18 replies to this topic

[xg4bx]

"Some advice for any Xbox 360 owners thinking ahead to the launch of Microsoft's Project Natal later this year: You might want to see if you'll need to reconfigure your living room. After all, the motion-sensing control system is no sit-on-the-couch experience. You'll need some space to move your body and swing your arms without banging into the coffee table. To be precise, you'll want to clear an area extending at least 4 meters (a little more than 13 feet) away from the television. That's the back edge of the space to be taken into account by the Natal sensors. In terms of width and height, the field of vision naturally expands as it moves from the Natal device to that back edge, ending up a little more than 4 meters wide and 2.7 meters high (about 8 feet, 10 inches)."

http://n4g.com/tech/...94546.aspx?CT=1

apartment dwellers need not apply. personally i'd need to completely rearrange my living room because it's long&narrow.

[liveinabin]

Living, as I do, in a small house in England (where space is premium) there's no way this is going to work for me. In any case, I'd rather games advance in storytelling, AI and other forms of immersion than this wavy-arms control method that will feel just as fake as a controller.

[Bilnick]

Sounds similar to the amount of space I have to create to play Wii Sports or Wii Fit already. We only have to move a coffee table over to accommodate playing those games. It is not a big deal.

10 - 12 feet is probably the typical distance from the television for most viewers already. The 10 foot width would be needed for 2 players for a game like tennis or baseball with out clonking each other. 10 feet is approximately a typical couch with a foot and a half extra on each end.

[KrazyKaiju]

The biggest problem with all these immersive technologies is that you're anchored by your TV set. We need a set of wireless HDMI enabled VR goggles that don't cost a fortune. Combine those with Natal and a fair size basement and you've got a poor man's holodeck.

[Gabriel]

In response to the question posed in the topic title. No. No, I'm not.

[Tickled_Pink]

I'm interested. But if you already have a Wii then surely your furniture is already optimally arranged.

[xg4bx]

Tickled_Pink, on Sat Mar 20, 2010 1:13 PM, said:

I'm interested. But if you already have a Wii then surely your furniture is already optimally arranged.

the thing is though, you only need to flick your wrists to play wii. the way ms has been hyping natal they expect you to use your whole body and play shooters and sh** with this technology.

personally, i'm much more excited by this-

http://n4g.com/tech/...95163.aspx?CT=1

[Mirage]

If they can make it work right, and they can get the interface right, but I don't see that happening. I do see a lot of basement rec rooms being cleared out though (if they're not already). Wonder if this will lead to a tendency toward shorter games since hours of playing something like this would be a lot more tiring than using a controller.

[Video]

I would be very interested if it works. That's IF it works. The Wii, well, yeah, you just flick you're wrist, though you can really get into some games like Bowling or whatever, though I agree, you don't really need near the space the Natal is supposedly going to need.

KrazyKaiju, on Sat Mar 20, 2010 10:01 AM, said:

The biggest problem with all these immersive technologies is that you're anchored by your TV set. We need a set of wireless HDMI enabled VR goggles that don't cost a fortune. Combine those with Natal and a fair size basement and you've got a poor man's holodeck.

Seconded. If I gotta actually MOVE to play a game, I don't want to be stuck to one viewing surface, either some 3d goggles or a set of projectors to do all the walls. Something to get you more INTO the game. But, eh...I've been saying this for 3D too, only for about 20 years now, people seem to in general, just not be interested.

[Tr3vor]

one word- EYETOY!!!! they need to stop with the stupid motion controllers. theyre just jealous of the wii. they need to make a 360 controller that is comfortable in my hands. oh well, so much copying and copying now.

[Video]

Tr3vor, on Mon Mar 22, 2010 8:56 AM, said:

one word- EYETOY!!!! they need to stop with the stupid motion controllers. theyre just jealous of the wii. they need to make a 360 controller that is comfortable in my hands. oh well, so much copying and copying now.

Yeah, except Eyetoy actually predates the wii by quiet a bit (and the tech works, at least in most the games I played) Xbox360 had a camera, though I think it's defunct now Thanks for the support Microsoft, at least Eyetoy got like a half dozen compo discs or so

I figure the Natal to be like Wii, the few games that work, will work well, the rest will really feel shoehorned into place and more or less suck, no matter how much the fans want it to be good.....EXCEPT I doubt the Natal will get 1/10 the market saturation of the Wii (but then, it's also High def, so who knows? Maybe it'll collect all those wii bashers that bitch cause it's "low res" )

Edited by Video, Tue Mar 23, 2010 11:32 AM.

[Tickled_Pink]

xg4bx, on Sat Mar 20, 2010 9:58 PM, said:

Tickled_Pink, on Sat Mar 20, 2010 1:13 PM, said:

I'm interested. But if you already have a Wii then surely your furniture is already optimally arranged.

the thing is though, you only need to flick your wrists to play wii. the way ms has been hyping natal they expect you to use your whole body and play shooters and sh** with this technology.

personally, i'm much more excited by this-

http://n4g.com/tech/...95163.aspx?CT=1

Cool. Although I'm not in the least excited. I don't have a PS3.

My only real concern about Natal is that game devs are going to go overboard with it and try to implement it on games that it shouldn't belong on. The driving demo they showed in the showreel, for instance. The reason I haven't bought a driving game for the Wii, not even Mario Kart, is that it just seems dumb to me to add a 'steering wheel' to a controller and have nothing solid to actually fix the steering wheel to. I've tried it and it just doesn't feel remotely natural.

At least on the PS2 I still have my Logitech force feedback wheel for Colin McRae 04.

[moycon]

Tickled_Pink, on Tue Mar 23, 2010 6:19 PM, said:

My only real concern about Natal is that game devs are going to go overboard with it and try to implement it on games that it shouldn't belong on.

I don't think it'll happen. The only reason it was done on the Wii is because the Wii-mote was the controller that came with the system so they had to develop games for it. The masses bought into the Wii and it's simple controller, and the traditional gamers suffered because many of their favorite genres suffered due to the wonky controls. In my opinion most developers are simply going to ignore Natal and Move. The technology only works well in very specific types of games. If they could ever figure out how to make a game like say Halo or Uncharted feel natural (Like any of us has ever fought aliens or hunted treasure around the world to compare it to, but you know what i mean) like say... Wii Sports Bowling, it might work. Right now I think the games would wind up having to be too over simplifies to even be half-assed.

[Starscream]

I only want it for the voice recognition. Like it that one video the lady says "play movie" and the Netflix movie started.

[cimerians]

13 feet?!?!?

Are they f~cking kidding?

I'm officially sick of all motion control crap.

[StanJr]

I was interested in this four years ago when it was called the Wii...

now, maybe not so much...

[Christophero Sly]

I was slightly interested in it, until I learned it won't have its own CPU. Now I guess I have a wait and see attitude.

[cimerians]

http://www.destructo...se-168195.phtml

[Tr3vor]

they could spy on people who buy this, like the laptop thing. they could catch you doing something inappropriate on the couch with someone else.... NO ONE WOULD BE SAFE FROM MICROSOFT!!! but then they get thier asses sued off. then... idk, their gonna do it again just for the fun of it, then get thier asses sued off... again. then they would have to drop xbox for good, and millions of 9 year olds that own the 360 will cry because they cant say innapropriate things on xbl. i think this whole camra-eyetoy-wii copy thing is a bad idea, sooo many thongs could go wrong, its gonna flop, no one is gonna buy it, people will buy it and then it will go unsuportted or something like half of nintendo's controllers and gimmicks and give microsoft a bad name. they already have a bad name, because many people thing Vista is CRAP. i dont its stable and easy to use for me.

this was a random rant about natal and a bit about vista and xbox. stay tuned for next episode.