PTE25: DisKinected?

[Neon Ignition]

There have been rumours for some time now that the next Xbox will quite heavily feature a new and improved version of the Kinect device. However, what we've been seeing for a while isn't just the painful halt of interest in Kinect but also in that of motion gaming as a whole as Sony also emphasises it less and Nintendo moves on.

Last week was the high profile failing of Fable: The Journey to dent the chart much. However, this weekz chart shows that the newest entry in Kinects darling series, Dance Central 3, has fared even worse and failed to chart at all suggesting the era really is at its end.

If the rumours hold true, should MS stick with Kinect for the new system or forge on without?

[chopemon]

It depends on what the implementation is. If it is a stand alone peripheral that you have to purchase separately it will run into he same problems. If it is bundled with hardware or the rumours of it being in the controller are true then you can sell games to everyone, not just those that have bought one separately.

It also needs to work this time.

[charlesr]

Ditto. I'm only really interested if it's free in the box. But I don't want to use it to navigate the dashboard and all that. I just want a quick text list. It's so ridiculously tiresome browsing on all these flashy interfaces.

On Saturday morning's BBC Click, there was a thing that could tell exactly where you were looking. I'd be interested in that, because then suddenly you could browse menus very quickly.

[nakamura]

What's Kinect?

[Neon Ignition]

I feel they really need to drop the focus on it. Fair play they made a mint off it but I don't see that hype coming back nexy gen and even witha great camera it's not the ideal method of control. It's best applications lie away from Xbox.

[wakka]

I think it should be included BUT only if the tech is significantly better. I don't think it's a great primary method of control for anything but the simplest of games (or dancing games, lol), but if the implementation is slick and smooth (think the first time you saw the iPhone interface) it will be a great input method that can be put into lots of different games in minor ways. Menu and inventory navigation, minigames etc would benefit.

It also includes voice control. Yeah, no one uses this right now, but it's only going to get bigger. And MS will want in on that action.

Oh and it needs to work in rooms that are smaller than village halls.

[EvilBoris]

I think it should be included BUT only if the tech is significantly better. I don't think it's a great primary method of control for anything but the simplest of games (or dancing games, lol), but if the implementation is slick and smooth (think the first time you saw the iPhone interface) it will be a great input method that can be put into lots of different games in minor ways. Menu and inventory navigation, minigames etc would benefit.

It also includes voice control. Yeah, no one uses this right now, but it's only going to get bigger. And MS will want in on that action.

Oh and it needs to work in rooms that are smaller than village halls.

Pretty much everything you said there

I think that the technology on the whole has lots of potential, the problem is I don't think that they had the right software experiences for the hardware itself. Even the more gamers games like Steel Battalion suffered the same lack of precision as other titles.

unless the actual recognition is better next time round, I'm not fussed. The part that gets the most use for me is the voice recognition, but even then the actual need for a Kinect for just Voice recognition is debatable.
Microsoft were actually ahead of the game with that, even beating Apple and Siri to the post, I've got so much content on my 360 now that it is actually easier to search via voice than navigate through pages of items.

[Guts]

If it would be included with the next Xbox, then the next Xbox would cost a lot more. So no thanks to Kinect. Keep it optional.

[PeteJ]

I'd rather it went away completely but if they want Kinect to be a viable 'thing' they have to include it as part of the console. Even then, because it isn't the standard on other consoles (PS4) I can't see the best developers throwing it the resource it needs.

I can only see it really working if someone comes up with a standardised waggle controller in a similar way to how we've got a (more or less) standard approach to analogue controllers.

[Neon Ignition]

Kinects trouble is even if it worked better its impractical for most of the playstyles thrown at it and for the way most prefer to play, it forces a passive hobby to become active in a way Wii managed to avoid. I can think of tons of ways Kinect could affect gameplay but few would improve it

[wakka]

If it would be included with the next Xbox, then the next Xbox would cost a lot more. So no thanks to Kinect. Keep it optional.

I don't think that this is necessarily true really. It's not like their pricing strategy will be 'well, we'll charge about ?300 for the next Xbox, and then we want to throw in Kinect, so say ?430?'. Yes it will cost more to include Kinect, but if the system is designed around its inclusion (as I suspect it will be), then it won't be driving the price up that much - especially since it will doubtless have the spec required to drive Kinect 2 as well as onscreen gameplay. So in effect, you'll be paying for the expensive part of it anyway. Them throwing the camera portion in shouldn't make too much difference.

The original Xbox 360 launched at ?280, which is a pretty incredible launch price - especially when you consider that a brand new PS3 500GB still sells for ?250! I think MS will want to keep costs down to drive adoption.

Also, if Kinect is optional again the only uses of it will be Just Dance 418 and Timon and Pumba's Party Time again, confirming everyone's worst suspicions about the peripheral mandatory inclusion will mean devs can feel confident developing a traditional game with traditional controls, and throwing some Kinect stuff in there too (menus, minigames, voice control for dialogue, who knows).

[dataDave]

Kill it.

[originalbadboy]

M$ are not going to abandon it as they think they can make heaps of case in the casual market. Personally as long as the tech is a lot better it wouldn't bother me so much if it happens to be 'bundled' with the machine.

I am much more concerned with the ongoing facination of M$ trying to make the 360 an all in one media box and the fact that the dashboard is not 'game centric' anymore.

I want to see the next gen dash with all the info that I want on games stats etc and what my online friends are doing, not an annoying advert, thats where M$ needs to be concertrating their efforts.

[Family Fry]

Kinect to me is like any other add on, soon as you make it an additional product your always going to have problems marketing it or getting people to buy it.
Soon as MS used the tag line, "controller free gaming" i knew that Kinect wasn't going to be used in the way I thought it would be originally, in conjunction with a controller for additional in-game choice/options/ganeplay.
Soon as the games were shown, yeah the tech was cool but none of the games shown were in any way for the 'hardcore' market, somehow this made all these 'hardcore' whine like little bitches when to start with the add on was never targeted for you!
The market it hit, god damn it hit that firmly in the head, I know people who swear by it now and think Kinect is fantastic fun. Especially with their kids. I also know some people who thought it would be good for the kids but has turned out to be a little awkward for the lil ones to play. All I do know is that those millions who enjoyed it, if MS bundle Kinect with next console it will be instant sales, they need to make sure it's backwards compatible. I honestly thought Kinect would be forwards compatible but that ain't happining.
As for MS's fascination with media hub I don't see why this is an issue, we have Smart TV's now that stream and play USB, trying to get an all in one box is what most companies should aspire to, whoever wins pride of place under the TV wins the race, even apple want a slice of that pie.

[EvilBoris]

"It only does everything"

Who started that eh?