Let slip the stench of war

Video games have largely conquered the world of realism in graphics and audio, so what could possibly be next?

How about smell? Just imagine what capturing the aroma of World War II, a zombie uprising, or a cake-baking simulator would add to experience of playing a video game.

As with most things, the origin of the idea has military roots, as the UK's Ministry of Defence is pushing ahead with a system that would allow war combat simulators to emit odors reflecting the stench of battle and the environments soldiers find themselves in.

Calling smell "the most underrated and underused of our senses," the program uses a computer-controlled system to emit dozens of compounds to reflect the smell of the locations troops wander into. Some are pleasant -- cooking meat and the sea spray of an ocean harbor -- while others are less so -- raw sewage and electrical fires. The idea is to train soldiers to use their nose the same way they use their eyes and ears: If one of those smells isn't quite right, they know something's up.

Naturally, smell simulators are already being talked about as a natural companion for home video games. While few gamers are likely to welcome the smell of sewage in their bedrooms -- where it would compete with the odor wafting from all the unwashed clothes on the floor -- the idea of adding the smell of gunfire or explosions to a combat game sounds intriguing, as might be the scent of burning rubber when you peel out during a racing game.

And, hey, I think there's a lot of legs in that aroma-enabled cake-baking game idea, too -- mess up and maybe you get rotten eggs.

This is far from the first time, of course, that computerized smell systems have been discussed. A company called DigiScents (to name just one) had planned to build a device called the iSmell that would emit aromas as you browsed the web -- you could program your website to smell like flowers, for example. The company had $20 million in financing... and promptly went out of business in 2001.

Will your Xbox or PS3 start smelling any time soon? Barring the occasional unit that overheats and catches on fire, I think it's a longshot, though quite an interesting one.