This is the real reason project Milo was killed

Peter Molyneux, creator of Lionhead studios and the brain behind games such as Black and White and Fable, recently left Lionhead and Microsoft to start his own studio. Now that he has left Microsoft he’s been talking with the press about his experience there, and the reasons why he left. In a recent interview with develop he talks a bit about Kinect and Project Milo…and it seems that the truth about this cancelled project is finally out.

[Godmars290]

So basically Milo is complete and sitting on some shelf, buried in a data base, while its creator shames the company that made it?

[RedDead]

Pretty much. They may as well put it out there if it's nearly finished, seems like a shi* reason to lose out on some revenue.(And the actual experiment that Milo represents). I mean you could say the same about most kinect games

[guitarded77]

It's really a shame that the game isn't being released... if it's complete, they should put in on the market. Unless it's a real turd, I don't see any other reason for it to be shelved. The money was spent, and to keep it shelved doesn't make them any money to offset the cost of developing it. I don't know if I'd buy it or not, but seeing a team's hard work just sit bugs me for some reason.

Plus, how are they gonna market Kinect on the premise of innovation, and then say a piece of software for Kinect is too innovative for gamers to handle. Doesn't make any sense to me... kinda insulting when you think about it.

[Soldierone]

I don't understand the excuse because 9 out of 10 Kinect games are casual crap and they still sit on the shelf next to COD and supposedly sell fine....

However this breaths light into why this generation is so lackluster in other genres. Why make a super creative platformer than breaks boundries? We have a shooter idea similar to everyone else that will sell millions because it has a gun in it! .....

[MaxXAttaxX]

but with a little boy, so.... yeah....

Who wants to bet that this is just a lie? ;)
It doesn't seem like it would've worked in real time anyway. 

Does anyone really see it being more than a tech demo?
Do we REALLY want it?
I mean, what the heck kind of gameplay is this?!

[come_at_me_bro]

Yeah yeah yeah. I have a hard time believing it's actually complete sitting somewhere collecting dust or that it was close to completion and it was cut because of the risk involved. Pete is trying to paint himself as some martyr for video games right now to market his new indie company, that's it. Fable is far from a murderous shooter and it's definitely successful. Most of its marketing and PR involves anything but its combat or gameplay, it's usually focused on marriage or npc interaction. You honestly think Milo wouldn't appeal to casuals and curious hardcore gamers, especially with Microsoft's marketing power backing it? It was a tech demo to bring hype for the Kinect and that's it. I'm sure they tooled around with the possibility of it working as a game, but Molyneux is a complete hack and probably couldn't design anything worthwhile. Pete, go "change the world" already. Maybe I'll finally live on a planet where Peter Molyneux doesn't make trite overhyped garbage someday.

[CommonSense]

or...Molyneux is full of it. He has been known to embellish a bit. Even Fable 3 doesn't live up to the original vision Molyneux said he was creating with Fable 1.

[iamnsuperman]

"They may as well put it out there if it's nearly finished, seems like a shi* reason to lose out on some revenue"

You have to bare in mind that Microsoft would have to put more money into it for advertising, shipping, general costs to get it on shelves. As it says in the article

"The game (Milo) did work, it really did. But I think that the world – whether that world is retail or marketing executives – wasn’t quite ready for Milo."

Doesn't matter the game is nearly complete. Obviously someone at Microsoft saw that there is little to no market for this type of game and so why have added costs. Who is realistically going to buy this game. It doesn't have the cuteness of kinectimals to appeal to a younger audience nor did it have anything really to appeal to a more mature audience.

[ChiVoLok0]

Yeah they could bundle it up with one or two decent Kinect games and sell it for full retail price or bundle it up with a 360 and then release it on Xbox Live.

[MAJ0R]

hahaha onyoursistersback got marked as immature, which it probably was, but that doesn't make it false lol

[TekoIie]

Has anyone not thought of the simple reason being that if Milo was a game we would all have to agree that it would be the biggest turd in gaming history???

[Godmars290]

I was thinking more that Molyneux was just talking for the sake of talking. That someone with an ego and a known habit for saying thing just to make an interview interesting might have some odd ideas about the word "finished".

And even if it is done its still a game that most likely is too heady for either the COD crowd or kids.

[Fylus]

Was Milo even real? I've heard that it was just a staged event to get people hyped for Kinect.

[jeeves86]

There's always Wii Music. At least Milo would have achievements lol

[dark-hollow]

Another promise that Mr.Molyneux didn't fulfil.

Surprise surprise!

[Bimkoblerutso]

His reasoning was that the market would not accept Milo sitting in stores "alongside these murderous shooter games."

He's such a pretentious douche. I don't believe for a second that this game was close to completion. This was just another opportunity for him to play the victim like he has been for the past decade.

[MaxXAttaxX]

I don't see why you/we should care much about this game/tech demo in the first place.
Do we REALLY want it?

[humbleopinion]

There's still a big difference here. While Fable games didn't fulfill many promises made during development, they still came out eventually and turned out to be excellent games: much more original and much better overall than your typical game. The second one especially.

Milo on the other hand is a completely unfulfilled promise (Like BC before it). It started out with tons of hype but then was completely buried without even seeing the light of day and letting the gamers decide if it's actually worthwhile or yet another casual kinect crap.

At least it wasn't a complete waste of time - while I never really cared for the premise, their mega meshes engine was simply stunning and will hopefully be put to good use in future games:
http://www.youtube.com/watc...

[Nimblest-Assassin]

5 bucks there is a dance mini game in it..

Im sorry I acted like a douche... but after kinect star wars, and the fact dance central is the kinects best reviewed game... I keep viewing the kinect as an accessory for dance games rather than what was advertised.

Granted, it is kind of cool with core games like ME3 and Ghost recon using the kinect, but I would much rather use a controller to quickly select a conversation option, rather than say it. But the vocal hotkeys are a cool idea, but I could never see myself yelling FUS RO DAH or LIARA SINGULARITY! in my living room... it would make me feel really stupid, since Im yelling at home.

[TekoIie]

I really like the gunsmith stuff. Can just sit there and read or play on my DS and just put a command without a controller and it would probobaly be a lot more enjoyable.

[N4realGMRZ]

You can yell it but you can type it? whatever pal....

[xAlmostPro]

Maybe the issue was amongst other Kinect games, this one actually took time to create and actually worked.

Despite what you say all other kinect games are completely on rails and require simple gestures. If this game worked so well people would begin expecting this from all kinect games which would mean longer dev times, probably what microsoft don't want.

As for the comment on how this would look against shooters etc, just look what heavy rain achieved for something some people called a QTE movie.

Although i'm still unsure if this is 100% working/real, look at the angle and how fast she put the paper up the sensor and it was scanned in, less than 1 second at an angle and it was perfect, hmm..

Anyway if it's real he should release it online as a free download :P

[-Superman-]

Its just big lie. It did not work !!!

[THESONYPS3]

Why not just make it a xboxlive game (download)? For like $20 it would hbe good like journey

[SandWitch]

Well, I guess the reason for its cancellation is simpler. It was the most boring game ever.

The most impressive thing on that demo is boy's AI and recognition technology, but the gameplay doesn't look interesting at all. I think only some forever-alone-retards would want play a game where you talk to a virtual guy and touch virtual water.

[Thatguy-310]

Well the E3 demo was obviouslyall smoke and mirrors. There is another video where even peter says that its all a trick but that its well done. In this demo we have milo exploring his new home that moved in and what it basically looks like is heavy rain because the game gives you options that you have to choose from and supposedly it creates a different experience with milo base of your decisions. This demo went to show that what they had showed in E3 was just to hype up kinect.

[kevnb]

i think milo is just too creepy.

[Gamer1982]

This is damage comtrol and nothing more as they found out somebody was pulling the strings in the back. We all read the articles about people controlling Milo in a back room. But of course he never would admit that as he wants to be known as a top AAA designer not as a scammer. He would never admit his mistakes in an interview like that so instead he's spouting the crap MS wrote up.

Want proof? There's no way MS would have pumped millions into this game and not released it. He blames it on its type and genre? There's games worse out there like Disneyland Kinect etc that sit fine on shelves. Plus MS were damn happy to show off this tech and if it had worked would have sold MILLIONS. There is no way a company who wants to make money like MS would have not put this in shops.

[Persistantthug]

:P

[Godmars290]

Given a bear of his resources, I'd expect him to have a copy.

That, a few "friends" to act it out with - *shivers*

[Virtual_Reality]

That version of AI, the build was scripted and fake.

I was waiting a real Tech Demo of Milo, looks like is not gonna happen at all.

[Outside_ofthe_Box]

*waits for pedophile jokes* lol

***"It’s just that… what was so hard for some people to imagine is what Milo would look like on the shelves, sitting alongside these murderous shooter games."***

That is a piss poor excuse.

I can't imagine how Just Dance looks on the shelves next to those murderous shooter games. /s

Milo was a great concept and shows the great potential kinect has when it's all said and done. I really hope future kinect games will implement some of the great elements that Milo was able to produce.

[StanSmith]

"I can't imagine how Just Dance looks on the shelves next to those murderous shooter games."

I can. Crap comes to mind!

Seriously though, Milo, while a great tech demo, just wouldn't have a place on store shelves. I mean, who would it's target audience be? What would be it's USP?

MS should have included it with kinect adventures and kinect or just put it on live to download for free. There was no way they could charge for it.

[TekoIie]

What would be its genre lol? Paedophilia?

[Outside_ofthe_Box]

Yeah, I agree that Milo probably wouldn't have been a great game, but it was the only thing that showed kinect's great potential.

[tigertron]

Exactly, who would buy a game where you play with a 10 year old boy? and to be fair, would kids of that age do the same? they're too busy playing COD.

[mac_sparrow]

I'm completely unsold on kinect personally, but if its done and there's no real market for it, release it on xbl as a tech demo. Sony did it with super rub a dub and even managed to make a little money. The fact that kinect needs to prove its anything like what was promised plus the fact that Peter is known for hyperbole makes me doubt that this project even works properly, let alone is finished.

Prove me wrong MS.

[Felinox]

Im thinking the "real" reason is it was developed when project Natal was prorotyped with on board processor and better camera. Then when MS wanted to save a buck and decided to have Kinect run off 360 processor with lesser camera it made the game to inacurate to play Milo.

[Kahvipannu]

If they would change the Milo to hot chick, with customization for example, it would sell, and "would be accepted".

Virtual-reality boy sounds a bit hard to market, tought unique products like this should come out, just for the sake it's something different, it's a shame it didn't :/

[no_more_heroes]

I wonder what Microsoft is doing with the Mega Meshes tech from this game that they showed at GDC last year?

[GillHarrison]

I don't think this would've made a very good game. Great tech demo for Kinect though.

[ziggurcat]

i think the real reason was that it was garbage, not that the "world wasn't ready for it."

nice try, molyneux.

[Outside_ofthe_Box]

Wouldn't matter if it was garbage. Kinect Star Wars is garbage, but it still saw the light of day.

[VanillaBear]

But the difference is the game is called "Star Wars" , the name along would sell the game regardless if it's crap or not.

[Kahvipannu]

Yeah, VanillaBear is right here.

If it would be SW title where you follow Han Solo, or any character, or ME themed game where you follow Miranda's ass instead little cheezy boy called Milo, it would see the day of light, and would definitelly sell, and publishers/retailers/what ever would have no problem selling the product

Who really expected SW:Kinect to be great, it's ok in what it does, but it's still a license game, and brand sells, sad but true. HAs nothing to do with the quality of the product..

[sjaakiejj]

In reality, this game likely did respond to a limited number of sentences and responses the player could make. But that's exactly where its main flaw was - uncanny valley. The immersion would be broken too quickly when Milo was unable to understand simple language that just wasn't part of what Lionhead expected players to say, a problem which would have broken the game's experience.

I don't think it's the market, but rather the technology that isn't ready.

[Soldierone]

4 or 5 hours and its complete....ugh this generation I swear. No doubt this game would be absolutely amazing, but 5 hours? go back a generation or two and thats no where near complete at all.

[SuperBeast811]

People actually wanted this??either way I dont believe his reasons I've always assumed that it didnt work as demoed like almost all kinect games and it was canned to save themselves from embaresment.

[ginsunuva]

It probably was never I development. Just a pre-rendered crappy trailer to make people want kinect. They planned to cancel it all along.

You really think they can make a VI that responds to everything in a human, nonsynthetic voice?

[WooHooAlex]

"There’s three or four or five hours of crafted gameplay in there, and it was an amazing experience."

I don't get that. Asking a virtual boy if he did his homework is not gameplay.
It wasn't cancelled because the world isn't ready for Milo. It was cancelled because it was just dumb.

[DNAbro]

I still don't think it actually worked.

[Bakkies]

That demonstration video is fake, I thought it would be common knowledge by now.

Peter Molyneux is a great guy, but sometimes he can be a bit much.

[Bakkies]

To those people who disagree with me, let me explain.

From the footage perspective, Milo is looking at the woman. From the woman's perspective, Milo would be looking to her right the whole time.

Thus the footage is fake. If Milo looked at the screen and at the woman, Milo would be looking at the person watching the footage as well(and everyone in the room)

[mamotte]

Because it was a great video, but in practice the Kinect cant do anything so great at all.

[LOL_WUT]

R.I.P Milo

[Drainage]

they need to put some anime chick/s instead of that milo kid , i bet it would revive the xbox360 in japan for sure. shame microsoft dont have my wits

[kesvalk]

i am more prone to believe that Molineux isn't ready for reality...

[guitar_nerd_23]

I think it was because it was creepy.

[Colonel_Dante]

Msft mostly play safe with releases.. if its a niche game.. it wont sell millions

[razorpakk]

So someone still believes what Molyneux says? lol

[Alos88]

You know what? I hope the world never becomes ready for the "child conversation simulator" genre.

[Kran]

Release it as an XBLA kinect title. If its only 5 hours then XBLA is the best choice rather than retail.