty excited for the possibilities that could create.
     
  31. Grafos

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    I am not saying they won't make a splash this time around, none can deny their track record. All I'm saying is that it does not excite me as a product.

    The Steam Controller had one in the original designs but then they ditched it.
    A touch controller on a TV console is certainly not enough to excite me, I even bought a gamepad for my phone :)
     
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  32. nipoco

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    Apple's products usually get adapted by a wide audience, which leads to a huge market for developers. VR on the other hand has still to prove that it is more than a niche product for enthusiasts.

    That said, I'm personally not interested in playing underwhelming iAP games on my TV.
     
  33. goat

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    I'm installing Android Mame or something like that on my Android tablet. It'd be cool on TV too but I'd probably need the Amazon Fire or something like the Chrome Stick.
     
  34. Shushustorm

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    Think about Leap Motion for controlling touch apps on a TV.
    Could it do the trick?
     
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  35. ostrich160

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    Doesnt amazon already so all this, with their fire thing
     
  36. imaginaryhuman

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    So I wonder if they will expect people to own an ipod/ipad/iphone to use as a controller, with some kind `appletv app` on it?

    And on another note.. I'm not sure it'd make sense to just allow existing phone/pad apps to work right away on the new platform, because that means a mostly `mobile` style of game trying to run on a very much bigger screen, which doesn't really gel well in many cases. Similar to the complaints people had about Ouya developers trying to take `phone` games and make them console games. Ideally a `proper` appletv game would be designed for the big screen and be more of a console-game experience. One report I saw notes that the Apple A8X chip is about the same graphics horsepower as a playstation 3, and a little under an xbox 360.. which isn't too shabby, and takes it out of the realm of just casual gaming.
     
    Last edited: Sep 8, 2015
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  37. RichardKain

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    Casual gaming being tied to hardware power is misleading. The "style" or focus of a game is not about how much power the hardware has, but is most closely tied to the time commitment that the developer demands of the player. A casual game does not require as much of an attention span, while a more intensive title would insist on more time and attention being paid.
     
  38. goat

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    I disagree, it means that casual games need to be made to change the scope of the 'peripheral vision' of the TV viewport compared to say, an iPhone viewport, mostly.
     
  39. Shushustorm

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    While I don't think the power behind hardware makes it a better or worse target for casual gaming, I do think Apple TV wouldn't really make sense with most iOS titles because they are meant to be played when you just have that 5 minutes of spare time while waiting for a bus, for example. The concepts of most popular iOS titles are hilariously optimized towards exactly that kind of usage. They will, for example, restrict your playing time to 5 - 15 minutes. After that, either you won't really have any more progress due to locked skills or something similar or you will even be completely locked from playing.
    That being said, when playing on a console, I'm pretty sure the average user wants to play for longer than that.

    I've got another fun idea with Leap Motion: You could use your thumb and your index finger of one hand and shape them to a corner, which will be the corner where the imaginary "touch display" starts and then you can touch from there onwards using your other hand.
    While this might be a fun thing, I'm pretty sure people would be sick of it very quickly, though, because it's "exhausting".
     
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  40. goat

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    Thanks true I neglected the drop in another 0.99 cents to play 15 minutes in most of those games.
     
  41. imaginaryhuman

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    Thats kind of what I meant really... a mobile audience is not the same kind of game player with the same amount of time as someone willing to sit in front of the tv for an hour. Not that it's hardware related as such. Many touch-interface games also probably wouldn't work. It's going to be really interested to see what the user interface for this thing will be, it can define so much about the platform and what kind of games it can support.
     
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  42. imaginaryhuman

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    Wohoo ... well... there we have it..... small touch/swipe pad, accelerometer, giroscope.... kind of like an iphone without a screen, in terms of the user interface/games potential. Maybe harder to do `onscreen` control pads?
     
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  43. RichardKain

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    We're getting a more TV-centric version of the iOS, that's good. Should make it a little easier to customize apps for TV resolutions.

    The "remote" is going to be a bit of a mixed bag. It has some very nice features, but it is definitely fairly far from a more traditional game pad. Still not seeing a traditional game controller from Apple. They did enable third-party controller support in iOS a few versions ago, and I think that support will likely be included in TVos. But no official Apple controller. As usual, the games that work best on the Apple TV will be the ones designed with this new remote in mind. There's potential here, to be sure, but it will limit the ease with which third parties can port their games.

    And all the predictions about a game-friendly app store are coming to pass. That is a big deal, and a welcome change. It should dramatically improve the Apple TV's competitive edge in the growing market for set-top micro boxes. (such as the FireTV, Chrome Stick, etc..) All in all, a fairly nice development. I look forward to seeing how this shapes up. I will also be firing up my Mac Mini to see about updating my copy of XCode.
     
  44. imaginaryhuman

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    Seems you can use iphone or ipod as a controller, too. And maybe with the new phone, utilize force touch (3d touch) to `mean something`.

    Still, would've been nice to see a proper game controller, maybe at least a dpad or something similar to the old nintendo controller? but maybe people don't like that style.

    It wont be long before there are thousands of games on the Apple TV, more than likely any other platform or console, including many big-money companies making millions.
     
    Last edited: Sep 9, 2015
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  45. Shushustorm

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    Well, there we go. It’s using actual touch surfaces on the Apple TV remote control or using iPhone/iPod touch. Also, tvOS, huh? When is it going to be supported by Unity? Has Unity already worked on this? Crossy Roads announced their TV version and they used Unity for development, right?

    While they said apps could be used cross-platform, I’m not really sure about the store they were talking about. Did I miss this? Is it actually a new store different from the iOS and Mac App Stores?

    (Sort of) Off-Topic, but does anyone think 3D Touch will be coming to Unity soon?

    Yes, onscreen control pads. Basically all the UI will be broken, won't it?

    I don't even see that as a problem, but making UI extremely hard to work with is just not very pleasant.
     
  46. goat

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    I think with this and that Crossy Roads was featured you can see Apple intends to bring gaming to the living room and not so much compete with the consoles but have people that have had no interest in gaming on TVs, play games on TV. Convenient when you consider they sell music, books, and videos too.

    I agree with imaginaryhuman & others though that game players expecting to be hit up every 15 minutes for more cash isn't going to lend itself well to TV gaming so a lot of games are going to have to adjust their play style I think.
     
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  47. RichardKain

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    You could do that already. Not saying it's a bad idea. Handled properly using smart-devices as controllers is a good way to handle some games. But it would likewise not be best for every game. I refuse to use a smart-device as a virtual gamepad. A touch interface is all well and good, but it isn't a proper substitute for a controller. If I was going to go that route, it would be for a game where a touch interface makes sense.
     
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  48. imaginaryhuman

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    Ok Unity, how long before a build target? :-D
     
  49. Ostwind

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    Roadmap RSS feed has 3D touch and new ATV added to development but not to any fixed version
     
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  50. Shushustorm

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    Yes, touch interface makes sense especially when you see what you're interacting with on the touch device itself or maybe when the interaction is very simplistic like playing crossy road on the Apple TV remote control. But when interaction gets more complex, I don't really see how you would do that.