Does anyone here remember the Eye Toy?

[Lilani]

I've been seeing all of these ads and demos for the Kinect, and every single time my reaction has been "Oh, so it's an Eye Toy."

For those of you who don't know what the Eye Toy was: it was a little camera made for the PS2 that allowed you to play games specifically made for it using only your body. Not only did the gameplay rely on the camera, but also all of the menus, making the few titles made for it completely free of controller use. Sound familiar?

I haven't used mine in a while, but I do remember that it required quite a bit of space and the lighting could sometimes be a pain, as too bright of a light would cause it to not detect your motion, but too dim would cause it to stop functioning and flash a little red light that urges you to add more light.

Anyway, my point is I just find it very funny that Microsoft is waving the Kinect about like it's some golden egg freshly lain by the Golden Goose of Innovation when Sony came out with something that does the EXACT SAME THING less than a console generation ago.

So...a discussion. I guess your thoughts on this and perhaps comparisons on the performance of the Eye Toy VS the Kinect if you've used both.

 

[Sir Thomas Sean Connery]

Yes, I remember it.

And this is the image that always comes to mind.

[spoiler/][image/]http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_f3SZ5Tu916o/S8oMjXM7bVI/AAAAAAAAQfA/WHq5GqoU3vA/s1600/pedobear.png[/IMG][/spoiler]

It's hard to compare it to the Kinect because they are very different. (And I haven't tried the Kinect)

 

[CaptainKoala]

Yes I remember it, but it SUCKED.

 

[Starke]

I remember it, but due to... I guess, poor marketing, I never knew exactly what it was.

 

[Space Spoons]

I had an EyeToy. What I remember most was how hard it was to get it to work. I had to turn on practically every light in the house and clear a lot of space out from in front of my TV, and even then it was kind of a crapshoot. The few times I was able to get it working, though, I remember it being kind of fun. Not anything I'd play for extended periods of time, just a fun little gimmick.

Pretty much sums up my opinion on motion-based gaming altogether.

 

[sheic99]

The Kinect is basically Eye Toy 2.0. It fixes a few of the bugs and can read movements more accurately, but otherwise it's the same thing.

 

[superbatranger]

I remember, but I never used it nor did I know anyone who had one.

 

[Defense]

And the DreamEye for the Dreamcast came before the EyeToy.

While we're on gimmicks, Le Stick was the first motion controller.

 

[Graevan]

I do remember the Eye-Toy, it was enjoyable for a brief time until I got tired of waving my arms around like a maniac.
I see the Kinect as pretty much the same thing.

It's hard to compare it to the Kinect because they are very different.

Not that different at all, in my opinion. Break it down to basics and it's two peripherals that detect movement via cameras and interprets that into commands. There's no doubt the Kinect does it better than the Eye-Toy boasting object-recognition, 3D positional awareness (or depth-perception), and voice recognition, but aside from the voice recog, the Kinect is essentially an upgraded Eye-Toy.

 

[thenamelessloser]

The Eyetoy was the most brilliant marketing tool Sony has ever designed. I mean anyone who played the Eyetoy would be thinking OH FUCK is the Kinect going to be the same way. CONSPIRACY THEORY- SONY HAS TIME MACHINES OR IS PRESCIENT thus they released the eye toy years ago to make the Kinect look bad.

(I haven't played the Kinect but from random things I skimmed online it seems it may actually work without devoting your life to figuring out how to a light a room for it.)

 

[tharglet]

Yeah - I have an EyeToy kicking around somewhere. When they first announced what the Kinect/Natal was going to be, I instantly thought... hrm, updated EyeToy.

Based on my EyeToy usage, even if I had an XBox, I wouldn't be rushing out to get one. EyeToy was good for a bit of more active gaming here and there, but was never a major chunk of my gaming time.
Never had the lighting issues other people had - my TV must have been in a good spot lol.