Microsoft to showcase Natal at Gamefest in February

[Jos]

Microsoft today announced that it will reveal more details about its upcoming motion sensing peripheral for the Xbox 360, codenamed Project Natal, to developers at its Gamefest conference this February. According to the event's website, one session will focus on designing games for the peripheral while another gets into the technical aspects of it, giving advice on gesture recognition, avatar retargeting, speech recognition and more.

The company has yet to announce an official release date but the fact that many developers are just getting this information three months from now is not very encouraging -- as it will probably be a long while before they have any worthy games ready for the public. That said, Microsoft has already got some major publishers in the loop and expects to have several quality titles ready for the device's launch sometime next year.

Previous rumors have hinted at a November release aimed at impulse buyers, with the hardware set to cost between $50 and $80. Microsoft denied these claims but of course we didn't expect anything else from them.

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https://www.techspot.com/news/37060-microsoft-to-showcase-natal-at-gamefest-in-february.html

 

[BlindObject]

I think it's gonna be like $150, no games included except for maybe those shown at the intros.

 

[Xclusiveitalian]

$50-$80 are just rumors, but if I know the money hungry people at Micro$oft it wont be in that range unless there is some sort of a weird subscription fee which makes them $.

 

[gobbybobby]

they will prob release new xbox models that come with it, and offer it at a loss to get people to buy it. (I am no analyst, but mark my word whn the day comes!) I think 3D on the PS3 will be bigger...

 

[red1776]

has anyone seen this thing in action (previews) of it around?

 

[ajickes]

I've seen video demonstrations online - it looks great. I wonder how this will compare with a similar project that the PlayStation group is embarking on.

 

[PCIGamer]

If Tony Hawk : Ride is any indication of things to come I think this will be fail for gaming. I will stick to a controller and/or mouse/keyboard

 

[RealXboxMaster]

Response to gobbybobby

Sony just annouced it. It's vaporware as of now. I really don't think it will be that big. First of all some of the population suffer fron dizzyiness when playing a 3D game. MS on the other hand already showed Natal technology and it's the best idea yet that will sell pretty well if marketed right with the right games.

 

[RealXboxMaster]

Yes, Project Natal enables users to control and interact with the Xbox 360 without the need to touch a game controller through a natural user interface using gestures/full body movement. The word natal means "of or relating to birth", reflecting Microsoft's view of the project as "the birth of the next-generation of home entertainment"

 

[RealXboxMaster]

I would say this device will retail around $79-$99 when it hits stroes nation wide.

 

[Hyperian]

didnt they show it off during E3 and people found out there was a guy sitting on the back controlling one of the games for natal? and the video they have of the kid riding skateboard is silly, should just ride a real skateboard outside.

 

[yangly18]

The idea of it is good, don't get me wrong. I just dont see myself using it. It would remind me off the Wii too much, and I'm sure we all know how sometimes games can be challenging when you are using motion as a controller, especially in tight spots. I still don't see how they will be able to intigrate this into the majority of the games that are produced for the xbox. It worked fine for the Wii only because the games designed for that consol were basic movement type games, like wii sports. I've only played a couple shooter type games on the Wii like metroid and medal of honor, and I did not like them at all. Considering the larger majority of games on the xbox are shooters/action type games, I dont see this as being a big hit with thoes kinds of gamers.

 

[nubnasty]

Natal will hit the market hard if its specs actually designed to follow basic movement. Im pretty sure there will be a lot of disappointments because people would expect it to be better.

 

[Nirkon]

You know, $50-80 doesn't sound that bad at all...
but since its just rumors it'll probably end up costing more

 

[lupinnktp]

nice, isn't it? and quite affordable too. juz wondering how well it works