I’ve been digging into haptics more the past few years - I was eager to get them setup in skate. and I’m super happy with the feedback already from players about this feature.
During my testing I wanted to see if there were any ways to improve auditioning and demonstrating haptics. It really felt like only those with a dev kit and a working build could feel this and as a result this seems to diminished the impact of the feature. Also for the longest time this seemed like a "one platform feature” which always made it difficult to prioritize along with other audio work. Since then, haptics can be felt with a PS5 controller on PC and given our general focus on this, I wanted to try and find easier ways to enable others on the dev team to hear this work.

In addition to this, Apple released a trailer for an F1 film which actually has haptics on the iPhone.
I feel haptics was a big leap forward for audio, and possible integration with linear media will only help this feature stand out more. So I wanted to dig into this further, to if you could easily add haptics to videos and share them online easily.

Spoilers - you can!

However, it’s worth noting that this is quite “hacky” right now and clearly just something that can be done, not something that’s properly supported. The user experience is a bit lacking, and there’s the potential for haptics content to become audible if someone plays the video without dual sense connected. But still, it’s pretty cool.

So how do I experience this for myself?

What you need:

• PS5 Dual Sense Controller

• USB cable

• Headphones

Setup:

1. Connect PS5 Dual Sense controller to your computer
   (USB hubs will likely not work)

2. Connect headphones to the headphone jack on the controller

3. Set your system output to the Dual Sense controller

To test, check out the video I made here (not these are not official haptics nor did I work on this title, just using it as a small test):

Haptics Example Video

How does this work?

For those unaware the Dual Sense controller has 4 relevant outputs:

• 1/2 - Headphone Out (L/R)

• 3/4 - Haptics Out (L/R)

Really we’re just leveraging the fact that Vimeo allows us to upload and playback videos with multichannel audio. What’s interesting is that this does not work with a quad file, but instead works with the Left Surround/Right Surround channels in a 5.1 file.

This is also why I refer to this as being a bit of a hack right now. If this video were played with audio output set to a device that isn’t the PS5 controller the haptic content would become audible. On surround systems it would play through the Left/Right surrounds, and on Stereo outputs it would be folded into the stereo mix. Neither of which is ideal, so it’s important to probably only use this for demonstration purposes only.
In addition to this, the volume control will also effect haptics intensity.

Why Vimeo? What about YouTube?
At the time of testing this, YouTube does not support playback of multichannel audio files (aside from a few exclusive channels). I did additional testing with 360 videos and embedding various metadata to see if that could get around this, but never had any luck.
That content was always folded into the main headphone outputs, and no haptics were ever felt through any YouTube tests.

How can I do this for myself?

If you’re using Reaper the setup is simple, just a bit odd.

• Set the Dual Sense as your output device in Reaper, you should have 4 channels of output. For content you want to hear, route this to 1/2, for content you want to feel, route this to 3/4.

• When printing your work, route the haptics material on 3/4 to 5/6 (muting 3/4), and then render a 5.1 output.

• Ensure your file follows SMPTE channel ordering: L, R, C, LFE, Ls, Rs

Haptics Channel Test Video

The above video features audible counting for outputs 1-4 (L, R, C, LFE) and then plays a low frequency tone for 5/6 (Ls, Rs). I added attenuated low frequency tone for all outputs for additional confidence. So you should expect to feel vibrations on every channel identification. But if setup correctly, you should not hear the low frequency tones and only feel vibrations for 5-6 (Ls, Rs). If you are hearing low frequency tones on each identification, you are also likely not feeling vibrations and the output device is not set correctly.

Anyone you’re sharing this with will need a PS5 controller, and to follow a similar setup. (PS5 controller to PC, set outputs to controller). But so far there have been no inconsistencies across various machines from multiple testers.

I hope this information helps out anyone who wants to give this a shot and maybe explore haptics more for themselves.