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daroamer on 09 October 2009
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kitler53 said:
daroamer said:
Impulsivity said:
Who didn't expect this? I mean seriously, its Microsoft.

They charge 100 dollars for a friggin cheapo wireless adapter (free for Wii and PS3), charge 150 dollars for a 120GB HD (you can get a 3rd party Terabyte drive into the PS3 for less then that), charge 49 dollars for online gaming (which is free on every single other device be it PC, Mac, PS3, Wii, PSP, DS or anything else) and led the charge to the 59.99 for Next Gen games price point.

If this is less then 200 dollars I'll be amazed. I have no idea why anyone would pay that personally, I mean it looks kind of interesting but really only a step above what the eyetoy has done for years. I'm certainly much happier to pay 30 bucks for a Wii or PS3 style motion stick then any insanely expensive "exiting new thing" solution.

Incidentally you can use all kinds of cameras with the PS3 even, yes, the Xbox live camera of all things. You can also use just about any mic, not just the PS3 mic, any keyboard/mouse, not just Sony branded ones (if sony branded keyboards even exist). I'm 90% sure you'll be able to use a 3rd party Motion controller soon enough as well, thats just how Sony rolls.

For those estimating nearly 100 dollars for the PS3 version of motion controllers I bet the real cost will be half that, or one fourth the Natal price tag (much like Wii costs for motion controls)

I REALLY wish people would understand what the hell Natal is before speaking.  If Natal was nothing more than Eyetoy it wouldn't be getting the buzz from developers that it is.

What people seem to fail to realize is that it's NOT just a camera and microphone.  It has software built in to analyze and interpret the data is receives. 

For example, any microphone can listen to you and record what you're saying, but it doesn't UNDERSTAND you.  That job requires software to interpret the sounds that the microphone is hearing into words that games can understand.  Sure, the developer can program their own speech recognition software, but Natal is built on the Microsoft speech recognition software that they have been developing for YEARS.   This is complex stuff. 

The same goes for the realtime skeletal tracking and face recognition.  Beyond the fact that Eyetoy cannot see depth, something has to take this data and construct it into something that developers and actually use.  Face recognition?  Same thing.  Eyetoy can see if there is a face there, but can it determine who you are?  No.

All of these are things that different devices can do to varying degrees, but what Microsoft has done is combine these into a cohesive package that is more than the sum of it's parts.

Developers don't need to take raw data like sounds, images and depth information and create software to interpret that data into something USEABLE, Natal does that internally.  All developers need to do is access the output and THAT is why they are excited.

so natal is the eyetoy with software to interpet the data?

but anywho...

1. according to Peter M. Milo doesn't reconize what you are saying - it only reconizes tone.  it was in his explanation of the "tricks" milo was using to create the experience shown at E3.  I follow natal pretty close cause i find it interesting and i haven't seen even a faint suggestion that natal has the software support for full voice reconition.  if you have prove otherwise i would greatly apprecite seeing that.

2. (...and more importantly.)  it's not like MS's software support is writing games for third party developers.  Natal does a lot of interpitation, true, but the output from that interpitation is the skeletal system and the game developers still have to interpit that data in terms of how it controls their games. 

let me put it this way, Nintendo (like MS) has all sorts of software support to help developers interpit what the controller is doing.  The big difference (to me at least) is the wiimote/wand are going to be giving detailed information on 1 point; x/y/z location, acceleration, ect. Natal on the other hand is going to be giving the same information for something like 48 points if i remember correctly.  so tell me this,...how is that going to be any more useable to the developer?

...if the developer is going to make a "breakout" game where the full avatar is represented 1:1 on screen than yeah, that's pretty easy to put on screen.  but any game that is looking for more of a guesture based motion control things are more than likely going to be just like they are on the wii - laggy, unresponsive, ect.

I don't know if you're trying to be funny with your first sentence or deliberately obtuse.  Answer me this, if Natal is basically just Eyetoy, then please explain why SO many developers (including Japanese ones) are excited about the tech and no one bothered to support Eyetoy to any significant degree?  Seriously, the only people making the comparisons are PS3 fanboys.  Let me ask you another question, if Natal was basically Eyetoy, don't you think SONY would have said SOMETHING by now?  They haven't because Eyetoy is not capable of the same things.

As to your 1st point, I can't believe you're following it so closely if you clearly missed this - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ie02k3eAvxY

I'm pretty sure it wasn't just reacting to the tone of his voice. 

Your second point is just nitpicking, I never said it would write code for the developers but the process of interpretting the raw depth camera information and mapping it a 3D skeletal fascimile IS the bulk of the work.  That's basically like giving someone already processed motion capture data, all they have to do it map it to the joints of the characters in the game.  FAR FAR easier than getting raw 3D data and having to write your own code to figure out what it all means, don't you agree?

You're also changing the subject, my post had nothing do with Natal vs the Wiimote or the PS3 motion controller, it had to do with the person's comments regarding Eyetoy.

But hey, here's another question for you.  Why are Sony even bothering to release a motion controller?  Eyetoy can already do everything Natal can do!  Right?