and sega made a motion control circa 1994...and yet the wiimote is still revolutionary. The difference between the eye toy and natal is that just like with the wiimote and the sega control, Natal is a realistic attempt at bringing "no hands" gaming into fruition. As well as a whole hearted attempt at succeeding...and not just making a technology to later try to claim you did it first.

One cannot claim revolution and glory if one fails to succeed.

Besides...Natal takes it MUCH further.

First off, anything above $100 will be an epic fail, even at $100 it simply looks like too steep a price.

However, I think maybe Microsoft is strategizing heavily if they price it around $100.

They could end up pricing Natal at $85-$100+ individually, and then devise a bundle with one of the skus or maybe a new sku designed specifically to sell natal. They would do this by pricing the bundle in such a way that within the bundle, Natal actually costs $50, maybe even a little lower. This way they give the public heavy incentive to buy consoles (MS's true goal).

This way nearly every person that buys a 360 buys it with natal and some people that were on the fence are enticed enough to a natal 360 bundle.

Personally, if their doing something like this...i dont like it at all...waaay to risky.

It'll be $50-60 sold alone, even if that's the cost to produce the camera.

This is a razor blade handle that MS will want all current 360 users to buy if they're serious about Natal being a major part of the platform's future.

If it's bundled with a full size game, something like Eye of Judgement, then you could be looking at a $75-80 MSRP. $99 bundle is not out of the question if it was for a game (that no one has so far heard anything about) that is a true killer app and not a collection of tech demos to showcase the technology.

If it's bundled with the Xbox, either MS adds an extra $50 to both SKUs, or... they bundle it for free as a new "discount" to encourage the highest number of consumers possible to buy new consoles and have Natal ready for future games.


As a current owner, I'd strongly consider buying a second Xbox if such a bundle were sold even though there's nothing wrong with my console (no hardware problems yet). I'm probably not the only one.

I'm not saying you're wrong, but you're saying that you don't think it's worth 150$. MS have undoubtably done demand testing and have found a good price that will have the biggest impact. Look, people bought millions of wiis at 250$...for 3 years! People decided that 250$ was reasonable, and might also think that 150$Natal is reasonable. However, lowering the price doesn't linearly or exponentially raise the consumer base, it simply includes more people.

There may be some bundling or deals here and there, but a lower price does not ensure more customers. It ensures desperation. Remember that products themselves are also valued on lol..their actual value. Studies show that higher priced items are seen as better than an exact copy at a lower price. If it's 50$, people might think of it like a shoddy toy and not have anything to do with it.

Even if its $150 its still going to be cheaper for multiplayer than either the Wii or Arc. Only needing one device is going to help it sell.  Lets just say Sony manages to sell each arc for half the price of a regular controller...to get 4 of them is still going to set you back $120 assuming you dont play anything that needs 2 of them (sony demonstrated dual arc's already) in which case you are going to need 8 of the things plus the eye toy requirement which is another $35. 

I always thought they were going to "re-brand" the 360 with natal included, since they are going after the casual gamers and wii owners. A lot of current 360 owners have already showed there hatred for motion controls and casual games anyway.

Nintendo's original plan was to release the wii remote as an add-on to the gamecube. Do you think MS should have waited and put natal in with there next system?

Have there been any demos with multiple players playing on the same game with Natal?

+1

Great call!  Those controllers + peripherals for controllers sure add up super fast!  I know when I originally bought my Wii I was dissapointed that it cost me an easy extra $200 to get 4 people playing on it (and more once that damned glorious Mario Kart Wii came out!). 

hmmm, Not sure, I kinda like the idea of being able to have 2 player support on an Arc and being able to sit down and play. But I have the 360 too, so I will try the Natal, wii will see.

Why the hell would you want 8 Arc controllers. I highly doubt there will be a game that supports 4 people with dual controllers at the same time. I even doubt there even will be a 4 player co op when it comes to Sonys Arc.