Treehouse Hands On (Off?) : Kinect

I was lucky enough, thanks to avid reader Puressence, to get a chance to take Kinect for a proper test drive in Microsoft’s central London lair, the Kinect galleries. At no doubt meteoric expense, they have hired out a labyrinthine exhibition space in Covent Garden as part of their UK tour, and filled it with screens and toys. The top level, the galleries themselves, comprise several looping video screens and installations, as well as a stage area where the bold and the small can try the games out for an extended period in full view of often baffled members of the public. Downstairs however, in the bowels of the building, lies the heart of the affair – 3 (only 3?) living room setups where you can finally try Kinect out properly. For the briefest of brief 30 minutes, I got hands on (we need new terminology, no hands required) with some of Kinect’s launch line up. Read on for the verdict.

Our guide asks us if we’re aware of Kinect? Yes we’re aware of Kinect sonny, stop wasting our precious 30 minutes and get the screen on! Kinect adventures is up first, and is a suitable title to get that precious first Kinect moment. As I stand in front of the screen, up pops my avatar, and the instinct to pull all kinds of shapes is natural and irresistible, so I do. To my squealing delight, the avatar mimics my moves perfectly, with no noticeable lag. Amaaazing. But, much as I just want to screw around with the avatar, there’s a game to play, and moments later, I’m flying off downstream in the raft adventure. Puressence leaps up to join in, and his avatar appears next to mine almost instantly, true drop-in drop out gameplay. Now we’re jostling down the river side by side, physically leaping to hit the jumps, timing between us to get double jump style airs, and swerving back and forth across the wild rapids. Motion sickness, palpable. But it’s hard to take in as I’m marvelling at how my avatar moves back and forth within the dinghy as I move towards and away from the camera, it hadn't occurred to me that 3d movement would allow this.

Next up, we’re no longer cooperating, time for a little mono a mono shape throwing, a la hole in the wall. As our avatars progress along an on-rails, well, rail, collectible tokens appear in groups ahead of us, and we must pull a shape to maximise our collection. Puressence proves more flexible, beating my score by a mere handful. This is war. And so onto bubble popping – this sees our avatars flying around a chamber like Charlie and grandpa on Fizzy lifting drinks. We flap our arms out here in the real world, and there onscreen, up float our little avatars. What follows is an orgy of looking extremely silly as we try to grab the most bubbles. I forget who won that one..ahem.

Next up, a sit down, I’m bleedin’ knackered! So we sit back to watch our lovely assistant, who lacking a suitable internet moniker, I shall dub “Nicky”, takes Kinectimals for a test drive. A fuzzy little tiger cub is selected and out it trots, to much cooing from all concerned. Voice control isn’t implemented yet, we’re told, and despite a rather self conscious trainer, we did witness the cat stand on one leg, get firmly stroked, play dead (most amusing) and lick the screen a bit (ew scrabbles!). A quick trot around the assault course looked rather dis-kinected as the cat charged through everything without attempting them, but our organiser assured us, much to our relief, that it was simply because Nicky was being rubbish.

So we kicked her off, and got Puressence back in charge, with a little Lady Gaga action on Dance Central. I tell you what, rather him than me, this looked shattering. I have my doubts that I’m going to be able to play this game, it looked very hard, although he did foolishly select “hard”. Now that’s ambitious. Anyway, the dancer’s limbs onscreen were almost permanently red, indicating that some degree of fail was occurring, and Puressence scraped a couple of stars, and narrowly missed a coronary. The report was in; fun! The game looked as slick and stylish as the videos suggest and is going to be a ton of fun in the privacy of your own home. Expect some very silly parties in the near future.

Next, a few minutes to squeeze in a quick “Sports”, the assistant selects 100m vs, much to Puressence’s horror, as I step up fresh from my rest and ready for action. Again, the moments between the games provide the most entertaining parts for me, as I limber up, my avatar does exactly the same onscreen, a small thing we will all get over pretty quickly I’m sure, but it’s hard to convey how odd it is to witness, and how cool it’s going to be. I mime adjusting my shorts, he’s up there doing it! Brilliant! But again, the moments passing and we’re here to race. Knees up is the key comes the word, so we’re off – knees up on the spot puffing to the finish, and I’m in by a nose, I cross the line my arms raised, whooping. It’s all happening out here, and in there. Round 2, another victory. I pull a few Hussein Bolt poses, but now our time is up.

Sooo, verdict? It’s fun. It’s a lot of fun. I was very much a Kinect Adventure’s cynic, but it was probably the highlight of the session, although I would have liked to have had a bowl, and I still get the feeling sports would have been a wiser choice for the hardware bundle. Oh well. The responsiveness of the avatar was amazing, as in, like really quite impressively good, but it’s telling that the real highlight was the in between moments – I remain largely indifferent to the line up – these games are for mum, gran and the brats and will be wheeled out at Christmas never to be seen again. The technology itself though seems, in our brief moments together, to be a genuine leap forward. To have it mimic you so accurately, so smoothly was a little unnerving, and this is just with a cartoony avatar, the concepts being dreamed up by talented game designers, I simply can't imagine (that’s why im not a game designer). For this reason alone I hope Kinect gets embraced by gamers – the internet h8torade continues to flow freely most places you look, but the technology represents such a potential shift away from the status quo I can’t help but be excited. Combining play with the existing controller(s) and any number of as yet unannounced peripherals and functions, the possibilities are mind boggling. So if not a day one buy, pretty soon after. My biggest fear for the system, is that if gamers don’t embrace it, and it becomes the new wii, Puressence will have to toil through mountains of awful and potentially life-threatening shovelware to keep up with his gamerscore whoring. I guess that’s inevitable, and pretty funny.

Also quite funny, some grainy footage of us looking ridiculous. This thing is win.

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I didn't realise I wanted to be a cowboy..

..until now. Why have I previously been so seduced by roaming devastated post apocalyptic dystopia with silly laser guns and radioactive mutants? Or rain slicked city streets, to get on trains and go to bars, in a grotesque mimicry of my tedious real life? Why the hell have I not been yearning a simpler existence? - the open fields, the picturesque creeks, the lonely mountains? The sound of blowing off an outlaws heads with a shotgun, hog-tying a bank robber and a-spitting to-baccer? No, I clearly haven't been paying attention as this, looks, awesome.

Red Dead Redemption just buzzed into my game-dar in a massive way. It had always been a little blip - "oh Rockstar are making a cowboy game" I mused, idly munching on a piece of toast while reading the paper "that will be cool" - but this multiplayer mode is tantamount to a cowboy MMO! You know what that means?! It means I can totally ambush douchebag x-bot posses with my superior l337 skills and infinite, badass patience. The potential is undeniable! A totally free roaming single player world, teeming with players and gangs of xbox parties? I will happily hunt pigs in the hills by some lonely mountain pass, in the mere hope that some bunch of lost douchebags will come by to be picked off with a sniper rifle and the carefully laid explosive I rigged on the bridge. "Oh no" they will shriek into their little headsets, "its Munial, the posse hunter, an he dun shot ma horse!".

Ok so I'm sure there's fun to be had actually forming a posse, but that's just not where the romance is for me. Real cowboys (bearing in mind - I'm English, we don't have cowboys, we have show jumpers, so my concept is limited) are lonely figures; dark tormented souls who find solace for the crimes they done, only in the arms of the forgiving gal he just paid for or at the bottom of a bottle o' redeye. The only good posse was the Young Guns posse and look what happened to them. Well, Billy was ok, but only 'cos he was a loner really.. No, a gang may be the best bet for survival but to really live, a cowboy's got to go his own way. Or at most, find his-self a Sundance Kid. Yeah, actually , that's the cheese. The way I figure it, that's some mighty fine ambushin country up ahead. If I stay here, and you get up on top o' that ridge, we'll see them sumbitch's coming before they even done had their biscuits.

This is going to be so much fun. Ya'll take care now..


Yeah single player looks pretty amazing too...



Epic..



Treehouse Do-want rating: 6/5

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Review: Perfect Dark

The year 2000 was a splendid time for a happy go-lucky Nintendo fan. For that summer, they were blessed with the long awaited spiritual successor to the legendary Goldeneye, indubitably the finest console FPS of all time. What they got didn’t disappoint; a deep single player campaign with bond-esque objectives and gadgetry as well as a multiplayer mode that once again pushed the envelope and rekindled the sweaty 4-way fisticuffs typical of a marathon Goldeneye session. To revisit it now on its native N64 is an exercise in disappointment. Sure the look, feel and sounds are all present and correct, but the framerate and murky textures are not what you recall. No, back then all was laser sharp, tangy neon and inky blacks and you certainly didn’t have any framerate issues when you set off 20 remote mines at once. So the rebirth of Perfect Dark onto Xbox Live has been even longer awaited by those who know, promising as it did, the genuine article with HD graphics and, well, that’ll do actually. And now it’s finally here, available at a surprisingly restrained 800 points, has it survived the transition from our sepia toned memories..?

argh, she got me..

Short answer, yes. Its back, it’s looking better than ever and it hasn’t been mucked about with. Forget the ropey sequel spawned of a wholly different era and ethos, and look back to this lovingly crafted original which in many ways remains surprisingly advanced and more forward thinking than most fps' churned out these days. Here, mission structures are difficulty level dependent; meaning the difficulty you select from the menu directly affects the tasks and mission content you’ll see in the mission. (why isn't that a more common concept?) The fully worthwhile cooperative mode returns, now playable over Xbox live, as well as the way-ahead of it's time Matrix style "player 2 plays all the bad guys" mode, again reminding us just how much of a progressive title this was. The familiar blocky headed scanned faces of the old Rare team adorning the henchmen and characters have sadly been replaced by more contemporary fizzogs, and the textures updated, but the overal look remains firmly intact, and the synthy soundtrack and terrible voice acting is better than ever.

I- I haven't seen you before..?

The story is pure sci fi hokum- you are agent Dark, the sassy Victoria Beckham-alike protégé of the mysterious Carrington, a fat beardy Scottish bloke with piles of cash and a secret militarised organisation. Set in the not-too distant future of flying cars and blade-runner style city scapes (as much as that was possible in 2000, this is no Mass Effect 2), your mission is to uncover the conspiracy of a shady industrial organisation that may or may not (may) have something to do with aliens, the US president, and the intervention in an intergalactic war between 2 alien races (maybe). What you bring to the table are an assortment of smashing weapons and gadgets that were an improvement on Goldeneye’s Herculean inventory. Pistols, rifles, laser beams, bombs, mines, launchers, knives, crossbows, heat-scoped rail guns (oh yes) they’re all here, and each one featuring a secondary fire mode that often changes their dynamics in unexpected ways. The legendary laptop gun for example transforms your rifle into a deadly turret, gunning down enemies for you on sight, while you flick through the latest copy of FHM, (ok you’re Victoria Beckham, Cosmo then). And yes you can have it in multiplayer.

..my gun!

The levels are sprawling, meandering mazes, difficult to navigate in comparison to today’s subtly signposted worlds. The opening mission sees us join Agent Dark on top of the Datadyne building which we must infiltrate to retrieve a defecting doctor in distress. For part one of the mission, you descend down through the tower taking out security as you go. Part 2 is the infiltration of the secret basement laboratory, while the final section has you working your way back up the tower. This clever approach to the use of space, revisited a couple of times in later levels, never feels like recycling so different is the challenge for the remix sections. They can feel aimless at times however, and it is only due to the careful training veterans had back in 2000 that we can easily find our way – a newbie gamer today might be tempted to cry in frustration on learning the mission has failed because they didn’t plant that bug on a random console back at the start of the map. We've all been there agent.

But.. I cant throw a bug that high..

Where it was neither progressive nor very successful was in it’s enemy AI. These goons are fresh from an Austin Powers super villain lair; spot you and they’ll either start shooting in 4 second bursts (unless you get one of the buggers that just walks at you firing continually) and then they may leap to the side in a bid to dodge where you’re most likely firing. Half the time their gun may jam, much to their astonishment, before uttering a brilliant soundbyte as you finally off them. No there are no flanking tactics here, no retreat and regrouping – they will run at you until they get shot. What they lack in nouse, they make up for in deadliness, certainly on the fiendishly difficult Perfect Dark agent level, where if they sneak in a hit you will find half your health gone.

Any questions? No, good!

For all the leaps and bounds in the FPS genre over the last ten years, you’d be forgiven for assuming Perfect Dark is a pointless addition to your heaving collection, but you’d be sorely mistaken. The little touches remain as brilliant today as they were then. The way Joanna tilts her pistols sideways, gansta style if you get close enough to a bad-guy. The way you can disarm and knock- out every henchman if you so choose, some of them throwing down their guns pleading for you not to kill them. The ever entertaining shooting gallery, the spy-cam, and the spectacular return to what you thought was just a pretty hub world. No, Perfect Dark remains a quite brilliant and relevant shooter; never less than fun and full of invention, and with quibbles only worthy of mention because the overall standard remains so high, this is an essential purchase.

Treehouse Rating: 4/5

Ah, our star agent..

Perfect Dark is available on Xbox Live for 800 of your Earth points

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A new era for consumers loom

Is it a bird? Is it a plane? Nope, it's not Superman either. It's cloud based gaming and cloud based movies, music and any other type of entertainment you might want. This is fascinating stuff (even if I do say so myself!) and her is my brief view on some of the dramatic technological changes coming our way in 2010.

Look out for an announcement on June 17th as a new service that allows consumers (gamers) to play any game, at any time and without a console is officially launched. As consumers, we’re getting used to video/music/film on demand but gaming has not, so far, really taken hold in the same way. But I like my shiny black PS3 under my shiny black TV. Munial likes his Xbox360. But imagine a world where such hardware is not required. Imagine a world where all you need is a small adapter that plugs into your HD TV and your broadband connection and you have access to hundreds of games. No need to download them. They are just there. They exist in the mysterious ‘cloud’. All we mere mortals have to do is pay a monthly subscription fee and in of we go and play whenever we want (on our TV, PC or Mac). The service called OnLive and brainchild of Steve Perlman (WebTV, QuickTime) promises that it “will change the way that entertainment applications are created, delivered and consumed.” If it takes off and has mass market appeal, I do believe it could just be the single most important development for gamers worldwide. It would, quite literally, change the entire gaming landscape.

If this happens, what would Nintendo, Sony, Microsoft and for that matter, Apple do in a world where their hardware becomes obsolete? Would they try and compete with their own digital offering? What would stores that rely on the sale of tangible gaming DVD’s and Blurays do? Would they try and compete? I would argue that they could be surplus to requirements. Ancient business models in a world where technology is developing at a frightening pace. Don’t believe that such changes can happen so quickly? You only need to take one look at Kodak to see that you ignore a changing technological future at your own peril. In 1988 Kodak employed 145,300 people and made a profit of $1.17bn on $13.3bn in revenue. By late 2009, the payroll nose-dived to 19,900 with a quarterly loss of $111m. And why? It’s because Kodak failed to see the impact that the digital camera would have on its business. What’s worse is that Kodak invented the digital camera! But Kodak has fought back hard and expects strong demand in Asia to lift its digital revenues to about $7bn a year from about $5.5bn within three years. It’s been a painful transformation though for them but they had to learn the hard way. Another example is EMI. Whether companies can learn to change and adapt given they have strategies laid out for 5-10 years can make all the difference.

There is also an interesting development by the Digital Entertainment Content Ecosystem (DECE), a coalition with support from every industry involved in digital entertainment. It’s claimed that this new system will provide a revolutionary new way to enjoy movies, TV shows and other entertainment. The consortium, which consists of companies such as Alcatel-Lucent, Best Buy Co Inc, Cisco Systems Inc, Comcast, News Corp's Fox Entertainment Group, Hewlett-Packard Co, Intel, Lions Gate Entertainment Corp, Microsoft Corp, General Electric Co's NBC Universal, Viacom Inc's Paramount Pictures, Philips, Sony Corp, Sony Pictures, Toshiba, VeriSign, and Time Warner Inc's Warner Bros Entertainment are working on a "uniform digital media experience". The group wants "interoperability of devices and websites" and fair usage rights that will allow consumers to copy content for household playback devices as well as burn their purchased content to physical media for playback or storage. Each consumer would also be given a "rights locker", a virtual library where all video purchases would be stored and available for download again if ever lost. DECE will also have a logo that can be places on products and websites that will inform consumers on whether that site or product is compatible with DECE standards.

Both Sony and Microsoft have already started making strides towards a more coherent digital downloads market but as the competition heats up for this 'cloud' and all its content, I think it will be hampered by fragmentation, different technical standards and different DRM solutions. But, competition is good. There is likely to be consolidation in the industry with a company, perhaps like Amazon or Apple providing new leadership in this so digital of ages.

Let'sbe honest, I’m not a fortune teller. But even if OnLive or the DECE project don’t work commercially, important strides are being made to change the way we consume content forever. Whether we like it or not. Personally, I like it. My life is becoming more and more like Star Trek all the time.

Beam me up (to the cloud) Scotty ...

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Mini Review: Chime

I’m not sure what it is that makes Xbox Live and music games such a good fit, but there it is, here comes another one. Brighton based Zoe Mode’s “Chime” popped up a couple of weeks or so back, and like Rez before it, is a unique, if less dramatic foray into interactive music games. It is a gorgeously simple and satisfying game, that is a lot easier to play than it is to explain. The player is presented with a silent grid into which you place blocks of various size and shape, in a Tetris stylee. All the while a “beat line” sweeps across the grid, which upon reaching your recently placed blocks , creates a sound. Fitting blocks together into rectangles creates “quads” which claims part of the grid for you as "coverage" – the aim of the game being to get 100% coverage of the board. These quads create musical phrases when the beatline hits them, and their complexity and point value is determined by how big you’ve managed to build your quad before it “expires”. As you play you gradually build the music track up and push it along through it's sections and verses. There's a bit more to it than that, but you can learn more at the game’s excellent website, or watch the trailer after the break.

All sounds a bit dry, but this is a bona fide little gem. The success or failure of such a game is always going to hinge on the music and how well its implemented, and here Chime is resplendent. While only 5 tracks are on hand, each is an auditory joy and provided by artists of real clout; we’ve got Lemon Jelly, a guy from Orbital , Mark Schulz (dunno him, but it’s a nice track, if the weakest) and er, Moby with a toe tapping working of electro pop “ooh yeah”. Crown jewel for me though is Brazil from Philip Glass – an epic orchestral reworking that’s all dramatic strings and woodwind, and wouldn't have sounded out of place on the Punch Drunk Love soundtrack. The interaction with the music throughout Chime is exceptional; you have real influence as you claim more and more of the game grid, starting gradually with plonky bloops and bleeps, gradually building the song up to tumultuous crescendos, all of which are seamlessly integrated into the gameplay, the rendition will vary each time you play it.

It’s no picnic either, it’s deceptively difficult to clear the board within the time limit, although with practice you can do this several times within a round. I found it initially difficult to shrug off my tetris mentality of fitting the shapes together, it’s not necessarily the best way to get the coverage you crave - those pesky quads won't go round corners, and it's easy to misplace a piece ruining your multiplier. The experience as a whole though is deeply relaxing, the music builds and builds, flutey trills and phrases bubble up as you put the quads together with hypnotic little visual flourishes, and before you know it the timer is running out and you’re cursing because you hadn’t noticed and you’ve only covered 98% of the board.

Even more remarkably for what is a fully formed, highly polished game, this is going on Xbox Live for a mere 400 MS points, or a little under £3.50 – an absolute steal which probably undervalues it – I’ve paid a lot more for a lot worse. Furthermore a portion of that goes to children’s charities via One Big Game Could this be the perfect game? Go buy it.

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Too many DJ's: DJ Hero hands-on impressions

I finally managed to beat off the chavs to get close to the demo unit for DJ Hero that appeared last week in my local Game. I've been itching to have a look at the turntable close up, despite not actually being terribly excited for it based on what I'd seen, not to mention band games and the like are usually, with their peripheral proclivity, prohibitively pricey. But based on a mere ten minutes of scratch n' sniff, I might just have to make an exception.

The deck itself is pleasingly sturdy, the disc on the right (or left, southpaws), freely spinning unfettered as it should, and the "mixing desk" to the left (see above, reverse it) all present and correct with its cross fader, effect knobs and standard controller buttons tidily concealed under a flap. I thought I best start with the tutorial being offered, as the videos I'd seen hadn't permeated my imagination enough to actually gather what was happening in them. But it turns out it's dead simple, so I skipped it. Also Grandmaster Flash was embarrassingly drawing attention to my newbness really loudly in a crowded store.

DJ's of course, (and not mind, the ones you encounter at weddings who press play to Now that's what I call music 18), mix (or mash, to use the correct parlance) two, often entirely disparate tunes (choons), to make a new and usually improved mash up (song). The same happens here. Track one is the line on the left, track 2 is the line on the right. The one down the middle, as far as I could gather, is used to insert annoying sound effects and cause you to lose your streak. As with Guitar Hero, the iconic buttons zoom towards you on the mesmerically curving track, and you hit the corresponding real world button located conveniently on the deck under your fingers at the appropriate moment to keep that track in the mix. You may see the line jump from left to right and back again. This indicates where a cross fade is required, causing the favouring of one track over the other. Finally, there is what's called the scratchy scratchy move, where a button is depressed and you use the turntable to scratch a funky "eeriyt" into the groove. Simples.

Like Guitar Hero, this promises to be fiendishly addictive and hair tearingly difficult. That said, I blazed through the three demo tracks on normal without problem. There's obviously a lot more to it I don't appreciate yet - there was no specific direction required to get the scratch right, and I barely touched the effects knob. Coordinating all the button presses and crossfades required to keep up with the track, and then dropping in a tasty scratch, is just as rewarding as nailing a guitar solo, and indeed, a tiny crowd of gobby teenagers had quickly gathered to marvel at my mad skills (skillz). My only concern was the crossfaders tendency to leap unbidden out of its central groove, causing one of the tracks to fizz out like a fluff covered needle. No doubt with practice, a non existent problem, clearly one's hand should instinctively hover between the tracks like a Buddhist passing through life.

So I think I need to start saving for this one, because the deck remains fairly pricey for a game. And although it does lack the pick-up-ability of a dinky plastic guitar, based on this tiny slice of gameplay joy and with the knowledge that Activision have secured a genuinely impressive playlist, I have no doubt this will, once it gathers some momentum, be a huge hit. I certainly know what we'll be doing in the Treehouse this Christmas.

Hit the jump for some lovely official videos of a taste of the wonders that await you, and try, unlike I did, to use an iota of imagination of yourself causing these crunchy grooves..

Yes, yes! Sold.




This will never work, right?





Bowie wins. But you probably won't on expert..

More than the sum of its parts..

Check out the Dj Hero Youtube channel for more.

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E3 Update: Modern Warfare 2

Did someone mention Modern Warfare 2? Oh right it was me. We've seen the trailers, but now feast your eyes on the glorious gameplay footage, fresh from the stage at E3. Looks like they've stuck to the winning formula and delivered the trademark, and presumably patented "awesomeness" that was the mantra of COD4. The vid demonstrates some nicely paced tension/action, all played out in the glorious Ice fields of Hoth, and a Return of the Jedi speeder chase thrown in for good measure. Although that could be For your eyes only too.

Also nice to see the return of the SAS, those cheeky cockney muppets, although hardly surprising, being as they are the finest military outfit in the world. It would seem you, the silly-named "Roach" are now under the tutelage of er, yourself, being Captain "Soap" Mactavish as played by you in the first game, when you also had a silly name. How Zen. Between the pair of them, there's some serious havoc on display here, and this is just a taster. Must keep an eye out for the multiplayer beta. Roll on November.

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E3 Update: Project Natal

Sadly, Treehouse budgets preclude us from jetting to E3 to cover press conferences in person, so we have to make do with live video feeds and reading smart alecy girls' typed updates. Microsoft were first up this year, and have dropped a couple of bombshells. In amid the Beatles, more Halo, game play footage of Modern Warfare 2 and Metal Gear Solid coming to Xbox, was a fairly extraordinary piece on the motion capture camera everyone's been poo pooing. This was clearly the crown jewels in the display, as Steven Spielberg and Peter Molyneux were wheeled out to wax lyrical about it, and some bloke named Kudo (Tsunoda- lead designer) who couldnt resist taking a few pops at Nintendo's lame waggle approach to inclusivity.

Project Natal (working title, for 'tis but a prototype) consists of what must be a fairly spiffy camera, capable of facial recognition, body motion capture, voice recognition, object recognition - blah blah blah, big whoop, whats new? - the presentation kicked off with a Nintendo style video of people playing various games, martial arts, racing, quiz games, all by just moving their bodies. Right, bit suspicious, although the motion capture looks impressive. Still cant be real. Oh look, they're navigating menus Minority Report style, and chatting on the video screen. Also, voice controlling movies - now that is handy, but hardly revolutionary.

Next up, after a potentially diastrous start in which Kudo's avatar spazzed around like a double jointed gymnast (lotta lights onstage huh Kudo?), an onstage demonstration of some tech demos; a block smashing game where a girl bounces around kicking punching and heading balls down a corridor. Hmm interesting; plausibility, rising.. Next a painting game where the guy paints a landscape with elephant. Not too interesting in itself (but clearly fun) but it's here I noticed how closely the movements were being replicated; as the guy just stood talking to the audience, the avatar onscreen mimicked precisely. Full body motion capture, with real subtlety of movement. Ooh.

Next up, Molyneux, and the part of the demo that puts this in the almost creepy folder. Lionhead have had Natal for a couple of months, and have come up with an AI boy, Milo, that the player can interact with. Using the facial and voice recognition, the creepy kid looks at the demonstrator's face, reacts with emotion to what she says while having a seemingly proper conversation, "throws" objects to her, is passed a drawing. Er, really, its a bit creepy. She then plays with the water in the river Milo lives by, her reflection shimmerring realistically in the surface as she sloshes the water about. That sir, is pretty freaking amazing.

Whether or not this will turn out to be what it appears to be, we'll know in the next few days as fortunate journos with their deep deep pockets get to try it out, and lord knows, we can't trust Peter "ZOMG" Molyneux. If it turns out to not be a fancy pants eye toy, and does do what it suggests though, well, I'm not one for hyperbole, but it could literally change the entire world forever. Or just be a ton of fun. One of those.

Image courtesy of (pinched from) Kotaku

Check after the break for some early videos.

The cheesy "product vision". Hmmm, really?




And Milo. Imagine Fallout 3 with NPCs with this tech.

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Let the battle commence

Earlier this month Sony announced a new and totally free on-demand music video-streaming service for the PS3 called ‘Vidzone’. It offers users unlimited streaming of music videos from a library of content to watch from their PS3 or have streamed to their PSP via remote play. Personally speaking, in addition to the service being free, its main selling point over YouTube (also available via the PS3) is the higher quality of its videos and sound. I’m a great fan of YouTube but, I must admit, the quality of the video and sound can leave a lot to be desired – even the alleged ‘HD’ videos. Sony state that Vidzone is "backed by several Major record labels as well as thousands of Independent labels" which is great news. Coupled with PlayTV where you can watch, pause and record free-to-air digital television, Vidzone further expands the wonderful entertainment possibilities of PS3. I’m already beginning to buy more Blu-rays and the list of games being released this year alone is making my wallet quiver in fear.

Not to be outdone, Microsoft has just announced a deal with SKY that will see live football, TV and film content brought to the Xbox 360 for a fee. Sky's channels will be available on the Xbox 360 later this year but they won’t free and as yet no specific content or pricing details have been announced.

Both the PS3 and Xbox 360 deals are good for the consumer in providing us with greater choice. The battle for our eyes, ears and money is being fought in the living room. What will we watch? How will we watch it? These are debates likely to endure for sometime but, regardless of whether you prefer a PS3 or Xbox there is no denying that these are exciting times for us.

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