Last year's "Illumiroom" concept turned a lot of heads when Microsoft showed it off at CES. Now Microsoft's research division is back with something even more complicated: "RoomAlive," which turns a living room into an interactive augmented reality space.

While Illumiroom was certainly eye catching, the technology was only able to project a larger image surrounding the walls and floors. RoomAlive, though also in the research stages only, is even more complex, and brings the user off the couch to interact with the environment it renders on the furniture and other surfaces.

The video below offers a much clearer idea of how that works than words alone. There are game concepts specific to RoomAlive that are shown, including a whack-a-mole type of game (where a gun peripheral is recognized) and an interactive danger room where traps pop out off the walls.

Obviously this is currently proof-of-concept type technology, and no way represents what the end-user may see in the future. Still, it isn't just a battery of projectors creating a super-large viewing surface. Six Kinect sensors follow the player's head around the play space, and RoomAlive's software recognizes the different surfaces in the room's layout and adapts the video game to them.