How's the new PlayStation controller look and feel to someone who lives and sleeps with Wii remote in-hand?

by Craig Harris

March 10, 2010 - There's no question that the PlayStation Move – the official name of Sony's long-in-development motion controller solution – has Nintendo to thank for its inspiration. Hell, even at the Sony press conference at the Game Developers Conference, Peter Dille, Sony's executive of marketing and emcee of the event, couldn't help but congratulate Nintendo on its success with the Wii and its motion-sensing remote. 

And after playing through many of the demos here in Sony's "arcade" at GDC, it's pretty clear that the company's going right after the Wii market. Sony even said it on stage: the PlayStation Move is meant to attract the Wii user ready to move into the world of HD. 

The PlayStation Move is a single, wireless remote control that bears incredible similarity to the Wii remote. It's very comfortable to hold, and definitely sleeker than Nintendo's four-and-a-half-year-old device. The unit even operates similarly to the Wii remote, just in reverse: instead of the Wii remote being the "camera" to sense the sensor bar for its position in 3D space, the PlayStation Move uses the PlayStation Eye camera on the television and senses the light on the tip of the controller. 

I will say that the technology is certainly stronger than Nintendo's Wii remote, but after nearly five years of the Wii being on the market, Sony's solution better damn well be superior. And at a hundred bucks for the starter system – that's just for the controller and a game – it needs to be more than just waggle. Luckily, it's more than just waggle for most of the games here at the Sony event.

Thank you Nintendo for all your great ideas. Your pal, Sony.

I think I'm most impressed with what Sony calls the "augmented reality" experiences. Move Party is a great example: the PlayStation Eye's video feed is displayed on the screen – much like the company's EyeToy games – and the game will overlay handheld items right on top of the PlayStation Move controller. In one of the games in Move Party, you guide falling birds with a handheld fan, twisting the fan in clockwise and counterclockwise fashion to blow the birds towards the nests on either side of the screen. The device tracked the controller's position and rotation impressively well – even when I blocked the glowing orb from view of the camera, the game remembered its last position and tried to keep up with my hand motions. Eventually it would get out of sync until I released the glowing orb, and once the camera saw the light…bam, the item snapped right back where it should be. 

It does feel like there's a bit of lag with hand motions, but it seems to me that it's because the PlayStation Eye's video feed is a millisecond behind real-life. But the augmented reality overlays match up perfectly with the on-screen controller, a testament to the camera's color sensing combined with the motion and tilt sensing keeping track of everything going on.

There are a couple of "pointer" based games on display, too. A game called "The Shoot," basically a rail shooter along the lines of Resident Evil: Darkside Chronicles or Dead Space Extraction. Players move the PlayStation Move controller to guide the on-screen reticule around the playfield and shoot the incoming enemies. The "lag" I felt in the augmented reality demos was more apparent here because you didn't have your on-screen self guiding the reticule, and it wasn't matching up with any physical object. Plus, the game has its own calibration system and it was throwing off my aim – someone had set up the calibration for wide sweeping motions to guide the reticule just a few inches on-screen. Luckily a quick recalibration with the menu option, and a simple tap of the button on the controller and I was back in business. 

I should note that The Shoot did get thrown out of whack in aiming, much like the same thing that happens in Wii Sports Resort's Sword Play. The game has a built-in recentering tool for when the reticule drifts, so it looks like the system may have a similar calibration issue that Wii MotionPlus does. 

Sony really needed a better first-person shooter demonstration for the PlayStation Move and its uncreatively named Sub Controller (basically the Wii nunchuk ripoff). The company has a very early, and low-framerate version of SOCOM 4 here that does pointer tracking, similar to Resident Evil 4 on the Wii. It doesn't feel very sensitive in this demo, and that may be more because of SOCOM 4's early-in-development state.

Sony wasn't being a stickler about using the wrist straps like Nintendo is at its own events...

There are some really early game demos here, and the less said about them, the better. Brunswick Bowling is way too early for prime time, and the bowling in Wii Sports Resorts (and even Wii Sports) has absolutely nothing to worry about if the game continues on its current path. Luckily the developer has a half year to work on the bowling game. It needs it, badly. 

Then there's the fighting game called Motion Fighter that's gesture-based, and that felt way laggier than it should be, almost disconnecting the player from the on-screen action. The gladiator game in Sports Champions was a little better, but it, too seemed to have more lag in its swing motion than should be comfortable for the "next generation" of motion controllers. 

Overall I'm liking the PlayStation Move's form factor and tech, and I'm more excited for this solution than Microsoft's Natal. That could change in an instant if and when Microsoft shows off more of its Xbox motion control in the next couple of months. 

But the price and the lack of any real "wow" games on display here at Sony's press event sort of diminishes its impact. 

However, ignoring pricing, the PlayStation Move is clearly a stronger solution than Nintendo's Wii remote, nunchuk, and Wii MotionPlus combination, and it definitely has more potential because of this more sensitive and more capable tech. 

I'm just hoping for more than just Wii-like experiences in HD, and other than the augmented reality stuff in Move Party, that's all we're getting with PlayStation Move. So far, anyway.

LINK HERE

im sure this will get hits in the morning, as for tonight, im heading to bed ^_^

Pretty fair comparison. Obviously you would expect better tech for something that has had much longer to be able to work out the kinks and more advanced things. However, I think a lot of people just don't give the Wiimote with WM+ enough credit simply because the devs don't give it enough credit. I mean the original wiimote was able to do wonderful tracking and the WM+ pretty much perfected it with easier ability to develop. Yet it's obvious we still haven't gotten the full use out of WM+ and it can do a lot more than we've seen. So comparing it to that doesn't seem to do it justice.

Of course we'll see how well Zelda plays with it and hopefully Nintendo was able to get everything out of it. But what it does seem that Move is able to do a lot of what Wiimote plus WM+ can do, but doesn't seem that it goes above and beyond what it can do. Which is not necessarily a bad thing because obviously the Wiimote is doing things right. But little agitated by the comment that they want to see the thing used for more than the Wiimote is used for despite the Wiimote being incorporated in almost every way possible.

I wonder what Nintendo's immediate response to this will be. I doubt they knew about this until today. Whenever the next interview takes place, it will be interesting to see what Reggie, Cammie or Iwata think about this, after all, it's a Wii but with HD graphics, minus the Nintendo software of course.

This can only confirm that next gen, Nintendo will have to innovate a lot, simply adding HD resolution won't be enough. And that's good news if you ask me.

Oh Nintendo has known about this, knew about it when they showed it at E3 last year.  Aside from that, they knew if something they did became popular obviously others would jump on board.  And if they didn't, numerous Wii Fit, Brain Training, and Wii Sports clones have shown them that now. 

But I don't understand the argument.  Nintendo can't get away with just putting HD resolution on a Wii, but Sony can get away with just putting a wiimote on an HD console.  Seems like both would be in trouble in that case.  Point being Nintendo understands that they have created something popular and the industry is going to move with them, or even try to best them (although if 3rd parties are anything to go off of it might not happen).  Nintendo knows they have set the bar high and they are going to have to keep raising it, and just HD resolution with better tech specs won't do that. 

I think we'll also see Sony and MS on the other side of this, that simply just adding in motion controls or whatever to an HD system won't guarantee success either.  To win over fans, you have to differentiate yourself from the competition and create something people want but don't necessarily have.  MS is trying this with Natal and we'll see if it pays off for them like Wii did for Nintendo. 

"and definitely sleeker than Nintendo's four-and-a-half-year-old device."

November 2006 to March 2010 is three years and four months. Can't these people count?

Of course just HD next Gen will not cut it for Ninty. If you read a lot of the interviews with Reggie Cammie Iwata they have all stated for a long time thier will be no such thing as a Wii HD. When they make a new system it will have HD but it will also have much more as it would be pointless to just put in HD and expect most of the people to actually buy it.

Yea I noticed that too but can't say I'm surprised.  Would be surprised how many people just can't count haha.

I got into a heated discussion over that a few days ago. Cammie said Wii was into its 5th year, and when I told everyone that I didn't understand why would Cammie say such thing, they told me to learn to count lol. It's 3 and 4 months, like you say, but people count 2006 and 2010 as whole years :/

But are we sure that's really the case? If one ignores the promises and reads what was actually said about the games and the lag (all at this stage of course, things may improve), at least so far it doesn't sound on par with the Wii.