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Xbox Project Natal vs. PS Motion Controller

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Originally posted by: Lonyo
Uh, there was a physical object in the Sony demo...
Did you even watch it?
Click to expand...

No, I really can't be bothered to watch press releases like this.

So taking back what I said, I still stand by my decision. The Nintendo has the motion controls included with the base system. Every game can use them.

Aftermarket add-ons have a notoriously horrible history of being quickly and quietly ignored and abandoned.

Both Sony and MS will fail with their motion capture gimmicks.
 
Originally posted by: BoberFett
Originally posted by: Lonyo
Uh, there was a physical object in the Sony demo...
Did you even watch it?
Click to expand...

No, I really can't be bothered to watch press releases like this.

So taking back what I said, I still stand by my decision. The Nintendo has the motion controls included with the base system. Every game can use them.

Aftermarket add-ons have a notoriously horrible history of being quickly and quietly ignored and abandoned.

Both Sony and MS will fail with their motion capture gimmicks.
Click to expand...

Thats the thing though, its really just a trial run for adding motion capture to their next gen consoles(out of the box).
 
Originally posted by: BoberFett
Originally posted by: Lonyo
Uh, there was a physical object in the Sony demo...
Did you even watch it?
Click to expand...

No, I really can't be bothered to watch press releases like this.

So taking back what I said, I still stand by my decision. The Nintendo has the motion controls included with the base system. Every game can use them.

Aftermarket add-ons have a notoriously horrible history of being quickly and quietly ignored and abandoned.

Both Sony and MS will fail with their motion capture gimmicks.
Click to expand...

They might fail, but the wii implementation is awful. Just because it's an enormous commercial success doesn't mean it was executed well.

I haven't heard whether Motion+ is shitty like the base Wii functionality, but even if it isn't it's still going to meet a limited audience just like the balance board. And yet, it's the most exciting thing about the Wii because it promises (and hopefully delivers) playable games.

I liked Okami and TP, a lot. In fact, playing them gives me that fuzzy feeling inside that I got when I played OoT as a kid. However I still also feel frustration that the controls can be so horribly sloppy compared to what you would get with an analog thumbstick.
 
Originally posted by: Lonyo
How can you argue there's no inherent reason for the lag in Natal?
The Eyetoy was marking the relative positions of two glowing balls, while Natal was having to consider a person and calculate what is a person and what isn't, and the movements that person is making.
Click to expand...
Here's why I can argue: I'm actually somewhat familiar with the face/body-tracking algorithms out there, having taken AI in college back in the day, and they're not as slow as what you're describing or what we saw. Is it slower than tracking a ball? Sure. Is it that much slower? No way. Both the 360 and PS3 can _easily_ do it in real-time. The algorithms are well-known and optimized.
 
Sony by a mile.

There's only one technical difference here - the PS3 one requires you to hold physical objects, the 360 one doesnt. The 360 demo was plagued by lag, and went a bit crazy sometimes.

I seriously, seriously doubt it is going to be able to have the same millimeter precision the sony one had, since the wands provide solid reference points for the camera to latch on to. I suspect the wands may also have gyros in them, it was so precise - but even if they dont, thats an option.

Notice that they didnt really show many true gaming applications with the 360 one, but they marketed it as a way to bring casuals in. The Sony one was entirely gaming oriented.

Other than precision, the wands are also an advantage since they have buttons. Characters in game are holding objects. They also provide feedback through the color of the globe, and presumably rumble as well. You could also potentially play with it in the dark (yay).

Natal could do facial and voice recognition - but thats just software. All you need for that is a camera and a mic, and sony already has that, they just need to implement it. Sony could have even done Milo with their hardware, but for once, it was Sony that was sticking to reality.
 
Originally posted by: Wreckem
Originally posted by: BoberFett
Originally posted by: Lonyo
Uh, there was a physical object in the Sony demo...
Did you even watch it?
Click to expand...

No, I really can't be bothered to watch press releases like this.

So taking back what I said, I still stand by my decision. The Nintendo has the motion controls included with the base system. Every game can use them.

Aftermarket add-ons have a notoriously horrible history of being quickly and quietly ignored and abandoned.

Both Sony and MS will fail with their motion capture gimmicks.
Click to expand...

Thats the thing though, its really just a trial run for adding motion capture to their next gen consoles(out of the box).
Click to expand...

Yeah...none of these are really going to catch on I bet, but the next round of consoles are going to be absolutely revolutionary.
 
Originally posted by: BD2003
There's only one technical difference here - the PS3 one requires you to hold physical objects, the 360 one doesnt. The 360 demo was plagued by lag, and went a bit crazy sometimes.
Click to expand...

Not quite sure I'd use the word "plagued". From what I saw, the input lag was minimal (a second or less), and I never saw anything go "crazy". Given that they introduced the device under it's project name means that it still has a ways to go, so hopefully we'll see improvements on that front.

I think I really need to watch the Sony video, because I've not seen their implementation yet.
 
Originally posted by: Dominato3r
Natal hands down. I have no doubt that Microsoft will have a demo for us by E32010 for sure.
Click to expand...

I would hope so. They have mentioned 2010 as the release year.
 
Natal looks more ambitious than the Sony Wand. However, if rumors are true and it launches at $200 it has Epic fail written all over it. I can't see any major developer support for an add-on peripheral that costs that much.
 
I think Penny Arcade actually summed up my thoughts on these technologies rather well:

Link

In general, the freaky-deaky augmented video mechanisms presented by Microsoft and Sony are inert for us - that is to say, we have no reaction to them whatsoever. Absent anything beyond minigames and puppet shows, I don't know how to contextualize this technology. I can't be certain that it has ramifications of any kind for the games I like to play, the ones my friends like to play, or for the games that built this industry.
Click to expand...

I think there's a lot of potential for motion controls to introduce new and interesting experiences, similar to something like Wii Sports or (hopefully) beyond, but ultimately I see it as more of a casual--in the truest sense of that word--experience and not something that will replace my current interests or habits.

It all depends on how far they take this but I don't see myself becoming fully immersed in a motion control experience as I would in a game like Mass Effect or inFamous. It would be more like a workout where I check it out for 30-60 minutes and then move on.
 
Natal does nothing for me. I can't see it as anything I would ever use. Maybe casual friends and family that are non gamers, but I don't want them hogging my gaming time with their non gaming nonsense.
 
Originally posted by: Saulbadguy
Originally posted by: SunnyD
Natal. My non-gaming wife even thought it was cool.
Click to expand...

EXACTLY the reason it is stupid - nongamers think it is cool.
Click to expand...

My wife thought HD was cool, but she doesn't care about picture quality. Does that make HD stupid?

I'm frightened of an all-motion controlled gaming future (hopefully this never happens), but something like Natal is far from stupid.
 
Originally posted by: peritusONE
My wife thought HD was cool, but she doesn't care about picture quality. Does that make HD stupid?.
Click to expand...

No, that makes your wife stupid. 😛

Kidding, of course.
 
Originally posted by: R Nilla
It all depends on how far they take this but I don't see myself becoming fully immersed in a motion control experience as I would in a game like Mass Effect or inFamous. It would be more like a workout where I check it out for 30-60 minutes and then move on.
Click to expand...

I see potential for Natal. I think people get too caught up in thinking about games being all or nothing with the motion controls. I know the MS video showed it this way, but I think the video is simply trying to get across how well they hope to have the techology working. But here's an example of what I'd like to see...

Imagine a game like Rainbow Six or GRAW where you can use hand signals to give commands to your AI allies. And each of these hand signals would also have a voice command alternative. When you're being stealthy approaching an enemy position you would use the hand signals because using voice would potentially alert the enemy. But when the shooting starts you could start shouting commands because stealth is out the window and using voice commands would mean you wouldn't have to take your hands away from the controller in the middle of the fire fight.

I want to see subtle yet immersive stuff like that used. I'm not really interested in flailing around my living room to play a game, but I don't think it has to be that way. Beyond that I also think it would be cool to be able to control the dash with hand/voice commands and have the facial recognition stuff.
 
Natal looks the most interesting. Sony's looked just like a wiimote (welcome to 2 years ago for the company that didn't think it's users wanted rumble anymore).
 
I think Natal is awesome. I almost wish MS would have just saved it for their next system, because then the attach rate would be 100%. Kinda like the wii and the wiimote. I like Natal way more than the PS3Penis thing, because you can still just use your normal controller but add motion stuff anywhere you want. Think of simple stuff, walking in Oblivion and holding up your left hand and turning a door knob. Or control your guy with your joystick but hold your right hand up to hold a torch while in a cave. It can do simple little things like that, then full blown out motion only stuff too. I love it. I hope it comes out sooner than later
 
Originally posted by: UpgradeFailure
I think Natal is awesome. I almost wish MS would have just saved it for their next system, because then the attach rate would be 100%. Kinda like the wii and the wiimote. I like Natal way more than the PS3Penis thing, because you can still just use your normal controller but add motion stuff anywhere you want. Think of simple stuff, walking in Oblivion and holding up your left hand and turning a door knob. Or control your guy with your joystick but hold your right hand up to hold a torch while in a cave. It can do simple little things like that, then full blown out motion only stuff too. I love it. I hope it comes out sooner than later
Click to expand...

Well, the way it is looking now all companies are going to be holding off their next console releases longer than originally thought. Part of the way of doing that is to introduce things like Natal and Sony's wand to add to the experience of existing consoles on top of doing feature updates/additions through software.

Both Natal and the Sony wand are supposedly coming in 2010.
 
Originally posted by: UpgradeFailure
I think Natal is awesome. I almost wish MS would have just saved it for their next system, because then the attach rate would be 100%. Kinda like the wii and the wiimote. I like Natal way more than the PS3Penis thing, because you can still just use your normal controller but add motion stuff anywhere you want. Think of simple stuff, walking in Oblivion and holding up your left hand and turning a door knob. Or control your guy with your joystick but hold your right hand up to hold a torch while in a cave. It can do simple little things like that, then full blown out motion only stuff too. I love it. I hope it comes out sooner than later
Click to expand...

i think both of those examples sounds pretty lame and i would not want to play a game where i have to do either of those.

i'm not really excited about either of them. the wii seemed pretty damn cool too ... until i actually used it.
 
Originally posted by: Hazy
Neither... I don't like motion controllers.

I want to pick up a normal controller not look like a retard flapping my arms around.
Click to expand...

Arm flapping is done by morons who don't have any motor skills, so if you're flapping around like a retard you have nobody to blame but yourself. And maybe your parents, extra chromosome boy.

Boom Blox is an awesome example of what could be done with high quality 3D motion capture, whether by camera or Wiimote. Increased accuracy will only help.

I recently played a lot of Banjo Kazooie Nuts & Bolts, and while the vehicle editor was adequate, it would have been really cool if I could have actually moved pieces around with my hands. Think of the scene from Iron Man where he was designing the suit in his office.

Still, they will fail miserably as add-ons.
 
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