Speaker 1: Brought to you by the reinvented two thousand twelve camera.
Speaker 1: It's ready. Are you get in touch with technology with
Speaker 1: tech Stuff from how stuff works dot com. Hello there, everyone,
Speaker 1: Welcome to tech stuff. My name is Chris Poulette and
Speaker 1: I am the tech editor here at how stuff works
Speaker 1: dot com. And across from me, sitting there as usual,
Speaker 1: is Senior Ryan Jonathan Strickland. We control the horizontal. We
Speaker 1: control the vertical too. Nice. Yeah, Actually, this, this podcast
Speaker 1: is all about control and lack thereof. No, okay, no,
Speaker 1: just just control. We're normally out of control on this podcast, right.
Speaker 1: The genesis of this comes from a little listener mail. Yes,
Speaker 1: listener mail comes from Josh and not not our Josh,
Speaker 1: not Josh Josh creepy hands clark. Um, this is different,
Speaker 1: Josh says, Hey guy, I was just wondering if you
Speaker 1: could do a podcast explaining Xboxes project and at all
Speaker 1: and how it works. Thanks Josh. So let's start. We're
Speaker 1: gonna actually talk about the sort of the future of
Speaker 1: video game controllers in general, but we could spend a
Speaker 1: little time talking about the toll. Yeah. I thought it
Speaker 1: would be interesting to discuss, like, very very briefly, where
Speaker 1: we've come from, because I mean the very early video
Speaker 1: game controllers were rock tied to a string attached to
Speaker 1: a another rock. We call that poe really now, um, now,
Speaker 1: they were very simple. I mean on Pong, you had
Speaker 1: a paddle. Yeah, a paddle, which is essentially a potentiometer,
Speaker 1: you know, electronics device that goes you know, it's a
Speaker 1: knob that goes left to right and back again. Um.
Speaker 1: And it's very you know, are sure that's a that's
Speaker 1: a paddle or because that sounds to me like a
Speaker 1: like a dance. I think that's how you did the
Speaker 1: tutsie roll left and right and back again. Okay, stop it, um,
Speaker 1: but no, yeah, I mean those the paddles were very early.
Speaker 1: And the joystick, um, you know, it's just a series
Speaker 1: that basically a um, a series of switches that were
Speaker 1: controlled by the position of the joystick. You know, the
Speaker 1: early buttons, and those were used in in arcade games,
Speaker 1: in the early home video games, and you had stuff
Speaker 1: like your favorite the in television. Now for our younger listeners,
Speaker 1: there used to be these places called arcades. There's still arcades. Yeah, no,
Speaker 1: there are arcades. But you know what's disappointing is that
Speaker 1: when you see arcade now they're talking about like some
Speaker 1: sort of like courtyard. It's very few times that you'll
Speaker 1: find a video arcade. Actually, those were around before video arcades.
Speaker 1: What I thought that they took their name from. Are
Speaker 1: you sure? Yeah, I'm pretty sure. But let you see
Speaker 1: that Wikipedia page. I'm just kidding. We do not use
Speaker 1: Wikipedia people, um no, um no. So all right, so yeah,
Speaker 1: the arcade being a place where you would go and
Speaker 1: they had lots and lots of video games that you
Speaker 1: would exchange either quarters or token in order to play them. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and a lot of them we're talking about very very
Speaker 1: simple uh switches. I mean you had them. You had
Speaker 1: the paddles that go left and right. You had track balls,
Speaker 1: which are essentially, you know, the old roller style mice
Speaker 1: turned upside down where you roll the ball with your
Speaker 1: hand to control stuff like Marble Madness, for example, if
Speaker 1: those centipede um you know, where you control your the
Speaker 1: movement of the thing on screen by rolling the ball. Switches.
Speaker 1: You had the bi directional joystix, which only get left
Speaker 1: or right, you know, and then you had the kind
Speaker 1: where you could do up, down, left and right and
Speaker 1: again these were just switches he would you would push
Speaker 1: the joystick in a certain direction that would put pressure
Speaker 1: on the switch, which would indicate, hey, this guy wants
Speaker 1: Mario to climb up the ladder. Mario used to go
Speaker 1: up and down ladders a lot, Yes, he did, was
Speaker 1: before he had the ability to jump, leap tall buildings
Speaker 1: in a single bound. Yeah, go three D turn into
Speaker 1: a paper airplane, that kind of stuff. Those were the days. Yeah,
Speaker 1: but no, Uh, video game controllers, you know when they
Speaker 1: moved into the home, basically used the same kinds of technologies,
Speaker 1: just the uh, the leaf switches, um and a lot
Speaker 1: of them. You know, we're very simple. Even a key
Speaker 1: pad would have a membrane over there with the numbers
Speaker 1: or whatever else. And in television had that. Yeah, and
Speaker 1: those were you know, very very early controllers. Atari trying
Speaker 1: the the ridiculous with controller and it's you know theoretically
Speaker 1: three sixty degree non centering joystick, which was a pain
Speaker 1: in the neck. Oh yeah, yeah, I heard about that.
Speaker 1: I never had at so I never got to experience
Speaker 1: the joy of the broken joystick. Yeah. They break very
Speaker 1: easily because the joy six I mean you could put
Speaker 1: those behind a truck back over it and it would
Speaker 1: still work, yeah, and not really being a little exaggerating
Speaker 1: a touch, but those they were rugged. Yeah. Joysticks were
Speaker 1: a lot more, but they were very simple as far
Speaker 1: as these things that these things go. And I think, um,
Speaker 1: I think the first game controller that that was like
Speaker 1: a real game had that I remember was from the
Speaker 1: NES and Nintendo Entertainment System. There was actually sort of
Speaker 1: the four runner of the modern four directions direction direction
Speaker 1: pad and the two buttons BN A yes plus start
Speaker 1: and select. Yeah. I mean there were other the controllers
Speaker 1: that were sort of like that, but they were they
Speaker 1: usually had they were big and he didn't you know,
Speaker 1: you held them usually sort of vertically like the Colico
Speaker 1: Vision the in television HR joysticks like that Dell. They
Speaker 1: were all sort of vertical, and there was a most
Speaker 1: first yeah, yeah, and then I mean there were tons
Speaker 1: and tons you know, the other nintended control pads, and
Speaker 1: then the Genesis and then the PlayStation pads you know,
Speaker 1: but they were all sort of you know, evolutionary based
Speaker 1: on that. They were a little more ergonomic, you know,
Speaker 1: they weren't square and candy bar shape anymore. You got
Speaker 1: to the Dreamcast controls that that was one of the
Speaker 1: larger controllers that had the um the different analog joysticks
Speaker 1: as well as the buttons, and then it also had
Speaker 1: a slot for a memory card. The slot the memory
Speaker 1: cards actually had a little uh displays on them. You
Speaker 1: could in some games, actually had many games that would
Speaker 1: play out on your controller's little miniature screen, which I
Speaker 1: thought was kind of innovative and interesting. Now, granted, I
Speaker 1: got a Dreamcast after the Dreamcast had already gone off
Speaker 1: the market. I got a used one, and I got
Speaker 1: a bunch of used games, um, and I even got
Speaker 1: some old memory cards and stuff. And uh, I was
Speaker 1: really surprised at how ingenious the Dreamcast system was and
Speaker 1: and kind of sad that it never really took off,
Speaker 1: because it was in many ways uh and equal or
Speaker 1: superior to the other systems that were on the market
Speaker 1: at the time. But um, but that controller. You can
Speaker 1: kind of see similarities between the Dreamcast controller and the
Speaker 1: Xbox controller. Well that's the thing. I mean, for the
Speaker 1: last couple of generations of game consoles, just about everybody
Speaker 1: who's brought something to market has a nice, comfortable, ergonomic
Speaker 1: controller that is that's easy to hold the button. I
Speaker 1: hate the PlayStation controller. I okay, look, I love the
Speaker 1: PlayStation system. I love the games. I think they're great.
Speaker 1: I hate that controller. It's just too cramped for my hands. Yeah.
Speaker 1: And and since since we're talking about hate and controllers
Speaker 1: and the same thing, I think we should point out
Speaker 1: we've gotten some some recent comments about about our feeling
Speaker 1: on video games. And I don't think there's a video
Speaker 1: game console that I'm speaking for you here that either
Speaker 1: one of us doesn't like, you know, as a video
Speaker 1: game console. I think we might well, okay, but I mean,
Speaker 1: if you had an opportunity to play one, you would
Speaker 1: probably take the opportunity to play one. I mean I
Speaker 1: would even play I had a chance. Sure, I would
Speaker 1: take the opportunity to play one, because I'm a video
Speaker 1: game We do not hate any game console in particular.
Speaker 1: I mean, there's there's always but and and that's an
Speaker 1: aspect of the thing. But I haven't actually, uh, you know,
Speaker 1: had a chance to mess with the PlayStation three that much. Um,
Speaker 1: not because I don't like it, but because I just haven't.
Speaker 1: I haven't had the time in grad school, um so
Speaker 1: you know. But that's the thing is that these are
Speaker 1: are in general fairly comfortable, They're rounded, they have buttons,
Speaker 1: in in convenient places. For the most part, some of
Speaker 1: them have lots of buttons. Depending on the games, it
Speaker 1: might take a little learning to figure out where are
Speaker 1: Some of us old folks will still be spending the
Speaker 1: time saying, all right, which one allows me to jump?
Speaker 1: And you meanwhile, you sniped us forty three times in
Speaker 1: a row. Yeah, yeah, we understand. We're not as good
Speaker 1: as you are. Ha ha, great, we make more money
Speaker 1: than you do. Possibly not, but come on, give me something, man,
Speaker 1: Come on, alright, alright, so anyway, Veronica Belmont befriended me
Speaker 1: on Twitter. There I don't have that so um but uh,
Speaker 1: you know, one of the things that that has come
Speaker 1: up with the current generation of game consoles is, I
Speaker 1: mean much has been made of the Wee Remote and
Speaker 1: Nunchuck because there they were the first to market with
Speaker 1: a wireless controller that can be used um, you know,
Speaker 1: because it's got accelerometers and things, and you can actually
Speaker 1: use it to make motions like you would if you
Speaker 1: were actually playing, uh, like a phishing game. You actually
Speaker 1: act like it's a fishing run, right right. It was.
Speaker 1: It was the first really innovative step in video game
Speaker 1: controls that we have seen in a very long time,
Speaker 1: because everything up to that point had been an evolution
Speaker 1: of the basic control system. Even even the wireless controllers
Speaker 1: for the older systems were the same controller that didn't
Speaker 1: have a leading to the to the actual console. It
Speaker 1: was the same exactly, and so the we mode was
Speaker 1: the first time in a very long time that we
Speaker 1: had seen some innovation. The Nintendo is actually known for this.
Speaker 1: They've tried it a few times, not always successfully. Do
Speaker 1: you remember the power Glove? I do remember the power glove.
Speaker 1: Not the most successful implementation of a video game user interface,
Speaker 1: nor the most attractive. Yeah, hey, that thing was pretty
Speaker 1: you know what, I there are no superlatives I can
Speaker 1: use that I will actually make it into this podcast.
Speaker 1: They'll all be bleeped out. It was. It was cool
Speaker 1: from a from like a twelve year old perspective, that
Speaker 1: thing was. It was like you're a freaking robot when
Speaker 1: you push it on. I mean, every kid wanted that
Speaker 1: I knew wanted one of these things, even the kids
Speaker 1: who didn't have any Supernantendo system or whatever, they wanted one.
Speaker 1: But yeah, as a game controller. Because I actually got
Speaker 1: to play with one because one of my friends got one. Um,
Speaker 1: it was it left a lot to be desired. It
Speaker 1: just didn't have You know, you weren't able. You you
Speaker 1: thought you were suddenly going to become like super Leak
Speaker 1: in all these games because you just be able to
Speaker 1: point your hand at the screen and make your little
Speaker 1: guy move around and jump and fire, and it would
Speaker 1: all be at a twitch of a finger. It didn't
Speaker 1: quite work that way. Um. However, it did show that
Speaker 1: Nintendo was already even back then, thinking of ways to
Speaker 1: create new forms of gameplay so that, uh, you know,
Speaker 1: they could sell more games. I mean, ultimately it means
Speaker 1: making more money, but it also means not falling into
Speaker 1: the trap of just doing the same thing over and
Speaker 1: over and over again. What's something else that Nintendo is
Speaker 1: often accused of doing because they depend so heavily upon
Speaker 1: certain franchises like the Mario franchise of the Metroid franchise. Um,
Speaker 1: but they also are known for really being innovative when
Speaker 1: it comes to hardware. So the We mode was another
Speaker 1: step in that where you finally finally get to a
Speaker 1: point where this is a system that actually works. Unlike
Speaker 1: the power Glove, this system worked pretty well. You could
Speaker 1: do lots of neat things with the game. The biggest
Speaker 1: Prominintendo's faced since the introduction of the Wii is a
Speaker 1: real lack of compelling software. It's not that the hardware
Speaker 1: is is a lackluster It's just that there aren't enough
Speaker 1: really great games for the Wii too for people to
Speaker 1: to have their attention be held by this device. I mean,
Speaker 1: most people will say, I got a Wei, I played
Speaker 1: the heck out of it for about three months, and
Speaker 1: then I turned it off and haven't turned it on since.
Speaker 1: M Yeah, it seems like, um, well, it's the very
Speaker 1: first that the titles that came with its launch, there
Speaker 1: were very few that really took advantage of the we
Speaker 1: remote capabilities. I think it would be safe to say
Speaker 1: means WE Sports did definitely do that quite a bit.
Speaker 1: Sure there, but their third party title, sure, the third
Speaker 1: party talk well, I mean when you think about it,
Speaker 1: they were okay, but they weren't as advanced as the
Speaker 1: ones that are currently in the market. And that's the
Speaker 1: danger of creating a really innovative form of gameplay is
Speaker 1: that you have to hope that developers can keep up
Speaker 1: with you and create content that takes advantage of your
Speaker 1: new hardware. Um, if you have created a brand new
Speaker 1: style of gameplay. Then that that's a big hurdle. It's
Speaker 1: not like, oh, we have to learn how to program
Speaker 1: for this new video card, or we have to make
Speaker 1: sure that the game system sound card UM is supported
Speaker 1: that kind of thing. It's we have to figure out
Speaker 1: how how we want to interpret certain motions and and
Speaker 1: translate them into game action. It's a totally different way
Speaker 1: of thinking. So it's actually, when you think about it
Speaker 1: that way, it's a huge challenge from a game developer standpoint.
Speaker 1: So I'm not terribly surprised that the early third party
Speaker 1: games UH did not take advantage of the MOATS capabilities
Speaker 1: to the extent that most of us had hoped. And then,
Speaker 1: of course UM over the past year, year and a
Speaker 1: half or so, you know they've started they released the
Speaker 1: add on, the Motion Plus, which plugs into the back
Speaker 1: of the more precise UM and that's you know that
Speaker 1: that will probably give it a little more life to it.
Speaker 1: I think the other issue we need to look at
Speaker 1: it's not just the gameplay for the WEI, but also
Speaker 1: the target audience, because we really targeted casual gamers in
Speaker 1: a way that the other game systems don't. UM. Not
Speaker 1: to say that there aren't casual games on the p
Speaker 1: S three or Xbox three sixty. There are, uh. And
Speaker 1: not to say that there are no hardcore type games
Speaker 1: on the Wii, because there are core games as well.
Speaker 1: It's just that, in general, the perception is that the
Speaker 1: we was for casual gamers, like families. You know, it's
Speaker 1: the sort of thing that a mom and dad could
Speaker 1: play with their their kids. Um, not just because the content,
Speaker 1: but because the control system was so intuitive that you
Speaker 1: didn't have to sit down and learn, oh wait, I
Speaker 1: need to do half circle forward be a to pull
Speaker 1: off that move. It was just you know, you flip
Speaker 1: your wrist and you push a button and there you go.
Speaker 1: And UM. The thing about that is that, yeah, these
Speaker 1: casual games are fun, but it's like a board game.
Speaker 1: You know, you don't want to play it every day.
Speaker 1: It's not the kind of game that gets you sitting
Speaker 1: down in front of the television and playing for hours
Speaker 1: on end, day after day after day, like other hardcore games.
Speaker 1: So ultimately, yeah, you're gonna lose interest in these games.
Speaker 1: It's just that's the way we work. We don't tend
Speaker 1: to want to play the same sort of casual things. Uh.
Speaker 1: For a prolonged period. I mean, you might want to
Speaker 1: go and revisit them now and then, but it's not like,
Speaker 1: you know, you're not making time to do it all
Speaker 1: the time. Yeah, well, I don't know. I mean I
Speaker 1: think it sort of depends on on the gamer, but
Speaker 1: I think it's the same. I mean, casual games have
Speaker 1: an appeal in a way that that the hardcore games,
Speaker 1: uh don't depend It depends on the obviously depends on
Speaker 1: the game. There are a lot of them that have
Speaker 1: a story that goes along with him, and once you've
Speaker 1: played through to the end of the story, a lot
Speaker 1: of people don't go back to the start of the
Speaker 1: story and go again. They go find a new game.
Speaker 1: Well yeah, but even like even like party games that
Speaker 1: kind of stuff with like little mini games things like that. Yeah. Um,
Speaker 1: and I mean it's the sort of thing that could
Speaker 1: definitely still be brought out every now and then whenever
Speaker 1: you got friends over. I just don't think that it's
Speaker 1: the I mean, we've seen this in sales figures where uh,
Speaker 1: November of two thousand nine excluded, uh, the we sales
Speaker 1: started to kind of drop off. Part of that was
Speaker 1: probably for another session. Part of that was because back
Speaker 1: in September we had the Sony announcing the price cuts
Speaker 1: for the PlayStation and and Microsoft announcing price cuts for
Speaker 1: the next plus three sixty. And also think part of
Speaker 1: it is that the stores actually have We's in stock
Speaker 1: now as a normal thing, that the demand has been
Speaker 1: meeting the supply. A lot of people, a lot of
Speaker 1: people who wanted to WE already have one, so that
Speaker 1: also helps. Um. But but the point being that that
Speaker 1: interest in the WE appears to be waning. It's a
Speaker 1: WE waning and Nintendo has admitted that that that's going on,
Speaker 1: that they're selling fewer of the consoles. But but at
Speaker 1: any rate, the WE what it did do is it
Speaker 1: spurred both Microsoft and Sony. I mean, you could argue
Speaker 1: that maybe the WE didn't spur it. Okay, well, I'm
Speaker 1: sure the companies would, but they've started to develop their
Speaker 1: own innovative game controller systems. Yeah. As a matter of fact,
Speaker 1: Sony was and I know for a fact that Sony
Speaker 1: was working on uh some motion sensitive controllers for the
Speaker 1: PlayStation for for a quite a long time. So I
Speaker 1: imagine though that that's the kind of that having the
Speaker 1: WE out there and having it be a success as
Speaker 1: the kind of think that proves that, yes, people really
Speaker 1: are interested in having this kind of experience when they
Speaker 1: play games, right, you might want to ramp up the
Speaker 1: research and development on those kind of projects once you
Speaker 1: see the success of the Wei um and yeah, and
Speaker 1: Sony had some experience with this already because they had
Speaker 1: their their eye toy stuff, the uh, the camera based
Speaker 1: games that for the PlayStation two, where you would hook
Speaker 1: up a little it's kind of like a webcam to
Speaker 1: your PlayStation two and you would you could play games.
Speaker 1: You would be inserted into the game system. You might
Speaker 1: see like little bubbles floating around you as you look
Speaker 1: at the screen and you see yourself and you move
Speaker 1: your arms around you pop the bubbles. And they had
Speaker 1: lots of little mini games like that. Actually know someone
Speaker 1: who used to work on that project, and um, he
Speaker 1: had done a lot of mo cap stuff motion capture
Speaker 1: stuff as well, sou. But that was just kind of, um,
Speaker 1: that's kind of like the the very the beta version,
Speaker 1: if you will, of some of the control systems were
Speaker 1: starting to come out. Now, now you said you had
Speaker 1: looked into some of the other stuff Sony had done, well, yeah,
Speaker 1: because um, because you know, it was just last summer. Uh,
Speaker 1: and it makes them look late to the game. But
Speaker 1: I don't really think that they were. I think that
Speaker 1: they were actually sort of um investigating it and doing
Speaker 1: R and D on it. Um. But last summer, Sony
Speaker 1: announced um that they were going to come out with
Speaker 1: a WAND type controller. UM. As a matter of fact,
Speaker 1: I believe they're unfortunate timing there. Um press, you know,
Speaker 1: formal press announcement came the day after Microsoft announced project
Speaker 1: at all. But um, Sony actually announced this WAND style controller.
Speaker 1: It's got. Um it looks kind of strange. It really
Speaker 1: does look like a wand because it's got a glowing
Speaker 1: ball on the end of it. UM. Maybe maybe not
Speaker 1: depends on the game. Uh, but no, it actually works
Speaker 1: in conjunction with the PlayStation I and uh, by the
Speaker 1: accounts I've read about it, Uh, this particular controller is
Speaker 1: extremely precise. Um, and especially for things like fighting games,
Speaker 1: could be really uh you know, could out we the
Speaker 1: we as far as the you know, how precise the
Speaker 1: controller is and how how well you can capture the
Speaker 1: motion even when you're interacting with the game. UM. Yeah,
Speaker 1: So I mean I don't know, Uh, the the articles
Speaker 1: were I was checking out. We're immediately following that in
Speaker 1: pre we Motion Plus. So I mean I haven't seen
Speaker 1: any uh you know, hard evidence of either. Of course,
Speaker 1: the wand control of the new UM motion controller for
Speaker 1: the PlayStation three isn't due out until next year. But
Speaker 1: you know what kind of game I'm gonna want for that? Yeah?
Speaker 1: What what type of game this? You're gonna say something
Speaker 1: involving a lightsaber? Yes, I want a lightsaber game. That's awesome.
Speaker 1: I'm I'm guessing that Lucas Arts will be happy to
Speaker 1: help you out with that, I should hope so. Because
Speaker 1: he still owes me for episodes one, two, and three,
Speaker 1: I'm holding him personally responsible on behalf of true Star
Speaker 1: Wars fans everywhere. As long as I get the payoff,
Speaker 1: I'm happy to bear that burden. Yeah. But the but
Speaker 1: the weed doesn't actually have a camera. You know, it
Speaker 1: does have you know, infrared, and it has the accelerometers
Speaker 1: and it could tell what's going on. Um. But the
Speaker 1: the PlayStation does has the combination of the PlayStation I
Speaker 1: and this one controller, so you should be able to
Speaker 1: be somewhat more immersive. The camera is able to track
Speaker 1: the motions of the one. The one itself has its
Speaker 1: own accelerometers and everything in it, so so it should
Speaker 1: be pretty cool. I think I'd like to have a
Speaker 1: chance to to mess with it. Of course, again that's
Speaker 1: very different from what Microsoft is proposing with Roget and
Speaker 1: that really took off again because the popularity of you know,
Speaker 1: the Wei. Of course, they were kind of dismissive of
Speaker 1: it at first, Oh, this is just a toy, but
Speaker 1: you know, it proved doubt that people actually liked the
Speaker 1: game that way. Yeah, and and the thing about at
Speaker 1: All is that kind of took everyone by surprise at
Speaker 1: three this past year. Yeah. Um, I was at E
Speaker 1: three when they announced it. I was not at the
Speaker 1: press conference where they unveiled it. I actually arrived too
Speaker 1: late to attend that that press conference. But that was
Speaker 1: all I was hearing on the show floor that first day.
Speaker 1: It was about Project Natal and at the time I
Speaker 1: had no idea what it was. I sadly was not
Speaker 1: one of the lucky individuals grabbed off the showroom floor
Speaker 1: to be dragged into Microsoft's demo room, kicking and screaming
Speaker 1: to be given a full demo of Project at All.
Speaker 1: I've seen the videos of people who were and actually
Speaker 1: they weren't kicking and screaming. Most of the time, a
Speaker 1: rather nondescript person would just come up and say, hey,
Speaker 1: do you want to see this cool thing we've got
Speaker 1: working at Microsoft. And if they didn't immediately get a
Speaker 1: creepy vibe, they'd say sure. You know, they weren't using
Speaker 1: Steve Bomber. If they had been using Steve Bomber, you
Speaker 1: just would have heard cries and screams of of of
Speaker 1: fear as as fires broke out across the showing floor.
Speaker 1: But they used someone with a little better, uh, you know,
Speaker 1: a little gentler approach, and uh. And so people went
Speaker 1: up and they checked it out. And the thing about
Speaker 1: Project and at All is it's considered it's kind of
Speaker 1: a controllerless system. You don't hold a wand you don't
Speaker 1: hold any kind of remote control. You you control the
Speaker 1: game with various motions of your body and that you know.
Speaker 1: The first yeah, the first version of this I saw
Speaker 1: involved a game where all you were doing is swatting
Speaker 1: balls being thrown at you back at the the far
Speaker 1: end of the game board the room. It's like dodgeballs
Speaker 1: being thrown at you and you just you know, you're
Speaker 1: swatting them. Out of the air and knocking them back
Speaker 1: to where they from where they came from, and um,
Speaker 1: to where they came from. And so you're just you know,
Speaker 1: you're using your whole body. You're jumping back and forth,
Speaker 1: you're kicking, you're you're swatting your hands. You look like
Speaker 1: a crazy person in the middle of this room. If
Speaker 1: you were standing on the same side of the room
Speaker 1: as the television, you think this person is having a fit.
Speaker 1: If you were standing behind the person and seeing the television,
Speaker 1: you think, wow, that's really cool. He or she is
Speaker 1: blocking all of these digital objects using their own body.
Speaker 1: And depending on where you stood, Like if you stood closer,
Speaker 1: you'd be a larger presence, if you stood further away,
Speaker 1: you'd be a smaller presents Like it could detect the
Speaker 1: distance that you were at, uh from the from the
Speaker 1: actual screen. So yeah, it wasn't just left right up
Speaker 1: and down and how slow could perceive depth. Um kind
Speaker 1: of a it's kind of a neat little radar kind
Speaker 1: of system, although it's not actually using radar. But it
Speaker 1: can recognize your face. Yes, it can recognize your face. Um,
Speaker 1: you can. So theoretically you could have a family of
Speaker 1: people who all have profiles on project at all, and
Speaker 1: the game would recognize who was going to be playing
Speaker 1: the game and could set things like even difficulty settings.
Speaker 1: Let's say little Billy is awesome at this boxing game
Speaker 1: on the Xbox three sixty that uses project at All,
Speaker 1: and Dad thinks he's a great boxer, but he's a
Speaker 1: glass joe, So they can't play on the same level
Speaker 1: because if they did, Dad would be knocked unconscious within
Speaker 1: thirty seconds. So when Dad gets out there to play
Speaker 1: this game, the game says, oh, let's just turn this
Speaker 1: to nube and Dad will have a fighting chance. So
Speaker 1: that's that's kind of the idea here. And uh, the
Speaker 1: neat thing about is not just that you you know,
Speaker 1: like I was saying, the first games I saw, you
Speaker 1: could do things like you're blocking dodgeballs coming at you.
Speaker 1: But they also had a racing game. And in the
Speaker 1: racing game, you sat down and it could still recognize
Speaker 1: that you were there. You put your hands out as
Speaker 1: if you were grasping a steering wheel, and you put
Speaker 1: your foot out to indicate your stepping on the gas,
Speaker 1: and this you could race. You know, you turn your
Speaker 1: hands as if you're turning the steering wheel. And your
Speaker 1: car turns. You can actually control without holding a controller. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's pretty neat to look at. It's really innovative. Is
Speaker 1: it going to take off? I don't know. I mean
Speaker 1: part of it is just that we've kind of grown
Speaker 1: accustomed to using controllers and it seems odd to try
Speaker 1: and control a game just through gestures. Right. Well, you
Speaker 1: know what, that's actually one of the things that the
Speaker 1: Sony engineers said. They said, you know, hey, this is
Speaker 1: the TNAL thing is really cool, we admit, but um,
Speaker 1: actually I don't know that they said that, but they
Speaker 1: did say, okay, this isn't at all it is you know,
Speaker 1: you don't use any control at all. We believe that
Speaker 1: people want controllers. We've you know, from what we've done,
Speaker 1: we have learned that people want to hold a controller.
Speaker 1: This is why we came out with the WAND. Yeah, definitely.
Speaker 1: Like I think it's the same thing if you were playing,
Speaker 1: say a fencing game. I say you're playing a fencing
Speaker 1: game using either the Sony WAND system or project at all,
Speaker 1: it might feel more natural that with the WAND. Because
Speaker 1: you actually have an object in your hand, it's easier
Speaker 1: for you to visualize where the point is going to go.
Speaker 1: You tilt your wrist up or down, and you you
Speaker 1: control the point's very precise. When at all, even if
Speaker 1: it's very good at detecting you know, how your hand,
Speaker 1: how you're holding your hand, it's gonna seem weird. You're
Speaker 1: gonna have to judge based upon what you see on
Speaker 1: the screen, like, Oh, I guess I'm tilting my my
Speaker 1: wrist up a little higher than I thought it was
Speaker 1: a better tilted down. Uh, it's not gonna necessarily translate
Speaker 1: as well, because you don't have something physical in your
Speaker 1: hand that you can, you know, quate with what's on
Speaker 1: the screen. So I think that maybe we will eventually
Speaker 1: move there. The question I have is whether or not
Speaker 1: project at all is ahead of its time. Um, maybe
Speaker 1: we need that evolutionary step that the we mote and
Speaker 1: the Sony wand are providing before we can go to
Speaker 1: complete gesture control. Well here's um, here's what I'm thinking.
Speaker 1: I think. Number one, it's kind of funny that something
Speaker 1: that you know that the current generation of consoles. One
Speaker 1: of the reasons Nintendo was sort of counted out at
Speaker 1: the beginning was Sony and Microsoft were competing with one
Speaker 1: another to deliver the crispmas graphics and you know, high
Speaker 1: deaf and surround sound experience. You know, the hardcore gamers
Speaker 1: really wanted this immersive experience. And I think that the
Speaker 1: success of the WE style gameplay. Now, I think the
Speaker 1: next generation of consoles is going to be about the controllers,
Speaker 1: because I mean, we're you know, the the the machines
Speaker 1: themselves graphically are matching the state of the art, and televisions,
Speaker 1: I mean they're not. They can play on high definition systems,
Speaker 1: although the WEI is behind in that step. Um, but
Speaker 1: I think that that that we finally have gotten to.
Speaker 1: You know, let's go Shakespeare here the plays the thing.
Speaker 1: That's a different play. Yes it was a different play,
Speaker 1: but still, I mean, I think the gameplay majesty should
Speaker 1: be what two is? Why day is day? Night? Night
Speaker 1: and time is time where it's nothing but to waste night,
Speaker 1: day and time? Are you done? Well? It's polonious. He
Speaker 1: doesn't get done for another page? And I know, but
Speaker 1: I know. But the gameplay is is the the experience
Speaker 1: of the gameplay is where it's at right now. And
Speaker 1: I think all three of these manufacturers, I think the
Speaker 1: next console is going to be about gameplay. Now, the
Speaker 1: trick is, uh, you know, is Project at all going
Speaker 1: to give you the same amount of fine control that
Speaker 1: we Motion plus and the Sony PlayStation three controller. It's
Speaker 1: hard to say because so little has been seen of it. Yeah,
Speaker 1: so we don't know that answer. See, here's here's the
Speaker 1: problem I see with that. That premise not that you're wrong.
Speaker 1: I'm not gonna say that you're wrong because I think
Speaker 1: I think you're right. I have no idea, but I
Speaker 1: think I think that the gameplay. I think Nintendo's approach
Speaker 1: the gameplay proves that that is enough to attract people
Speaker 1: to your console. It is not necessarily enough to keep
Speaker 1: people on your console. For that, you need the really
Speaker 1: good software. I think if Nintendo had really, really, like
Speaker 1: if they had managed to keep up on the same
Speaker 1: level as the PS three and the Xbox three sixty
Speaker 1: with the games, if their game library were as strong
Speaker 1: as the uh, the other two, then maybe we would
Speaker 1: be able to make an easier conclusion, Because what then
Speaker 1: we could say for sure whether or not Nintendo was
Speaker 1: winning based mainly upon its control system along with the
Speaker 1: game library. It's not an equal footing though, because it's
Speaker 1: game library is lacking It's hard to say what's more important.
Speaker 1: Is it more important that you go and create this
Speaker 1: kind of system that caters to the hardcore gamer, or
Speaker 1: is it more important that you control create a a
Speaker 1: control system that is as inclusive as possible. That's the
Speaker 1: thing that was brilliant about the Wei was that its
Speaker 1: control system was so easy to pick up that you know,
Speaker 1: you have senior citizens who were playing the games. You know,
Speaker 1: you didn't necessarily hear about folks over at the Senior
Speaker 1: citizen home breaking out the Xbox three sixty four little
Speaker 1: Call of Duty. I mean, you know, for one thing,
Speaker 1: that airport level would probably freak them out. I don't know,
Speaker 1: maybe not all of them. Probably some of them were
Speaker 1: in the original version of Call of Duty, which was
Speaker 1: called World War Two. Well yeah, well the current once
Speaker 1: I'm talking about our modern warfare where saw this small
Speaker 1: squad stuff? But no, no, no, yes, I've been getting
Speaker 1: back to right, like this game is this game is
Speaker 1: giving me flashbacks? Um, I get that every time I
Speaker 1: play Sonic anyway, So I had a Hedgehog problem when
Speaker 1: I was younger. I'll go into it in another podcast.
Speaker 1: The but but yeah, because the game, because it doesn't
Speaker 1: have the library. It's hard to say. Is the the
Speaker 1: user interface enough to to attract and keep people with
Speaker 1: your console? Um, but I think once we see the
Speaker 1: Wand and the Tall come out, if those systems not
Speaker 1: only are successful, but people develop really good games to
Speaker 1: go along with those systems take advantage of the capabilities,
Speaker 1: then maybe we will actually see an evolution or true
Speaker 1: evolution of the video game console system. Because really, I know,
Speaker 1: you can always go you know, higher definition and faster processors.
Speaker 1: I mean, there's always that that place, But eventually you're
Speaker 1: gonna hit a hit a law of diminishing returns where yeah,
Speaker 1: the improvement is there, but is that enough for people
Speaker 1: to say this is a game system worth owning? Because uh, look,
Speaker 1: this helmet looks twelve more realistic than it did on
Speaker 1: the old system. Well on the next generation of consoles,
Speaker 1: I'm I can I could guess that what's going to
Speaker 1: succeed is a combination of you know, high end capabilities
Speaker 1: plus an awesome control system, plus the library games. I
Speaker 1: hope that all three of them make it through, yeah,
Speaker 1: because I mean they're the competition is obviously doing all
Speaker 1: three of them good, and those of us who buy
Speaker 1: the consoles as well because we have the opportunity to
Speaker 1: play these really cool games. We should also point out
Speaker 1: that some people have suggested that things like the Sony
Speaker 1: Wand and Project at all. Uh, the real reason that
Speaker 1: they're coming out, I'm not necessarily saying this, but this
Speaker 1: has been said. But the real reason they're coming out
Speaker 1: is just to extend the life of both of those
Speaker 1: consoles um so that you know, because people have talked
Speaker 1: about the PS three it was supposedly having a ten
Speaker 1: year lifespan, Yeah, which I mean the PS two, they're
Speaker 1: still games coming out for that, so, I mean, it's
Speaker 1: it's completely believable, so that people have some people have
Speaker 1: suggested that these these new systems are really just a
Speaker 1: way to kill time before they have to come out
Speaker 1: with whatever the next you know, mind blowing video game
Speaker 1: system will be, whether it's the PS four and Xbox
Speaker 1: seven twenty or whatever they're gonna be. Uh, if there
Speaker 1: anything like the current generation, they're going to be extremely
Speaker 1: expensive to develop and manufact after the first ones. Yeah, well,
Speaker 1: I mean, if you always want to try and get
Speaker 1: the most out of whatever hardware you're putting out as possible,
Speaker 1: I mean, come on, Microsoft, they still need to make
Speaker 1: an Xbox three sixty that doesn't break out, dude, Like
Speaker 1: when you're breaking rate rage is close, you have got
Speaker 1: a serious problem. I am an Xbox fanboy, Okay, I
Speaker 1: make no apologies for it, but man, that red ring
Speaker 1: of death stuff that is out of control. So um,
Speaker 1: I don't want to get into a long thing here
Speaker 1: because we probably need to wrap this up. But I'm
Speaker 1: also interested to see what this means for PC gaming.
Speaker 1: I mean, obviously that's a different audience, but I wonder
Speaker 1: if any of this is going to make it over
Speaker 1: to the computer. And well, another thing what we should
Speaker 1: mention is that Microsoft has has said that they hope
Speaker 1: to include just your controls within Windows operating systems, so
Speaker 1: not just games, but also other applications. So this could
Speaker 1: actually make it over into say office. So well, you
Speaker 1: think about any like, you know, it's like like Minority Report.
Speaker 1: You know, you move your hands around and you can,
Speaker 1: you know, think about we've got the surface, Yeah, exactly,
Speaker 1: You've got to think of it. You know, just say
Speaker 1: I have like a wall of photos and you flick
Speaker 1: your hand around and you scatter the photos around, or
Speaker 1: you pick a specific one you gesture and it expands
Speaker 1: very much the same sort of thing as multi touch
Speaker 1: on screens like the iPhone or whatever, except that you
Speaker 1: are no longer even making contact with the screen and
Speaker 1: just making gestures and that is executing commands. And I
Speaker 1: think it, uh, you know, the popularity may have its roots.
Speaker 1: You know, are basically introduced introduced to the public from
Speaker 1: video games, right, you know, it's pretty cool. I mean
Speaker 1: video games have spawned a lot of other things as well.
Speaker 1: But we can We'll want to do a podcast, a
Speaker 1: full podcast, just on the technologies that video games have helped,
Speaker 1: uh push along, Like virtual reality is the number one
Speaker 1: that I can think of, augmented realities way up there too.
Speaker 1: All right, well, um, let's wrap this up. I guess
Speaker 1: what we can do is we can do another tiny
Speaker 1: little uh listener mail. This is your mail comes from loop.
Speaker 1: Loop said, hey, on the mr Fusion thing, the car's
Speaker 1: flight was powered by the mr Fusion and it was electrical.
Speaker 1: The lightning at the end of part two damaged it.
Speaker 1: It was in Duc's letter. Also, that thing you spoke
Speaker 1: of about seeing information about people and their company and
Speaker 1: online conversations the opposite the future, well, it was predicted
Speaker 1: in Back to the Future to remember when Marty was
Speaker 1: talking to Niels and later his boss on the TV
Speaker 1: and the den. It showed the name of the person,
Speaker 1: stuff about them and their favorite color and food and
Speaker 1: stock quotes when their company also be careful using that
Speaker 1: way back. Machinist Peabody stated the time machine was too tricky,
Speaker 1: but when he built the way back, it was could
Speaker 1: have been machine, and it showed what happened, only in
Speaker 1: a different little slant. On the Newton NP have to
Speaker 1: and still use one regularly. And yes, the handwriting recognition
Speaker 1: can be bad, really bad, I'll give you that, But
Speaker 1: the Newton NOS was designed to recognize normal print and
Speaker 1: normal cursive writing, your regular alphabet you have been taught
Speaker 1: since kindergarten, whereas the poem used graffiti, which is a
Speaker 1: proprietary alphabet that you have to teach yourself to right
Speaker 1: so it can understand you. So you have to put
Speaker 1: that into perspective on the tech. April Fools Gags I
Speaker 1: g N made a trailer for Legend of Zelda and
Speaker 1: release it on April first, a couple of years ago,
Speaker 1: and the head fool's folks believing it also Hello Loop
Speaker 1: that Loop, you are a wordy person. You also have
Speaker 1: a really interesting tone. I don't know how that came through.
Speaker 1: I don't know where that came from. That was that.
Speaker 1: I think I might have actually been channeling a little
Speaker 1: of Molly Wood there, although she does an amazing nerd voice.
Speaker 1: Um and loop. I don't mean to suggest you're a nerd.
Speaker 1: I'm a nerd. I just as I was reading and
Speaker 1: I was like, this is how I would say it
Speaker 1: if I were saying the things you were saying. Also,
Speaker 1: you're right, So part of me gets all snoughty because
Speaker 1: you're correct and I was wrong. And I made this
Speaker 1: statement about gasoline powering the flight of the car, and
Speaker 1: you were right, and Chris was right and I was wrong.
Speaker 1: Gosh to think that I got something wrong about a
Speaker 1: movie about a about time travel that if you actually
Speaker 1: examine it for more than two seconds, completely falls apart.
Speaker 1: I feel really terrible about myself. All right, guys, Well,
Speaker 1: if you have any other emails that you wanna, you know,
Speaker 1: send us so that I can feel badly about myself.
Speaker 1: Um well, our email address is tech stuff at how
Speaker 1: stupp works dot com. Remember we have a live show
Speaker 1: every Tuesday one pm tex Stuff Live. You can find
Speaker 1: that at the blogs at how stupp works dot com.
Speaker 1: Just look on the right side you'll see the links there.
Speaker 1: Um lots of interesting stuff on the blogs. It's not
Speaker 1: just me and Chris. We have tons of writers here
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Speaker 1: including a brand new fans Stuff contributor, Chanel. She is awesome.
Speaker 1: You guys are gonna love herself. If you like genre
Speaker 1: type stuff like science fiction, fantasy, horror, those kind of things.
Speaker 1: I guarantee you she's got some interesting perspectives on that
Speaker 1: on that stuff, and she's a big fan. So check
Speaker 1: it out. We will talk to you again really soon
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