Sony patents cloud trick to load lighter game assets on your console
Sony describes a method where a cloud server creates a simplified, smaller version of a large game asset, such as a detailed character or environment, using virtual camera images. When a player's device requests the full asset, the server sends this lighter placeholder instead, allowing the local device to render it without downloading the heavy original file.
In the filing’s own words
A method performed by a cloud server system can involve generating, for an asset of a gaming application, an object representation of the asset based at least in part on one or more images of the asset captured by a virtual camera. A first data size of the asset can be larger than a second data size of the object representation. The method can involve generating metadata indicating the second data size and properties of the object representation. The method can involve storing the object representation in association with the metadata. The method can involve, responsive to receiving a request for the asset from a client device, providing, based at least in part on the metadata, the object representation as input to a rendering engine executed by the client device.
What exactly they claim (claim 1)
1. A method comprising, by a cloud server system: generating, for an asset of a gaming application, an object representation of the asset based at least in part on one or more images of the asset captured by a virtual camera, wherein a first data size of the asset is larger than a second data size of the object representation; generating metadata indicating the second data size and properties of the object representation; storing the object representation in association with the metadata; and responsive to receiving a request for the asset from a client device, providing, based at least in part on the metadata, the object representation as input to a rendering engine executed by the client device.
Facts
- Company
- Sony (Sony Interactive Entertainment Inc.)
- Official title
- THREE-DIMENSIONAL PLACEHOLDER REPRESENTATIONS OF LARGE-SCALE ASSETS IN GAMING APPLICATIONS
- Publication number
- US20260295400A1
- Application number
- 19097112
- Filed
- Apr 1, 2025
- Published
- Oct 1, 2026
- Inventors
- 4
- Claims
- 20
Classified under
A63F 13/358 Human necessitiesA63F 13/525 Human necessitiesG06V 10/82 Physics & computingA63F 2300/66 Human necessitiesMore from Sony in Games & media
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Summaries are simplified from the filing’s own abstract and first claim. A patent filing is not a product announcement.
Patent data and drawings: U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO). Nebula is not affiliated with or endorsed by the USPTO.