Failed Controller-Free Gaming Devices of the Past

adeelarshad82 writes "While Microsoft does get points for innovation, Kinect for Xbox 360 isn't the first attempt to make gaming a hands-free affair. Decades before Microsoft would release its depth-sensing camera system, other companies tried to take the gamepad out of the gaming equation. PlayStation, Dreamcast, NES and Sega have all been there. These attempts varied in usefulness, ranging from somewhat functional to laughable and pointless, and from the forgettable to the downright infamous."

Comments

The real question:

[Phopojijo]

I think the bigger story is that after all these iterations... developers still don't know how to properly use the hardware.

People envision that Kinect will be used for sign language recognition and creating custom animations/taunts (actually waving bye to that Pyro wanker's head).

Will we ever see a developer use the hardware? Or will they just use it shallowly and default to what they know for anything of substance?

Re:The real question:

[Anonymous Coward]

IIRC, the Kinect's depth camera doesn't have enough resolution to distinguish between fingers. Having a better camera would have made the unit too expensive.

Re:The real question:

[Anrego]

developers still don't know how to properly use the hardware.

Indeed!

This really is the problem. I think this looks like a very interesting and powerful piece of technology.. but if it only ever gets used to make a bunch of wii style "minigames", what's the point!

There will probably be a whole collection of Kinect minigames which though fun will not provide any real substance, and a handful of "real" games with Kinect support thrown in (but not required) for a little novelty. I'm not holding my breath for any serious titles appearing which really use Kinect to provide fundamental unique gameplay.

Re:The real question:

[Anonymous Coward]

Until recently, I was working at a company that had come up with a demo of something very interesting to do with the Kinect.

Of course, when I left, the project had been shelved because no one was willing to put up money for anything interesting. The publishers all wanted a normal game with some kind of Kinect minigame glued on as a bonus. No one wanted to stick their head out and make a game which you could only play if you had a Kinect.

That's what will kill it. There won't be any game out there that you *have* to buy it for, so most people won't bother to buy one, so the publishers won't back any game that can't be played without one, so no one will buy one...

It's a pity, because on a big screen this demo changed the way I was thinking in a way that no game has ever done before, and I've been a game dev since the end of the 16-bit days.

Re:The real question:

[parlancex]

Correct, which is one of the main reasons I can't see it ever catching on. In order to control anything you're going to have to make huge motions with your entire arms like a god damned gorilla, with all the accuracy and subtlety that entails.

It's that time again, eh?

[damn_registrars]

Apparently it is time to rip on the Power Glove yet again. As I, unlike some of the people who write negatively about it, actually owned one, I would like to give my piece on the matter. In particular, I would like to point out that indeed there was one good game that worked with a regular controller but worked exceptionally well with the power glove.

Unfortunately, that game was not Punch-Out (with or without Mike Tyson). Punch-Out was a massive pile of failure to end all massive piles of failure with regards to the power glove. For some reason some idiot programmer thought that a good way to set up the power glove for punch-out was to move your hand forward for a punch, and then backwards for a power punch. Which of course meant your only power punch was gone pretty well immediately and then you were hosed for the rest of the round.

No, the game that worked well with the power glove (while not being power glove specific) was Top Gun. That game had very sensible controls; move your hand, move the plane. First two fingers are your weapons. You didn't need anything more than that. Unfortunately few people ever used that great combination.

I suppose it is probably a good thing that some of the MS engineers who worked on Kinect are actually too young to have ever tried to play punch-out with a power glove. Because if they had, they might have started out with the idea that motion control without a controller could never work properly.

Re:It's that time again, eh?

[antifoidulus]

Actually I think you hit on the biggest problem with the power glove, very few games were actually designed for the power glove and the creators of the power glove had to assign control schemes to every game. I wonder how long they actually spent testing out each game.

I think the control scheme for punch out was designed solely as a way to advertise the power glove(I remember the power glove commercial prominently featured Punch-Out). What looks really cool in a 30 second ad obviously may wear thin really quickly.

Re:It's that time again, eh?

[Boycott BMG]

I never had a power glove, but the kid across the street did. We tried it when he got it on his birthday. Designing games for the thing would have only solved one problem with the thing. Another major problem with the power glove was the weight. Your right arm got really tired holding the thing all the time in a certain position. It meant you had to limit your gaming sessions to 20 minutes at a time.

Re:It's that time again, eh?

[Kenja]

I've owned several power gloves, which when combined with the old sega stereo shutter glasses made for a poor mans virtual reality rig.

Re:It's that time again, eh?

[EdIII]

I never got to own a Power Glove :(

When I saw the advertisements for it, I went apeshit because of the hype. The only way to describe myself in front of the TV was Wayne from Wayne's World chanting, "it will be mine, oh yes, it will be mine". Kind of an obsession for awhile...

Which brings me to my other memory of the damned thing. There was a TV show with Kuppa from Super Mario Bros. Can't remember too much about the show, but I do remember a sweepstakes that allowed you to send a postcard to win a Power Glove.

I ended up sending several hundred postcards into the show and did not win. Of course, I had to take a box of stamps from my father's office that was apparently valued at "severe ass whooping" to do it.

Good thing I was never disappointed by it I guess.

Re:It's that time again, eh?

[davester666]

But he'll be happier once he reaches puberty to have a stronger right hand/arm!

Power Glove

[mister_playboy]

I love the Power Glove... 'cuz it's so bad.

An Impressive Try

[Brianech]

Its well known that MS actually bought the tech from an over seas company. Either way though its an impressive piece of machinery for a company first try. I picked one up after reading mixed reviews, and being a guy that must have the latest gadgets I decided not to fight my inner geek. I actually love this thing. My only complaint is the most common. LAG! But what I found was despite the fact you have to adjust to the lag, you do. 10mins after turning it on, I was use to doing everything 1/3 of a second early. I wonder if its a USB limitation, or the lack of an onboard processor. The voice commands actually work well, as Im a person that cant enunciate my R's very well, this was a bit of a surprise. Some complaints about unresponsiveness have gone unnoticed by me. When I do something, even in fast succesion it happens on screen (nothing like making your avatar jerk off). I think Kinect was a good step to controller-less gaming, and albeit not perfect, is definitely fun. I have a Wii that I have only used a few times, a PS3 I love for offline gaming (but no Move) and a 360 now with Kinect. I'll still have to get the Move before I make a verdict. But i enjoy bowling/boxing more on the 360 than on the Wii. Not to mention ping pong is a blast!

I went 3 days after launch expecting to find a ton of Kinects in store after the mixed reviews, but when I went to futureshop there was only a single unit left. I was shooting the shit with the guy in the game/movie section, and he said demand was far higher than they predicted. Interesting considering the device is far from perfect. In the end though, I have had a ton of fun so far. I just dont know when the novelty will wear off (like it did with the Wii) but this is just my 2 cents on the Kinect after a few days use. I really like it, but time and games will tell if it can be a Wii killer, just like the PS Move also hopes to be. At least sales wise I dont think initially this can be classified a failure, and use wise I also wouldn't call it a failure, just not a complete success. Solve the lag issues, get some longer lasting games, give a better menu system than holding your hand over a button (have you ever tried pausing with Kinect while playing?!?! you have to stand still for like 2 seconds) and extend the Kinect use to incorperate voice commands at all times, and it could be.

Re:An Impressive Try

[S3D]

PrimeSense system had originally had built in depth processing on the chip, and that was planned to be included the project Natal, but at the end MS decided it would be too expensive and moved processing to CPU. Of cause that caused lag. Though I've read in the latest versions they had reduced lag considerably.

Re:An Impressive Try

[iserlohn]

It's the lag that kills the experience though. Once the novelty wears off, any sort of gaming becomes a drag when there is lag. The used to be a Japanese arcade game like Time Crisis but different in that you had to physically duck to dodge incoming bullets. I played that game once or twice but the lag on it killed the whole experience.

Think about the Wii. Most of the original Wii sports game made use of the precise timing for controller movements to control the on-screen action. Wii tennis for example is all about the timing of your swing. Latency is the single biggest "hidden" (ie. no visual or auditory) factor that determines gaming experience and any sort of lag will definitely kill it.

PowerGlove was good for Garage VR

[MauiMaker]

The PowerGlove may have been a failure as a game controller, but it was a boon for those of us trying to create Virtual Reality systems with our home equipment. Rend-386 was the software only rendering engine that let us create a virtual handshake coast to coast with powergloves. 3D Rendering went on a MAJOR growth rate curve in the 90s (doubling every 6-9mo). Unfortunately 3DUI didnt do so well. The professional gloves were better than the P-glove, but still not all that great, even 10yrs later. I've still got my dual-glove PC controller. I just dont have a working 386 computer anymore.

Re:MS Gets Points for Innovation???

[KDR_11k]

The Wii also uses a light and camera, the setup is just reversed. The Wii has the camera in the controller and the light in the sensor bar, from what I heard Move lacks accuracy when it comes to pointing (which is mostly rotation) while of course having more when it comes to detecting controller movement (which is mostly translation). Yes, the Move has a gyroscope but that's not nearly as accurate as the sensor bar setup when it comes to determining where the player is pointing since the gyroscope will drift and the camera cannot recalibrate it (since the light is spherical).

The U-Force worked

[drej]

TFA (yeah yeah, I know, I wasn't supposed to actually read it) seems more like an advertisement for Kinect to me. I actually owned a U-Force and it worked without a hitch, even the flight-stick accessory. But oh well, guess they were going for that whole "Thanks for liberating us from the oh so sucky past, Microsoft! Now could you pay us?" thing.

Re:The U-Force worked

[Renraku]

This all seemed like advertising shill to me. It was like.

"X device sucked, unlike Kinect."
"Y device sucked, unlike Kinect."
"Z device sucked, unlike Kinect."

If they would have put, "unlike Kinect, Wii, or Move." it would have been more neutral.

EyeToy was no failure

[FromWithin]

From the article: "Sony dabbled twice with console-based webcams over the last two generations, and it only got any success after it introduced the Move."
From Wikipedia: "As of November 6, 2008, the EyeToy has sold 10.5 million units worldwide.".

10.5 million sales is most definitely a success by any definition.

The whole article strikes me as a Kinect advert: "Despite the occasional misinterpreted gesture, Microsoft's Kinect offers impressively immersive game controls and voice commands, all without needing to lay your finger on a single button."