Since the Hand Sillhouttes was my Idea...Merger?

You are settling? Fight it man.

...... *sneaks away*

Expect to hear from my lawyer then...See you in court

@ Roland

LOL

One of the centerpieces of last month's Microsoft E3 press event was Project Natal, the long-rumored motion sensing peripheral for the Xbox 360. Speaking with GameSpot, Phil Spencer, head of Microsoft Games Studios, revealed that two major shooter developers, Bungie Studios and Epic Games, were already playing around with Natal technology--which requires no controller to use.

Bleszinski won't be air-chainsawing any Locust anytime soon...

The prospect of playing a 360 shooter without any buttons, pads, or thumbsticks--all of which are heavily used in the genre--was greeted with more than a little skepticism. This sentiment is apparently shared by Epic design director Cliff Bleszinski, who told British magazine Develop that his studio will probably not be jumping on the motion-sensing bandwagon anytime soon.

"Y'know, we'll take a look at Natal--no promises--but it's likely that the classic control interface is what Epic will be working on in the foreseeable future," promised Bleszinski. He then added, "But I think there's ways that you could merge the two interfaces and supplement a classic game with Natal controls to make something compelling."

Bleszinski went on to express his feeling that he thinks the shooter genre should evolve by adopting elements from role-playing games. "I had a conversation with Harvey Smith--one of the lead designers on [the action RPG] Deus Ex--and said to him the future of shooters is RPGs," the designer told Develop. "He said he completely agreed."

Bleszinski went on to praise another recent action-shooter hybrid, BioShock, and to call out another one coming out this year. "Randy Pitchford at Gearbox is an absolutely brilliant designer and business man, and I think Borderlands is not getting as much hype as it should because it really looks like a more accessible, shootery version of Fallout," he declared.

I think an interesting use of Natal would be to be able to see your friend/opponent on your tv as you play against them.

For example: Baseball

Your friend shows on your TV, Natal auto draws in the appropriate uniform, bat and ballpark but it's your friend actually doing the swinging. On his TV he sees you dressed as a pitcher with the virtual ball. Potentially an entire team or actually players could be superimposed onto the screen but it'd be damn dull in the outfield or bullpen so most likely just a two player game.

Could also work for golf, frisbee, etc. Any non-physical sport.


I can't see playing a FPS with Natal. Would prefer the Wiimote for that.

A superhero or Dragon Ball Z game using gesture control could be epic though.

Johnny Lee interview:

http://www.360magazine.co.uk/general/natal-dev-natal-will-spawn-new-genres-of-videogames/

360: Do you think Natal is likely to spawn entirely new genres of videogame?

Johnny Chung Lee: “Almost certainly.  Most of the current game genres are optimized for the input device that was available.  With the additional of motion and pointing sensing, we’ve already seen several great examples where developers are exploring novel kinds of gaming experiences.

“The lines blur between game categories, and the lines blur between control mechanics. Natal provides a very different set of input capabilities than your typical game pad.  To really take advantage of those capabilities, new kinds of experiences will have to be explored.”

Lee also said that Natal won’t necessarily be more geared toward casual gamers and that the technology will be very entirely compatible with the regular 360 controller. But… you’re gonna have to check out issue 54 of 360 Magazine for the full interview. Yep, we’re cock-teases.