Emotive Lighting Controllers for Wagering Game Synchronization
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Solution Overview
Problem
Wagering game systems face challenges in effectively controlling and presenting lighting content, particularly in large and sophisticated environments, where existing technologies lack robust fault recovery and synchronization mechanisms for coordinated media shows across multiple lighting devices.
Innovation Solution
The implementation of emotive lighting controllers (ELCs) that manage lighting effects through a networked system, allowing for fault recovery by maintaining state information and synchronizing media transitions across distributed lighting components, ensuring seamless presentation of lighting effects even if a host ELC becomes unavailable.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Adaptability or versatility
If multiple lighting devices are coordinated across a networked system, then the entertainment value and player experience are enhanced, but the system complexity and difficulty of synchronization increase
Solution Approach 1:
The system divides the lighting control function into separate emotive lighting controllers (ELCs), each responsible for specific lighting devices. This segmentation allows independent control of lighting groups while maintaining overall coordination through network communication, reducing the complexity of centralized control for large-scale installations.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent introduces ELCs as intermediary devices between the wagering game system and the lighting devices. These ELCs receive commands from the game system and translate them into appropriate lighting effects, acting as a buffer that simplifies the interface between gaming logic and lighting control while enabling sophisticated coordinated displays.
2Adaptability or versatility
If lighting effects are used to enhance player experience, then entertainment value increases, but the reliability of continuous operation decreases due to potential host ELC failures
Solution Approach 1:
The system performs preliminary actions by having backup ELCs maintain standby readiness and pre-load synchronization information before failures occur. When a host ELC fails, the backup ELC can immediately take over and resume lighting presentations without interruption, ensuring continuous operation and maintaining player experience.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent implements fault tolerance by having backup ELCs that are prepared in advance to compensate for potential host ELC failures. This cushioning approach ensures that if a failure occurs, the system can seamlessly transition to backup control, maintaining lighting effects and preventing operational interruptions that would degrade player experience.
3Reliability
If fault recovery mechanisms are implemented, then system reliability improves, but the device complexity and information management requirements increase
Solution Approach 1:
The backup ELCs maintain copies of the synchronization information and state data that the host ELC uses to control lighting devices. This copying approach allows rapid failover because the backup controller already possesses the necessary information to resume control without requiring complex real-time data synchronization or reconstruction mechanisms.
Solution Approach 2:
The ELCs are designed with multi-functionality, serving both as primary controllers and potential backup controllers. Each ELC can operate independently to control lighting devices, and any ELC can assume the host role based on operational needs. This universal capability simplifies fault recovery by eliminating the need for specialized backup hardware or complex role-management protocols.
Data Source
AI summary
In some embodiments, a method includes detecting, by the first emotive lighting controller, the wagering game event for which to present the coordinated media show. The method can include executing, by the first emotive lighting controller, an instruction script identifying a first group of media effects for the coordinated media show, and in response to executing the instruction script, causing presentation of the first group of media effects by at least one media device connected, via a network, to the first emotive lighting controller. The method can include detecting a synchronization trigger associated with the coordinated media show, and in response to the synchronization trigger, transmitting a synchronization marker to at least a second emotive lighting controller in the network, wherein the synchronization marker causes the second emotive lighting controller to transition to a second group of media effects for the coordinated media show.