OK, OK, so I’ve been slacking off lately. I might as well just admit it and get it done with. Here’s hoping this will make some headway in making up for lost time, then: Woot is having a Sellout sale in which they’re letting the always desireable Xbox 360 Pro 60GB console go for just $229. I know what you’re thinking: “Oh, but it’s probably a refurb, and we all know how MS tends to treat refurbs”. Lucky for you, then, it’s not a refurb but a brand spankin’ new console.
Of course, you probably already know that the story has the 360 Elite (120GB) receiving a $100 price drop (to $299) to counter the newly minted PS3 slim 120GB version that was announced the other day at Gamescom, but still, for $229 you’d be hard pressed to find a better deal on the 360 right now. My feeling is snag it while it’s cheap, it won’t be too long before all you’ll get in this price range is the hard-drive-less Arcade model at $199 (though if Microsoft is smart, they’ll drop that sucker to $149 post-haste!).
So, this was a couple of days ago now, but I’ve been so busy over at E3 and blogging at our sister publication All That Gaming Stuff, that I haven’t had time to drop a note about it here. Project Natal is, in a word, the single most advanced motion control system ever devised or introduced for a home game console (OK, so that’s not a word, it’s more of a…phrase-like construct…thingy). And yes, that includes Sony’s newly announced Wiimote Duo (and yes, you should check out the Demo, it’s actually very cool as an evolution of the Wiimote concept).
So what does this sucker do? Well for starters it detects your entire body and the motion of 48 of your joints. It also detects your face–and will automatically log you into your profile when it sees you. It can detect your voice–and distinguish it from those of your friends, your family and even the game or movie characters you’re watching or playing. It can rapidly scan real world objects and convert them to real-time objects in a game as you can see in both the above video and in Lionhead’s demonstration of its advanced AI character Milo. But the most impressive thing shown with regards to Natal so far is that it enables the game software to do something that no game software has ever done before–it can recognize your emotional states by reading your facial and vocal patterns. No other system on the market or announced for a home console has this capability, and what it can mean for games where characterization is of great significance (RPG lovers take note) is simply off the charts.
Sadly, Microsoft has yet to announce a release date for this impressive new device, but given that they’re now in a race against time to beat Sony’s new Wiimote to market, to say nothing of Nintendo’s Wii Motion Plus, which is already on the market, it’s likely that this device has already been placed onto a priority track in Redmond. I wouldn’t be surprised in the coming months to hear of a massive internal push by Microsoft to get developers up to speed with this technology, retrofit high profile existing games for which it will make sense, and get the device into the hands of consumers as soon as possible. If they’re smart, they’ll also bundle it with consoles moving forward to ensure a reasonable amount of developer support, but we’ll just have to keep our eyes peeled.
What do you think of Natal? Next-Gen or gimmick (or both?) Let us know what you think in the comments!
We’ve been swamped the last week or so as we prepare for the launch of our new sister site, All That Gaming Stuff. While we occasionally cover games industry related news (and generalized bitching) here, the new site will focus exclusively on games news and reviews and Industry chatter. We’ll shortly be launching a new Gamer’s community on the new site where you can drop by and shout out what you think about all the latest comings and goings in the industry!
Welcome to the fold, ATGS, we look forward to a long and fruitful run!
It probably seems like premature nerdjaculation to begin speculating about the Next Generation of gaming consoles at this point; PS3 and Wii have scarcely been on the market for 2 years and 360 has just broken 3. Even so, that hasn’t stopped a little speculation from happening, not the least of which has come from UBISoft’s Yves Guillimot who, quoted in an article on GamesIndustry.biz, has stated that his company is preparing for the next generation to arrive in the 2011-2012 time frame.
As you should expect, there are naysayers, and some of them have good reason say nay, but they’re still wrong. The logic goes like this: “Well Sony says PS3 will last 10 years!”. Yes, and they said that about PS2, and that appears likely to be the case–but that didn’t stop Sony from announcing PS3 just 5 years after PS2 launched, and launching just a year later (that’s 6 years, folks, and if you use both hands worth of fingers to count you’ll find that 2012 will be-you guessed it-6 years after the launch of PS3-and Wii for that matter). Moreover, Xbox 360 will be 6 years old in 2011. Simply put, it’s not unreasonable to suspect that the next gen will launch-or at worst case scenario, be announced-by 2011-12.
As if it werent strange enough that Microsoft has publicly released the beta of the next version of Windows, possibly over a year early if their statement that “Windows 7 may not be out in 2009″ ends up being true, Microsoft has now announced that Win7s new Personalize Your PC website has launched. The new site (or Service, as the case may be) offers a variety of new themes, desktop backgrounds and gadgets for your desktop or Windows Sideshow (did that really ever materialize on any laptops?), all of which are, I suppose, geared toward making your PC feel more “you” centric.
And by “you” I mean “Me”, because we might as well just face it right now: this world revolves around me and should be personalized accordingly.
OK, OK, so I’ve been slacking off lately. I might as well just admit it and get it done with. Here’s hoping this will make some headway in making up for lost time, then: Woot is having a Sellout sale in which they’re letting the always desireable Xbox 360 Pro 60GB console go for just $229. I know what you’re thinking: “Oh, but it’s probably a refurb, and we all know how MS tends to treat refurbs”. Lucky for you, then, it’s not a refurb but a brand spankin’ new console.
