Project Natal recognizing retail shelves in 2010, says Ballmer (update: maybe not)
By Ross Miller 
posted Jun 18th 2009 5:14PM
posted Jun 18th 2009 5:14PM
Update: Looks like Steve might've spoken out of turn. Microsoft just us over an official statement reiterating that they "have not confirmed a launch date at this time." Full reading after the break.
"As the Xbox team stated at E3 two weeks ago, we are not even halfway through the current console generation lifecycle and believe Xbox 360 will be the entertainment center in the home for long into the next decade. Project Natal will be an important part of this platform, but we have not confirmed a launch date at this time."
So, what's new?
Looks pretty sweet still, nonetheless the huge time period!
It was only just announced... Of course there's a time period. Face Recognition, Movement Coordination, cmon. It'll be cool.
More than half of the stuff announced at E3 doesn't release until sometime in 2010.
well, the chinese have to manufacture it for a few months....
nah, they said they are "treating it like a new console launch," meaning they are not releasing it until they have around 30 games from 3rd party supporting its launch.
its all about giving 18 mths to devs to build AAA games.
the hardware is obviously at 100% (for all intents n purposes)
will a year and a bit be enough to beat Wii Sports?!
probably. but not by much.
Depends what people use their consoles for in 2010.
"Hey! What's playing on your Wii?"
"Mainly dust mites."
dust mites and music games
@mac
I don't think it's main competition is Wii Sports. Looks like this is quite a bit more versatile than sitting on the couch doing wrist flicks. I see good things coming from this, but I still probably won't buy it, unless they can incorporate it into NXE. Hopefully this will be standard on the next console.
I honestly think this thing is not releasing till 2011, its no where next to ready. But I bet that Sony's motion controller will hit there spring 2010 date, but thats not a complicated either though.
Finally, something that's not a baby's toy.
That's what she said
...Or a Wii.
The Wii requires you to hold controllers. That does not count.
(Sorry if double post, there was that "thank you" message came up.)
Hmmm. With this being MS, does this mean we can expect it to actually arrive in 2012?
That'd be Blizzard
I don't think MS is the game console maker famous for delays. How's GT5 treating you?
Just fine, thanks for asking! Oh and Alan Wake says hi.
The exchange between Duke and Bailers was epic!
Blizzard is aces compared to Adventurine. 5 years of "next year" for Darkfall.
So it's real and it's on it's way, nice :).
Well if it's a year or longer away, and they are hiring people now to work on it, then yeah I'd not call it that 'real' as of yet, seems they only have a plan to develop really.
It's strange though that they present it to the press/public, but obviously have nothing if they are so far away form actually creating it.
Is that a guy or girl?
Guy.
Look at the fighting stance, it's a girl. No guy would lead with his right.
Um... Bruce Lee led with his right.
"You are the controller"... more like "You are a tool".
Sorry, had to do it...
All i want to see is a Street Fighter game and people doing e-honda or blanka moves...
Or Dhalsim.
Terrible timing for Microsoft, too late into this generation in an upredictable economy. I don't see this working out at all. I except this to go great for the first three months but then continue to lose popularity. The Wii already has the casual gamers or people who don't want to spend too much money, Microsoft missed the boat this generation.
I wouldn't agree with that. Most people with Wiis just let them sit. It's a gimmick that works poorly, and a bunch of fools were sucked in--and now they sit and gather dust.
My wii is on ebay right now.
I'm not saying that people are using their Wii console but that they have already bought it and probably won't buy a new Wii like console (Natal in this case) during this generation unless they are a tech geek/gamer or already own a 360.
"Terrible timing for Microsoft, too late into this generation in an upredictable economy. I don't see this working out at all. I except this to go great for the first three months but then continue to lose popularity. The Wii already has the casual gamers or people who don't want to spend too much money, Microsoft missed the boat this generation."
Taking out the cliches, memes, and the fact that he has to conclude we consumers cant think for ourselves, can anyone make sense of his comment?.
I heard on NeoGAF it'll retail for around $200.
WHAT A SCAM
Neogaf isn't really the home of truth.
It's better than most sites though!
Yeah but anyone can claim a fact in there and there is no fact checking.
Yea, you're right! That website must be a scam!! Pricing doesn't get released until a few months to weeks before its release! The iPhone didn't get priced until about a month ago!
They're still building the damn thing!
Yeah, even thought NO pricing information has been released. Use your head and wait till they release more info... donut
Miles, Ballmer thought the iPhone would be too pricy to be successful.
Meh, 360 is done for. I sold mine 2 weeks ago, as nothing has inspired for the the last 12 months, and games simply aren't getting any better, it's the same regurgitated junk. I can't see how Natal can be targetting 2010, as by then surely most people have moved to PS3 by then.
C'mon man, that flame bait trolling of yours is just too easy.
Um, okay. Because PS3 is releasing so many more interesting titles anytime soon?
You, my friend, are delusional.
lol @ Justin. Good Point.
@Justin. What you on about? PS3's got pretty much all the killer exclusives for 2009. Xbox has what?
@Mark And those would be??...
@CREW
Killzone2
MAG
Uncharted 2
Final Fantasy Versus XIII
Gran Turismo 5
Pixel Junk: 1-4
Ratchet & Clank Future: A Crack in Time
inFamous
Heavy Rain
God of War III
Mod Nation Racers
off the top of my head. There i bound to be more..
@Mark
You did say killer exclusives for 2009 right?
So that means you can cross off, GT5, God of War 3, Final Fantasy VS, Mod Nation, and Heavy rain.
Kind of shortened up your list a bit there didn't it?
And to whats left I counter, Halo Wars (sold more than KZ2), Forza 3, ODST (will pretty much outsell anything in that list), Splinter Cell, Shadow Complex.
You can't say best exclusives in 2009 when half won't see the light of day until next year.
Halo Reach will beat that whole list in 2010 :P
Anything over $75 and this flops. It's a friggin add-on, price it like one.
I take it you cant afford anything over $75?
The wireless networking add on is $99! You can get a USB wireless network adapter for $20. The 120GB hard drive upgrade is $150. You can buy a 120GB hard drive, provided you can find a hard drive that tiny, for $30. Do you really thing this thing will be under $150?! Its more likely to run $200 - $250.
Can't wait for it! Hope it's as cool as it sounds/looks!
cool.
This is why i hate E3.
Project "lets copy Wii, we already copied everything from all our other competitors with everything".
*Let's copy Wii and make it actually sense stuff, and let's get rid of the stupid Wii-motes, and let's actually let people play in HD, and most of all, let's make it not suck.
Damn Justin's good.
Hate to break it to you Ryan, but the Wii wasn't the first company to invent axis-controllers. Its called competition, and sadly.. its actually needed to motivate the other company to produce higher quality products. And... natal doesn't even use a controller. It's something entirely different.
Hopefully it can inspire new technology from this, not just from the gaming position, but every-day functions too.
Right - just how every cell phone to have a touchscreen can be called "Project: let's copy iPhone". And how every camera with some sort of image stabilization can be called "Project: let's copy Canon's I.S. system". Er....no.
This is the way the market works. One company cannot hold an entire technology to itself. And just because Nintendo were first to the mainstream market with a motion controlled-based console doesn't mean that they're the only ones allowed to continue to use motion control in games. How would you like it if Yahoo was the only search engine you could use? AOL was the only internet provider? The Ford Model T is the only car allowed to have a steering wheel?
now, I know alot won't believe this, but here goes...
One of my best friend's cousin and her husband (try not to laugh at the sisters, aunt, mothers, brother) developed and sold this technology to Microsoft. They developed the alpha software, and it's integrated with a webcam to recognize human features and movements. Pretty Sick. They used to be developers with or working for EA...Names omitted.
None the less this is coming, and is going to be very (hopefully) cool....
Actually +1 for you mister!
Even if what you said is not true, then you are damn good at making stuff up(atleast I believed it :) )
Why is anyone giving this attention. It's a concept. It doesn't exist. The video is a simulation. Anyone could have come up with the idea. Getting it done is beyond the capacity of Microsoft. They are hoping their announcement will get someone else working on the idea so they can steal it once they learn how it could be done at an affordable price. I think it's absurd, and won't get done, for many years.
You, my friend, are a moron. Natal has already been demonstrated several times and appears to work perfectly(at E3, on good morning america, and on Late Night with Jimmy Fallon). Still think it's funny though that the best the MS haters can come up with is that they don't think it's real. Just shows you how amazing it really is.
"It's a concept. It doesn't exist." "Getting it done is beyond the capacity of Microsoft."
Apparently you didn't watch the E3 videos. And apparently you haven't seen Windows 7, which is done very well by Microsoft.
Troll-fail.
"Why is anyone giving this attention. It's a concept. It doesn't exist. The video is a simulation. Anyone could have come up with the idea. Getting it done is beyond the capacity of Microsoft. They are hoping their announcement will get someone else working on the idea so they can steal it once they learn how it could be done at an affordable price. I think it's absurd, and won't get done, for many years."
How old are you?
you are light grey because you are true mister fenton. it's a concept... out it will be very expensive... beside the shame to use a M$ product...
Most games require controllers, so until MS adds on simple controls that can be used for motion sensing (small, light, doesn't inhibit motion: like a design similar to the Wii), this will be nothing more than a gimmick.
When they add two handheld and small controllers like above, it'll be taken serious. Sony's isn't better, it's just more realistic for developers to develop actual games.
Most (well all at the moment) games require controllers because they've been written under a controller based paradigm. Assuming Natal isn't going to simply be a new controller for old games, why should the new games not be written with this new way of interacting in mind?
While still an awesome idea, I can't see Natal completely revamping video games. It may be fun for certain games (re: action, adventure, maybe sports) but won't replace the need for a controller when I need to squeeze a trigger or set up more complex actions than merely waving my arms around can provide.
Stepping forward and backward to control the gas and brake is just like driving a real car lol.
@Clyde
I don't think anyone believes this will replace a controller.
I've been really curious of how they intend to make characters on screen to move, walk, run, and jump specifically.
Several years back we had a VR helmet that we used to play games like Quake, Duke, Doom, and Redneck Rampage on. To move we had a small "puck" that fit in the palm of your hand and had four buttons on it that we used to bind forward, backwards, jump, and fire. The direction you walked was based on the direction you were looking in game.
A small, in hand, wireless controller with 4-6 buttons on it would go a long way to making Natal a viable controller for most games.
im calling it, this generation of consoles fail. I haven't been able to capture the same amount to fun I had with last gen's console with this gen's. I really don't think that motion controls will be good with this generation, its going to take some time to for motion to become a good enough standard, but it won't be for a while.
While this looks like a great idea, I think "x" will fail. The video is pre-rendered, and we all know how much vaporware there is out there. Plus M$ is all about money and "x" is just a marketing gimmick. Plus it will probably cost way too much money and nobody is going to spend more than "y" am I right???
OH AND BOYCOTT LEFT 4 DEAD 2!!!!
Hold on while I go ask my mom for some lunch money.
I guess they "pre rendered" the hot chick in the sweat pants at E3 that went up and used it in real time, eh?
Perhaps the rendering of your thought process's should have run longer.
Go and ask mommy for a wii, instead of cash. Another one, 'cause your girlfriend already told us of the wee you have now.
@ agent
Failing to recognize sarcasm win.
Motion control: Controlling motion, as in a motion-control camera setup.
Not the other way around.
Ahh, once again the notorious Steve Ballmer fabricates release dates to create some buzz. It's hilarious.
I'm a total Microsoft fanboy, I own a Zune ffs, but this is just hilarious
I think that Natal has promise,but I'm not sure how it will re-invent everything. Yeah your not using a controller but me personally I don't want to hold my hands out like a steering wheel to drive a car, but that's just me. I give M$ credit for going out the box but I still think that Sony has a good motion controller too. Uncharted 2, Heavy Rain and GOW3 will be huge...how long will M$ milk the Halo franchise...that's all they got. Sony has the best third party developers, NaughtyDog(Uncharted), Insomniac(InFamous), Kojima(MGS4) and Team Ico(The Last Guardian) just to name a few. But all of this talk that everyone is having is just spectulation, I'm sure that Natal won't 'flop', M$ is putting to much into it and if it does then M$ and Box won't have anything else to fall back on.
It is so weird seeing myself on the front page of Engadget.
>.
...perhaps you can get a haircut with all the money MS paid you to be their bitch.
Does having a coffee table ruin the experience? I mean you will have to move it if you want to play full stand up games or driving games. A
Too long, buying a Wii. If they're gonna wait this long and spend all this time developing this I'd rather just have them make the next xbox console to be honest.
I've noticed a phenomenon where young kids and early teens fail to recognize sarcasm. It lasts pretty well up to about high school too. It's really funny to watch their ignorance to... you can be sarcastic to them all day and they just dont get it.
too* as in "watch their ignorance too.."
don't* as in "just don't get it"
And it's more frustrating than funny, but the thing is that it's not always a flaw in the people when sarcasm is not recognised on the internet, how a line you write on the internet sounds in your head might not be how it sounds in the head of the one reading it, researchers and psychologist confirm that problem, that's another issue with sarcasm on the internet, also what one person in one area would naturally understand as sarcastic another person in another region would not unless it's punctuated clearly as such, and internet spans many areas and regions and countries, thus the need for use of emoticons, and the good old [/sarcasm] tag.
There's a certain talent in expressing sarcasm to everybody, both on and offline, I mean apart from the development of the ability to process sarcasm by the listener.
Not that the comment you were trying to respond to had any issues in showing it was sarcasm, by the use of "x" and "y" for starters.
I was there...I don't recall him throwing down a date. All I remember was him saying that Project Natal was the "next version of the Xbox".
He also said his biggest regret was not getting into search sooner...imagine that.
Hah, it's not the when they got into search but how.
I'm still sceptical as to whether Natal will ever actually be released. Those videos looked seriously fake.
MS better keep the basic controller in the loop. I don't have room for a Natal setup, and I wouldn't buy Natal if I did have room.