Kinect Message Board older than one year ago

Pre-orders will see Microsoft's camera shuffling and waving its way off shelves.

#television The most recent episode of American comedy program "How I Met Your Mother" featured not one, but two cameos. More »

#microsoft In late 2006/early 2007, then-Xbox boss Peter Moore wanted a "Wii Killer" to be the centrepiece of Microsoft's next E3 press conference. So he had two teams compete to try and make him one. More »

In a cheeky response to the Video Game Voters Network initiative to bombard California senator Leland Yee's office with old and broken controllers, Yee's chief of staff Adam Keigwin told GamePolitics, "I think the Senator would appreciate a Kinect add-on rather than those dated controllers." That wasn't his only zinger.

"I can only assume these broken controllers must represent the broken promises of the video game industry to parents," Keigwin quipped in his reply to GP on the matter, before firing off a list of "free speech awards" Sen. Yee has earned for his apparent commitment to the First Amendment. "In fact, there is not a California legislator who has authored more bills to promote speech rights than Senator Yee."

Sen. Yee is the author of Caifornia's law AB 1179, signed by Gov. Schwarzenegger in 2005, which bans the sale of certain "violent" games to minors. Two years later, the Ninth District Court of Appeals found AB 1179 to be a violation of the First Amendment and effectively terminated the law. However, the Governator fought back, leading us up to November 2, 2010: the day the U.S. Supreme Court will hear opening arguments in the case -- and two days before any of us can actually send Yee a Kinect unit.

Would the senator settle for a Move in the meantime?

#microsoft Microsoft will be releasing a new update to the Xbox 360 soon, adding support for Kinect, ESPN and introducing a revamped dashboard. But there are also a few "under the hood" features Microsoft will be including in that update. More »

#peripherals And you thought because it doesn't use peripherals Kinect would be spared a bunch of ridiculous third-party add-ons. Well, you were wrong. More »

#xbox360 In 2010, Microsoft's Kinect is a motion-sensing camera that requires no control pad. You are, as the marketing goes, the controller. In the beginning, though, things weren't so fancy. More »

#onlyinjapan According to the Kinect manual, the controller-free peripheral needs between 6 and 8 feet of space. That's important to know. Here is the manual's exact wording: More »

Do you lack both the money for a Kinect and Dance Central, and shame? Harmonix and Truth have a Mephistophelian offer for you. Their "Killer Routine" contest asks fans to submit 10-30 second videos of themselves dancing to this clip of Salt-n-Pepa's "Push It." Those videos will then be posted, with the most popular video earning its creator a "House Party with a Dance Central choreographer" and Xbox/Dance Central/Kinect bundles for themselves and five friends.

"You must be participating in some recognizable form of dance for at least 75% of the video," the rules warn. If you are dancing for the whole time and you're disqualified for this rule ... that's going to sting. But if you're confident enough in your dancing to show the world, you have until November 25 to get up on this!

#xbox360 A considerate reader has sent us images from the manual for Microsoft's Kinect peripheral, and amongst the tips on USB cables and power supplies comes some disheartening news for owners of small living rooms. More »

#xbox360 In Japan, schoolgirls are often the default characters for product pitchmen. They pop up in sports drink ads, life insurance ads, bicycle ads — you name it. More »

#gameface Chuck actor Zachary Levi and The Event star Jason Ritter play Kinect at Zack's Xbox-sponsored 30th birthday party. More »

#kinect The Xbox 360's Fall Update will be with us soon, but for some, a preview went live earlier today, bringing with it a whole range of new additions and features. More »

#xbox360 Earlier this year, when the Xbox 360 add-on Kinect was still known as "Project Natal," reports surfaced that Microsoft was tearing one of the cameras processors out the hardware. Kinect general manager Kudo Tsunoda explains why. More »

Kinect adopters won't be limited to spending face time with just each other come launch, as Marc Whitten, Xbox Live general manager, has confirmed the sensor will interact with Windows Live Messenger on PCs. "I'm also excited to confirm that Video Kinect will integrate with Windows Live Messenger at launch, so Xbox Live members can video chat with hundreds of millions of PC users around the world," he said in a press announcement.

However, it appears the cross-platform functionality will be limited to video chat. If you were hoping to invite your PC pals to virtually watch Harry Potter and the Goblet Devils of Shamshire (or whatever) with you, it's not happening. As if they'd stop playing StarCraft 2 long enough to join you, anyway.

#clips Vacuum your floors. Reduce background noise. Make sure you have adequate lighting. Are we playing video games here or hoping to score? This Xbox Live video shows the steps needed to ensure a pleasurable Kinect Experience. More »

#rez Tetsuya Mizuguchi wants to share your "happy feelings" with the world—or at least with the people who play Child of Eden, developer Q? Entertainment's spiritual sequel to the classic synaesthetic shooter Rez. More »

Hey, you EU guys folks not have Netflix over there, but you've got the next best thing: Sky Player. Eurogamer reports that Kinect voice commands -- one of the most lauded pieces of functionality in the upcoming Microsoft peripheral -- are coming to the Sky Player streaming service. Even better, the two will play nice right at Kinect launch in Europe, on November 10.

According to Eurogamer, users will be able to use voice commands to pause, rewind, fast-forward, play and stop, much like the integration detailed back during E3, though there's currently no official word from Sky Player. We're currently reaching out and will let you know what we hear back.

#microsoft Sprint and T-Mobile join Chevrolet in using Microsoft's innovative new Kinect controller to advertise to gamers in innovative new ways. More »

#xbox360 With Kinect's November launch looming, Microsoft has kicked the peripheral's marketing drive into top gear with these TV commercials. Don't they look familiar? More »

#indie Right now, the only people who have access to Microsoft's Kinect development tools are larger, established studios. Microsoft is trying to expand that group to include indie developers, though the emphasis at this stage is still on "trying". More »

What if Nintendo made a game for Kinect? Namco Bandai does its best to answer that question with Dr. Kawashima's Body and Brain Connection, a "Brain Age" game for Microsoft's motion-control peripheral. This family-oriented minigame collection, featuring Xbox Avatars alongside the ever-digitized Dr. Kawashima, makes for an experience that seems more than inspired by Nintendo's recent efforts -- it's a total knockoff. The UI, the music and the gameplay all feel ripped from the Brain Age series and Nintendo's Wii Fit games.

In some respects that's a compliment, but gamers who have already written off edutainment and exergames won't find much reason to give Body and Brain Connection a try. You know exactly what to expect from this game.

What if Nintendo made a game for Kinect? Namco Bandai does its best to answer that question with Dr. Kawashima's Body and Brain Exercises, a "Brain Age" game for Microsoft's motion-control peripheral. This family-oriented minigame collection, featuring Xbox Avatars alongside the ever-digitized Dr. Kawashima, makes for an experience that seems more than inspired by Nintendo's recent efforts -- it's a total knockoff. The UI, the music and the gameplay all feel ripped from the Brain Age series and Nintendo's Wii Fit games.

In some respects that's a compliment, but gamers who have already written off edutainment and exergames won't find much reason to give Body and Brain Exercises a try. You know exactly what to expect from this game.

#pullquote Microsoft's Kudo Tsunoda, talking to Game Informer about the future of Kinect, had this to say about the current state of first-person shooters on the PC. More »

#microsoft The eBox is a Chinese game machine that offers players a controller-free experience. Sound familiar? More »

As you would expect, Microsoft's Kudo Tsunoda has expressed an optimistic viewpoint on Kinect's rarely utilized ability to scan real-world objects and incorporate them into games. At a recent Tokyo Game Show demonstration of Kinect Joy Ride, he demonstrated a small example of how Microsoft-owned developer BigPark utilizes the motion-sensing camera's capture capabilities. It's not quite a scanned skateboard, but it's enough to spur some color commentary.

Kinect Joy Ride features some minor pre-race vehicle customization options, starting with your car's color. If you're dissatisfied with the selection of bold colors in the game, Kinect can take a peek at any item positioned in front of the camera (within a small, on-screen reticle) and transfer its color onto your car. You could apply a dark shade of red (apple), an uplifting purple (GameCube) or a disgusting, sickly white (game journalist arm).

It's worth noting that this technology is hardly new -- you might have used it to capture textures in LittleBigPlanet with a PlayStation Eye -- and the implementation is far removed from Kinect's promotional promises. It's not even a particularly interesting addition in the case of Joy Ride, but it's in Microsoft's best interests to shift its conversation with consumers, away from "what can't it do" onto "what can it do?"

#tgs Sometimes, Tokyo Game Show booth companions need to cut loose. Perhaps to a little computerized J-pop and when instructed to by management. This is the kind of thing that happens at TGS. More »

Kudo makes brash prediction.

Will Kinect sales meet expectations?