WO2007105534A1

WO2007105534A1 - Game device

Info

Publication number: WO2007105534A1
Application number: PCT/JP2007/054278
Authority: WO
Inventors: Tetsuro Itami; Yukie Yamazaki
Original assignee: Konami Digital Entertainment Co., Ltd.
Priority date: 2006-03-10
Filing date: 2007-03-06
Publication date: 2007-09-20
Also published as: TW200734021A; JP2007236824A

Abstract

Provided is a game device enabling a user to play a game based on a music reproduction signal and enjoy a simple play even during a soundless state. The game device (1) includes: a rhythm creation unit (31b) for permitting the user, during the soundless state, to operate an operation input unit (6) for a predetermined time and creating a rhythm based on a pulse signal generated by the input operation; and a melody creation unit (31c) for creating a melody signal by combining sound data (40) stored in advance with the rhythm created by the rhythm creation unit (31b) so that the created melody signal is outputted from predetermined sound output units (5, 20).

Description

Specification

game machine

Technical field

The present invention relates to a game machine used by being connected to a music playback device.

Background art

[0002] In the case of a game machine connected to a music playback device such as a portable audio player and playing a game based on the music playback signal of the music playback device, when music is not played back, that is, silence In the state, games based on music playback signals cannot be played. Even in this silent state, there is no game machine that provides the user with a game different from the game based on the music playback signal. Note that there is already known a game machine that enters a power saving mode when it is not operated for a predetermined time (see, for example, Patent Document 1).

Patent Document 1: Japanese Unexamined Patent Application Publication No. 2003-144751

Disclosure of the invention

Problems to be solved by the invention

[0003] Therefore, an object of the present invention is to provide a game machine in which a game based on a music playback signal is played, and which can enjoy simple play even in a silent state.

Means for solving the problem

[0004] The game machine of the present invention receives an input operation by a user, generates an pulse input signal in response to the input operation, and a signal input unit for capturing a music playback signal output from the music playback device A sound output unit that outputs a predetermined sound signal to the outside, a game control unit that analyzes the captured music reproduction signal and controls a game based on the analysis, and sound data relating to at least one sound The sound data storage unit to be stored and the music playback device power When the music playback signal is not continuously output for a predetermined time, it is determined that there is a silence state, and the process executed in the silence state is executed. A silent time processing unit for controlling, and the silent time processing unit permits a user to perform an input operation to the operation input unit for a predetermined time and based on the pulse signal generated by the input operation. And rhythm creation unit that creates a beam, and the sound data stored in the sound data storage unit, the Li A melody creation unit that creates a melody signal in combination with the rhythm created by the rhythm creation unit, and outputs the melody according to the created melody signal from the voice output unit. To solve.

[0005] The game machine of the present invention is a game machine in which a game is performed based on an analysis of a music playback signal, and includes a silent time processing unit that performs processing when there is no music playback signal, and a silent time processing unit The rhythm creation section and melody creation section can provide a game for creating a melody when there is no sound. In particular, in the present invention, the sound data is stored in the sound data storage unit and uses V, and the sound is used. Therefore, the user can create a melody by a simple method only by inputting a rhythm by operating the operation input unit. Can do. Therefore, it is possible to provide a game machine that can enjoy simple play even in a silent state. The silence state may be a standby state for music playback signals, or may be a state where music playback is paused. The tone and pitch of the sound data are not important. Music playback signal analysis includes tempo analysis and genre analysis.

[0006] The sound data is data relating to notes, and may be data indicating the pitch and length of at least one note. In this case, it is only necessary to set the attribute related to the note as the sound data setting. Since the created melody is reproduced by musical notes, it can be expressed musically. It can also be used for other games using notes of the sound data. The sounds of the sound data may be set so that all output sounds have the same length. As a result, the input interval to the operation input unit and the sound output interval become substantially the same, so that the storage capacity can be reduced and the processing can be simplified without impairing the input rhythm.

[0007] The game machine has a display unit for displaying a predetermined image, and the sound data storage unit stores sound data of each character in association with at least one character displayed on the display unit. The silent time processing unit causes the display unit to display any one of the at least one character in the silent state, and the melody creating unit is associated with the displayed character. The melody signal may be created by combining sound data and the rhythm.

[0008] Thereby, the user can create a completely different melody depending on the displayed character. The displayed character is, for example, a key used in a game by the game control unit. It may be a character or a character directly selected by the user.

[0009] The game machine has a microphone unit for inputting external force sound, and the silent time processing unit generates a detection signal when detecting sound input from the microphone unit; An animation control unit that controls the movement of the character so that the character displayed on the display unit performs a predetermined action when receiving a detection signal from the detection unit.

[0010] In this game machine, in the silent state, in addition to creating a melody, it is possible to provide a game in which a character reacts to an external voice.

The invention's effect

[0011] As described above, according to the game machine of the present invention, when music is played on the music playback device and the sound is silent, the user is allowed to perform an input operation to the operation input unit for a predetermined time. Then, create a rhythm based on the pulse signal generated by the input operation, create a melody by combining the sound data stored in advance and the created rhythm, and output the specified output force . As a result, it is possible to provide a game machine in which a game based on a music playback signal is performed and a simple game can be enjoyed even in a silent state.

FIG. 1 is a diagram showing a state in which a portable game machine according to one embodiment of the present invention is arranged between a portable music player and an earphone.

FIG. 2 is a block diagram showing a configuration of a control system of the game machine of FIG.

FIG. 3 is a diagram showing an image displayed on the LCD when the game machine of FIG. 1 is silent.

FIG. 4 is a diagram showing an example of sound information.

FIG. 5 is a flowchart showing a silence processing routine performed by the control unit.

FIG. 6 is a flowchart showing a melody creation processing routine.

FIG. 7 is a flowchart showing a sound reaction animation processing routine.

FIG. 8A is a diagram showing how input rhythm information is created.

FIG. 8B is a diagram showing how melody M is created.

BEST MODE FOR CARRYING OUT THE INVENTION FIG. 1 shows a portable game machine according to one embodiment of the present invention. The game machine 1 is used in combination with the portable music player 100, and includes a housing 2 and an LCD 3 as a display device attached to the front surface of the housing 2. The case 2 is provided with a line input terminal 4 and a phone terminal 5. The line input terminal 4 is connected to the line output terminal 101 of the portable music player 100 via the relay cable 102. The phone terminal 5 is connected to the earphone 103. That is, the game machine 1 of this embodiment is used by being interposed between the portable music player 100 and the audio output device to be combined therewith. The audio output device combined with the music player 100 is not limited to the earphone 103. That is, the portable music player 100 is not particularly limited as long as it can output a music reproduction signal for audio conversion to various audio output devices such as speakers and headphones. It doesn't matter. Furthermore, the music player is not limited to a portable player, and any player that plays and outputs music in home audio, television, and commercially available portable electronic games may be used.

On the side surface of the housing 2, an input button 6 is further provided as an operation input unit that receives user input operations. The input button 6 is a push button, and the user performs various selections and inputs related to the game performed on the game machine 1 by pressing the input button 6 as an input operation. A microphone 7 is provided on the back surface of the housing 2. Microphone 7 is normally off, but when it is on, it can capture external audio. The game machine 1 functions as a repeater that passes the music playback signal output from the line input terminal 4 of the music player 100 to the FF 103, and also analyzes the music playback signal output from the music player 100 and analyzes the analysis. Based on the results, it functions as a game machine that provides users with games.

FIG. 2 is a block diagram showing a configuration of a control system provided in the game machine 1. The game machine 1 has a bypass path R1 for passing an analog audio reproduction signal from a line input terminal 4 as a signal input section to a phone terminal 5 as an audio output section, and a branch path R2 that branches from the bypass path R1. And a control unit 10 for processing an audio reproduction signal captured via the branch path R2. The paths Rl and R2 are each composed of three lines, the right channel, the left channel, and the earth channel. Show.

The control unit 10 is configured as a converter unit in which a microprocessing unit (MPU) and peripheral devices necessary for the operation of the MPU, for example, a storage device 11 such as a RAM and a ROM, are combined. In addition to the input button 6, microphone 7 and LCD 3 described above, the control unit 10 is connected to a speaker unit (SP) 20 as a sound output unit for generating sound, sound effects and the like. Phone terminal 5 is also connected to the connection path to 20. When the input button 6 is pressed as an input operation, a pulse signal synchronized with the press operation is output to the control unit 10. The storage device 11 holds various programs and data necessary for realizing the present invention.

[0017] The control unit 10 provides various game functions to the user by performing processing such as displaying a game screen on the LCD 3. When the control unit 10 reads a predetermined control program from the storage device 11 and executes it, a game control unit 30 and a silent time processing unit 31 are generated as logical devices inside the control unit 10. The music playback signal input to the line input terminal 4 is sent to the game control unit 30 and the silent time processing unit 31 via the branch path R2.

[0018] When the game control unit 30 takes in the music reproduction signal, the game control unit 30 controls the game based on the music reproduction signal. The game controlled by the game control unit 30 includes, for example, a game related to the tempo analyzed by analyzing the music playback signal power tempo, and the genre analyzed by analyzing the music genre from the music playback signal. There is a game.

[0019] The silent time processing unit 31 includes a state determination unit 31a, a rhythm creation unit 31b, a melody creation unit 31c, a voice detection unit 31d, and an animation control unit 3le. The state discriminating unit 31a discriminates whether or not there is a silence state depending on the state of the music playback signal. If the music playback signal is not input from the line input terminal 4 for a predetermined time, for example, for 2 seconds, it is determined that there is no sound. When the state determination unit 31a determines that there is no sound, the rhythm creation unit 31b, the melody creation unit 31c, the voice detection unit 31d, and the animation control unit 31e provide a simple game to the user. The processing performed by each unit 31b, 31c, 31d, 31e will be described later.

An outline of the game provided by the silent time processing unit 31 will be described with reference to FIG. First, when the state determination unit 31a determines that there is a silent state, the predetermined state is displayed as the silent state screen NS. Lacta C is displayed on LCD3. The character C may be set in advance for the silence state screen NS, for example, or may be a character used in a game by the game control unit 30. Next, when a predetermined operation is performed by the user, the communication mode with the character C is set, and the melody creation play and the sound reaction play are switched between!

In the melody creation play, a melody is created according to the rhythm input by the user. The created melody is output from the speaker unit 20 or the phone terminal 5. On the LCD 3 during melody output, the character C1 singing the song and the note image are displayed. On the other hand, in the sound reaction play, the character C2 that moves in response to the sound input from the microphone 7 is displayed on the LCD3.

In the present embodiment, a plurality of characters C are prepared, and information relating to sounds used when creating a melody is associated with each character as sound information 40 shown in FIG. 11 is remembered. Thereby, the storage device 11 functions as a sound data storage unit. The sound information 40 includes a plurality of character-specific sound information 41, and the character-specific sound information 41 includes character information 42 and note information 43. The character information 42 is, for example, identification information uniquely assigned to each character. In this embodiment, five types of characters A to E are prepared.

[0023] The note information 43 is information relating to the notes associated with each character, and is waveform data indicating the pitch, tone color and length of each note. Note information also includes order information. The order information is information indicating the order of notes used when creating a melody in the melody creation play. For example, in the case of note information 43 of character A in FIG. 4, information on the pitch, tone, and length of each note “do, les, mi, fa, so, la, shi” is stored as waveform data, and in order In the information, the order from the first to the first is set in order. In this embodiment, the timbre is an electronic sound and the length is the length of an eighth note.

[0024] The number of notes indicated by the note information 43 of each character C may not be constant. For example, in this embodiment, character A has only one note associated with force character E, which is associated with eight notes.

Next, silent processing performed by the control unit 10 as the silent processing unit 31 will be described with reference to FIGS. It demonstrates according to the flowchart shown in FIG. Control unit 10 is first in step S100

It is determined whether or not there is a silent state. The method for determining whether or not there is a silent state is as described above. If it is determined that the sound is not silent, step S100 is repeated as the sound determination state. If it is determined that there is no sound, the process proceeds to step S 105 and the silence state screen NS is displayed. The silent state screen NS displays character C as described above. Hereinafter, in the present embodiment, the case where the character A shown in FIG. 4 is displayed on the silent state screen NS in the silent state will be described.

[0026] Silence state screen After displaying NS, it enters a standby state. When the music playback signal from line input terminal 4 is detected in step S110, the process proceeds to the game processing executed by game control unit 30, and the music playback signal is not detected, and the operation for specifying the communication mode is performed in step S115. If it is determined that the communication has been performed, the communication mode is started in step S120. In this embodiment, for example, when the input button 6 is pressed in the silent state, the communication mode is started.

[0027] At the start of the communication mode, the control unit 10 turns on the microphone 7.

Further, the character A in the mode for the communication mode may be displayed on the LCD 3. If there is no processing for designating communication, the process returns to step S110 and the standby state is maintained. When the communication mode is started, the control unit 10 determines in step S125 whether or not an operation for designating a melody creation process has been performed. If the operation is performed, the process proceeds to step S130 to perform melody creation processing. In this embodiment, for example, when the input button 6 is pressed, a melody creation process is performed. The melody creation process will be described later.

[0028] If there is no operation for designating the melody creation process, the process proceeds to step S135 to perform the voice response animation process. The voice response animation process will be described later. After the sound reaction animation process is displayed, the process proceeds to step S140, and it is determined whether or not it is the power to end the communication mode. In this embodiment, for example, it is determined that the communication has ended when 10 seconds have elapsed since the start of the communication mode. After completion of the melody creation process or when it is determined that the communication mode is ended, the control unit 10 proceeds to step S145, turns off the microphone 7, ends the communication mode, and returns to step S100. Communication mode May be terminated by, for example, an interrupt process by a cancel operation.

The melody creation process executed by the control unit 10 will be described with reference to the flowchart shown in FIG. 6 and FIGS. 8A and 8B. First, the control unit 10 specifies the note information 43 of the character A from the sound information 40 in step S200. Next, in step S210, acceptance of rhythm input is started, and in step S220, the pulse signal P generated by the input button 6 is captured for a predetermined time T, and the pulse signal P captured in step S230 is taken into the pulse signal P. Based on this, the input rhythm information RI is created. The input rhythm information RI indicates a rhythm pattern by a note position NP at which a note at a predetermined time T should be located. Specifically, the start of rhythm input is notified to the user via, for example, the LCD 3. After this notification, for example, the pulse signal P generated by the input button 6 is captured for 3 seconds, and the input rhythm information RI is created with the position where each pulse signal P was located as the note position NP. As a result, the control unit 10 functions as the rhythm creation unit 31b.

[0030] After creating the input rhythm information RI, the control unit 10 creates a melody M based on the input rhythm information RI in step S240. Specifically, the melody M is created by associating each note position NP of the input rhythm information RI with the notes set in the note information 43 of the character A in the first power order. As a result, the control unit 10 functions as the melody creating unit 31c. In the case of this embodiment, the note information 43 of character A is “do, les, mi, fa, so, la, shi” in order of strength, and as shown in FIG. Since NP is set, for each note position NP, as shown in Fig. 8B, 6 notes (Do, Les, Mi, Fa, So, La) from the first "do" are associated with the melody M Create The melody M created by the melody creation process is essentially a melody signal expressed electrically.

[0031] As shown in the above example, when “A” of the note information 43 of character A is used, the next time a melody is created for character A, it is used from “S” next to “L”. You may return to the first “do” or use it again from the first “do”. When the note position NP indicated by the input rhythm information RI is greater than the number of notes indicated by the note information 43, it may be used after returning to the first note. For example, since the note information 43 of the character E is only “M”, the melody M is all expressed by “M”. When melody M is created, control unit 10 changes the created melody signal of melody M to an analog signal and outputs it from speaker unit 20 in step S250. When the earphone 103 is connected, the melody number of melody M is output from the phone terminal 5 to the earphone 103. On the LCD 3 when the melody M is output, the character A in the form of V singing a song is displayed as described above. In addition to character A, a note image may be displayed. The melody output image may be stored in the storage device 11 in advance, for example.

Note that the control unit 10 stores the created melody M in association with the character A. As a result, the created melody M can be replayed. If creation of media is again selected for character A and a new melody is created, the previously created media M may be overwritten by the later created melody or all created The melodies M and M 'may be stored in association with character A.

The sound reaction animation process executed by the control unit 10 will be described according to the flowchart shown in FIG. In step S300, the control unit 10 determines whether or not an external sound is input from the microphone 7, and when the sound is input, generates a detection signal in step S310. Thereby, the control unit 10 functions as a voice detection unit. When the detection signal is generated, the control unit 10 proceeds to step S320 and displays the sound reaction animation on the LCD 3. Specifically, the character A on the silent screen NS is displayed, for example, by shifting it vertically by 2 dots (for example, 0.2 seconds), and displaying an animation that makes the character A move rapidly.

Accordingly, the control unit 10 functions as an animation control unit. The number of dots shifted by the detection signal may be changed. As a result, for example, it is possible to express an animation in which the magnitude of movement changes according to the volume of the sound. After displaying the sound response animation, or if no sound is input from the microphone 7, the sound reaction animation process is terminated.

The present invention can be implemented in various forms without being limited to the above form.

For example, when a music playback signal is received in the silence state of this embodiment, the game process is performed. The silence state is a so-called standby state, but the silence state may be a state in which a music playback signal is not accepted. In addition, the order of notes used when creating a melody may be used randomly without setting the order information. The note information 43 may include chords as well as single notes. The note in this form is an eighth note. Not limited to quarter notes or 16th notes. One piece of sound information 41 may be associated with all characters C. The movement of the sound reaction animation is not limited to vertical movement, but may be instantaneous movement.

Claims

The scope of the claims

[1] An operation input unit that accepts an input operation by a user and generates a noise signal in response to the input operation;

A signal input unit that captures a music playback signal output from a music playback device, an audio output unit that outputs a predetermined audio signal to the outside,

A game control unit that analyzes the captured music playback signal and controls a game based on the analysis;

A sound data storage unit for storing sound data relating to at least one sound;

When the music playback signal is not continuously output for a predetermined time, it is determined that the music playback device is in a silent state, and a silent processing unit that controls processing executed in the silent state;

With

The silent time processing unit

An input operation to the operation input unit is permitted to the user for a predetermined time, and a rhythm generation unit that generates a rhythm based on the pulse signal generated by the input operation, and a sound data storage unit A melody creation unit that creates a melody signal by combining the stored sound data and the rhythm created by the rhythm creation unit, and the melody according to the created melody signal is voiced Output power A game machine that outputs power.

2. The game machine according to claim 1, wherein the sound data is data relating to a note, and is data indicating a pitch and a length of at least one note.

[3] The game machine according to claim 1 or 2, wherein the sound data is set so that all output sounds have the same length.

[4] The game machine has a display unit for displaying a predetermined image,

The sound data storage unit stores sound data of each character in association with at least one character displayed on the display unit,

The silent time processing unit

In the silent state, any one of the at least one character is displayed on the display unit, The melody creating unit creates the melody signal by combining the sound data associated with the displayed character and the rhythm described in any one of claims 1 to 3. Game machine.

The game machine has a microphone unit for inputting external power sound,

The silent time processing unit

A voice detection unit that generates a detection signal when detecting a voice input from the microphone unit; and a character displayed on the display unit that performs a predetermined action when receiving a detection signal from the voice detection unit. 5. The game machine according to claim 4, further comprising an animation control unit that controls movement.