A recently published patent suggests that Sony may be considering the implementation of biometric sensors on controllers for its upcoming PS5 video game console.

The patent primarily concerns a “scene tagging” feature that would allow gamers to capture metadata pertaining to a certain gameplay event, and then share it with other players online. Those other players might search for the event in question in an effort to find out how their peers navigated a particular puzzle, for example, and could even play against a kind of overlay of another player’s performance to see how they compare.

The patent goes on to note that a controller “may additionally or alternatively be designed to capture biometric readings using sensors in the remote to record data including, for example, skin moisture, heart rhythm, and muscle movement”. This opens up the possibility of letting players compare not only how they played in a given section of a video game, but how they reacted to it on a physiological level. As IGN Nordic notes, this could even lead to challenges in which players try to remain more calm than others during a frightening or stressful gameplay event.

Of course, patents are never guarantees of what will actually come to market in the tech world. But with the PS5’s launched still about a year away, there would seem to be some time for this technology to be implemented in at least one model of the device’s controllers. If that happens, it could represent one of the most novel uses of biometric technology in mainstream consumer devices yet.

Sources: VGC, IGN Nordic