Business Approach Comparison Sony PS4 and Microsoft Xbox

[temesgen]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R1oljgejGqs
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L8TkhHgkBsg
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OLBnlUjVNh4

I remember the conversations I had a few years ago about eBooks. They would never catch on, because who wants to pay hundreds of dollars up front to read a book. Paper books are a simpler interface. You would have to buy a hundred books before the ebook would be cost effective.
Now? eBooks are outselling paperbacks because someone made it easy to use them and see the benefits.

At the risk of being labeled a luddite the advantage of an ebook over paper is the fact that ebook can contain tens of books with hundreds more available by download. So ebooks solve a storage problem that paper can't even begin to address.

Waving my hands at the TV or speaking to my Xb1 versus picking up the remote or my joystick don't have same issues associated with paper books and storage.

Again to be clear I am open to the possibilities of Kinect and voice controls but for all the cheer leading and strong support very little has been presented so far by MS or people championing the technology that justifies the additional cost and hype. I think its best to reserve strong opinions for things you understand well or can clearly articulate the benefits for. However if we see it used in interesting and compelling ways that is great. For now I view Kinect as a wait and see.

 

[blakjedi]

At the risk of being labeled a luddite the advantage of an ebook over paper is the fact that ebook can contain tens of books with hundreds more available by download. So ebooks solve a storage problem that paper can't even begin to address.

Waving my hands at the TV or speaking to my Xb1 versus picking up the remote or my joystick don't have same issues associated with paper books and storage.

Again to be clear I am open to the possibilities of Kinect and voice controls but for all the cheer leading and strong support very little has been presented so far by MS or people championing the technology that justifies the additional cost and hype. I think its best to reserve strong opinions for things you understand well or can clearly articulate the benefits for. However if we see it used in interesting and compelling ways that is great. For now I view Kinect as a wait and see.

If what was demoed on stage by Mehdi is real (no telling because it was was too smooth and had zero hiccups) then that would be enough.

Again its an optional interface that's always available, You choose to use or not depending on the game, your media goals or usage patterns.

Walking in the door and saying "xbox on", "xbox show me discovery channel" is worth it to me. The other option is to find the remote and tune to it. It works either way but one is clearly easier and slicker.

 

[rockaman]

The ebook thing is so far removed from home automation and the simplicity of a light switch. I'm not sure what correlation that is supposed to be...

That's like saying smartphones are the reason 3D TV will take off?

The enthusiasm is fantastic, but it just doesn't make a compelling argument as to why any of this is going to matter soon or in the near future. These systems have to interface with the electric skeleton of the home at some point, and that is a hell of a lot more complicated than having a portable device able to use wifi and store some text documents. Which input/output ports of any of the consoles are ready to support these kinds of things?

Kinect made a massive fuss over the last one or two holiday seasons. I'm not sure it will be able to rely on the benefit of the doubt argument and potential argument as much, if it doesn't really become an item that really does make the living room experience better.

And I don't mean it necessarily needs to change the living room experience into something drastically different, or that it needs to be viewed as a necessity, or that it even needs to supplant the existing framework based on remotes and buttons.

But even to the point where it even properly shares control of the living room with the controller/remote/light switch based paradigm we have now...? I'm just not seeing it happen. The point where these voice commands and such become more convenient and more efficient tools to manage the living room, it's just not there. Not even close, imo. It's a nice gadget to have, but not everything that we imagine to be nice turns out to be practical.

The direction for games and Kinect hasn't been shown to be going anywhere very fast either, with Crimson Dragon and Ryse both moving towards supporting controller pads, where they both were originally intended to be Kinect only.

For all intents and purposes today, and in the near future, Kinect is just not making the break that others are promising. And not necessarily what MS promises, but some other people do. The substance behind it is just not there.

 

[blakjedi]

The ebook thing is so far removed from home automation and the simplicity of a light switch. I'm not sure what correlation that is supposed to be...

That's like saying smartphones are the reason 3D TV will take off?

The enthusiasm is fantastic, but it just doesn't make a compelling argument as to why any of this is going to matter soon or in the near future. These systems have to interface with the electric skeleton of the home at some point, and that is a hell of a lot more complicated than having a portable device able to use wifi and store some text documents. Which input/output ports of any of the consoles are ready to support these kinds of things?

Kinect made a massive fuss over the last one or two holiday seasons. I'm not sure it will be able to rely on the benefit of the doubt argument and potential argument as much, if it doesn't really become an item that really does make the living room experience better.

And I don't mean it necessarily needs to change the living room experience into something drastically different, or that it needs to be viewed as a necessity, or that it even needs to supplant the existing framework based on remotes and buttons.

But even to the point where it even properly shares control of the living room with the controller/remote/light switch based paradigm we have now...? I'm just not seeing it happen. The point where these voice commands and such become more convenient and more efficient tools to manage the living room, it's just not there. Not even close, imo. It's a nice gadget to have, but not everything that we imagine to be nice turns out to be practical.

The direction for games and Kinect hasn't been shown to be going anywhere very fast either, with Crimson Dragon and Ryse both moving towards supporting controller pads, where they both were originally intended to be Kinect only.

For all intents and purposes today, and in the near future, Kinect is just not making the break that others are promising. And not necessarily what MS promises, but some other people do. The substance behind it is just not there.

Until we use a Kinect 2, and give it a season or two to mature... we just don't know. Kinect 1 was a good start. This is its evolution which goes beyond gaming... which is exactly where MS wants it to go.

 

[bkilian]

The ebook thing is so far removed from home automation and the simplicity of a light switch. I'm not sure what correlation that is supposed to be...

That's like saying smartphones are the reason 3D TV will take off?

Aah, sorry, it was two thoughts. The youtube links were to innovations doing exactly what temesgen said no one was going to bother to do.

The ebook talk was just a musing on the fact that every new innovation gets labelled useless and a fad and a toy until it suddenly isn't, and then everyone can't imagine how they could survive without it.

I predict Kinect will take a similar trajectory. We'll just have to see how long it takes.

 

[steveOrino]

I predict Kinect will take a similar trajectory. We'll just have to see how long it takes.

Considering MS didn't even show it in its presentation (not to mention 2 Kinect only titles are now traditional controller titles) they sure have a lot of convincing to do, especially at that price. Really gives an impression that they lack confidence in it as a gaming addon. Not saying that's the case but that was the perception I had.

 

[3dilettante]

With the custom silicon, the amount of R&D, and the bundling, Microsoft would be picking a weird time to lose confidence. Pulling the trigger would have happened a long time ago.

 

[wco81]

Supposedly one of the issues with Kinect was precision with registering button presses for the twitch games and such.

Does Kinect 2 track individual fingers? Or how would it let you spree precise bursts of bullets in a shooter game? Or register a tight maneuver in a sports game?

Or does it even have as a goal to replace controllers or merely supplement them in most games?

 

[AlphaWolf]

It won't track fingers but hand position. The biggest improvement for gaming should be that they've reduced it's latency to near traditional controller levels.

 

[manux]

The biggest improvement for gaming should be that they've reduced it's latency to near traditional controller levels.

And how would you exactly do that... And what is the source for your claim? Best I saw was they reduced the lag but nothing was mentioned with "traditional controllers" or absolute lag amount in milliseconds. AFAIK. kinect2 still is 30fps so that gives 1/30s + processing latency for best case scenario.

Let's take an example. press a button character jumps. Try with kinect... how many frames needed until jump is recognized + processing latency on top of that. Yeah, not close to traditional controllers. Probably still close to order of magnitude difference on latency for a simple use case of "jump". You would also have to do the physical jump instead of pressing a button down 1mm adding to the lag.

Same applies for anything that requires multiple frames of data, physical large movement or waiting until a whole sentence is said(xbox jump character).

 

[temesgen]

Supposedly one of the issues with Kinect was precision with registering button presses for the twitch games and such.

Does Kinect 2 track individual fingers? Or how would it let you spree precise bursts of bullets in a shooter game? Or register a tight maneuver in a sports game?

Or does it even have as a goal to replace controllers or merely supplement them in most games?

I'd love to see someone at EA use Kinect to implement moves in Fifa. That would genuinely get me excited about the tech. They should be able to do penalty kicks fairly easily but I'd like to see that and more, perhaps step overs and feints while dribbling....

 

[3dilettante]

I'd opposed, damn damn damn opposed.
Video gaming is a great equalizer. It's the democratization of a professional sport whose industry is so profligate in its pursuit of a rarified zenith of overspecialized talent that it keeps it fully beyond the realm of the average person.
A regular schlub can be a great player, or field a great team without a massive bankroll or having all the right connections or the time to devote to a singular physical activity. It's all down to a few buttons and the presses thereof.

There's no way we can fake an injury better on Kinect than the pros.

 

[bkilian]

Supposedly one of the issues with Kinect was precision with registering button presses for the twitch games and such.

Does Kinect 2 track individual fingers? Or how would it let you spree precise bursts of bullets in a shooter game? Or register a tight maneuver in a sports game?

Or does it even have as a goal to replace controllers or merely supplement them in most games?

It tracks thumb and forefinger. For sports games, it can tell exactly how your weight is dispersed, which muscles you are using, and how much effort you are putting into things. I highly recommend watching one of the Kinect demo videos
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hi5kMNfgDS4

 

[Orion]

Voice is a great way to search and already beats a remote or pad there, unless you enjoy skipping through menus and typing things out on virtual keyboards. I imagine it's at least occasionally much quicker to control TV with voice, more so if you don't keep the remote in hand the hole time. I like "Xbox pause" when it's available, while I go put the kettle on or whatever.

A combination of both is what will work, but you only have so many buttons, and there's a lot of fiddling about in menu and inventories that could be streamlined with voice commands.

I don't know about voice, most professional grade automated customer service suck badly. So if microsoft doesn't have some revolutionary far better voice tech I don't see how they'll be any different.

Regards kinect, I think the applications are limited. What is truly desired is a nonsurgical neural interface, not voice or waggling one's hands.

If what was demoed on stage by Mehdi is real (no telling because it was was too smooth and had zero hiccups) then that would be enough.

Again its an optional interface that's always available, You choose to use or not depending on the game, your media goals or usage patterns.

Walking in the door and saying "xbox on", "xbox show me discovery channel" is worth it to me. The other option is to find the remote and tune to it. It works either way but one is clearly easier and slicker.

For me the remote is either beside the tv or on the couch. And I've to get it anyway because I won't be changing channels and volume with voice, also if I'm planning on playing a game the remote is a must have.

 

[AlphaWolf]

I don't know about voice, most professional grade automated customer service suck badly. So if microsoft doesn't have some revolutionary far better voice tech I don't see how they'll be any different.

Yes MS have revolutionary far better voice tech than professional grade automated customer service, they call it kinect.

 

[bkilian]

For me the remote is either beside the tv or on the couch. And I've to get it anyway because I won't be changing channels and volume with voice, also if I'm planning on playing a game the remote is a must have.

With the X1, you _can_ change the channel and the volume with voice. You also do not need a remote to start a game.

In my case, the remote is normally on one of the ends of my 18 foot long couch. Normally the end opposite the one I just sat down on.

 

[Cyan]

With the custom silicon, the amount of R&D, and the bundling, Microsoft would be picking a weird time to lose confidence. Pulling the trigger would have happened a long time ago.

Microsoft aren't vacillating at all, I am glad they aren't.

My personal experience with Kinect is exactly what bkillian is describing.

I couldn't play many games with it -lack of space- but I can't see myself using the Xbox without it anymore.

I use it to chat and the occasional voice command -i.e. in Skyrim (or any other game which supports voice commands for that matter).-. The Xbox is certainly not the same without Kinect, at least for me.

 

[MrFox]

In my case, the remote is normally on one of the ends of my 18 foot long couch. Normally the end opposite the one I just sat down on.

I think there's a meme about what you just said.

I sat down on my 18 foot couch... the remote is on the other end.

My rule at home is never put the remote anywhere other than the coffee table. A cellphone that could control the console would be best, if everybody in the house has the software.

 

[dagamer]

Kinect beats a remote/controller because voice control implemented properly has little concept of a depth queue. A controller can never immediately take you from one action (playing a game) to another (watching a specific channel) without navigating some complex menus.

It saves time, pure and simple.

 

[temesgen]

Kinect beats a remote/controller because voice control implemented properly has little concept of a depth queue. A controller can never immediately take you from one action (playing a game) to another (watching a specific channel) without navigating some complex menus.

It saves time, pure and simple.

You do realize you can do macros with good third party remotes....

Saying Kinect is superior to remotes is like saying touch controls renders mouse and keyboard useless. Let me ask you a question; do you type at all on your computer? Why not rely on dictation and touch controls for everything? Kinect might solve some issues associated with conventional controls but it will also introduce its own problems.

The reality is that remotes, joysticks, mouse and Keyboard already are optimum choices for many situations.