And this is the real reason. 

End of thread.

All these rumors about the Xbox 720 are making it out to be some sort of a totalitarian machine with infinite amounts of limitations (paradox). I understand the kinect being a required peripheral, but Microsoft is clearly making effort to suck up as much revenue as possible that would be lost without these restrictions such as always online, no used games, mandatory game installs and kinect feature. 

with the current kinect it doesnt matter if the camera is blocked for the voice controls to work. They also still let you use a controler for navigation. The reason kinect is probably required to be on is more likely that it is connected to the same power line and possibly controls turning it on and off.

Ok that makes sense. Hopefully thats the case.

Here is why I think Kinect harmed the core 360 gamer, and I am one of those mind you. The existance of Kinect meant a shift away from what USE to be Xbox's strength. When the first Xbox launched, that console and brand was designed and marketed towards the hardest of core gamers. It was by FAR the most powerful console ever, with an online service that put the other consoles to SHAME. It had an HDD built in and more than a hand full of HD games. It was a gamers console first and foremost. As the years went by, MS shifted away from that and towards casual experiences. Kinect became their focus, their priority, if you will. That meant letting exclusives go, ignoring what got them there, and shifting revenue and entire E3's AWAY core gaming in general.

The death of the blades and advent of avatars were the warning signs. Kinect? It was the trumpet. Now they aren't even denying it.

If MS doesn't care about the "hardest of core" gamers why is Halo 4 so damn amazing and it's awesome just won't stop thanks to all the additional content that keeps getting put out? If MS doesn't care about us they would have outsourced Halo to some cheap dev and pushed out junk. Instead they spent unprecedented sums of money to ensure that Halo 4 and all future Halo games would be the best of the best for the hardest of the hardcore. The only thing that pulled me away from Halo 4 was sexy Lara Croft. I just finished that and before I get back to Halo 4 now I'm playing Gears of War Judgment. That's another pretty damn hardcore game with the MS Studio logo on the front.

As for Kinect. I'm not a fan, but I am looking forward to Crimson Dragon. The spiritual successor to Panzer Dragoon one of my all time favorite gaming series.

There exists two worlds of gaming. Hardcore and everyone else. We hardcore may care the most, but we aren't the biggest group. There are tons of little kids who want to play with Kinectimals and Once Upon a Monster. Don't be offended that they get their stuff too. Games are for entertainment and we hardcore have had plenty to be entertainment with since Kinect was launched.

If the number of exclusive hardcore titles has slowed it's not due to Kinect. It's due to the winding down the generation. MS has put all their 1st and 2nd party developers on the task fo creating the next generation of games. We were lucky to get Halo 4. It would have made a killer launch title for the Nextbox. Thank Gates we were blessed with it's glory without waiting for next gen.

Was Halo 4 as hyped as Kinect? Did it get as much E3 time as Kinect? The answer to both of those questions is no. And that's a pretty big deal. I never said they completely ignore gamers like us, just that it's not priority number one anymore. That's my opinion based on what I've seen anyway,

Halo 4 got a lot of hype. The produced a live action movie just to promote it. A really good one considering it was a web series in format. Leading up to release you couldn't watch TV without a Halo 4 comercial. There were Red Vs Blue ads, the live action ad, and the Chief and Cortana ads. They've even ran ads for the maps packs on TV. Yeah TV ads for map packs.

As for E3. It's not about us. It's all about products for retail. I've been to E3 in person. It's not a gamer focused event, it's all about selling products and brands to stores and shareholders. That's why Penny Arcade created PAX which is ALL about gamers. Of course Kinect is going to get the most E3 time. For the same reason MS is going to push the Surface at CES. On the 10th Anniversary of Halo the year leading up to Halo 4, MS owned PAX Prime. They had endless panels, playble demos and a mini-museum with the history of the series.

The gen is winding down but we're still gaming. MS's studios are working right now for us to enjoy the Nextbox and we still got a new Gears of War. BTW Judgement doesn't have any Kinect features.

that being said that would make dance central just dance and  a few other kinect games the ultimate gamers paradise right?

a casual gamer can pick up a joystick and become a "gamer"  but can a "gamer" master the skills of dancing or master a game like steel battalion heavy armor.

besides the battering it took steel batallion main flaw was in the game itself more than kinect.  some people can play it flawless while others flail and fail miserably. 

I think it would be great to be fully integrated, especially if the tech in the next kinect is much better. Hopefully kinect can understand drunken jibberish, i find the 360 menu too hard to navigate when im wasted... to many colourful squares. feels like im playing tetris or something.