Microsoft Xbox 360 Kinect Official Thread - Page 3

Has anyone tried Kinect in person? I would like to hear some first-person opinions.

I went to the Microsoft store in Mission Viejo.

The two Kinect displays they have are just outside the store in the main corridor. Which made trying it very intimidating considering it was 4th of July weekend and there were a lot of people around.

One display was bowling. The bowling is pretty cool. A lot of people were throwing 1-pin and gutter balls at first. You do have to watch the position of your wrist. If you pronate (as a lot of people do), the ball will tend to go in that direction. I was intimidated by so many people watching that I ended up bowling the way other people were (didn't want to look weird). So I didn't try a full bowling motion. I just cupped the ball and threw but I tried not to rotate the wrist and did pretty well. I'm a beginner in real life bowling so I bowl straight down the middle of the lane rather than true bowling where you hook the ball in.

The other screen was the Adventures one. It was pretty neat. I doubt I'd buy it though. But kids found ways to play it to do much better than I expected. Like if you're in midair after a jump, if you jump again, it'll pull the raft up again. Adults were the ones that actually needed instructions. The little kids just jumped in and were better at controlling the raft.

The Adventures game can have jittery movement like your character would jitter sometimes even when you weren't. Control was pretty good. Yes, it has lag but it's like Wii lag so if you're used to controlling the Wii, the feel will be similar. but you don't have to fight the lag. not like the Wiimote where if you move it too fast, it'll sometimes spaz out.

I think the Adventures game definitely has more lag than the bowling game.

I think if you're the type to be intimidated by crowds, it's hard to play well. Like when I went to nightclubs with friends and girls would tell me to move my hips more and I thought I was, but then I looked at myself dancing in a mirror and I barely moved. That's what it's like. The adults would have these tiny leans but they set up the river course to make you move. in the online vids and fallon show, the river doesn't seem to change direction much. but when you're playing it, it seems fast and really moves around. it was like when you first see someone playing DDR and it seems easy. but then you get on it and the arrows seem so fast and you're a half step behind and missing the arrows. you swear that you're hitting the arrows but you're missing.

the kids would lean for more subtle turns but had no problem with taking major steps to make the craft go on the big turns.

So that's it for this visit. I think I'll come back on a weekday some time to test out the limits of the system where I don't have a zillion people watching me. they only had bowling and Adventures on display. But I read that the stores have all the Kinect demos available to them, including Dance Central. But there's no way in hell I'm going to try dancing in front of all these people. I'm a shy guy when I'm surrounded by a ton of people I don't know all looking at me. my dad said I was super stiff and was a back seat advisor, telling me to lean. I wish the demo was inside the store but I guess they wanted max exposure.

inside the store, they had a nice fifa demo on the big screen. i worked a kid for a goal. they had a nice demo of the lakers. Fisher was bricking, as always.

they removed all the 360 skinit displays. if you ever visited this store before, they had all the 360s skinned with skinit skins. really slick looking vinyl skins. you can pick a skin on any of the PCs and then they print it in the backroom. got me to buy a UCLA skin for my 360 arcade. but since they removed all references to the old 360, they had to get rid of these old skinned 360s. a shame because I really liked the skins. The Lakers jersey one and the Cowboys jersey skins look awesome. hopefully skinit will make new skins for the new 360.

but I doubt I'll be picking up a new 360. I'm willing to wait for the next gen consoles to come out. I have a feeling that next year will be an announcement and the year after will be the new systems.

http://www.joystiq.com/2010/07/07/ki...eated-players/

From Joystiq:

Microsoft has clarified that Kinect is very capable of recognizing a user that's sitting, an aspect of the new tech that continues to be a point of confusion. "Kinect can be used while sitting when an experience is developed with sitting in mind," a representative for the company confirmed to Joystiq today.

As for previously revealed Kinect applications that are being developed with a seated user in mind, Microsoft pointed to navigating the Dashboard, along with using the ESPN, Zune and Video Kinect apps as "experiences where we expect people to be sitting."

Microsoft concluded that what it showed at E3 was "only the tip of the iceberg" and that it's going to be "natural for Kinect games to be designed to get you off the couch: dancing, running, dodging, bending and kicking." It's just good to know that we'll also have opportunities to stay seated and move as little as possible to connect to this motion-based gameplay technology.

That's the same basic response MS gave back when Stephen Totillo ran his piece for Kotaku a couple weeks ago.

MS said at the time that they were still working on Kinect menu navigation, but that their ultimate goal was that it would work fine from couch-potato position at launch. What isn't being said, however, is that the supposed reason that we didn't see any games at E3 "developed with sitting in mind" was because MS told developers specifically not to design games "with sitting in mind." What wasn't clear at the time (and still isn't) is whether or not this was a technical limitation, or merely a suggestion for the sake of marketing the device as an "exercise-oriented" peripheral. Hopefully it's just the latter.

Does it really make any sense to design motion-controlled games with the goal of extremely limited motion?

It really just depends on the type of game. For instance, if playing a rail shooter, I'd like to be sitting on the couch and that should probably give me more precision with my shots. Now, a sports game, like baseball or golf, I'd have no problem getting off my ass to swing at the ball. Depends on the game, but I hope Kinect will allow me to have the option.

As a corollary question then: does it really make sense to design motion controls into a sedentary game?

I see the developer question as this: am I using the controller for input or not? If so, it's not that easy to be up on your feet and access the controller unless it's terribly basic like only hitting "A" for the tambourine while singing in Rock Band. If I'm using the controller and all the buttons, the player is probably sitting and there's no reason for motion controls. On the other hand if I'm designing a motion controlled game where I want the player to get up and move around, do I really want to force them to hold the controller? Prolly not.

I see it as an either/or proposition: on your arse controller or off the couch motion controls. Seems like a good basic tenet that you only violate under bizarre conditions that uniquely make for a great game. All IMHO of course.

Absolutely.

Plenty of (good and even great) Wii games that use the motion controls are designed to be played while sitting: Super Mario Galaxy 1&2, Metroid Prime 3, Twilight Princess, No More Heroes, Sin & Punishment, etc. These are all "hardcore" games and all use motion controls from a sitting position.

But if Kinect is just going to be a more dynamic version of the Wii Balance Board (which is what the current crop of Kinect games at E3 was), then yes, we'll probably all have to get up off of our asses. It all depends on how MS decides to market this thing. So far, judging by all the marketing pictures, press releases, demos, in-store customer impressions, and general banter, MS is aiming for a version of the Wii Balance Board rather than full-blown motion controls.

So the answer to your question is "yes."

Almost all motion games are sedentary. A small flick of the wrist or turn of a controllers sums up almost all Wii games. Same goes for Move, playing KZ3 or SOCOM3 is not going to require jumping and waving. Motion controls != exercise.

Just because non-gamers and kids spazz out playing Wii sports does not meant hey have to. I am much better sitting with small motions than these casuals who think Wii = spazz around the living room.

the reason why Wii games play better with flicks of the wrist is due to limitation of the hardware and software design.

for example, If you played with real tennis swings in Wii tennis, you'll get murdered. non-tennis players found out fast. you give gamers time and they'll always find loopholes in the gameplay.

motion in Wii is not realistic. even motionplus (which I so wanted to be good) didn't improve things that much. but even though motion on the wii is not realistic, it moves us closer to reality than moving an analog joystick.

and what is up with hold down A with this motion or hold down A+B for that motion?

look at the pathetic just dance for the wii. they invent these weird dance routines that are a shell around the motion of the wiimote. but you can strip away the fake dancing and just sit on the couch and rotate and gyrate the controller around and get better scores than if you did the fake dancing.

I think as technology gets better, motion controls will require more realistic actions and thus be more active than today.

with today's technology, all you can expect is flicks of the wrist, thumb, and button presses.

the ultimate controls would be controlling the game with your mind. but even that's not realistic because your mind can think far faster than the physical motion would take.

Highly abstracted, the moniker "Motion Control" could be applied to thumb movements and button presses. So I think we need to make a distinction between things like shaking your wrist or pointing at the screen and full body interpretation. I suppose it's reasonable to say Mario Galaxy and Killzone 3 are motion control games but I don't think it is an accurate description.

Maybe "motion control" versus "movement control"? Whatever the terminology, as I have said before, Kinect is a new interface paradigm. Now that it has been confirmed positions besides standing are supported, the questioning of this always seemed to be bluster and fud, I'd expect sedentary games and active games and all different kinds of games to be developed for Kinect. Which means we'll probably be wading through lots of crap to find the gems

Xbox execs have made it clear that there are games that make sense for Kinect (sports, casual games) and there are games that really are not well suited for Kinect (FPS).

I don't expect that attitude to change any time soon.

We can call it "body moving control", but "motion control" existed before Natal, so you cannot narrow down an existing term for the sake of MS.



That is a bit dramatic, we did have EyeToy last gen which did many similar things.


No it has not, MS has given a nebulous response while multiple other sources have said standing is required (for now). So dismissing peoples concerns is giving MS a pass they did not earn.

http://www.joystiq.com/2010/07/07/ki...eated-players/

It does work while sitting.... ms confirmed it yesterday as long as the app/game is designed for a sitting person. What doesn't work is the transition from standing to sitting (yet).

I'm trying to be open minded to the possibilities without being a fanboy or a tech crapper. Not an easy thing to do.

To me Kinect is far different from the Wii and the Move because of the initial push to separate the player from the controller. In reality we'll probablly need some button presses somewhere and we might end up with something like the Scene It! controller that would be easier to handle in one hand, but the push right now is to realize the whole "you are the controller" schtick. I'll bite on that and see where it goes.

On that note, I don't know that adding a hand-wave command to my CPU team-mates in Call of Duty adds anything other than gimmickery. You already have a ton of complex commands mapped to all the buttons and sticks and triggers, and having to take your hand off the controller would probably be more detrimental than any gain realized from it. I'm sure there are some special cases that could be good, but overall I don't see it working for most stuff.

By the same token, once the control scheme is developed to get me off my arse and controlling the game with my own self, getting tethered back to the controller seems like a step backwards. Design the control scheme so that I am free to pursue the art of open handed gaming. I'll try it.

Of course motion controls for media center and Netflix are logical for seated viewers. I'd love to navigate to the next episode of Dollhouse by waving my arms instead of fumbling for my controller and turning it back on, but that's not gaming.

I see important distinctions between the interfaces that are currently all being referred to as motion control. My previous comments were an attempt to point out the potential ambiguities. I don't see how the chronology of the term's origin is relevant. And I wasn't trying to do Microsoft a favor.

From my perspective it is accurate to state that the interface Kinect provides is a new paradigm. Similar in my mind to the differences between imperative and declarative programming. The EyeToy is certainly an ancestor of Kinect. Just as the NES pad is an ancestor of the 360 controller.



I don't think "nebulous" means what you think it means.

I'm dismissing concerns about this capability because they were exaggerated and ignorant. I believe the developer quote that started all the hoopla was "Sitting is something we're still calibrating for." People took that and went right to "Kinect doesn't work while seated". Instead of considering the context and what was actually said.

When software that is still in development is being shown, developers try to avoid revealing known issues. This is the case for all types of software in all industries. The controls working from the seated position were still being developed and that is all that was said.

I don't feel that I was giving Microsoft a pass but I am curious what Microsoft, or any electronics company for that matter, would have to do to earn a pass from you?

Saying EyeToy did many similar things to what Kinect is about to do is like saying horse & buggy did many similar things to what an automobile does.

Kinect builds a real-time 3D skeleton. This has NEVER been done for a gaming console. N-E-V-E-R. You have no idea how significant this technology is if you think EyeToy did "similar" things. This is lightyears ahead of EyeToy.

And I cannot believe controlling Xbox while sitting down is still even a question. MS has answered it and there are reports of it working if you look around. The are still working on refining controls. They are still weeks away from code complete. What is the problem?

Let's not exaggerate. I remember when I first heard about the TurboGrafx-16 and I remember being amazed by NEC's claim that the hardware could handle AI in ways "never" imagined. Or remember the claims about the 3DO? A level of realism "never" thought possible. And so on.

The tech of Kinect may be capable of rendering a rudimentary skeleton (which may or may not be a big deal for games), but none of the games shown so far put that to any use. I have yet to be shown anything that convinces me that this technology is that big a leap over what the EyeToy did (and I never felt compelled to buy an EyeToy either BTW, so I'm not picking sides here). So far it's all just Wii Balance Board games without a Balance Board.


If they're still "calibrating" for sitting this close to launch, there must be something exceptionally tricky about it. So even if they get it working for menu navigation, who knows when/if we'll see it work for games. It might work by launch, but I'm skeptical if it'll be working as well as I would want it to. The statement sounds pretty "nebulous" to me, too, and is worded strangely. Far from definitive.

Yes, let's not exaggerate. I actually owned the EyeToy for the PS2. And it wasn't that good. You basically pointed out in space along an X-Y space to do stuff like pop bubbles. It was pretty crude. It was very sensitive to the light in the room and was very sensitive to the distance from the camera.

It's been a few years since I played it (packed away in boxes). Maybe I'll bust it out to give proper observations. But I did have fun with it because of the novelty. But it was an idea that didn't have the tech behind it.

I do think the automobile analogy is correct here as well. The Eyetoy was the Model T. The Kinect is like the Fusion or the Camry. And future generations of technology will only get better.

If you're going to make simple connections like that, then you can say that the CD is only a better cassette tape.

Undoubtedly.

But I'm skeptical that this will be the "big technological leap" that the Wii was. Between the Wii and the 360/PS3 was a radical difference in kind. But between the Eye/Balance Board and Kinect is only a difference in degree.

And that car analogy is a huge exaggeration. Between the Model T and the Camry was an unbelievable amount of technological, economic, historical, cultural, and industrial change. Without those changes, mass-market cars like the Camry wouldn't be possible. It's not as if someone saw the Model T and just "thought up" the Camry. Massive shifts in global business, industrial practice, technology, etc., etc. all had to happen first. This is no such thing.

Looks like another round of in store demos next thursday at macys...

http://www.pressstartgames.com/2010/...ect-event.html

Does anyone know : "How to Connect "Kinect" to Xbox unit"
Right now i am in the process of building theater room. Building it slowly. I didnt have a chance to look at Kinect in store. After my wife saw their AD on xbox, she wants to get it.

Wiring:
What cables does this Kinect Require.
Q1. Power Cable - Yes / No
Q2. USB Cable - Yes / No
Q3. Can the USB cable extended to Xbox unit Over Cat 6 cable & USB extender. Yes/No
Q4. Any other wiring required for Xbox (other than remote IR - already considered this) - 1,2,3,4...

From what I read, if you have the new XBox Slim, you just need one cable that connects to the special USB port on the XBox Slim. Otherwise, you will have a splitter cable to that connects to both an AC adapter and USB port on your old Xbox. Make sure the Kinect box itself have a proper position to capture your motions.

Xbox is going to be the new version too. This is only for the purpose of wiring..
Good then -- Then this cable must be a USB cable - I can extend it with Cat 6 & USB extender for 100' (under my projector screen to closet)
thanks

I'm not so sure that it is a USB cable that goes into the XBox Slim. They probably need some extra juice than regular USB port can supply. Take a look at the photos of new XBox slim and its special Kinect port (not a regular USB port).

But at worst, you can still use the included splitter to connect the AC adapter near the Kinect and your extended USB cable for the connection to the XBox.

Oh, C'mon.

You are comparing marketers hyping "qualitative" difference to "objective" leap in technology between Eye Toy and Kinect. One is just BS with no actual evidence. The other is an actual difference between crude 2D projection and sophisticated real-time 3D modeling.

If you do not appreciate how much of a quantitative leap that is in both programming and hardware, I don't know there is really any point in discussing it any further.

Ask anyone who has coded any games about the level of complexity involved in 2D gaming and 3D gaming. They are not in the same league. While it is true that 2D game could be more interesting and fun than a 3D game, there is absolutely no question which is harder to pull off technically.

The cable carries USb and power. Which is why it has a proprietary connector. That way you can use one cable. but You can also just use a regular USB cable with kinect, and then you just use a power cord plugged directly into Kinect.

I think you are exaggerating the technical differences. The PS Eye has a mic array like the Kinect. The PS Eye has a better RGB camera than the Kinect. The Kinect has a low res IR camera for Z information, there is no real-time 3D modeling.

It estimates a 20 point skeletal structure (down from over 100) from this crude Z map. The problem is the IR resolution (along with other specs) have been down graded, it is now 320x240 16-bit depth @ 30 frames/sec (it was 640x480 in the prototype). So with a resolution of 320x240 is has to estimate the 20 point skeletal structure for two people! Now you know why the avatar spazzes out in demos, this is prone to errors. With that low of a res it can barely make out arms and legs (which melt into the torso when not spread out, see Ubi E3 presentation). So while this Z info is novel and useful, it is also under sampled.

Remember the days of talk about finger tracking? They are dead, you will be lucky to tell open vs closed hands. This is also probably why there is issues with sitting down, the legs and lower torso will be part of the couch and the skeletal tracking algorithm probably uses context (head on torso, arms in legs in their appropriate places relative to torso) to figure out where the hands are.

This quote


is in direct disagreement with this quote


If you are not doing 3D modeling, why do you need Z-axis info?

And who ever talked about finger tracking? Even the high-end motion capture system used for game development do not do finger tracking and you are expecting a $150 home system to do it?

The problem with sitting down is simple. The camera cannot see the hip joints and the thighs. It has to guess where your thighs are, and whenever a computer is guessing, you are going to have problems.

I picked up the 360S yesterday from Gamestop (only 1 in 10 stores in my area!!). I was looking on the back of the unit, there is nothing specifically marked for Kinect, but one says AUX, is that the connection for the Kinect?

anyways, my kids are more psyched about the Kinect than I am, especially Adventures and Kinectimals. Anyone see the preorder deal that Walmart has: Kinect + 1 game + $30 online gift card for $199?