Nataalllllll...

Natal chooses who will go and who will stay!

Natal is the future of gaming!

Microsoft hasn't been able to successfully usher in the future of anything outside of online gaming with the first xbox.

Dreamcast ushered in online gaming, Phantasy Star Online was my game.

@ Jason 360

You are praising paying for P2P gaming??? When the PS3 is P2P with dedicated servers??? PS3 servers get shut down, GOOD why use bandwidth for GRAW2 when no one is playing it? I know you are a fanboy but damn.

On Topic:

Natal shouldnt come out this year, the only reason it would is to beat the PS motion (spring 2010) to the market. The Last time MS tried to beat sony to the market we ended up with a 33% fail rating.

MS, take your time, dont rush and end up dissappointing everyone with an overhyped piece of junk.

am i the only ones whos backwards about this?

MS should rush natal out the door this christmas. if its crappy (much like the e3 demo of the avatar) then MS should pay for the price AGAIN for shipping hardware that aint fully finished yet.

its all about beating the ps3 to the punch.

"PS3 servers get shut down, GOOD why use bandwidth for GRAW2 when no one is playing it?"

The gamers who only own a few games and still like playing GRAW thats who. I don't know what its like for the PS3 because I hear not many people with a PS3 buy to many games, but on PC and 360 people still play GRAW and all the Ghost Recons of the past.

Anyway I agree that Natal shouldn't be rushed and they should release it when its more stable.

I don't think they could get Natal out by Christmas. First off, the E3 demo was pretty static and scripted. Unless they are much farther along then the demo at E3 suggested, they have a lot of work to do. First they have to be able to make it recognize non-intended movements (such as a sneeze) and be able to ignore them without it disrupting game-play. This is a HUGE hurdle all by itself.

Furthermore, this is something that is going to require extensive testing. You can't test technology like this in 5 months and expect it to work. Even with a team of engineers, getting it ready in 5 months is a nigh impossible task. Programming is hard work, and we don't want this to turn into another Vista.

Rushing something out the door that doesn't work like it's supposed to, would hurt them far more than delaying it a few months.

If and when it comes out, and if it works like it's supposed to, it will be a great piece of technology. They are not going to rush something this big out the door at Christmas just to sell a few thousand more consoles because they CAN NOT afford for this to lose.

This is why.

How could it arrive a freaking YEAR earlier than announced?

If you think Natal will be released this xmas you are one of the people who thought FFXIII would be released early 2008 lol

I would bet all the money I have on Natal not even being released NEXT christmas.

it'd be cool if it came out this year. Whenever it comes out, though, I think it'll definitely take a while for devs to actually do anything great with it. Whether it's this year or next, I wouldn't expect anything awe-inspiring at launch.

Would it really surprise you if they rushed it our before Sony get theirs on the market after hearing Sony will release their motion controls in spring?

Wouldn't surprise me at all, what they need to do is get it right and then release it. The 360 already has a good install base and a good price point, if they get the hardware right and launch it with some cool games that take advantage of the feature then they won't need to release first like they had to with the 360.

For once, MS, get one of your products good to go before launching.

the tech in natal has been around for a good while. I don't think they should rush it, but it's not because of the technical abilities of the device. Moreso because of the software support.

A lot of people talk about the EyeToy and Natal, but frankly I haven't seen any sources for this information let alone any detailed paper.

Anyone care to point me to where you get your information? ... or is it just some information you assumed based on limited information released?

I actually predicted Xmas 09' Natal releasue due to all the hype it will get from demoing it at E3. Waiting until Xmas 2010 a lot of that hype would die down and isn't Xbox marketing style. Xbox except for a few games, tend to release information close to release date and within 12 months. All games mentioned at E3 as far as I know will be released within the next 12 months except for Halo Reach which is such a big game that they can release information so early.

As it is, Natal looks good to me and I look forward to seeing it sooner rather than later as long as it has enough software support.

Wait the Natal is coming next week!

Try 2010 holiday. You think a peripheral like this would come out this year when we saw no actual games for it really at E3?

http://www.youtube.com/watc...
http://www.youtube.com/watc...
http://www.youtube.com/watc...

These are all tech demos 9 years back, showing the capabilities of the EyeToy. It was used for the PlayStation 2, NOT 3. Most of these tech demos were also used in EyeToy games. You can search for a bunch em on youtube.. search "EyeToy."

The PlayStation Eye, can do everything that Natel can do now. That is a FACT.

Shouldn't you wait till you actually see a Natal title that doesn't look like it could be an Eyetoy game before saying that they aren't similar?

Even Milo has a counterpart with Eyedentify, considering that both are presentation demos. Not to mention that Sony could still put out a hands free XMB interface for only the Eyetoy.

What are you on about? The titles are irrelevant, the technology behind them is what's completely different. Natal has TWO cameras and uses infrared to track targets, the eyetoy uses one camera and uses differential contrast to track "differences". Natal has completely different applications than the eyetoy ever had.

Jumping could be done by just jumping. Do you need to walk? The game could just take you to set pieces where you interact with everything from there. If you watched the burnout paradise demo, just taking a single step forward starts you moving. Turning your body could turn you as well. Natal is similar in concept to the pseye, but it's ability to track your body movements is dramatically better especially depth. Add on 3d googles and the immersion just gets better.
Sorry I'm not a pessimist and I like new technologies. I paid alot of money to swing a tennis racket on the wii and hope that the game can get me to the ball in time.

"What are you on about?"

That the only real difference between the two systems is depth, which Natal hasn't actually shown. Everything else is what MS hopes to have ready when they put out Natal.

Yes the kickball demo has your outline moving back and forth, but to no real effect. It would mean something if you could lean into an incoming ball to knock it back with more force, lean back to slow it, but you can't.

i noticed when i play(ed) the wii, i would slowly bring the nunchuck and wiimote together. lol

As for the Burnout demo, I would still prefer a gaming wheel and a controller to pantomiming.

"Do you need to walk?" unless you like mini games and being limited to track games (house of the dead/time crisis) then, yes you need to walk in videogames.

I am totally with you on that, I tend to think of the possiblities. I don't recall Msoft saying you couldnt use a controler with natal. I think the possiblites are endless, imagain a three point shooting contest on nba live or 2k where you shoot, or playing madden and throwing the ball and calling out the reciever that you throw too, I don't think it is going to change everything, I think it can just enhance gaming. It amazing how many people cry about the wii, but actually own it, because it is fun to play. Its just ps3 fanboys that are hating on this. Until sony announced their motion controls they were all hating on it, now its well ours is better. I think any inovation is a good one.

Natal means christmas in portuguese but NOT in SPANISH, in spanish Xmas is "Navidad"

Godmars290: "THe only difference is depth", really? You managed to brush that one off pretty well, that's like saying the only difference between Doom and Halo is "Depth" because one is 2D and one is 3D. Depth, particularly in this instance, makes a HELL of a difference. And yes, it has been demonstrated, Burnout Paradise had players controlling acceleration by moving their foot forward and backward. Eyetoy couldn't do that. What's more, Natal tracks specific points in 3D space, points that the developers have complete control of. Fingers, arms, whatever, they can tell Natal to track those specific movements. The eyetoy is only capable of a basic form of tracking and gets easily confused if you, say, clench your hand into a fist or hold it over your face or obstruct it in any way. The two systems are VERY different.
If Natal truly was just like the eyetoy, why would it need to even exist? Microsoft already has a camera that can do everything the PSeye can do, there'd be no need to release new hardware.

"It would mean something if you could lean into an incoming ball to knock it back with more force, lean back to slow it, but you can't."

You can't? Or it just wasn't programmed into that particular demo? For what you're talking about, Natal doesn't need to do anything different, all the software has to do is calculate the velocity of the outline at the time it makes contact with the ball. There's no reason why that couldn't be done, it just wasn't necessary for that particular demo. You haven't seen half of what's possible with Natal and because you refuse to actually look at how the technology works and why it's different to the PSEye, you don't understand what is and isn't possible.

I would also prefer a steering wheel in burnout, and if they make halo reach all motion controlled I will probably cry. I also love motion controlled minigames. I think hard core games are an exercise in frustration on the wii. I think fps should stay primarily k/m or controller and add motion control where it would be cool. But a primarily motion controlled star wars game would be amazing. The force unleashed is hard to do with controllers (except for moving around).

@Hutch
Right on. Or a baseball game using a real ball and how you place your fingers/hand on the ball and throwing motion determine the type of pitch it is.

I also think it's great how all 3 consoles are offering you a different experience in terms of motion controls.

MS hasn't really shown anything truly impressive. Sure the interface stuff is cool, but no games look even remotely good. I still don't see any good applications for the tech, despite the fact that it is apparently 'super impressive'.

I wouldn't defend it too much. If MS actually pulls off some awesome games, then great. Until then I don't understand what the hype about Natal is.

I can invisible skateboard, and race car drive? Woweee! They should have demoed something people would actually use/play (besides menu interaction, which won't be worth it for the price).

"no games look even remotely good"

That's because they're not games, they're tech demos. They're not designed to LOOK good, they're designed to show off the technology. Sony's were the same and I believe the early Wii stuff wasn't much different. The technology depends on Developers making good use of it and although you might not be able to see it, I can see a lot of possibility with this technology. It's beyond anything the Wii can do, even with WM+.

Your 2.11 comment if not proves then reinforces my argument: They might be able to program a game where position and movement have added effects, but it wasn't shown. The Burnout argument is not the same thing otherwise I'm sure MS would have done a demo of that in-between the kung-fu fight, the daughter mother soccer match and the kid stomping through a city.

"If Natal truly was just like the eyetoy, why would it need to even exist?"

Maybe because MS doesn't own the Eyetoy or Wiimote and they want to make an entry into the motion controller arena? Preferably one that's closer to Nintendo's attempt rather than Sony's?

I've said it before, with the hands free dashboard interface they're on the right track, certainly came up with something Sony should have, but for actual games we need to wait and see what's actually offered before heralding Natal as the Second Coming.

Not that it wont stop most even if all that's offered are Wii carnival and Eyetoy clones.

The Live vision camera is, in every way except for a mic, the same as the PSEye. Same deal, same things possible. If you look at "You're in the movies", you'll see very similar things going on that you see with the eyetoy, the difference is that Microsoft never really invested a lot into developing software to do a lot of those things, whereas Sony did. But now Microsoft has software and if it really was just the same, they wouldn't need new hardware for it. But I've said this before and I'll say it again: You refuse to understand how the Natal technology differs from the technology behind the PSEye and because of that, you don't see where the differences are and thus cannot see how Natal would be any more useful. If you actually stopped and restrained your Knee-jerk reaction of "It's just like the PSeye!", you'd see how it differs and why it differs.
The PSEye, for example, cannot track specific parts of your body. IT might be able to track your head, because your head isn't going to get obstructed by another part of your body and it's a pretty obvious shape to detect, but it wouldn't be able to detect fingertips or individual joints unless it had something specific to track. Even look at Sony's new motion controller - it has a great big glowing ball on top of it that the camera uses to track. That's not just there for show, the camera needs that position the object. Natal does not, it can just track any object, no matter what its size or shape is.
With Sony's motion controller, if you happen to be standing in front of a background that just happens to be the same colour as that glowing ball, it's going to have issues tracking it. Natal works even in the dark, because it uses infrared and the second camera means it can track objects in 3D space - something the PSeye cannot do with just one camera. That's why it needs accelerometers in the wand.
But the point I'm trying to make, the point you keep missing is that although both devices are "motion controllers", they're both completely different implementations with different uses and applications. It's like saying that a Car and a Skateboard are both "modes of transport" - yeah, they are, but you wouldn't drive a Car on a footpath, then flip it onto some railings, nor would you skateboard down a motorway. Different implementation mean different applications.
And then you keep throwing around the "Well MS didn't demonstrate it!" argument. They demonstrated a lot, you're just picking holes at it because it didn't demonstrate something you specifically wanted to see. That doesn't mean it's not possible, it just means you haven't seen it. Once again: Learn how the technology works and you'll see why everything you mentioned is, indeed, very possible.

I think you're both being a little extreme. Natal is definitely more advanced tech than PSEye, but they do both fill the same role and perform the same basic function. Natal can do more then the PSEye, though because it does track depth.

Godmars, the Ricochet demo did show the woman headbutting a ball at one point, and i'm pretty sure she leaned forward for that, hence depth. Besides, have you seen that video of Richard Marks speaking at Stanford in 2004? That was exactly the same tech (he even mentions 3DV by name, yes MS just bought the company that Sony had been working with) and that clearly shows depth perception by this tech. As far as nothing looking good: they were really just concept videos, let's see what devs do with it. The PS3 Motion Controller demos (Sony release a name soon, please) didn't look very good either, though the sword demo and archery demo could be good in a game.

Kushan, I think you overstate a little the presence of two cameras on Natal. It doesn't use them for stereoscopic view, one of the cameras is the z-cam that uses IR to find depth and gets the same perspective as the other camera. You also imply that Natal and PSEye differences are analogous to the space shuttle and a bottle rocket. That HUGELY exaggerates it. You could maybe get away with saying space shuttle versus Apollo rocket, though.

Not forgetting that Natal also has its own processor and RAM.

PSeye = 1 Camera + 1 Microphone + Motion Capture + Background Noise Supression + Voice Tracking

Natal = 2 Cameras + 1 IR Light + Processor + RAM + Motion Capture + Voice Recognition + Facial Recognition + Acoustic Source Localization + Ambient Noise Supression + CMOS Sensor + 48-and-above Feature Extractions + More

Natal does not mean Christmas in Spanish. Maybe in Portuguese, but not spanish

Most of those Natal features you listed are just software and some have even been done on PSEye. PSEye does have a "four capsule microphone array" not just one mic, and is also capable of ambient noise suppression and acoustic source localization (see Wikipedia). The two cameras thing is overstated since they are so close together, they do not give stereoscopic view, it's just that one of them sees in IR for the depth sensor part. Natal is more advanced than the PSEye, but let's not overstate it.

Natal does mean Christmas in Portugese, but it is also the name of a city somewhere. Microsoft has a tradition of code-naming projects after cities, so that is where the name actually comes from.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wik...

I think what he meant was that those features are done on board the natal device rather than on the console running it.