Infernal Lawyer said:
I dunno, ask the right people and they'll tell you they're happy to have their ads tailored for them to, ah, 'cut down on hassle' or something.
Sorry my friend, but I would personally find it very difficult to trust the word of anyone who says they're happy to have ads - be they tailored to them or not - forced upon them via a service they're already paying subscription fees for.
In any case, did you watch the video? I thought it looked okay, and the latency is definitely better than the last one, although I still think they'd have to leave it for functions that didn't require split second timing for the less casual games. And yes, I've kept up to speed, I know about the spy-cam and how it was originally made to jump on the motion control bandwagon. (Actually, was it you who posted some amusing picture of an entire family spazzing out in front of a Kinect ages ago? Maybe you only commented on it, but anyway.)
Nope, didn't watch the video because I already know I don't want a Kinect in my house. At all. The fact remains that it's a spy cam, the slogan they were running with at the beginning was "It's Always Watching"...because yeah, that's not creepy at all >.>. Sure, they've rolled back and said the entire thing is completely optional now, but still, if you plug it in then you're going to be plugging in a spy cam. And why the hell does it need to know your biometrics? What part of a videogame accessory - outside of one of those exercise games - needs to know what my heartrate, facial expression, and tone-of-voice are? I'm not a conspiracy theorist, but that's some crazy stuff they've got this thing wired up to do. But beyond all that, the fact simply remains that I don't want voice/motion controls for my games. I didn't want it when the first Kinect came out, and I don't want it now.
And no, I've never posted the gif with the spaz-family, but I know exactly which one you're talking about and I always get a good laugh out of it every time I see it...especially when one of the kids just slows down and stops towards the end of the loop and looks around like "Wait...wtF are we doing?!"
Still, the fact is I like to keep my judgments educated rather than just write it off because the last one was shit (multiple console generations aside, the 3DS was actually Nintendo's second attempt at implementing 3D into a handheld, and the Virtual Boy didn't catch on at all while the 3DS is, well...).
That's a bad comparison my friend. The VirtualBoy sold like crap because it was horribly designed. Basically just watch The Angry Video Game Nerd's review of the thing to know what I'm talking about. There was no good way to "wear" it unless duct-taped it to your head. The 3DS, on the other hand, was a nice, neat hand-held device no different than their already popular Nintendo DS. A more proper comparison would be to say that Nintendo came out with a new Virtual Boy 2.0 "NOW WITH A HEAD-STRAP!!!" I highly doubt that would make a difference, just as I doubt making the Kinect 2.0 more responsive - as that is apparently the only good thing people can say about it - will change people's hearts and minds if they didn't want a Kinect to begin with.
That, and I feel somewhat sympathetic for the MS fans who are finding it so hard to defend the Xbone while MS is depraving them the ability to actually refute the naysayers (come on, if you found out that the Kinect 2.0 was actually functional and kickass to boot I'd bet you'd at least have second thoughts about it).
Annnnnd that's the other thing, MS has done absolutely nothing for the Kinect 2.0 other than say "It's better than the original!" "How so?" "It's more responsive!" "Ok...what else?" *insert cricket chirps*. You're missing the point: if people didn't want a Kinect when it first came out, they're not going to suddenly want one now. They didn't want one because they didn't want motion/voice controls. If people wanted voice/motion controls, the original Kinect would have sold like gangbusters, but it turned out to be a flop. There was absolutely no interest in it. So rather than give up and say "failed product is failed" MS is now forcing it onto people and charging an extra $100 for it...and look where that's got them: tying back into the topic at hand, their pre-order sales are in the tank. Nobody wants their product.
Like I said, I don't really care about getting a console, though I know people who are still making up their minds, and they usually go to me for advice, and I'm not sure if they'd accept "because the last Kinect was shit" as a reason not to get one (especially since they have... Kids, and we know how impressed they are by gimmicks XD)
Edit: Oh, and insert some nasty comment about UnnDunn, I suppose. Still waiting, buddy...
And that's perfectly fine, please don't think I was writing this as an angry response or in a frustrated tone. I do apologize if it came of as being a bit "ranty". All I was wanting to do was explain why people who have made up their mind already are perfectly justified for making up there minds already...why they don't
need to wait for the product to come out to make their decision. In the end the moral of the story is "Failed Gimmick is Failed", but MS just can't swallow that pill, so now we've got an XBone that costs $100 more than it's competitor because of a (now completely optional) accessory that MS insists on putting into the same box as the console. I will say this, though: I can respect MS's decision to stick to their guns on this issue and refuse to sell a (no Kinect) version of the XBone. I highly disagree with the decision and think it's completely stupid and will hurt them in the end, but I can respect it. This does indeed ensure that every XBone owner will have a Kinect, which will at the very least increase the chances that people will try it out.
Or they'll just throw it in the garbage the moment they open their box because they don't want an MS spy cam in their house.