The problem isn’t failing to track that many people, the problem is that it breaks bad enough to be unusable if there are too many people.
At this point I just need to know if I can hack an xbox gamepad to the ps4. If so, then I’m going to buy one of those and be done.
Yeah, I don’t think anyone could expect it to be flawless in all situations, but there needs to be a fall-back or fail-state option. “More than 10 people detected, Kinect disabled temporarily to avoid confusion. Please use the controller for the moment.”
Instead the system seems to be built to just let Kinect chug along in situations where it becomes detrimental to the user experience. That is not really good design for something that is intended to be an always on central point of your entertainment system.
Or just recognise X voices. (Three, perhaps). Heck, there really needs to be “lock to only use voices loaded so far”.
Canuck
4693
Why don’t you give a Dualshock 4 a try? It’s probably not as bad as you think.
The DS4 has felt totally natural to me after about a week of adjusting to the dpad being above the left analog stick, and I was (and am) a huge fan of the Xbox 360 controller.
I still think the 360 has the best controller I’ve ever used (and that includes the Xbox One controller: I’m somewhat surprised there isn’t more backlash against the One controller considering I’m not a fan of the reduced analog stick tension nor the new bumper buttons. The haptic triggers are nice, but given the other two issues I think the 360 controller is still the superior one), but given what I view to be negative changes for the One controller, the DS4 and One controller are pretty much tied for second place behind the 360 controller for second place, IMO.
flyinj
4695
That Forza controller locking stuff sounds like a nightmare. You can disable Kinect controller/player recognition, right?
Editer
4696
BTW, if you’re playing Forza 5, get thee over to Forzamotorsport.net, log in with your Xbox Live ID, and choose Forza Rewards.
Having played all of the previous Forza games, I racked up $3M in cash to spend on cars. I think the reward amount varies by accomplishments in each game.
I hadn’t thought of that. Maybe we can just cover the kinect by putting something in front of it and it will automatically ask?
Nice! I just did it. Thanks Denny! By the way it lists two cars I have gifted to me, I assume those must be the cars that were listed as a reward for buying the Day 1 edition of the game? How or when do I get access to those two cars within the game?
Yep. You can also override who you are on the home screen (or set everyone to always log in manually, but that seems a bit of a waste). But if you want to avoid confusion in a room full of people, putting something in front of the camera works fine. Then you login manually.
Wendelius
Teiman
4699
“XBox, not optimized for a orgy”. What you guys describe is pretty cool. Even the bugs are really cool too. I would like a machine that confuse a dog for a visitor. Its weirdly endearing.
Reading the posts here, listening to podcasts here on QT3 and Giant Bomb… I get the sense that there’s some rose colored tech glasses here. There’s talk about loving the device but then listening to the in depth discussion feels more like the quirks and hang ups are a litany of minor annoyances (or maybe not so minor with a large group in the room). There’s the initial “saying XBox on and having everything turn on is dope!” followed by how the kinect still feels tacked on in games, voice control can be a bit spotty or specific or what have you, snapping is cool I guess but why, etc.
It might be obvious that I went with a PS4, but that’s not because I’m pro-Sony, I’m just anti-Kinect. I loved my kinect-less 360, and while I’m sure Microsoft has a vision for how the XBox One turns out in a few years once the hiccups are worked out, I’m personally willing to bet that the new kinect always remains something that is useful for “XBox On” and then the rest of the time you either feel it’s still tacked on in games or you have to wrap yourself around how it works without much gain. Giant Bomb called both platforms a good start but I think the evolution of the One will involve minimizing the Kinect’s role over time if they are true to actual use, or remain in the fog of bending over backwards a bit to make this thing seem as relevant as they think it is.
Not sure what the new direction I want for user experiences, but I know yelling at my tv trying to get the Infocom Text Game parsing right would make me feel stupid. I’d rather companies work on much cleaner UIs that allow navigation faster with streamlined remotes.
I personally think you are wrong with that long term vision. But then again, there are no games to prove you wrong on the XBox One at this point. So I’d definitely say that, if you feel Kinect is a liability and there were no games to make you lean towards the Xbox, you made the right choice going for a PS4. Both consoles are not going anywhere. If there is ever a compelling case for the One and the Kinect functionality, you can always reconsider then. Just like I can see a PS4 in my future. Possibly Spring or Summer next year.
Wendelius
History is against the Kinect ever having any serious, useful gaming functionality. This doesn’t mean it is impossible, but you’re giving Microsoft a lot of Faith if it entered your purchasing decision in a positive way.
stusser
4703
It’s silly to say that voice and motion control can’t offer a real advantage, if it works well. Microsoft’s company line about putting it in every box so it’s ubiquitous makes a lot of sense. I wouldn’t dismiss kinect out of hand. That said, most games are cross-platform and none of them will rely upon it for obvious reasons. You might get some Xbone exclusives where it’s central to the experience, and will probably see some cross-platform games with minor voice/motion control usage for things like “save my game” or “heal me now”, but it won’t be central.
No I’m not. The games that still get played the most on my 360 right now (that we’re in the grip of next gen fever) are Diablo 3 and… my daughter’s Kinect games. I’m a family man and a natural fit for Kinect that way. And I’m already enjoying the Kinect in similar ways I did on the 360 (better voice commands throughout the OS, also when streaming movies and TV series, auto login, … as well as “record that”).
But, as I said, while there really is nothing out right now to broaden the appeal of the device, I think OS upgrades and further game generations will (which is where I differed from the poster above me). However, that did not enter in my purchasing decision and probably shouldn’t enter in anyone’s. We’ll see what we see (or won’t). The XBox One was right for me as it is now. With 4 children, and a wife who loves Dance Central, and all of us enjoying Kinect voice commands, I am simply very likely a different market segment than others here. The device and the exclusives out right now were just the argument I needed. But, as I said, I also totally see a PS4 in my future too.
Wendelius
I definitely admit my prediction is coming straight from my ass but if I were a betting man and needed to bet one way or the other, I’m leaning toward more kinect marginalization. I think cross platform games will prevent the kinect from ever being more than tacked on in games and the skyrocketing cost of development will mean just things go cross platform.
The main Microsoft controllable push will be the os, maybe that will pan out. What I expect is for the voice stuff to become convoluted as the OS gets stuff globbed on like they did with the 360. But I could be totally wrong.
I have two kids but I’d rather their technology experiences were with better interfaces… Cleaner as I mentioned before. I don’t see voice control really taking over despite the current push with android, Siri, and kinect. All the voice stuff feels to me like what 3d was earlier.
But again I could be totally wrong.
Part of my ire was the fact that I felt like the kinect meant I potentially got less hardware muscle for games. Hopefully I’m wrong about that but that was how it seemed out of the gate.
stusser
4706
You are. The kinect meant you paid an extra hundred bucks.
It’s not just that on some level. Part of me wonders how things would be different if that RD efforts went toward the ui and hardware.
I didn’t say they can’t. I merely think that the history of motion capture devices like the kinect point to there being a significantly higher chance of the kinect never being used seriously for motion control. Possible, but one in a million odds that not even the worst vegas gambler would take.
I have a really hard time giving the kinect points for anything sound related. I’m not paying $100 for a mic. They could have included that in the controller for no added fee and had the same voice functionality. I believe they should have done this. Could you imagine how well the xbone one would have done if microsoft came out telling gamers that they listened to the complaints, dropped the kinect, added a built in mic to the gamepads and dropped the price by $100? What exactly would be the functionality we would have lost then? Auto logging in based on face?
Correct, you are not and you appear to agree with me.
You and others bought the xbox one because xbox has a lead in popularity in the USA. This is perfectly understandable and if i liked some of the xbox’s big series more, i would likely do the same.
Completely agree.
For generations we as gamers are told and tell the phrase “gamers always go to the lowest common denominator” over and over again. Even if the kinect was a good idea in theory, it would suffer from this. The problem is that motion control like this has not been proven and many people have tried. I simply have no reason to believe that this time microsoft will succeed and they haven’t helped that position at all with anything anywhere near concrete.
