Kinect (previously Natal)

[Neon Ignition]

£100? No way. For me or the peeps I know to consider Natal you'd be looking at around £60 as the needed price tag and for there to be some seriously major software that makes good use of it. Given the new adopters they're chasing may very well already have had a Wii for some time and the 360 (Natal or not) is likely the format of the three with the shortest lifespan looking forwards means charging a high price point isn't an option. I'm expecting some good stuff to come for it but also for most popular genre's such as racers, FPS etc to simply not work which marginalises it's useablity.

I agree with the sell at a loss approach, though MS might try to keep it profitable per unit in the off chance it suffers on the shelf next to Move which will probably ship for £45-£50 and be billed as a rival.

[averybluemonkey]

I'm getting this whatever happens as it looks to have far more potential than any of the other motion controllers. It looks to be unquestionably the perfect interface for strategy games which I'm sure we'll see. Not to mention the kind of point and click games they could pull off with a Minority Report style interface. There was an interesting and simple third person shooter UI in Gamer that Natal could pull off which looked a hell of alot more fun than any Wii game has interface wise. And with Rare on the case there's bound to be at least 1 launch title that'll appeal to me.

[Team Andromeda]

If its costs £100 the Mega CD sales will look stunning . When will MS learn its not the joypad that the barrier to gaming , but the high cost of the hardware, and more so the games them self's

[MJ]

For ?100 (as opposed to the previous price tag of ?35-?50) i'm out too unless you get at least 2 decent games with it.

Surely you never really expected it to cost ?35, the price of the Live Vision when that launched.

[sj33]

£35 is optimistic for sure, but it really needed to be priced so that that it's not perceived as an 'investment'. A little bit outside of impulse purchase range, yet still within the price range of a purchase that wouldn't feel like a major decision.

[EvilBoris]

If the price is correct then it may be because MS want this to be perceived as somethign more than just an accessory, going to cheap at launch affects people's perceptions.

[EDDIE M0NS00N]

Surely you never really expected it to cost ?35, the price of the Live Vision when that launched.

There were prices flying around the web at the time of between ?35 to ?50 but I will admit that I actually expected it to cost ?50 as that was the announcement made at the time. I'd read that this was possible due to the fact that they had removed the hardware chip & instead were to use software to cut the cost of production.
If MS cant deliver at ?50 then why was this price announced? Surely you're just shooting yourself in the foot by announcing such a low price then doubling it at a later date?

[Matt]

If the price is correct then it may be because MS want this to be perceived as somethign more than just an accessory, going to cheap at launch affects people's perceptions.

Then MS are mistaken. This needs to be dirt cheap. Cheap enough so those of us gamers who see this as little more than a tech novelty will buy it on a whim. If it launched tomorrow with a fun party game, I'd drop ?35 on it. For me, it's worth that much just to see mess around at home. I think it looks brilliant in many ways - though not necessarily for the games I enjoy, but still brilliant!

At ?100, there's no way I'd buy it, and I imagine many more will skip it. At ?70 I think it's too much.

If MS want to extend the 360's userbase, they need to be practically giving this away with 360s. And while there's no way the hardware is worth anywhere near that price, I don't know what they paid for the tech itself when they bought the company where it originated. That may have been a huge outlay they want to recoup.

FWIW, I'm hoping the Move comes out around the ?35 mark but it would need at least 2 controllers at that price point for me as well.

Yes I know I'm living in a dreamworld where gamers get to enjoy the latest gadgets for a fair price

[charlesr]

Hmm. One peripheral with nothing, or 2-3 normal games. Sanity check.

[EvilBoris]

They have said from the off that Natal was being treated as a full console launch would be, hopefully that means there will be a killer app or two on launch. The price might Not be quite to high, the Microsoft product manager said between 100-200 dollars in february

[Charlie]

$100 - $200? So £70 - £140. Paint me hesitant.

[Neil]

Well it's like this, if it's even remotely good (and it looks promising) 90% of peeps on this site will buy it no matter what the cost. Sure people will protest at the high price but in the end if it's good they will cave for the latest gaming thang.

I know I will but I'll buy anything I'm getting a psp go tomorrow ffs.

Oh and Snoop Dog at Glastonbury

Bow wow wow yippee yo yippee yay!

[Matt]

You really think 90% of people on here will buy it for £100??

It's all about the software, what this adds to the games I enjoy, and how the latency affects titles.

I bet 90% of people on here would prefer to play Burnout on a pad than Natal [once the novelty has worn off].

[Neil]

Yeah I do Matt providing like you say it has some decent software on release.

[Matt]

Fair enough. MS would love that take up