well atleast 360 will be around longer. Hopefully xbox 720 or w/e wont be appearing soon thanks to natal
I really dont wanna jump into next-gen yet.. this gen has just started!

Do people really want to stick around with natal instead of a new machine? sequel? LMAO!

great. good to hear the 360 won't be going anywhere anytime soon. I personally am just not ready to invest in new hardware already from any of the big three companies. Seems like we just started.

That confirms that they aren't going to control games like that with your full body. So its going to be what sort of non-fps games? You're In The Movies?

Greenberg said "Halo Reach should be a great game with a controller. It should never be played with your body."

That was my concern, that they'd mess with the games I love to play in an attempt to push Natal on gamers. If they want to attract the casuals, by all means go ahead. No harm in that. Just don't do it at the expense of the gamers who put you were you are today.

is this why MS has so few games ready for 360?

in 2 years ( 2009 / 2010 ) there's very few new IP's and few games in general...

could it be they re-assigned resources to Natal development and screwed hardcore 360 gamers? (ala Nintendo with the Wii? )

soooooo
MS is doing what sega did once

http://media.giantbomb.com/...

MS should learn from other mestakes
add ons as sequels dont work at all

why won't it die already.

the psn will have a premium service while online gaming still free, so whats the point in xbl.

natal is already here since ps2.

the gap is shorten from 10mill to 4or5mill.

and you got this halo reach is better with a controller talk that personally kicks natal in the nuts.

sad

so it's official Bayonetta is the best Action Game I've played. Then there is NG--->DMC3. What a sick game.

My guess is MS is gonna drop support for the 360 by 2011. 6 years into the generation if far better than just 4 and the PS3 will have caught up by then. There's really nothing else MS can do at this point.

agree. sometime i wonder the only reason natal have no controller is because of all these controller patents

They don't have anything to replace it with. No way Microsoft is going to drop support for the 360. Why would they? They're still billions in the hole over it. If they are indeed making money with it right now, some is better than nothing, and XBL fees will keep rolling in.

The question is, are they actually making money right now? I've never seen Microsoft say the 360 was profitable. We know Microsoft Entertainment has had a couple of profitable quarters but the 360 is only part of that division and just in September analysts said Microsoft was still taking a loss on every 360 sold. Also, 90% of the 360's library never hits the 1 million mark. And finally, even though Microsoft took the warranty hit on their books in 2007, that was just clever accounting to keep that out of the eyes of shareholders from that point forward. The cost of warranty repairs is eating away at their bottom line as we speak.

But even with all those points, Microsoft has too much invested into the Xbox brand right now. There's no way they'll ditch the console in a year's time. I think Saaking's way off on that one. I think Microsoft needs to milk every dime they can out of the 360.

By releasing Natal for Xbox 360, MS is extending support for it. There is no way, they would release a peripheral that MS considers their trump card only to drop it a year later. That makes no sense and only a fanboy could come up with a comment like that.

MS has re-iterated many times that they will support the 360 for a long time and I see no reason for them not to. It's profitable, and it's their most successful console... why would they drop it?

Instead of saying BS, how about you elaborate why MS would drop it!

I fear for MS with Natal. They are going to try and sell a casual gaming device/gimmick to a brand new crowd of people, most of which don't owned a 360 already. Trying to dip into the Wii's crowd of ignorant(not saying all Wii owners are ignorant) non-gamers who probably never even play their Wii.

These motion controls don't appeal to their current crowd of 360 owners. I'd guess that most of the 360 user base is full of hardcord/avid gamers, Halo fanboys, CoD fanboys, and Madden exclusive gamers. Most people in these categories will have little to no interest in Natal. Pushing Natal out to the current 360 install base might be tough.

Who knows though... the 360 install base might be full of more casual type gamers than I think.

If MS can't create a huge media buzz about Natal, and get the attention of casual non-gamers...then I see a tough road ahead for Natal.

...Are you guys serious? Have you been blind this whole generation?
OHWAIT! I've seen it's the usual Sony doomsayers ignoring everything, as per usual.

Look at the Wii.
- How much is it to buy a complete controller? £88 here. Four times if you want the full party experience it's meant to be, which is double the console.
- One of the highest selling games this generation? WiiFit... which needs to be bought with a peripheral, which is almost always bundled at stores, for ~£110, which is 2/3rds of the console.

Look at the PS3.
- Pre-paid online cards. £25 or £50. Not much of a choice for safety, eh?
- The movement controls for their console? The PSEye AND ANOTHER controller? So that's four normal controllers, four wands and a camera? Considering a DS3 is £39.99 here, this can only be bad news.

Look at the 360.
- Natal has said to be retailing at £50. Check this site alone.
- You only need one. Unless you want the complete variation. Four pads worth £22.99 is easily done when compared to the others.

OHNOES! M$ iz runing et!!!1

Please, a little piece of rational thinking on the price front.

Furthermore, Microsoft is treating this like the evolution of the 360. It combines past ideas with contemporary technology. It's not just 'get up, jump around for an hour, go make sammich' as most are assuming.

It's not winning awards because Microsoft has said "Yeah, it's pretty good".

I hate sh1tty sequels. This screams "TMNT 2: The Secret of the Ooze" to me. Just need Greenburg doing the running man, singing "Go Ninja, Go Ninja, Go!".

History tells us that peripherals seldom attain success unless they aren't peripherals and actually come with the system. Of course this isnt always the case but it is the rule as opposed to the exception. Eyetoy on the PS2 was a relative success however it has to be said the PS2's userbase was much larger than even the current wii userbase at the time. Not only that but it came coupled with games and a wide variety of them at that.

So why cant this work for MS? Well the answer is simple. MS is looking for major success with natal not relative success. They are openly throwing all their eggs into one risky basket which mandates major success. Relative success would amount to failure since development costs would not be covered (assuming the games that are being developed are of a high standard quality wise).

How can MS obtain the required success with natal. Well the media campaign and press support is one facet they've nailed so far and i'm sure they'll up the ante closer to release.

On the other hand its quite obvious the actual cost of the natal system was too high and thus it has been downscaled to be more cost-effective. And cost effective it will have to be since there will be no existing userbase for it. Every sale will be a new sale and thus it will literally have to be cheap in order for purchasers to pick it up without second thought.

Finally, gimmicks... yes gimmicks. Gimmicks are what sell to the casual consumer not "hardcore" games. If MS can come up with enough gimmick-y games or even something along the lines of The Sims and package them nicely the masses will buy and buy in droves. I apollogise to "hardcore" gamers like myself but while we do count we just dont tip the scales sales wise.

To be fair, even though it appears more useful to the "hardcore" (i prefer the term natural) gamer, the Sony wand has an even greater mountain to climb to be labelled a success - even though it does not require major success. But that is Sony's not MS's problem and it remains to be seen how they handle it

guitarded, the butt hurt xtard with a fitting avatard

bwaaaaaaaaaaa ha ha ha ha!

Nintendo has a house hold names for all generations for family friendly entertainment. Xbox doesn't have that reputation. When Microsoft pushes this out on the market, they will not get the traction that they are hoping for.

Lately, I feel that the decisions being made by Microsoft are being done with the direction of Wii envy stockholders pushing the entertainment devision to make a profit now. Natal was a way they could stall out the stockholders from pulling the plug. This is their 2nd console and the haven't really turned much profit, sold many consoles, but not turned a profit.

They look at the Wii and Nintendo is making money hand over fist, and the Xbox360 isn't. They look at Sony and they see serious momentum that they, without Natal, it's momentum will not have beyond Halo:Reach. They need to make the Xbox360 successful/profitable and the measurement of success they use is the PS2 and the Wii. Those are some serious console sales icons.

I see the 360 going more casual and if that doesn't work, one more Hardcore push, and if that doesn't work, then game over. If Natal sells great, then the 360 will raise hell in gaming.

But with the latest news about the processing chip taken out of Natal, some of the coolness about he tech just was taken out. Now the question is what makes Natal really special? What really makes this a revolution vs just a lot of smoke and mirrors? Is this a bluff by Microsoft?
I wonder what hand Microsoft will play next, this is interesting.