Storytelling environment: intradevice communications

A storytelling toy device that communicates over line-of-sight plus a secondary channel, letting interactive story devices coordinate with each other.

One embodiment provides a device that includes one or more line of sight transmitters configured to transmit signals over a line of sight communications medium, one or more transmitters configured to transmit signals over another communications medium and a controller.The controller is configured to perform an operation that includes retrieving a key adapted for use in decrypting encrypted content. The operation further includes transmitting the key to a second device over the line of sight communications medium using the one or more line of sight transmitters. Additionally, the operation includes encrypting data such that the data can be decrypted using the retrieved key. The operation also includes transmitting the encrypted data to the second device over the other communications medium using the one or more transmitters, where the second device is configured to decrypt the encrypteddata using the key received over the line of sight communications medium.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS(1) So that the manner in which the above recited aspects are attained and can be understood in detail, a more particular description of embodiments of the invention, briefly summarized above, may be had by reference to the appended drawings.(2) It is to be noted, however, thatthe appended drawings illustrate only typical embodiments of this invention and are therefore not to be considered limiting of its scope, for the invention may admit to other equally effective embodiments.(3) FIG. 1 illustrates a playtime environment in which a controller is instructing interactive devices to perform an effect, according to one embodiment described herein.(4) FIG. 2 is a block diagram illustrating an action disc device, according to one embodiment described herein.(5) FIG. 3 illustrates an interaction between an action disc device and a wind-up action figure device, according to one embodiment described herein.(6) FIG. 4 illustrates a communication sequence between two interactive devices, according to one embodiment described herein.(7) FIG. 5 is a flow diagram illustrating a method for transmitting encoded data between devices, according to one embodiment described herein.(8) FIG. 6 is a flow diagram illustrating a method for receiving encoded data, according to one embodiment described herein.(9) FIG. 7 is a block diagram illustrating an interactive object, according to one embodiment described herein.(10) FIG. 8 is a block diagramillustrating a con