The Fall and Rise of Motion Control For Games

Eurogamer has a story about how the design of motion-control input devices has evolved over the years, ranging from the Nintendo Power Glove and Sega Activator up to modern devices like the Wii Remote and the upcoming projects by Sony and Microsoft. Now that the technology has caught up with the ideas, EA CEO John Riccitello said he expects motion-control gaming to rapidly expand, eventually occupying half the total games market. He said, "We almost invested to create a platform extension like that for some of the games we're working on. We're very pleased, frankly, that it showed up at Microsoft, because I'd rather them pay for that. They can leverage it better, and we can build software. But I felt the market wanted that technology and I'm glad it's coming."

Motion gaming on consoles already is 50%

[WiiVault]

I find it odd to hear EA talking about how motion controls will "someday" make up 50% of console gaming. Meanwhile the Wii has about 50% marketshare already according to stats put out by the big 3. Seems to me we are already at about 50%.

Re:Motion gaming on consoles already is 50%

[seeksoft]

Yeah, but what you must realize... all the consoles pushed.. maybe 20% still play the wii. Mine's been collecting dust as my brothers and my best friends wifes. She bought wii fit, played it for like 2 weeks then that fad wore off. I play my 360 4-5 times a week.. My wii gets used when someone comes over, and even then the fad has kind of worn off.

Re:I remember the power glove

[bertoelcon]

The Wii controller is alot more useful than its given credit for, its a bluetooth HID and actually works really well on a computer, with a driver for it of course. I seen them used to control everything from WoW to a presentation.

Re:Motion control doesn't work

[Anonymous Coward]

A friend of mine once broke a leg and, when I asked him what happened, he replied "I fell off a motorcycle." Since we weren't old enough to ride motorcycles back then, I was very surprised. Seeing this, he continued: "A motorcycle at the arcade." This was in the 90's.

Re:Motion control doesn't work

[Ross D Anderson]

I expect it will have best effect when used as a combination of the controller and the motion sensing, i.e. for motion sensing leaning round from cover could be done fairly trivially wheras it obviously won't cut it for running across a battlefield.
How about casting spells in Oblivion style games etc. Having heard that Natal is capable of tracking 42 joints (or something) I don't think it's too hard to imagine casting different spells by using alternating hands and hand gestures. Maybe even something elaborate like drawing a shape in the air ala Black & White's gesture system for the more complicated to cast spells.
What about using hand signals to command your squad like the real army do? e.g. halt, herringbone formation etc.
I'm sure if I can churn out these ideas in just a minute of idle thought then they'll find some interesting ways of integrating them with FPS.

You are the world?

[Anonymous Coward]

You must realize that you are just taking numbers out of your ass.
Hey, its ok, Ive heard turds like Don Reisinger and Belmont (who works for PS3) say that the Wii isnt doing well about 18 months ago because 'the girlfriend' doesnt play it'.
That's really scientific research.

In our family, everyone uses the Wii.
And my wife actually has gotten off her ass and used the damn thing... maybe you should find a less lazy wife?

Most of the people that we know have Wii for one or two reasons:

1.Everyone in the family can play, even the non-gamer. (When granparents come over they always play taht Spielberg Jenga clone with the kids and the other grandad is thrileld that were buyin the new golf game)

2.Nintendo has the most non-killing games of any other console.

You may not like Big Brain, Mario Kart, Mario Galaxy, Blox, Tennis, PingPong and others but some people also dont want every game to be realistic games about killing.
Its a question of taste. I have some friends who think their youngs ones should play Smash Brothers brawl
while our toddler loves watching his olderst brothers play Diddy Kong and that big fat pink round ball character.
2 year olds love Mario as much as the 7 and 10 year olds..

Its like being gay and saying that you wouldnt bang Jessica Alba.
Yeah probably not buddy, but there is also many more who will.

I dont mean to say that my view is more correct but out of the dozen or more friends that have Wii, none have abandoned it so personal experience can not be extrapolated.
Oh yeah, all those people we know that have a Wii, all have kids under 12.

Coincidence?
I think not.

Re:Motion control doesn't work

[interkin3tic]

Metroid Prime 3 says it can be done just fine for very casual players.

For the 1000th time

-"Casual" is only an insult to immature gamers who take themselves way too seriously. Using it as an insult makes you and the gaming community look ridiculous. Trying to contrast yourself to "casual" gaming also is ridiculous.

-"Casual" and "real/hardcore/super duper/other artificial term you come up with to make yourself sound better" are not mutually exclusive. It is actually possible to play wii fit and then play WoW or whatever games you prefer. The videogame police will really not come to your house and arrest you, your immune system won't kill you if you try to play the other game type.

Re:Daw...

[CharityA]

The wii controller does not really require you to make exactly the same motion as hitting a bat with a ball or throwing a punch. It's a hybrid. You only need to flick your wrist. This does involve reflexes. It does not involve strength and to a lesser extent, stamina. It is still a lot of coordination. I think the old fighting games where you had to punch in a 10 button combination and get "nintendo thumb" is almost the same thing. The range of motion required for the wii mote is only slightly more than the old games. Sure, you can put more into it than that, but that is up to the user. If you do, you will become more fit and I think that was a little of the design behind the system. Plus you can get into it more. Have you ever seen someone playing an old nintendo game and lean back and forth with the controller as if it helped? With the wii, it does!

Re:I remember the power glove

[Anonymous Coward]

I've had the opportunity to play with Microsoft's Natal, and in short, no. There's no way the Wii remote even comes near. Wii Motion+ is more like it, but only the controller is tracked, as opposed to full body. I've seen Natal support 2 players. I'm not clear at all about Sony's technology, but with their tracking peripheral, there's absolutely no reason it wouldn't support multiplayer. At this point, both technologies are, IMHO, superior to Nintendo's. Only thing that remains is to see if they can do something with them at this point in the consoles lifecycle.