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PlayStation (Games) Entertainment Games

EyeToy - Sony's Next Big Thing? 32

Posted by simoniker from the spy-in-the-eye dept.
Thanks to CNN Money for their article tipping Sony's EyeToy USB camera and games as "a sure-fire contender" for this Xmas's must-have holiday toy. It's argued this intriguing motion-capture party game is "...the sort of thing that could get parents (or others who otherwise might not care about video games) off the couch and playing games with their kids", and consumer response looks good in the UK, where it's already racked up 5 weeks atop the charts. It's even audaciously suggested that the game/camera combo, which is due on November 4th for $49, "could take the family audience away from Nintendo."
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EyeToy - Sony's Next Big Thing? More

EyeToy - Sony's Next Big Thing?

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  • this reminds me of the awful Hough tranforms...

  • From the /. prior article. (Score:3, Informative)

    by Anonymous Coward on Saturday September 13, 2003 @08:27AM (#6951270)
    Worst...Idea...Ever. (Score:2)
    by Alkaiser (114022) [slashdot.org] on Mon Jul 07, '03 01:02 PM (#6384166) [slashdot.org]

    Worst Peripheral of E3 [netjak.com]. #5 one one of the Worst of Show Lists, and #2 on the other. The two guest reviewers rated it as the worst thing there.
    • The fact that it is the #1 best selling game where it has been released, and is fun to play, attracting crowds at shops, and is a cool use of technology and the slashbots say... uh a game where I have to get up off my fat ass? Must be terrible!

      Future tips for CNN money: There is a movie called "Return of the king" coming out soon in the US, and I predict that several people will go and see it. Also there is a games company called "Electronic Arts" that occasionally releases popular games.

      And yes, I am jea

  • I'm not sure (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Scrameustache ( 459504 ) on Saturday September 13, 2003 @08:47AM (#6951328) Homepage Journal
    I've seen this kind of game in museums and exhibitions for a long time, they allways sucked.

    Maybe this eyetoy finally has the processing power needed to make it good, maybe they've designed better games than the "proof of concept" ones that existed in the past. But to me it allways felt like the PowerGlove: Good idea on paper, useless piece of junk in real life. Hell, at least the powerglove is a cool toy to play with, this is just a very expensive mirror...

  • so what? (Score:2, Informative)

    by nuggetman ( 242645 )
    What's so revolutionary? I've got games on my Intel PC Pro webcam from 1998 that do the same thing, but more bubbles to pop and less ninjas to kill.

  • been done (Score:5, Informative)

    by bigbigbison ( 104532 ) * on Saturday September 13, 2003 @09:22AM (#6951463) Homepage
    This isn't that new of a technology. I remember a couple of years ago on Techtv they were playing around with one of these for the PC. IT doens't look that different of an implementation. This will be fun for a couple of days,then people will get bored with it. It is super gimmicky. I think it will be about as successfull as those fishing games that look like a fishing rod or the golf games where you have to swing the club. They are fun for a little while, then you get tired of them and they sit and gather dust.

  • Been there, done that (Score:2, Informative)

    by MMaestro ( 585010 )
    The technology is old. Very old. The most fun I had with the technology was watching someone play virtual soccer in a museum and watching him break down in laughter in front of a couple hundred people half way through the game.
  • This will not be an uber-hit with a game -- it will be a hit with video messaging. This has the potential to be idiot proof enough for my mom to use which means the idea of my 5 year old niece sending grand-ma videos at anytime without having to know what a phone is, how it works, or worry about long distance charges, is absolutely fantastic. Sure, you can set this up with PCs today, but my impression of PC software at this time is that it is too complex and too expensive for a five year old and her grand-m
  • One of the surprising thing is how much women like it.

    Normally if you stuck a video game on the TV during a party, all the women would find another party to go to.

    With the Eye Toy women (well slightly pissed women) actively enjoy playing the games, which just would not happen normally.

    I think that it's actually the lack of a physical controller that is the key feature, rather than having yourself appear on the screen (though that does get people interested in the first place).

    Of course when the ladies a
  • This is the stupidest idea ever. and every time an article comes up regarding this I'm reminded of how poor motion capture games are. Nothing like this will be able to compare to Mario Party, super monkey ball and the likes as far as fun during a party, etc.

    This might catch on for video conferencing, and for really young children still fascinated by seeing themselves on TV, but I know that I play video games to enter a new world, not see how crappy my living room looks on my television.

    • I don't think that you'll see your living room. Either it will only see MOTION (like dopler, or maybe not)and matte out the rest, or it will ask you to step out of frame, take a picture, then when you are back in frame, use a difference matte to only display whatever wasn't originally in the frame. For a demonstration of a diff. matte, load up the Fast and the Furious DVD and check out the special feacture w/ the train scene @ the end.
  • Moan moan moan stupid.

    Moan moan moan won't catch on.

    Whatever. I've had a dozen or so people who would never *ever* play a video game plopped in front of this and they have a GREAT time.

    You sit in front of camper strike for eighteen hours at a time, and those of us who like to have fun will spend ten minutes playing wishy washy before it's someone else's turn. Sony are on to a big winner here, you watch.

    Dave
  • The hardware accessory and games seem more appropriate for the Gamecube.
  • I can remember seeing this thing at E3 and thinking how it was kind of lame and maybe someday a good game could come out of it.

    Since then, I've probably seen 100 articles, reviews, etc. screaming how absoutly baddass this thing was. I was being to question my judgement. Now I see that most people think it sucks and the places that I read the positive reviews were probably owned by Sony or something.
  • I can't see this thing catching on at all... it's a curiosity, but how many games will actually use this effectively? I can't imagine the games that use it will have much gameplay (anyone remember the Activator for the Genesis?)... you can also use it to put your face in the game for stuff like Tony Hawk Underground or perhaps EA's sports games... but I certainly wouldn't pay more than about $5 for that.

    10 years from now, I think it'll just be another footnote in video game history next to the Nintendo U-F
  • Money talks people. This things been on sale in Australia for over a month now and its been consistently sold out across Sydney for weeks at a time. I work at Toys 'R' Us (much to my dismay) and we just can't get enough of them. People will ring around all of Sydney and drive all the way across town if they find a shop with one left. Sony just keeps running out of them. People are buying PS2s just for this one peripheral. Parents see it as healthier than a normal game. The games are simple but sometimes add
  • I wonder when the tae bo trainer game comes out.

    "It's like having a personal trainer come to your house!"

    On second thought, maybe a different type of "Adult" video game will be the next genre for this device...
    • I say Konami could cash in bigtime if they emphasised their compatibility with the Eye Toy. Police 24/7 (Keisatsukan) is a great example, since it already lets you use a compatible webcam to track your motion... Mocap Boxing could probably use a camera to track motion too. Games like Paraparaparadise that rely on hand motion would also work really well.

      As regards the fitness games... Aerobics Revolution! [web-konami.com]! Konami had an entire Fitness division based in the UK but now they've got a Sports Life division in Ja
  • Hey, you know how much fun Mechassault and such are on the X-Box with the full voice support? What if at the same time as playing a game like that, you could see your teammate pop-up in a low-res comm window on your hud anytime he talked? Color-key his image onto a mech-cockpit and people will be out building their own helmets and costumes for various games. Get some decent use out of cosplay equipment.
  • The most exciting thing about the Eyetoy for me is the other games that could be made using it. At the moment it's all for kiddie stuff like cleaning windows and rythmn games, but it could work really well with other genres, even if it's only by sticking your picture on a character or being used for dodging (in a shooting or boxing game for instance)
    If enough people buy the eyetoy, game designers will be tempted to add eyetoy features to their games.
  • I read about this about a month ago on the BBC website in this article [bbc.co.uk]. It sounds pretty cool, seems like a good value for the money (same price as a game), and is easy to pickup and just play. According to a developer in the article:

    "It draws in so many people that don't normally play video games," said EyeToy developer Ron Festejo, "within five to 10 seconds you know how to play."

    I guess we'll really see after the Christmas season if it's going to take off here too.
  • They have been available in Australia for about 2 months now and have been completely sold out.

    Apparently they will have stock for CHRISTMAS and the shortage is worldwide.

    Amazing considering it has only been released in Europe and Australia, etc.
  • I could have sworn we'd covered [slashdot.org] this already...

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