They might get cheaper over time but they aren't going to expand in capability unless someone actively pushes for that expanded capability. The engineering challenges of making something that is both sensitive and works over a very long range are completely different from making something that is just sensitive. Its like expecting advances in artillery to apply to hand guns generally it just isn't going to happen.

Actually I think at least at this point the movie industry could care less about size or cost. They are probably more worried about accuracy over pretty much anything at all. That's not to say they wouldn't love something smaller if someone came up with it. I just don't see them actively concerned about smaller as much as more accurate at any cost. Also durability isn't really an issue when all the fragile parts of the system are completely external to the movement. And I would also point out that this is a back track from this statement:

Which is obviously an oversimplification of the engineering at work.

Not really because that isn't real time motion capture. That and it takes a hell of a lot more computing power than you can fit into a console to make it work. Sure it'll get better over time but their is no guarantee it will develop in a useful way for gaming. Its better not to close off an avenue of research until its clear it isn't going anywhere.

I would also point out that with the Motion Plus the Wii controller is pretty much 1:1 but only in slower motions. Like when I play Archery or when I'm guarding with the sword in the sword fighting game. The guard follows every movement I make with a few liberties taken to keep me from sticking the sword where it couldn't actually go. The strikes are significantly less 1:1 but that seems to be a matter of what the software and process can handle more than what the controller can do. If I had to guess the shear volume of information that would be produced with a sample rate that would allow faster 1:1 control would currently overwhelm the system. The problem seems to be less in the controller and more in the processor. Of course it could be that there simply isn't enough bandwidth in the channel between the controller and the console even though the processor could handle the crazy amount of data. The point is the Wii does 1:1 motion in the slower regions which means the hardware can do it there is just a problem somewhere else preventing it from doing 1:1 any faster. That problem is probably no inherent in the actual motion sensing controller.

The point is that we have to go through the crappy to get to the good that is the only way this can work. Even if the technology was perfect the controllers would still suck if the programmers had to program motion control from scratch or nearly scratch.

The key difference here is that chess doesn't involve physical activity. While the computer might not be an Olympic level fencer if you want to play for any length of time you are going to have to have some pretty hefty endurance. That or you are going to have to get pretty darn efficient and skillful. Even then any sort of marathon session is going to need some decent endurance. Not necessarily a bad thing in a video game but you know there are people that would raise holy hell about it even if the had no intention of ever buying the fencing game.

I didn't say we didn't need both. I said we needed one a bit more then we needed the other and ignoring either one for the other is stupid.

Logical fallacy much. I never said anything about anyone dieing because inverter technology lagged. Obviously that hasn't stopped solar installations of various sizes. The only thing it has done is make them more expensive and generally less useful then they could be. This outcome is a pretty close parallel to what might happen if everyone just gave up on motion control for games until the technology caught up. Technology mind you that no one is really working on in the exact form that is needed for playing a game.

There is specifically something that can be done about this. You have to give up a little bit of the 1:1 control scheme to make room for a way to smoothly resynchronize the controller with the action. Oh and this just reminded me of something else. I do believe games are still programmed so that each character has a predetermined set of motions usually generated through initial motion capture. These are the only ways anything in the game can move which is probably why the Mii characters for the Wii have nor arms or legs. Anyway its currently impossible to judge accurately just how well motion control can match 1:1 because we are still stuck with characters with preset motions. Although I think they are moving away from this lately. Like Spore for example there is no real way to map out the movements every possible creation would make so they had to develop a way of making them move right based on how they were designed. Though I'm still not sure if they just pulled from a pool of generic possible movements and just tweaked it to work for each one or not.

Don't see how. I listed a bunch of technologies that will improve regardless of whether we use them for gaming. I still said those technologies would improve regardless of gaming.

You were focused on the difficulty of improving gyroscopes due to their standard uses, so I pointed out there's a slew of other technologies available to be used.



I doubt we're going to agree here, mostly because you seem to think that making games work with motion control is totally worth going through decades of shitty ass gaming, and I'm of the opinion that if it takes decades worth of shitty ass gaming... well, fuck it. It's not worth it.

I'm too old for this shit, and I'd like to be able to partake of the hobby I like in a way that is enjoyable before I'm 50. Ergo, I hope the current shitty attempts crash and burn so they move away from it.

For the record, I'm totally ok with Nintendo, OR Sony, OR Microsoft doing it. One shitty console that's only got a few good non-casual games--and even those suffer from control issues--I'm ok with. All three?

Not so much.

If you're talking about Wii Fencing--Understatement much? It's totally spaz and flail spaz and flail.
I'm not sure if I would draw the same conclusions here. After all the original Wii controller seemed to give pretty accurate control on some of the games, too. It was only when you moved too fast that the controller would really fuck up and miss what you're doing.

But if this is true--then I'm ok with Nintendo fixing the software and making decent games for it.





Yeah. People sure do bitch about DDR.

Point was that solar tech is kind of important, and yes, people COULD die in future generations if we don't develop it--same as any other 'alternative energy source'.

It's an entirely different level of importance from video games.

The entire point is that if they do it now it won't be 50 years of shitty ass gaming. We'll get one maybe two generations of relative crap before significant improvements. With the current rate of technological development its not going to take that long as long as someone is actively working on the problem. A big part of that is trying and failing and using that as inspiration. It speeds up the whole process.

Do you mean move away from motion control or move away from motion control that doesn't work because those are totally different somewhat incompatible arguments. Moving away from motion control entirely is just stupid. Moving away from what doesn't work is a better idea but more tricky because first they have to know what doesn't work and that's gonna take at least one try and its probably not the actual hardware for motion detecting that's the problem.

More people working on the problem from different angles means more wrong paths get eliminated faster. You can't say I want decent motion control yesterday and at the same time say I only want one person working on the project. You might as well try to swim in a straight jacket.

I think significantly was about the perfect degree of not being overly critical and dramatic about something that isn't that big of a deal. Also, if we're talking about the fencing in Wii Sport Resort there are two roughly equally decent strategies. One is the failing and the other is to actually aim around the person's guards while keeping your guards in the right area. It works but takes some practice and someone that fails can still get in a lucky strike here and there and overwhelm you.

Like I said it may be in the software or the hardware outside of the controller. Its hard to really tell without like being on the development team or taking the whole thing apart. The motion plus certainly can read position and rotation at basically 1:1 as long as you aren't moving rapidly.

There is a significant difference between one game you can avoid and 90% of games using motion control.

Not even remotely true. Solar Tech is at the point now where it is completely viable for our energy needs. Weather or not it gets used is completely up to political will. Any future refinement in solar tech is just icing on the cake. If it happens then it'll be cheaper and easier to implement but there aren't going to be any significant impacts. Above and beyond that the importance of the technology has absolutely no impact at all on the allegorical point being made. That is to say the importance of the technology does not change the lesson that we can draw from it. That is to say just because solar tech is more important doesn't mean we can't take from our experiences with it the lesson that technology improves most quickly when you don't ignore part of it and wait for someone else to improve it. Denying that is like saying you can't learn about the importance of social teamwork in any cooperative setting by white water rafting.

Why?





I don't care if the problem gets eliminated faster. I care about being able to enjoy video games in the 5-10-15-whatever years in the interim




I'd rather not have 90% of games use motion control at all ever regardless of how good they make it.



Not arguing that.

Arguing that:

A) I don't care how quickly it improves. I don't care if they never get it working right in my lifetime.

B) What I do care about is being able to enjoy my hobby in the interim.

C) It's not important enough that it taking longer to improve will significantly impact standard of living/life expectancy/anything actually important at all.

Conclusion: Fewer people working on it/waiting for someone else to improve it is the preferable route.

Great, so how many games are going to be similar to Super Mario Galaxy and push the envelope?

Now, How many are going to be just like Wii Sports on crack? Pareto Principle tells us the developers in the interim aren't going to be able to put out quality in the next 5-10 years while they work on the kinks.

Because motion control is always a great thing. I doubt that the technology has necessarily moved far from the Activator. Nintendo has the market share and Sony and Microsoft are trying to catch up in an already crowded market. A market that really doesn't need expansion when all we're trying to do is enjoy games via keyboard or controller.

But you also open more avenues of failure. So long as they're learning, great. But my viewpoint is why bother when all I'm trying to do is pass the time with Pokemon, God of War III or TF2?

Because the technology and its applications have not been fully explored. Its stupid to give up on any technology until its at least matured to the point where innovation seems almost impossible. You just don't give up on a technology until you've pushed it as far is it will go or you hit a dead end. That or the applications of the technology become unethical or dangerous. None of these have happened with motion control and as such giving it up is stupid. For all we know Minority Report style computer interfaces are less than a decade away.

Which should have been clearer from the beginning. Really was that so hard to just say at the end of a post somewhere. Of course it doesn't negate the errors in the other arguments you put forward either.

That's kind of a stupid position to take before you even know what that motion control will look like but you are entitled to it.

That's great but not actually in anyway a counter to the argument I put forward. Further, any conclusion is this case is at best opinion on either side.

Just because people not involved in the development of a technology might misuse or abuse the technology is not an excuse to forgo the technology. Except if the misuse or abuse is actively harmful. Also, in technological development you have to go through the whole alphabet to get from A to Z. There are no shortcuts and not doing it now means it has to be done later.

Maybe you are but I think market forces are speaking pretty strongly in favor of motion control. You can hate it all you want but you can't expect it to change. You either accept it and enjoy what you can or you become a bitter shell of a person that can't seem to enjoy anything. Really the fact that there is so much crap out there has no real effect on you that you don't allow it to have. No one is forcing you to buy anything you don't like. Not making the crap isn't a guarantee that something great would be made. It would just not be made or other crap would be made in its place.

Because obviously the companies have not completely abandoned non-motion control. They probably won't completely in the near future. Further as much as you might like to think so it isn't about any individual's preference. Its about market forces and market forces are always king. If something sells well that is the direction technology will go. For good or ill its how capitalism works and we don't really have an alternative. So far its done a pretty good job technology wise.

Sith, you're mixing my words here. The Pareto principle is being used to say that most of the things on the motion controllers is going to suck. 20% of the games are going to innovate in some way shape or form.

If anything, VR is going to take off and leave motion controls in the dust. With the lifelike graphics and cheaper computers, it's more likely that some other market force becomes introduced, making motion controlling obsolete.

*looks at my own post*
Where the hell did I say I'm upset at new technology? Matter of fact, where did I say I hate Natal or the Arc? The Activator was an expensive add-on from Sega along with everything else that they tacked on to nickel and dime customers into enjoying a game system. Did I have fun with Mortal Kombat without the thing? Yes. Was it decent fun playing the same game and trying to do a high kick that the thing couldn't register? No. The main thing that link was for is to show what happens when they fail and what they can learn from.

I'll be surprised if out the door, the new remotes can truly cater to the Wiifans.

I believe you have that confused somewhat. You can have a superior product in any market but if you don't have the right signals or read the market wrong, you still suffer from the same failures. Everything could be lined up and raring to go, only for the market to suddenly change, leaving you out in the cold.

Then what was your argument. Because when I hear someone say that only 20& of games are going to be good what I hear is 80% of games are going to be bad. Why bring up the point at all except as a counter point. Also the way the last sentence I quoted was worded really made it sound like you meant everything was going to be crap. All in all your argument wasn't very clear.

Not a foregone conclusion by a long shot. Further our first tastes of VR is just as likely to be better goggles and motion control gloves as it is plugging into the matrix. Just like we shouldn't be limiting ourselves to one avenue for motion control we shouldn't be limiting ourselves to one avenue for VR. For example, I give you the Keck Cave. It uses goggles, capture of head motion, a position sensitive wand, and position sensitive gloves all to extremely great effect. I also give you the Virtusphere. I say that some unholy combination of the two would be pretty damn awesome.

Well you jumped into an argument of fore and against with arguments similar to the against side. If you didn't want to be in the against camp you should have been clearer about your neutrality on the issue. Granted I could myself have reigned in the conclusions but doing that just bit me in the rear in regards to not inferring the right motivation behind Krylo's posts. Seems I'm damned if I do and damned if I don't.

And how does that change anything about market forces are king. Market forces still rule regardless of your ability, or ineptitude, at reading/predicting them. If there wasn't signs the majority of the market wanted motion controls then there wouldn't be a push for it. If the market shifts and backfires then so be it. I'm fairly certain before making any major move they will put market analysts on the case and if they screw up then the market was just in a state that couldn't be predicted. In which case cautiously going with what the trend currently is now is really the safest bet. You risk too much by going all in or waiting for it to settle into a more predictable pattern. Either way market forces are still king.

You're saying that within 50 years, we'll have games that exceed based on motion control. There will be minor implementations that make it better, but this was based on one assessment of your argument. Mainly, within that timeframe, why should I, or any of the external market forces (ie people) care about motion control when it's not going to be spectacular? The best games for the Wii are Super Mario Galaxy and No More Heroes (I don't have a Wii, so no particular bias there) with Galaxy revolutionizing how their game was implemented by working with gravity and No More Heroes based on a satire of videogames themselves. It's not a dismissal of the good games such as Mad World or Metroid, merely stating that they're within the 80% of games that aren't exceptional. In both cases, odds are they would have worked just fine with a mouse and keyboard. Since they were on the Wii, they got the special controls. Which leads to this one:

I wasn't disagreeing with you, merely telling the tale of what happens if the market is read wrong. Sega had more problems than the Activator. There was too much hardware introduced in a short time frame, causing consumers to not want to spend money on a system that couldn't identify what it wanted to be.

It's going to take a while to convince me on a personal level to jump with motion control. Namely, I see it as a new feature to be added to keyboard and mouse. I doubt it'll take over for "ye olde faithful" anytime soon, not until the market of consumers and business force an amazing application on us that makes this extremely profitable. Will it be done soon? Highly unlikely. Maybe Super Mario Universe with VR glasses will make it to the Nintendo Instation soon. :)