Kinect for Project Scorpio: Asset or Liablity?

Can Kinect be Microsoft's secret weapon or will it remain a cumbersome novelty?

[rawshack]

Who actually used Kinect?? In New Zealand they used Them to scan people bags at the airport.I was amazed to see how powerful the xbox one Kinect really is

[CocoaBrother]

I mainly use mine for voice commands. I don't play games with motion controls and most likely won't until my daughter is a little bit older and then she can mess around with Dance Central or something.

Should the Scorpio have Kinect? In my opinion, if they want to push VR with the system, then yeah; similar to how PSVR uses the PlayStation camera(Although they should lower the price unless it allows gameplay with the need of a controller). If not and if they don't have compelling software to compliment it or technical advancements to the device, they shouldn't bother with it anymore.

[MultiConsoleGamer]

Kinect was a horrible product. It's gone for good.

[RedPill86]

I enjoyed the voice navigation. But for its size, price, and draw on the system? Pass. Had it plugged in when it was convenient. Soon as I moved into my new house I put that thing in a box.

[MultiConsoleGamer]

On paper it had a lot going for it, but the reality of the product was terrible. The execution was the absolute worst. I really wanted to like it.

[BlacKJesu5]

As well as the system itself....play ps4 do yourself a favor

[ApocalypseShadow]

Forcing the bundle made it a liability in losing market share against Sony. Secondly, they didn't make any games internally that proved its worth. Relegating it to being a mic. For being superior to Kinect 1 with tracking software, it didn't improve the controllerless experience. It's really a shame because it is good tech.

What can they do with it? Hard to say. Taking support away from Xbox one with removal of the port, removal of the hand motion tracking, removal of the 10% used for Kinect resources to improve game quality. It's really not looking to good.

Use it for hololens on Scorpio? Why? Hololens already tracks hand gestures and does a pretty good job at it
https://m.youtube.com/watch...
It's also a self contained PC and wasn't made to be a console accessory.

Use it for Vive or Oculus on Scorpio? Well, both have their own tracking solutions making Kinect redundant.

How about the windows VR headsets? They come with inside out tracking where you don't need external sensors or cameras. Again, making Kinect not needed.

The good news, is that with the windows headsets not needing a camera, there's a slight possibility of them being used for Xbox one. And a definite possibility for them being used for Scorpio. Although it would be better to have a trackable controller, the Xbox controller is already being used for PC VR. At least with Oculus.

It may be able to be used like Alexa on Xbox since it is connected to the internet now that everyone has gone crazy for A.I. devices providing facts and streaming music, etc. Cortana could be the fact giving, music streaming assistant.But I think Kinect is done.

[Obscure_Observer]

I hope my kinect 2.0 (which i use only for voice commands) is fast enough for VR. :)

[marquisray]

So its okay for the ps4 to use there camera for vr but not for xbox to use there's for anything hmm double standards

[Aenea]

I feel it would be an excellent solution for Xbox VR tracking, but it would mean MS ditching Vive's and Rift's own tracking or adding it onto it or they can use it for when they make their own VR headset.

[RedPill86]

Liability. Can't reliably add features for the processing power it draws. I think Spencer is for the most part getting out of the Kinect mess. But then again he's moving towards VR like everyone else. God damn industry trends.

[b3l0kk]

When M$ does VR, the Kinect will be viable again, unless they are going to go with the new inside-out Tracking

[Summons75]

It was a nice attempt and unique for motion gaming (personally I enjoyed Dance Central) but the first Kinect didn't get much support and the Kinect 2 really didn't so I'd be better to just drop it. Focus Scorpio on games. No annoying and unneeded cable box, no trying to sneak online only consoles. Just let it be about the games.

[BizarroUltraman6]

Asset, if they can pair it with a vr/hololens.
If they can pair with third party vr. There will be a good product to bring back, with new revision. It had some cool tech...just not enough dev took advantage or took the time to really try and do something with it. Those that did the games worked well . The Gunstringer, Dance Central, Xbox fitness, D4 even some of the Kinect sports games.

[Goldby]

Rift and Vive have their own tracking cameras though, Hololens has its own internal tracking, same with the UWP VR headsets.

Thre is no reason to have the kinect part of their VR expereince. use the ones that are already workign with the systems

[PapaBop]

Obviously a liability, Xbox One one got relegated to voice commands, something which they could surely get working on mics? Microsoft won't bring back Kinect anyway, it was an interesting idea which just wasn't very practical in practice nor did we really see developers make good use of it in games.