Xbox One Phil Harrison on Xbox One: Kinect Q&A

[KN1GHTMARE]

The fellas over at Eurogamer have one of the lengthiest interviews to date with Phil Harrison and they go to great depth about the Kinect.

Let's talk about Kinect. Xbox One would be significantly cheaper to buy if there was a version that didn't come with Kinect. And in the context of the announcement you made about Kinect not having to be plugged in to the console to work, that seems like a natural extension. Will you release Xbox One without Kinect in the future?

Phil Harrison: The platform of Xbox One is a combination of many things. It's a box with CPU, GPU, memory and a hard-drive. It's a game controller. It's a Kinect sensor. It's Xbox Live. And it's the cloud. All of which inter-operate and work together. You're absolutely right, you can utilize Xbox One with Kinect unplugged in those scenarios where you want to take Xbox One to a room where it's not convenient to have Kinect plugged in. We fully support that. But we believe the most exciting and valuable use cases of Xbox One are where Kinect is part of the experience.Walking into your room and saying, 'Xbox on,' and for it to hear your voice, switch on your machine, recognize it's you and present your entertainment choices to you, and to be able to then recognize other people in the room and present their entertainment choices to them, is a great value, which is made possible by Kinect. Being able to use your voice to do sophisticated conversational navigation of entertainment and search on the Xbox One is valuable. Being able to say, 'show me movies starring Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt', using your voice to have rich and deep interrogation of Bing search and the entertainment that's on either the Xbox Music or video store or other app stores that will be on Xbox One, that's powerful when you use your voice rather than having to type. Being able to have HD quality Skype calls with your friends from the living room - that's only possible when you have a Kinect connected to Xbox One. And that's before we start talking about any of the game scenarios.

Looks like they're staying firm on their stance of Kinect being a necessary part or not just Xbox One as a console, but also as an experience. To be honest I can't envision them not bundling the Kinect, for at least another three years. They have too much time, money and research poured into this project already. I actually appreciate Microsoft finally sticking to their vision after trying to please all the naysayers. I think, and have been saying, that Microsoft had a great original vision and its too bad they did a 180 on us. Hoepfully in time all will be back to that very vision!

But Kinect on Xbox 360 didn't work out as well as many had hoped. Why should we believe it will this time around?

Phil Harrison: We should be really proud of what Kinect has done for motion gaming on Xbox 360, but we also recognize there were limitations to that technology. There was not the level of fidelity in the signal we have on Xbox One. We now have incredible precision on Xbox One. We now measure in millimeters and nanoseconds. What this means is a vastly improved way of tracking your body movement in a much more subtle way. On Xbox 360 it was quite big movements, maybe waving your arms around in a big way. Now on Xbox One, much more subtle. Seated, as well as standing. Being able to enjoy a movement-based games but also continue to be sitting down is important. And also being able to augment gameplay with subtle gestures. So the primary input device might be your game controller, but you might be able to augment the experience by touching your eye to bring up a HUD. It's creating the notion of additional buttons or functions on the controller just by a subtle body movement. Being able to pass the controller around the room and then for the settings to pass to the correct player, because of Kinect skeletal tracking. Six players being able to be tracked simultaneously. We show this in Kinect Sports Rivals, being able to create a champion based on your body and face likeness, and create a virtual champion avatar of you and use it in the game. These are all examples that are only possible using Kinect. So I really like the fact that as a developer every Xbox One I target has this functionality, so I can create experiences and game design features that scale to 100 per cent of the audience rather than a subset of the audience.

I'm personally more excited about Kinect's non gameplay functions above all. Navigating TV and the dashboard using voice just looks amazing and functional, despite a few trickling reports of problems being encountered. I really like the facial recognition being used to sign-in and the idea of coming home, sitting on my couch in front of the TV and being logged in is awesome. Throw in the fact I can then tell the Xbox what I want to do next and I'm in a gamers utopia!

​

One of the issues with the original Kinect was you couldn't guarantee developers all Xbox 360 owners had it. Was that the motivation behind bundling it with every Xbox One?

Phil Harrison: Correct. It was because Kinect came somewhat later in the lifecycle of Xbox 360 that was inevitable. As a developer I want to be able to create game design features and invest development time and effort in the features that are going to hit 100 per cent of the audience. I think that's good.

I think Microsoft was very smart to make sure every user in their install base has a Kinect. Now developers have no reason to dismiss the device and can truly fund innovating ideas in their gameplay. Who knows maybe this will be the difference make since Sony is no longer bundling their camera. This could be the key advantage for the casual market Microsoft is hunting after. Make sure to check out the full article which is very long, but goes into all the details on stock, availability, digital future,indies, TV and lots more.

Source: Eurogamer

 

[BlackSolaris]

But that is exactly the reason why a lot of people don't like it. They are trying to shoehorn it to everyone! If it was really good, then people would get it themselves, this way just makes everyone else suspicious of the real quality of that thing.

 

[StingerNLG]

I think what the hardcore gamer crowd never realized in all this is that Microsoft as a company is not stupid; no matter how many Antonio Banderes GIF's they can put up on the internet.

You can take it to the bank that they focus tested this, and have taken the fact that despite all claims to the contrary the Kinect sold very well along with several games.

They see articles like this: http://123kinect.com/kinect-autism-father-boy/6144/ where the Kinect actually brings together a video game playing father with his autistic son.

Maybe they got feedback from developers and users alike that said bundling the Kinect would make them more likely to use it, and developers more likely to integrate it into their games.

As with anything, Microsoft isn't making these decisions in a vacuum. They are bundling Kinect because they have enough data to support that it will succeed that they are willing to push forward with it despite a $100 higher price tag than it's next closest competitor.

They are trying to shoehorn it to everyone!

No, they aren't. You don't have to buy an Xbox One. There are three other options out there right now. But if you do, it includes the Kinect sensor. And it's not shoehorned in if they designed the UI and the main pieces of the console around it.

 

[incredibleone]

But that is exactly the reason why a lot of people don't like it. They are trying to shoehorn it to everyone! If it was really good, then people would get it themselves, this way just makes everyone else suspicious of the real quality of that thing.

I agree with your sentiment. It should be optional and it should be packaged with the console. I understand their desire for developers to want to make games that incorporate the kinect technology but the solution is not to force every One gamer to buy the kinect. The solution is to make the kinect such an amazing, advanced piece of technology that everyone WANTS to buy it and use it in the games. That way Microsoft, third party developers and gamers alike would win.

 

[KN1GHTMARE]

I think the problem is that people fail to realize that they did not create kinect 2.0 as a peripheral, but as a core piece of the console. To them, they are not bundling in the camera, instead the camera is as essential as the controller itself. They envisioned it as one unit.

 

[vertigo1]

If the Kinect should have been optional, then so should the controller. Same reasoning points apply to both, and yet it doesn't seem unreasonable that a controller is included because of how necessary it is to the experience.

Kinect is necessary to the Xbox One experience and post launch it will no longer be a hot topic because people will understand what Microsoft has been saying all along.

 

[KN1GHTMARE]

If the Kinect should have been optional, then so should the controller. Same reasoning points apply to both, and yet it doesn't seem unreasonable that a controller is included because of how necessary it is to the experience.

Kinect is necessary to the Xbox One experience and post launch it will no longer be a hot topic because people will understand what Microsoft has been saying all along.

Exactly. Couldn't have said it better myself.

 

[jstep]

If the Kinect should have been optional, then so should the controller. Same reasoning points apply to both, and yet it doesn't seem unreasonable that a controller is included because of how necessary it is to the experience.

Kinect is necessary to the Xbox One experience and post launch it will no longer be a hot topic because people will understand what Microsoft has been saying all along.

Great thread~I think that Vertigo hit the nail on the head with it. And Stinger is right on the money in regards to Microsoft having done their research with making the XBOX1 a complete package with the Kinect. You can't please 100% of the people 100% of the time, but they obviously did their research and decided that there were more benefits and better payoffs by packaging it this way.

 

[StingerNLG]

I think the problem is that people fail to realize that they did not create kinect 2.0 as a peripheral, but as a core piece of the console. To them, they are not bundling in the camera, instead the camera is as essential as the controller itself. They envisioned it as one unit.

And if you notice, they don't even call it a "camera". They call it a "sensor".

 

[Landshark]

November 22nd can't get here soon enough.

 

[Gary Oldman]

I think the quality of games will decide whether the Kinect is a hit or not on the XB1. Sure, the voice recognition is a great feature and as StingerNLG mentioned, is a fantastic tool for disabled people to use the console. But if the games aren't good enough, then it will still be seen as a gimmick. As of right now, it's still too early to tell. This could still end up being a home run for Microsoft.

 

[Landshark]

I think the quality of games will decide whether the Kinect is a hit or not on the XB1. Sure, the voice recognition is a great feature and as StingerNLG mentioned, is a fantastic tool for disabled people to use the console. But if the games aren't good enough, then it will still be seen as a gimmick. As of right now, it's still too early to tell. This could still end up being a home run for Microsoft.

I honestly think people are putting too much emphasis on the value of Kinect and games alone.

I know for me, I've spent well over $100 in the past few years on devices that do IR blasting to multiple devices at once, universal controllers for all of my devices, and hi-def webcams for using Skype (I use skype video about 5 times a week, every week).

If someone came to you saying you could get a device for your TV that allows you to control it entirely with your voice, controls all other tv related devices in your livingroom, allows you to voice-search for anything, use hi-def video skype calls in your living-room and could enhance gaming for your game console, plus a lot more, while doing it all for only $100....what would you say?

I think the stigma that Kinect is attached to the "Microsoft" name is the problem, it's easy to hate on a device and a large company that's an industry leader, that much we've seen to be true. But the actual Kinect/device itself? It's truly next-gen technology for an incredibly low price-point. I can damn near guarantee that when we get our hands on the Xbox One and Kinect it'll set Microsoft's Console experience a world apart from the competition.

 

[Gary Oldman]

I honestly think people are putting too much emphasis on the value of Kinect and games alone.

I know for me, I've spent well over $100 in the past few years on devices that do IR blasting to multiple devices at once, universal controllers for all of my devices, and hi-def webcams for using Skype (I use skype video about 5 times a week, every week).

If someone came to you saying you could get a device for your TV that allows you to control it entirely with your voice, controls all other tv related devices in your livingroom, allows you to voice-search for anything, use hi-def video skype calls in your living-room and could enhance gaming for your game console, plus a lot more, while doing it all for only $100....what would you say?

I think the stigma that Kinect is attached to the "Microsoft" name is the problem, it's easy to hate on a device and a large company that's an industry leader, that much we've seen to be true. But the actual Kinect/device itself? It's truly next-gen technology for an incredibly low price-point. I can damn near guarantee that when we get our hands on the Xbox One and Kinect it'll set Microsoft's Console experience a world apart from the competition.

Nicely put. It all sounds amazing but will it work flawlessly once it is released? Time will tell. At the moment there's a lot of concern about kinect. Check out this thread posted yesterday :

 

[KN1GHTMARE]

I honestly think people are putting too much emphasis on the value of Kinect and games alone.

I know for me, I've spent well over $100 in the past few years on devices that do IR blasting to multiple devices at once, universal controllers for all of my devices, and hi-def webcams for using Skype (I use skype video about 5 times a week, every week).

If someone came to you saying you could get a device for your TV that allows you to control it entirely with your voice, controls all other tv related devices in your livingroom, allows you to voice-search for anything, use hi-def video skype calls in your living-room and could enhance gaming for your game console, plus a lot more, while doing it all for only $100....what would you say?

I think the stigma that Kinect is attached to the "Microsoft" name is the problem, it's easy to hate on a device and a large company that's an industry leader, that much we've seen to be true. But the actual Kinect/device itself? It's truly next-gen technology for an incredibly low price-point. I can damn near guarantee that when we get our hands on the Xbox One and Kinect it'll set Microsoft's Console experience a world apart from the competition.

Very nicely put. Microsoft needs you on their marketing team because this was the first description I've read that screams "must-have!"

 

[incredibleone]

I think the quality of games will decide whether the Kinect is a hit or not on the XB1. Sure, the voice recognition is a great feature and as StingerNLG mentioned, is a fantastic tool for disabled people to use the console. But if the games aren't good enough, then it will still be seen as a gimmick. As of right now, it's still too early to tell. This could still end up being a home run for Microsoft.

Agreed. It is either going to be a monstrous home run or a pathetic dribbler right back to the mound. The quality of the games is surely going to be the deciding factor as to whether it reaches the stands. I have a feeling that Microsoft will be "going yard" in the end on this one. They still have just enough time to straighten out the kinks. Let's hope they keep their nose to the grindstone.