Oprah Gives Away Kinect to Everyone in Her Audience

[samsonguy920]

Yet another showboating extravaganza on the Oprah Winfrey show. Whoopee. And now she is pimping for Microsoft. Can it get any lower than that?

Say what you will, this seems like a positive step for making gaming more socially acceptable.

There is that, but the suspicion that for once this wasn't Oprah's idea isn't going to help. I am about willing to bet she has a Wii at home.

Perhaps they're excited that they're getting the 360/kinect for free?

Because someone's excited for getting something for free doesn't mean others will be excited about paying $200+ for it.

$150 for Kinect, $50 for a game.

I'm excited I'm not getting it. Yay!

 

[orangeapples]

Meh, the people in the audience of Oprah would cheer if she gave everyone a dying cat on a stick.

Ya know, if a high profile celebrity were to give me a dying cat on a stick I'd probably be happy too...

 

[ninjajoeman]

didn't she do a thing recently about how this is her last show or something?

 

[dex-dex]

yeah more than half of those women seems like the type to not know how to hook up a DVD player without help.

 

[ImprovizoR]

She's so clueless it's annoying. The next big thing in video gaming? Then why did they patch it for sitting down? It ruins the entire purpose of this already useless gimmick. If you're sitting you might as well use a gamepad.

Meh, the people in the audience of Oprah would cheer if she gave everyone a dying cat on a stick.

Ya know, if a high profile celebrity were to give me a dying cat on a stick I'd probably be happy too...

I laughed so hard at this. You win internet for one day at least

This motion control thingy is killing gaming. That and 3D. Instead of making great games they are trying to appeal to a group of people that doesn't know what gaming is. In the process they will lose loyal customers. I hope Sony doesn't do the same. At least PC will always remain a constant.

 

[BrunDeign]

So THIS is what the 400 million dollars in marketing money was spent on...

Also this is doing NOTHING to sell Kinect to more hardcore gamers. This is just proving that Microsoft is totally leaving Kinect to the casual crowd. Are they abandoning the hardcore gamers? No no no. They're just trying to get a bigger piece of the casual gaming money pie.

 

[SelectivelyEvil13]

I would not allow myself to watch the video[footnote]I strongly dislike blame Oprah for many wrong things in America and hate exposing myself to her vapid commentary.[/footnote], but let me make a single guess: rapid Oprah acolytes burst into hysteric cheering while zealously praised their savior for bestowing upon them more free stuff. These are the same people who let Oprah dictate what they read, so I'm pretty sure they had an armed gun squad off camera holding up the "applause" sign.

As others have said, though, this is at least a step forward for social integration of video games into culture. The only drawback that I see is what culture? Great, now that soccer moms across the country want to make royal asses out of themselves "exercising" with the Kinect, is Microsoft going to home in on this expanded demographic while neglecting its original audience? The 360's exclusive AAA IPs are in a stasis as it is, which makes me (as a 360 owner) rather dismayed at Microsoft's monetary focus to put Kinect at the vanguard for attention. If it weren't for my (new) PS3 and PC, I would feel this plateau for the 360's original titles to be a complete slap in the face.[footnote]Due to my other gaming options, this simply relegates my 360 to the rent-only console to absorb the remnant drips of quality exclusive titles such as Reach, Fable III, and Gears.[/footnote]

 

[Thorvan]

Perhaps they're excited that they're getting the 360/kinect for free?

Because someone's excited for getting something for free doesn't mean others will be excited about paying $200+ for it.

$150 for Kinect, $50 for a game.

Not to mention the, what is it now, 250-350 for an X-box, which a lot of people won't have already.

 

[Escapefromwhatever]

And the line between entertainment and advertising is blurred once again. Advertainment, hoooooo!

You want something that's just one giant advertisment diguised as entertaainment? watch The Wizard.

Fixed.

 

[Nouw]

Oooo, don't turn this into a "I hate Kinect" thread please.

I enjoy Oprah (I'm not a regular) but good to see. They're so damn lucky...
Microsoft doing it's thing. (Would it kill to say it's name properly?)

 

[Electrogecko]

Wow this is painful...."Keenect"

 

[Treblaine]

Grow up, accept diversity in markets and in games and enjoy the plentiful games that are still made for you.

My point was that Microsoft is NOT still making plentiful of great games due to clear lack of investment or priority (Bungie leaving). It's also blatantly clear that Kinect has absolutely zero appeal to the platform's established demographic, spending hundreds of millions if not billions overall on a peripheral that is so expensive that your core fanbase has no use for?

As back to Extra Credits, as bad as it would be for Kinect to fail, the onus is not on us to buy shit products from incompetent companies to prop up their bad decisions. We should NOT have to buy a bad and expensive product just to save the wider industry. They point out that developers are torn both ways, I say be loud and clear that we don't care about flailing gimmickry.

Kinect is less a game, its a toy, a novel plaything and almost worthless once the novelty wears off. I have TRIED to see the growth potential with Kinect and there is virtually none, the fundamental problem is the controls are so vague. We will never get a Metal Gear Solid out of Kinect, no Demon's Souls, no Half Life, not even a Time Crisis.

Getting people to move from Kinect to gamepad... how? It'd be almost impossible, that 16-button monstrosity.

 

[Treblaine]

I wonder how many units she has for the audience... perhaps...

Over 9000?

 

[mjc0961]

-Delaying major marquee games (Gears of War 3)

Okay back up. How is this one bad? It's not like they said "Hmm, we don't want this game that's going to make piles and piles of money to come out as soon as possible. Let's push it back because we hate money."

The game needed more time to make sure it was the best it could possibly be at launch, and it got it. I'd rather have a great Gears 3 next November than a mediocre Gears 3 next April. Plus, now we're getting a MP beta, which should ensure we're not going to get another Gears 2 in that department.

Seriously man, delaying a game to improve it is the sign of a good publisher. A bad one would rush out a partially broken game.

I wonder how many units she has the the audience... perhaps...

Over 9000?

And each one of them has a penis.

Sorry, couldn't resist.

 

[Asuka Soryu]

I told my friend about this, and this is what he replyed:

"ide walk there and be like
whoa wuts this under ma seat
holy shit
ITS A HUMP BACK WHHHAAAAAIIILL"



Kee-nect, I wonder if Oprah's fans can get off the couch for this.

 

[Treblaine]

-Delaying major marquee games (Gears of War 3)

Okay back up. How is this one bad? It's not like they said "Hmm, we don't want this game that's going to make piles and piles of money to come out as soon as possible. Let's push it back because we hate money."

The game needed more time to make sure it was the best it could possibly be at launch, and it got it.

Nope.

They said it in the ACTUAL press release when they announced the delay it was for a better sales window.

They want the Winter Season sale of November to January. They said so. It IS all about money.

The game does NOT need another 8 months. They have been working on the game since 2008, live gameplay was shown at E3, it is IN BETA! The game is for all intents and purposes DONE, they are delaying it as otherwise they won't have anything for Christmas 2011. The game should have been released in 2010 (following the pattern of development set by Gears 1 and 2) but Halo Reach.

The origin of the "Needs time for polish" is entirely fan originated, the actual developers said nothing of the sort.

 

[Kayevcee]

They said it in the ACTUAL press release when they announced the delay it was for a better sales window.

They want the Winter Season sale of November to January. They said so. It IS all about money.

I'm coming in late to this discussion and I hope you'll forgive me if I'm missing the point, but why would a business make the decision to release a product in a non-optimum sales slot, where it would potentially make them less money? Aren't Microsoft doing exactly what they should be doing to stay successful in that regard?

Is anyone tracking the number of games being released for the PS3 and 360 pre-and-post Kinect/PSMove and their target audiences? Is there really going to be a shortage of 'hardcore' games on the market in the future as the casual/kiddie/family market expands?

-Nick

 

[Eruanno]

So...
"Oprah gives away a free Xbox 360 with the Kinect! The crowd goes wild!"

would be the same as:

"Nathan Fillion shows up at your doorstep and gives you a blender! Awesome!"

 

[Gamegodtre]

i saw alot of old women.....
starting my predictotron.......
it forseees them hating this for all the running that will eventually cause some bodily injury

 

[Gamegodtre]

does this mean everyone who shows up at Jons rally gets a xbox and a kinect?