Huawei Watch patent shows wristwear designed for gaming on the go

A future Huawei Watch may aim to become a Nintendo Switch rival as a new patent shows an idea to make your wristwear into an innovative gaming device.

Rather than using the touchscreen or a rotating bezel, this patent shows you'll be able to interact with the watch through rotating and stretching the strap itself.

As you can see in the diagram below - provided by LetsGoDigital who spotted the patent - you'll be able to hold the watch with the strap stretched out, play games on the screen and press down on the band to go different directions.

It also shows that you'd be able to pull the band either left or right to move around a character or sway the band in different directions for other controls.

The diagrams also shows the controls may not just be designed for gaming either. The built-in controls inside the strap would allow you to interact with apps such as zooming in or highlighting text on the screen.

Considering smartwatch displays are so small it makes sense to add an extra way to interact with your watch.

Gaming on your commute

Another interesting element in the patent is the inclusion of a square watch for the images. 

Both the Huawei Watch and Huawei Watch 2 had round displays and it's likely the patent image is just for illustration purposes, but it may be the company is looking to embrace a square screen like on the Apple Watch 3.

Huawei filed for the patent with the WIPO in December 2017, but has previously filed for the same patent in China in 2015 and 2016 so it may be the company has been working on this tech for a while.

As this idea is so different to anything else we've seen before, we think it's unlikely we'll see these features on the Huawei Watch 3

The company's CEO has previously confirmed the company is working on the third iteration of its watch, so we're hoping to see it by the end of 2018 and that may mean there isn't time to include this gaming idea.

James Peckham

James is Managing Editor for Android Police. Previously, he was Senior Phones Editor for TechRadar, and he has covered smartphones and the mobile space for the best part of a decade bringing you news on all the big announcements from top manufacturers making mobile phones and other portable gadgets. James is often testing out and reviewing the latest and greatest mobile phones, smartwatches, tablets, virtual reality headsets, fitness trackers and more. He once fell over.