Invest into an accessibility breakthrough.

  • The Morat System

    The Morat system is a revolutionary approach to 3D situational awareness, constructed by and for Deaf and Hard-of-Hearing players. Leveraging the latest in 3D digital technology, the Morat system builds on the lived experience of Deaf and Hard-of-Hearing people to create a fully-immersive 3D environment in familiar sensory terms.

    Most haptic gaming systems emphasize and reinforce an audio experience — but that experience isn’t fully available to Deaf and Hard-of-Hearing players. The Morat system starts with the world as perceived without sound, building a fully immersive environment just the way you do!

  • Your Gameplay Reimagined

    With modern 3D audio, a hearing player hears that demon running up from behind. They know where the demon is and how fast it’s coming, and they recognize its distinctive growls. With all that knowledge, they whip around, already pointing their weapon at the threat, and blow it away.

    The Deaf/Hard-of-Hearing player gets none of that. Sure, maybe there’s a HUD with a little blip, or a flashing arrow, but that’s not the same thing at all. With Morat, you’ll know where that demon is, because you’ll feel it coming.

    The Morat system is all about a functionally equivalent experience. Experience intense immersion in your gameplay as you feel your surroundings, in detail, in real time.

  • Compatible Hardware

    Current development leverages the Tempest 3D engine on board the Playstation 5 console, because it is currently the only fully-digital 3D audio engine readily available. We expect that competing engines will begin to come online fairly soon, and we will be developing the Morat system to work with these as well.

    We expect that the Morat system will be available with one or more wearable devices tuned to make best use of the system. But some people have wondered if they’ll be able to use Morat with the wearables they already own. The simple answer is: we don’t know yet. We would like to make that possible, so that Deaf and Hard-of-Hearing players can get access to the Morat system with equipment they already love. But we know for sure that some current haptic systems just won’t handle the sophistication of the Morat system. When we’re finishing with primary development, we’ll post a list of known compatible devices.

The future of gaming is here.

Currently, devices in the haptic-enhanced video game space operate by translating sonic structures into tactile ones as a matter of emphasis through simulation. Such systems assume that total spatial awareness is normally auditory. In the case of a DHH player, however, spatial awareness is not (or not primarily) auditory. As a result, such devices are of minimal utility to DHH players, and indeed are not designed to provide Deaf and Hard-of-Hearing accessibility.

Morat advances an existing concept by creating a substitute for sound. The system picks up the total digital signal just prior to where it goes to the DAC (digital-audio converter) and translates the data into a haptic/tactile output. Doing this allows us to create 3D environmental awareness that mimics the way Deaf and Hard-of-Hearing individuals construct and navigate everyday spaces through vibrations, whether it is a door being closed or someone walking up behind them. 

Help enhance and expand this technology as an investor, whether through a gift or a partnership.