We see a lot of upset fans at this board, stating things like Sony copied ideas from Nintendo and vice versa (Eyetoy with EyeSports/EyePlay, etc).

I would like to go back with an example of motion tracking pioneering going all the way back to 1991.

At the time there was an Amiga based system using virtual realtiy together with head tracking and handtracking (you could duck, lean your hand out around a pillar to shoot, jump, etc). Albeit the 3D graphics at the time were horrible for today's standards a lot of neat ideas were introduced back then.

One of the games was called Dactyl Nightmare, a 3D FPS from before ID Software became famous for its not as advanced Wolfenstein3D game. The game allowed for 4 players to play deathmatch and co-op 'capture the flag' matches over a network. Players could communicate through the built-in microphone. The headset allowed for a stereoscopic 3D view of the environment using shutter technology (unlike Wolfenstein3D actually with different hight levels).

In another game you could for instance sword fight with other people.

Some quotes and more info:

"Looking at the joy-stick through the visor it appears as a gun. Extending one's arm shows a virtual arm rendered in bright pink polygons."

http://www.hitl.washington.edu/scivw/scivw-ftp/commercial/WIndustries/W.descrip

My point is many of the innovations and gaming ideas originate from decades before the current fan wars. They are refinements based on more modern technology, but in some ways even less ambiteous.

Also for example Wii-Fit from basic idea point of view is also pretty similar to the Amiga Joyboard, a balance board controller from 1982. You would balance on the board to surf or ski.

About Amiga: The original Amiga Corp was a small innovative company which designed the Amiga computer. At a time of single-tasking monochrome soundless Macs and beeping MSDOS PCs (1985), this company designed a desktop computer supporting 4096 simultaneous colors on screen at once (images would finally look like photographs on a home computer, SDTV resolution), it could do pre-emptive multi-tasking (meaning you could for example copy & paste stuff on the fly from spreadsheet to image processor or word processor) and it supported stereo sound (it could for example also read out text to you). You could do so much for the time outrageous stuff unheard of for home systems before, for example with a genlock you could combine realtime animations / subtitles, etc with home made video, etc all in professional quality for the time.

As a gaming platform the Amiga was a great choice during the 80s until early 90s:

Some multi-platform games (Amiga vs PC, but various lowend Amiga exclusives were far more impressive than these and could not really have been pulled off on a high end PC of the time)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cETl8PhUy_E

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_e4uwzNkUVE

I fail to see how this is true.

We all know how Nintendo are the only ones to innovate, and everything is really copying them. If this isn't true, people will whine.

You should know this by now.

So...everybody copied Amiga?

I think you might have it slightly wrong, the reasons why Sony and Microsoft are getting the copy card thrown at them, is due to the focus on motion controller. Nintendo was one that made it relevant in the industry, and now microsoft and sony have to find a way to enter the market.

Just like microsoft made online relevant in the industry, it existed before them, but they brought it up as a key part of the console industry and people will state the psn has/had to play catchup and offer similar features and benefits.

Sony remote might get more slack because it looks very similar to the wii mote and numchuck combo, regardless if the idea was always originally not nintendo, it is the execution that is causing this effect of people calling sony move a copycat.

Edit: I know you were joking somewhat.

Here is a pic of the Joyboard

Sold with the skiing game Mogul Maniac, the joyboard is a platform that you control by standing on it and leaning in different directions.  It is also used by the prototype games Off Your Rocker and Surf's Up.

The games were not for the Amiga but for the Atari 2600 as this was Amiga's first product, which was before they were involved with Commordore.

It was an exceptionally innovative time back then. The Amiga was the most powerful multi-functional system out there, so other small and big companies used the system to try out new things. Disney animated movies like the Lion King on the system or combined computer graphics with video for their classic Dinosaur, for the time amazing graphics like seen in series such as Seaquest or Babylon 5 were rendered on the system, NASA used the system for their rocketry, there were even reports of Microsoft using Scala (Amiga presentation software) for their early floor presentations of Powerpoint, cable companies used Amigas for cable channels, the US military used them for flight simulation, etc.

And I'm sure if you look back further Amiga got their inspiration from something else and so on and so forth.

It wasn't a sarcastic/micro stealth troll mash-up though.

I'm just going by what i have read since from around last E3

It doesn't really matter who first came up with the initial idea, it's who took the idea and made it into something big, appealing and successful. And while Sony or any other company may or may not have come up with some/a lot of great concepts in videogaming first, fact remains it was Nintendo who pioneered most of the things that are now considered industry standards by intuitively implementing them and making them successful. Some examples would be the D-pad, shoulder buttons, analog sticks, rumble, touchscreen gaming, Z-targeting, 3D platforming and motion sensing. Whether these may or may not have been Nintendo's own inventions is beside the point: they are the ones who made it into what it is these days.

The Joyboard came out in 1982.