PlayStation Move

[Flabio]

Not sure why people think Natal is controller free either, there's absolutely nothing stopping you having the 360 controller doing stuff in the game too.

[Brad]

Probably because Natal has been marketed as controller free by Microsoft. That's their thing isn't it? That there is no controller?

[nonny]

Natal still has a lot to prove but for me the most interesting thing about it over the other tech is using it seamlessly in combination with a conventional controller.

I'm thinking head tracking, voice recognition the whole works on top of still using tactile controls at the same time. For that reason I see it as having more uses outside the expected party games.

At the moment Move looks good but I don't like the need to wave a glowing ice cream cone around the place but it's recognition is great and should meet expectations. Wii has never ever interested me despite owning one for a few months. The reason simply that it isn't HD and my main display is a projector and the Wii looked like utter pants on it.

[Team Andromeda]

Not sure why people think Natal is controller free either, there's absolutely nothing stopping you having the 360 controller doing stuff in the game too.

I though that was the whole point of Natal , to free people from the controller , these so called gamers that can't handle a standard pad .
To me both NATAL and Move are a joke , and the real barrier to gaming , isn't the controller , but the high cost of games them self's , and where I see MS and SONY doing nothing to address that area .

[Brad]

My main concern with Natal - for conventional games - is accuracy. People moan about the accuracy of the Wiimote but I can't help thinking that even a wiimote must be more accurate than no controller at all. Maybe MS really have made something amazing though. Won't know til I try it.

[Flabio]

Probably because Natal has been marketed as controller free by Microsoft. That's their thing isn't it? That there is no controller?

Yeah, thats the way it's being pushed, and at the casual end how it will be mostly used. Although I don't think they've started to 'market' the thing at all yet.

But afaik you're not forced to forego the controller entirely, and I can see those core games that use Natal using it in conjunction with the controller.

Come E3 I think it might surprise a few people.

[Brad]

Yeah that makes sense. GT5 has normal controls plus head tracking using the camera. No reason why Gears 3 couldn't use a regular controller plus my much desired 'peek' function and some arm gesture for a grenade toss. Definitely excited to see what can be done.

[rubans]

...and yet, I'm interested in Playstation Move whilst my Wii is caked in dust, unused for months on end.

I see it from the complete opposite direction, I find most people who are "hardcore" gamers are ambivolent toward the Wii, but this kind of thing look geeky yet also quite cool and I find most of them are excited about the tech, but not quite on board...which I believe will come in time.

As for NATAL, I think it'll fail amongst the hardcore. I don't believe that that section of gamers want a peripheral free experience. Given how scaled down the tech has now become, I don't think the games will be any more complicated than the Wii lineup, whereas the MOVE has enormous potential with it's ability to move in a full 3D space.

You sound like the Sony boss Tretton, given that you have not yet seen what MS have for gaming for Natal, how can you dimiss it so quickly?
It all depends on how it's applied on games, as techonology.
"Sony's Jack Tretton has dismissed Microsoft's Natal movement control scheme, branding it a great idea that Sony "invented eight years ago."

Speaking with Gametrailers TV, the SCEA boss touted the company's PlayStation Move, saying: "ultimately this is next generation gaming."

When asked if PlayStation Move is an attempt to capture some of Nintendo's success, he replied: "We've kind of been looking for the right opportunity to bring motion gaming in a PlayStation like experience. We really feel that with the right combination of the PlayStation Eye and our Move controller we've really got the opportunity to bring realistic gaming with motion to consumers for the first time."

However, Tretton wasn't afraid of making a similar comparison between Natal and the PlayStation EyeToy.

"If you really want to get involved in playing with a camera I suggest you go out and buy a $99 PlayStation 2 and play some of the great technology we invented eight years ago," he said.

While Tretton refused to confirm what the company would announce at E3, he admitted that Killzone 3 was inevitable.

"We own Guerrilla Studios and they did a great job on Killzone 1 and 2 - I don't know when you'll see any announcements about it but I can promise you a Killzone 3."
"

[Jebus]

You sound like the Sony boss Tretton, given that you have not yet seen what MS have for gaming for Natal, how can you dimiss it so quickly?
It all depends on how it's applied on games, as techonology.

I sound like Tretton? Sorry, I know I'm supposed to tow the 360 fanboy party line, but given that they've scaled back the technology in NATAL, I'm just not that interested in playing Wii games on my 360 at the moment.

I've seen the demo's that MS have chosen to present to us, and none of them appeal to me. I don't want to turn my 360 on or off with voice commands, I don't want to PAY for a version of dodgeball that the family will be bored of after the first few sessions. We've been here before with the Wii. I can see both the MOVE and NATAL having applications in hardcore games, but the MOVE connotations appeal to me more.

Having used their current camera and software in "IN THE MOVIES" I'm very dubious about the quality of product we'll see, since that product only works in very specific lighting.

Also, the people thinking that there will be addon controllers etc for the NATAL, well, they'd have to be official as MS are notorious about allowing third party additions to the console family, certainly with wireless tech anyway.

I'd never be so foolish to write off or dismiss something so early, but given all the known facts around both pieces of tech, if I'm going to get excited about either of them, it won't be NATAL.

Molyneux can wax lyrical about talking to a little boy on screen all he wants, but I'd love to see that tech actually running without someone sat at a PC programming it all the while.

Sony have shown their product a lot recently, allowing people to try it just because they asked. They have shown enough that it has got my imagination firing about the future possibilities. Everything we've seen of NATAL has been carefully staged in perfect conditions, the E3 stuff was "wow" but so rehearsed it's unreal, and we've not seen a lot since.

To be honest though, I'd imagine neither are aimed at me anyway.

[nonny]

Out of all of them I do find Natal the most interesting because its also the most different. Lets face it the PS3 move is the Wii mote + nunchuck in black with a light bulb on top... they're aiming for the same approach but different tech.

My biggest concern with Natal is the scaling back, the apparent timing lag that has caused and the fact they are yet to really come out in the media all guns blazing and let the public try it out. The thing is though, because they havent done that yet I wouldnt be writing it off completely. It's an unknown quantity and it has the potential to have implementations that the other two probably cant simply because it needs no controller.

I remember watching the rather gimmicky video for natal when it was first announced and they showed a number of possible scenarios for usage. One in particular was a Buzz! rip-off but instead of having four controllers the family playing just used their fists as the buzzer banging it on their open palms to register a press. My initial thought was "yeh right" but the more I think about it this could be extremely useful... hell I wouldnt have to dig out 4x controllers and make sure they all have batteries for starters.

Same with steering a car, the Wii has how many clip-on things for the wii-mote? One being a steering wheel for Mario Kart. I dont see natal as being much different except here you could pick up anything circular if you needed something tactile.

I think MS muddied the waters a lot over the past months, especially with the Milo demo stuff but really lets just see. Sony have now thrown in their playing chip, I dare say Nintendo will answer both these devices in due course (HD Wii anyone?) and I guess MS will properly unveil Natal at E3.

[sj33]

Out of all of them I do find Natal the most interesting because its also the most different. Lets face it the PS3 move is the Wii mote + nunchuck in black with a light bulb on top... they're aiming for the same approach but different tech.

Actually, after watching the video posted a few pages ago, I came away convinced that it is clearly nothing like the Wii Remote, other than the fact that it happens to be in the form of a 'remote'.

From what I gather, the Wii Remote essentially executes a series of pre-determined actions, and uses an accelerometer to determine axis. The kind of functionality displayed on the video wouldn't be possible with the Wii remote, at least not in that implementation. It has the potential to do everything that people hoped from the Wii before release, before realising the technology wasn't versatile enough to do what people hoped.

That's not to say Natal isn't also interesting, but much like the Move controller until recently, I'm waiting to see what kind of things it can actually do to push things forward. Removing the controller doesn't, by itself, do this.

[J0e Musashi]

I'm just not that interested in playing Wii games on my 360 at the moment.

You are however interested in playing Wii games on your PS3. At least it seems this way to me.

[nonny]

Shakey.

I hear ya, but I meant more the physical design / ergonomics is the same with two hand-held devices... the tech is definitely different and adds more possibilities though. Agreed.

I think the main summary here is we all seem semi-interested in how this field of gaming is going to pan out but all want to see some progression of immersion or functionality in the actual games themselves past what we've seen benchmarked on the Wii.

[sj33]

I just think it would be a mistake to assume that the kind of software available for the Wii will necessarily be the kind of software that makes up the Move line-up. The Wii's software line-up is a product of the limitations of it's implementation of motion control, and the audience that it is perceived to have.

The Wii is seen as the format that finally broke into the 'mainstream' market, but I am skeptical about this. Plenty of people bought Wii consoles with Wii Sports. Significantly less people then proceeded to buy more software for the format. Even less of this 'new, mainstream' audience actually still use their consoles. Nintendo sold many Wii consoles over a short period of time, but failed to create an install base out of these new consumers (an install base must consist of active consumers, after all). This goes some way in explaining why third party Wii software doesn't sell (though it is easier to just blame the strength of Nintendo's IP).

Hopefully Sony will learn from this and ensure that the Move has relevance among their established audience. Same goes for Microsoft and Natal.

[J0e Musashi]

What else outside of Wii can motion control really offer though? It's all very well having a game where you can take part in a Krypton Factor style assault course, but if you have an "average" living room and entertainment setup it's not going to be possible. There are lots of limitations that come with such hardware IMO.

I can only see that whilst more may be possible with Move, the core experience will not differ greatly from what Wii already offers.