The Downfall Of Microsoft’s Kinect

Megalith

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I never really gave the Kinect a chance; I have no interest in using my body as a controller and knew it would never be used in the genres I enjoy. But do any of you own one and actually love it?

…after Microsoft sold about 29 million of them for the Xbox 360 and Xbox One, it just kind of faded away. A cursory Amazon search shows only seven games designed explicitly for Kinect have been released since the Xbox One console came out almost two years ago. Developers have abandoned it in turn, with no new real Kinect games on the slate for the foreseeable future.
 
came with my xbox one, used it for about 45 minutes, havent thought about it in the 10 months since though.
 
For me, the Kinect on my Xbox One never really seemed to work. I'm not too sad of it's demise.
 
fruit ninja was fun :)

Wasn't there a "kinect killer" under design a couple of years ago, maybe a kickstarter thing... twice the resolution and response at 1/2 the kinect price?

Maybe it was from these guys?
 
The lesson: gimmicks are stupid. Nintendo's still catching up on recognizing that.
 
I used the Xbox 360 version, not the Xbox One version, butI liked it as a way of controlling my console. Not so much as a way of playing my games. It was nice to just use voice control or motion to control Netflix or something else, like opening something, but I hated playing games with it.

I also hated how support was not 100% across all products. But that is something that generally annoys me about MS products. They will tout something such as 64bit computing for Windows, but their other applications will only have 32bit support at the time. Sure, eventually Office got a 64bit version, but it took a few years for that to happen.
 
I tried the Kinect on a friends XboxOne and it has input lag so didn't like it.
 
Good for voice control. The fitness app was fun for an hour. After that, it was just meh.... Used it for the Xbox 360 & the One. Neither get any use anymore. The One might have been fine, but the cord is too short to reach the front of my room. And, no effort on Microsoft to make an extension cable...
 
Didn't Apple's purchase of PrimeSense, the company behind the Kinect technology, had a lot to do with its demise?
 
Never really worked for me,the one game for it my son tried out was pretty much a complete failure as far as controlling it went.
 
Many of us called this years ago when it first came out, said the same thing about the wiimote and playstation move. Naturally we got called all kinds of names, luddite being among them for our "anti technology stance". When in reality we just simply recognized a gimmick for what it was. Motion control for games is a fun concept for places like Dave and Busters where you can do it for a short period of time. It isn't fun in most games for any length of time no matter how fit you are. It was great for the kids as well, but had the exact same problem of being fun for a short while here and there but utterly failing to replace a controller. There is another upcoming technology that is going to fall into the same trap, I won't mention it because it will just start a fight. But we all know what I'm talking about and no matter how hard people "hope", it doesn't change how things will end up.

That trap is simple. It's the Trap of It's cool as hell at a place like D&B and it has some really amazing other uses outside of gaming, but it has no place in the "average" living room for games.
 
My 5 year old likes Kinect Tuner on 360 so he can watch himself dancing around in 'green mode' ( for 5 minutes) but that's about it.
 
I like the ability to tell the console to do things with my voice and sign me in when I'm in the room automatically. These two things however can be done with a less expensive gadget IMO.
 
Its all in the games. There aren't any titles to speak of.
 
Kinect Party on 360 was a very good show case of how well it worked.

And the 360 version would physically adjust the tilt of the camera on its own. The One version does not, but it does a much better version of tracking people. It can track very well in low light.

The xbox one version also had very good facial recognition. And this is the feature that made me disable the device. Several games (like Skylanders) will offer to switch profiles when it detects someone walk in front of the screen. So my son (who has a profile) will ask me to come help him and when I walk on screen it will pause the game and ask to switch profiles. NO! Then while I play he will walk away and come back and it will detect him and offer to switch profiles. NO!

Do any of the new system packages even offer it anymore?
 
Kinect was really neat, but the novelty wore off quickly for me. I realized that I had no interest in using my body as a controller in my games. I game to relax and not to further exert myself. The lack of substantial usage could have also been a reason as to why the novelty wore off very quickly.
 
It was really a great hardware/technology, but in the wrong market for the most success. Even at the higher windows-version standalone price, it's a value for researchers and creators.
 
Many of us called this years ago when it first came out, said the same thing about the wiimote and playstation move. Naturally we got called all kinds of names, luddite being among them for our "anti technology stance". When in reality we just simply recognized a gimmick for what it was. Motion control for games is a fun concept for places like Dave and Busters where you can do it for a short period of time. It isn't fun in most games for any length of time no matter how fit you are. It was great for the kids as well, but had the exact same problem of being fun for a short while here and there but utterly failing to replace a controller. There is another upcoming technology that is going to fall into the same trap, I won't mention it because it will just start a fight. But we all know what I'm talking about and no matter how hard people "hope", it doesn't change how things will end up.

That trap is simple. It's the Trap of It's cool as hell at a place like D&B and it has some really amazing other uses outside of gaming, but it has no place in the "average" living room for games.
I could see it being used in an immersive environment (but that's not a game you could put in a living room). Where I think it could be useful is if (and only if), top titles implemented a good UI. It might not even be completely virtual, but as an example, i find most modern games have far more complex UIs that I feel like learning.
I could imagine a GTA UI, for example, where I can open the door without knowing any UI commands.

OTOH, I'm not sure I'd ever want to a totally virtual UI for games. Nothing I saw in commercials looked like it'd be fun. But as I said, I can see potential in using physical controllers that are not actual controllers (e.g. a flight stick, steering wheel and peddles) and so on. It'd be kinda cool to have all of those sitting on your table for a game of GTA and just swapping them out as needed....I assume I'd still want a game pad too. I'm just not a fan of steering or flying with game pads.
 
I love it on my Xone. Not for the camera but the voice controls are great for watching TV through it and other media type applications. Games, don't use it, media center- yes.
 
Don't have an XBox but bought the first gen Kinnect sensor for Windows to play with for development hobby use. Pretty much a waste. Neat idea but just not that great outside of very specific uses, the motion detection tech that is.
 
I could see it being used in an immersive environment (but that's not a game you could put in a living room). Where I think it could be useful is if (and only if), top titles implemented a good UI. It might not even be completely virtual, but as an example, i find most modern games have far more complex UIs that I feel like learning.
I could imagine a GTA UI, for example, where I can open the door without knowing any UI commands.

OTOH, I'm not sure I'd ever want to a totally virtual UI for games. Nothing I saw in commercials looked like it'd be fun. But as I said, I can see potential in using physical controllers that are not actual controllers (e.g. a flight stick, steering wheel and peddles) and so on. It'd be kinda cool to have all of those sitting on your table for a game of GTA and just swapping them out as needed....I assume I'd still want a game pad too. I'm just not a fan of steering or flying with game pads.

I'm very much a fan of good peripherals. While I enjoy my consoles for what they are, at the end of the day my PC has more peripherals as it is my primary platform. As such anything that is a flying game, i will only play on PC because darned if I'm being deprived of my sidewinder.
 
Many of us called this years ago when it first came out, said the same thing about the wiimote and playstation move.

It was the motion control built into the Wii remotes that made it good for casual party type games. That's the main reason they sold so many Wii's

As for the Kinect, it's fun when used for sports or party type games, but there is a real lack of decent games. Even the games that support the Kinect, the quality of the controls varies too much.

At least it gets the kids off the couch and burning a few calories. :)
 
It was the motion control built into the Wii remotes that made it good for casual party type games. That's the main reason they sold so many Wii's

As for the Kinect, it's fun when used for sports or party type games, but there is a real lack of decent games. Even the games that support the Kinect, the quality of the controls varies too much.

At least it gets the kids off the couch and burning a few calories. :)
The issues is that most developers don't know how to use it subtly and make things feel natural, 1st party nintendo games SMG and Zelda use motion controls quite well. The second issue is that users are just bad, i've seen people use wii motes like they are guns it's not at all how they work, they work more like a mouse being tracked. Similar issues come from all motion controls in that people just don't get how to use them, they over act thinking that's what they need to do when infact it just gets in the way.
 
It was the motion control built into the Wii remotes that made it good for casual party type games. That's the main reason they sold so many Wii's

As for the Kinect, it's fun when used for sports or party type games, but there is a real lack of decent games. Even the games that support the Kinect, the quality of the controls varies too much.

At least it gets the kids off the couch and burning a few calories. :)

Sold lots, still died off. Motion gaming is effectively dead again.
 
Mine came with my console. I tried exactly one game which was a demo.

I like the voice commands and use that feature. Controlling the console with my hands really never worked reliably from my seating position.

I'm not surprised development fizzled personally. It isn't that great and most people don't want to stand and pay video games.

Also, the short length of the cable that connects it to the console makes proper placement a pain with some setups.
 
I thought it was pretty good and generally got anyone playing laughing after a few minutes. Tracking on the 360 version was a little rough and I was looking forward to the improvements of the one version. Unfortunately the games just haven't come.
 
We use it for the voice and Xbox general controls with out picking up any of the controllers ... Kids love the Rabbits game , but UBI did a half azz job of taking advantage of the Kinect's power / hardware... I guess that goes with the other Kinect games that are out there. Game studio's are just too lazy these days. they seem to lack in true get down into the hardware and grit / developing area on anything that's new and original. I feels like no one wants to think out of the box and do stuff with hardware that is out there to be used and having their users play with and enjoy. Shit this can also be said about most games that use flight controllers too.
 
I actually really like mine. I rarely if ever use it for the visual sensors, however. It's nice that it recognizes me or my (at the time) significant other. What I, literally daily, use are the voice commands. I can cook dinner, then walk with my plate into the living room and say "Xbox on." "Xbox, go to Netflix." and by the time I'm seated and ready to eat, I can pick something out to watch. Nothing on Netflix? "Xbox, go to HBO Go." or whatever.

I think a lot of people don't really try to use it for that or, to be perfectly honest, are in some bad conditions for it. If there's often variable background noise, for example. It can deal with an air conditioner/fan, but when you have kids/adults/friends talking and try to say something to it, sure, that'll be hard for it to hear. Not many people have the ideal setup for it and so of course it has a hard time, which means people think it sucks and they hate it. Fair enough, to each their own, but I for one like it.
 
I love it on my Xone. Not for the camera but the voice controls are great for watching TV through it and other media type applications. Games, don't use it, media center- yes.

Agreed! I bought one specifically to control my home theatre and it works well for that. I also chose it over the PS4 (which I think is better hardware) as at the time the PS4 didn't even have DLNA capability.

As for games I've tried a few and I find the fitness ones the best. I'm really disappointed that it never really took off. So much promise...
 
We use it for the voice and Xbox general controls with out picking up any of the controllers ... Kids love the Rabbits game , but UBI did a half azz job of taking advantage of the Kinect's power / hardware... I guess that goes with the other Kinect games that are out there. Game studio's are just too lazy these days. they seem to lack in true get down into the hardware and grit / developing area on anything that's new and original. I feels like no one wants to think out of the box and do stuff with hardware that is out there to be used and having their users play with and enjoy. Shit this can also be said about most games that use flight controllers too.

Developers aren't lazy. Theres just no business case for it. Pushing a proprietary console peripheral is the platform owner's burden, not the developer. Especially so on multiplatform titles. There are business and cost reasons for them to use lowest common denominator features when setting development targets.

And you really can't blame third party developers for "just being lazy" when Microsoft couldn't even be bothered to get their own first party studios to make some killer showcase titles.
 
I called it. I said this was a giant piece of shit the day they tried to force it on everyone.
 
Developers aren't lazy. Theres just no business case for it. Pushing a proprietary console peripheral is the platform owner's burden, not the developer. Especially so on multiplatform titles. There are business and cost reasons for them to use lowest common denominator features when setting development targets.

And you really can't blame third party developers for "just being lazy" when Microsoft couldn't even be bothered to get their own first party studios to make some killer showcase titles.

its arguable Microsoft barely has first party games/software. They really need to impove it, if sony was on the ball game wise, especially with their first party software, they could have really stomped MS.



As one poster pointed out, its the hardware maker responsibility. MS should have made it 399 with Kinect.
 
its arguable Microsoft barely has first party games/software. They really need to impove it, if sony was on the ball game wise, especially with their first party software, they could have really stomped MS.



As one poster pointed out, its the hardware maker responsibility. MS should have made it 399 with Kinect.

and not change the bundling of it.. Almost no reason now to support it, and wont sell by itself without the games
 
Had fun with the kinect, but started gathering dust after moving and not having as much space for the living room. Things that they can't control.

I'm surprised that they gyms haven't picked up and found ways to incorporate them and have feedback for form for different movements.
 
Sold lots, still died off. Motion gaming is effectively dead again.

I think that's why MS wanted it to be sold with every Xbone. If everyone had it, then developers would have some motivation to put R&D into making it the primary interface, but MS backed down, because the extra 100 bucks pushed people to Sony.

Now that it's optional, developers aren't going to bother. Honestly, it'd be up to MS to come out with a killer game that was best played with a kinect to get people to buy it/use it and if that happens a few times, other devs might join the party, but until then any potential died when with the optional Kinect.
 
From what I saw of the 360 demos it was obvious that the Kinect could barely distinguish what was happening and just assumed any vague motion qualified as accurate and gave you credit for the task. I bought an Xbone for my g/f and while the kinect appeared to have a higher resolution, I immediately noticed in our dance games that I could basically flail my arms and legs about in a general manner and still be detected as having accomplished the movements. Basically the Kinect cheats, which makes it no fun, so I stopped using it after the first day.
 
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