Vancouver Secrets

Now I Might Have A Chance As A Gamer

BBC:

Microsoft has unveiled its new control system for the Xbox 360, at the E3 Expo in Los Angeles.

Project Natal is a fully hands-free control system that will use face recognition and motion sensors to allow users to play games.

Although still in the early stages, Microsoft has sent prototypes to all the main game developers.

Film director Steven Spielberg, said it was “a window into what the future holds”.  Mr Spielberg said he had always stated that “the main barrier stopping people getting into video games was the complexity of a games controller,” and that Natal was “a whole new world”.

“There is technology now that recognises not just your thumb, it recognises your entire person. The technology knows who you are,” he said.

Mr Spielberg drew an analogy with the film industry, saying it was evolutionary step for games.

“It’s like the square screen we saw all of our movies on in the early 1950s. Then The Robe came out in Cinemascope. And then came CinRam and Imax followed. That’s what this [Natal] is.

I think the technology looks very interesting but its success depends on the content and how easy it is to use Piers Harding-Rolls, analyst

During the demonstration, British developer Peter Molyneux showed how Natal could not only recognise faces, it could recognise facial expressions to determine what mood a player was in and react accordingly.

“The video games industry has not allowed us the opportunity to cry, because we were too busy putting our adrenalin rush into the controller, or wherever we swing our arm with a Wii controller to get a result,” he said.

“Because of that, there is no room for a video game to break your heart. We now have a little more room to be a little more emotional with Natal technology than we did before.”