I would have liked to see what happens if you don’t reach down. Do you not get the goggles? To put the goggles on, you have to make circles with your fingers and hold them up to your eyes, but does the program decide that you do or do not have goggles based on whether you ‘caught’ them, or is that just for show?

Interestingly, there’s an EyePet video going around where a kid draws the parts of a plane on a piece of paper and holds it up the camera, and the virtual pet takes it and turns it into a 3d model to fly around on.

It’s surprisingly close to Milo’s ‘draw me a fish’ thing. I don’t remember what Milo did with the fish drawing after he got it. If I draw an orange ball on the paper, would ‘he’ see that as an orange fish, or would he be able to say “This has no tail, it can’t be a fish.”

Still many questions. I’m encouraged by the fact that Natal has its own processor — some seem bothered by that, but to me it makes the whole demo more plausible. If there’s a duo-core level chip crunching data I’m more willing to believe there are fewer tricks and more “A-life” to the demo.

It has nothing to do with the motion control. Nintendo’s game libraries have shrunk with each generation, and each library has had a worse ratio of great games to mediocre ones. Microsoft, on the other hand, has attracted many quality games for the 360 and has many more on the way. Sony took a while to get going, but the PS3′s got a lot of quality stuff coming out as well. The Wii has some great games, but the other companies are attracting more quality design, for whatever reason.

The Milo demonstration was heavily scripted and controlled, but Molyneux has said that Milo wasn’t just made for E3. That’s a part of Lionhead’s full game project, and Molyneux demonstrated with Fable 2 that he’s learned to control expectations. Not all of that demo will show up as true gameplay, I’m sure, but Molyneux seems to believe that most of it is representative of his future game’s honest potential.

The two most important parts of Molyneux’s demonstration were when the player reaches down to catch what Milo throws (I have no doubt most people would reach down) and the passing of the paper from the player to the virtual character.

Project Natal is brilliant and has enormous potential. EA will be able to pump out a dozen fun mini-games, ala Wii Sports, in the first year. If they made an air hockey game, a fitness game, and a fighting game, people will buy 360s just for that. Yes, dueling with a lightsaber with nothing in your hand would feel weird, but no more so than having just the short Sony or Nintendo controller in your hand — and Natal could allow you to grab any stick-shaped object from your house, or include a styrofoam saber, to complete the experience.

Sony’s system also blows the Wii away. As I’ve said before, all they have to do is make one action-RPG using the sword and archery combat from their demo and I would go into debt to buy a PS3… as would hundreds, if not thousands, of other gamers. People who don’t normally game would buy a PS3 for that, and similar experiences. The fast-tracking and accuracy is great, and Sony has enough quality-focused developers in affiliation to produce many good motion control games.

November of next year at the earliest, perhaps summer of 2010, gaming will be taken to a whole new level.

And don’t forget the advent of modern 3-D technology being introduced to gaming with Avatar!

But stuff like the “Style” games and cheerleading games… his daughters love those.

Thallian, In theory Red Steel 2 could be the swordfighting game we’re waiting for, but after seeing it demoed on G4, I don’t think it is. I want a game where I really have to swing the sword, not make quick short motions, y’know?

1. Close fist.
2. Extend index finger, or index and middle fingers together, straight out.
3. Stick thumb up at right angle to extended index finger(s)
4. Lower thumb to index finger to fire (saying “bang” optional, supports dual wielding semi-automatic pistols, good luck with that Uzi)

Seriously, I think you’ve hit on the issue that the Wii has run into so far – the tech is nice but there needs to be an actual gameplay reason why it makes sense to use a motion interface instead of a traditional controller. Then again, this is far from the worst crime against gaming being committed at E3 this year. If you want to see adoption of gaming set back by a decade or two, look no further than:

“Dyan Williams, Senior Producer of “EA Girls,” takes the stage with four little ones. Announces: “Games that celebrate what’s great about being a girl.” Girls are about to play a game called “Speed Hair Teasing” — no joke! — a mini-game in “Pajama Party” for Wii.”
http://www.joystiq.com/2009/06/01/joystiq-live-from-electronic-arts-e3-2009-keynote/

That being said, I think that the idea of Natal is quite exciting, although I get a strong sense that it will have very little “gaming” applications. Obviously, a side-scroller or platformer might be able to bastardize the Natal, whereas an FPS might allow a greater possible use with the head tracking, or — gawd forbid — running in place in order to move (take that, Wii Fit!).

I see Natal more as a supplimentary control system/alternate reality option. Say you have a large screen TV mounted to your wall, and are having a party. You’ve got the Xbox acting as the jukebox (for some reason…I don’t know). Now, guests can approach the TV, and select songs “Minority Report” style, dragging them into the queue. Maybe when they walk past the Natal unit, the TV displays some kind of overlay; maybe an aura, or even a random avatar overlay.

That’s a pretty specific and probably not mainstream use, but it could be a viable application. I think that it might serve as more of a “Microsoft Surface” add-on for the Xbox then a game controller.