Roboplegic Wrongcock

It seems a wasted opportunity to me that Microsoft have not built some compatibility with the original Kinect into the XB1. Loads of people have them already, and the XB1 currently seems to use the Kinect device for voice and basic gesture controls. Both of these could be handled to a degree by the earlier version, and could have brought the price of the XB1 down to compete with the PS4 at launch.

I see a Kinect-less model as an inevitability at some point. Firstly, it is not required plug-in; thus it is an unnecessary expense for anyone who does not want it. Also, at some point people will be replacing failing launch units. Even the best-built machines die after a period. It is likely that the console and Kinect will not fail at the same time, so buying a new console with Kinect would be a massive waste of money when you could just plug in the old one.

There is also the possibility that Kinect will not take off with developers as MS hope it will. If so, this is an expensive and worthless addition to the console, aside from the ability to use voice commands and gesture control on the dashboard.

MS also need to bear in mind that, as they look to cut the price of their machine, Sony will be doing the same. Sony have proven themselves pretty good at doing this with previous consoles, with "slim" versions cutting the console costs considerably for previous Playstations. Microsoft should not be looking to compete with a £350 PS4, they should be looking to compete with the inevitable £250-£300 PS4 remodel which may be coming out within the next two years.

Kinect is at the heart of the system. So a kinectless version is probably a pipe dream. As for using the original Kinect for the Xbox One that would have been silly. I have both a K1 and K2 in front of my TV and the difference is massive. Even just setting the camera up and you can see how much better the new Kinect is. The FOV is amazing as is the actual camera screen quality, I don't have to rejig things as it can see my entire living room from the floor to ceiling very easily.

As for Kinect and devs it's up to MS to lead. One massive advantage is devs know every Xbox One has a Kinect, so any extra stuff they do they know it will get used. The stuff I have played that uses Kinect is pretty fun DR3 uses it to shake off Zombies and distract them,Kinect sports rivals is scarily good in terms of motion control. FIFA14 lets you call out your own custom plays and change substitutes on the fly without having to pause and go into the menu all very cool stuff. I imagine most first and second party MS games will use it in some way. Then you look at the bigger picture for stuff like Xbox Fitness which uses the Kinect camera to show if you're following your on screen instructors correctly. The camera will have multiple uses.

Today we're excited to announce that Microsoft Studios has acquired the rights to the “Gears of War” franchise from Epic Games, including rights to all existing and future games, entertainment experiences and merchandise. In addition, we are excited to announce that Black Tusk Studios in Vancouver, BC will take over development of the “Gears of War” franchise and that Rod Fergusson, former Director of Production at Epic Games on the “Gears of War” franchise, will join Microsoft and play a key studio leadership role at Black Tusk on the development of the franchise going forward. We had a chance to chat with Phil Spencer, Head of Microsoft Studios, Hanno Lemke, General Manager of Black Tusk Studios at Microsoft Studios, and Rod Fergusson about the big news.

Why did Microsoft purchase the “Gears of War” franchise?

Phil Spencer: It all comes back to our commitment to Xbox fans. The “Gears of War” franchise has a very strong, passionate and valued fan base on Xbox. Over twenty-two million units have been sold across all “Gears of War” titles worldwide, grossing over $1B dollars (US). This franchise, and these fans, are part of the soul of Xbox. By acquiring this franchise, Microsoft Studios will continue to offer them more of their favorite games and entertainment experiences from the “Gears of War” universe.

Why did Epic Games agree to this acquisition?

Hanno Lemke: Epic has been a tremendous partner to work with, and it has been a privilege for Microsoft to be Epic’s publishing partner and work together to achieve the phenomenal success of the “Gears of War” games. Epic remains great partners and good friends of Microsoft Studios. In fact we will collaborate closely with Epic to ensure the inclusion of the Unreal Engine technology into the “Gears of War” franchise going forward remains consistent with the high quality fans have come to expect from the franchise.

Why was an as-yet-unproven studio like Black Tusk chosen to lead the “Gears of War” development over a more established studio?

Phil Spencer: Black Tusk has assembled a world-class team with deep experience and passion for the shooter space, and specifically the “Gears of War” franchise. I am extremely confident that under the leadership of Hanno Lemke, Rod Fergusson and our other leaders in the studio, Black Tusk is well equipped to take on the future development of the “Gears of War” franchise.

Are there plans to bring anyone who worked on previous “Gears of War” games onboard to work on the future of the series?

Hanno Lemke: The news that Rod Fergusson is joining Black Tusk should be really exciting for fans of the franchise. Rod has played a leadership role at Epic on all of the “Gears of Wars” games, he understands the franchise deeply but equally importantly he understands the fans of the franchise – what they love, where they want to see the franchise evolve. Once the news spreads about the opportunities at Black Tusk, I’m confident we’ll see interest from a number of talented developers who share the same passion for the “Gears” franchise as the developers at Black Tusk.

When can we expect to hear more about the plans for the “Gears of War” franchise?

Hanno Lemke: We hope to be able to share more news about “Gears of War” later this year.

You’re moving back to Canada and back to working on the “Gears” franchise. Is it like a homecoming for you?

Rod Fergusson: I’m extremely excited to be joining Black Tusk Studios to oversee development on the “Gears of War” franchise. I’ve been privileged to work on a lot of great games with a lot of great teams, but “Gears” has had the most impact on me professionally and personally, so this really feels like a homecoming. I can’t wait to share more with you all soon.

Finally, Epic games shared the following statement on the acquisition:

“Epic Games has reached an agreement to sell the ‘Gears of War’ intellectual property rights to Microsoft. We’re very proud of the franchise we built in close partnership with Microsoft over the past decade and are happy that this agreement enables Microsoft to forge ahead with the ‘Gears’ universe on their industry-leading platforms as Epic concentrates its efforts on new projects,” said Epic founder and CEO Tim Sweeney. “Epic remains totally dedicated to supporting Xbox One and is licensing the Unreal Engine 4 technology to Microsoft in support of their future projects.”

Very interesting move. I don't think MS could have taken it if it went multiplat.

Also Black Tusk are the devs.

There is no wrong platform to play it on. There are platforms you can't play it on but that's a different thing.

And don't underestimate the amount of quietly raging butthurt that's causing.

It's been a delight reading the multiple Gaf threads for this game. With people, who interestingly usually have Kaz or KZ avatars trying to find all manner of faults in the footage. Of course none of them had actual hands on with the Alpha they just 'know' it's going to be lackluster.

For anyone planning to play co-op or MP it's a necessary evil. I used to rage at some of the BF3 updates I can only imagine what some of the BF4 will be like.

I started the update for DR3 about 10mins ago and mine kicked off at 50% done already. then at 60% announced it was 'ready to play'

It is fundamentally broken.

Install mandatory patch - game no longer works. I'd be interested in your definition of broken if that doesn't satisfy it.

I attempted restarting the chapters, working backwards, and then the campaign n order to try and find a point at which the game would work again. Seemingly that was not the problem and the only resort may be a reinstall and second download of the immense patch. This will therefore involve another restart of the game and, frankly, I'm sick of fucking around with it now.

And, semantically, they are not 'my' problems, they are the developers problems..

Hmm I can say I've no problems whatsoever with the game. Is it the only X1 game that gives you problems?

Not sure if this one was posted? This is an 8 min clip. I think it's the one that keeps getting taken off Youtube.

http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x19vjqc_titanfall-gameplay_videogames

Things I love about the match. Even with 6V6 the match is pretty chaotic in a good way always something going on. I would imagine as people get used to what they should be doing the matches will be real ebb and flows.

The movement around the levels is cool,again once people spend some time mastering it,Some players are going to be very flashy. Titans look imposing but still beatable loved the part when two enemy Titans stomp past the player. Whats going to be even more interesting is when you weigh up what Titan you're going to choose. Not sure how many are available in this alpha but we've seen some that cater to certain playstyles.

I really hope Respawn announces a wider beta next week.

I thought visuals were nearly always stripped back in betas?

BF3 and BF4 looked like dogshit when that was in beta, that's for sure.

One of the Respawn guys on gaf said this

Now that half of you are browsing crappy unauthorized cellphone pics...

TO BE EXPLICIT:

All textures in this Alpha Test build are at 25% of the final game's resolution. So if you're staring at a 256x256 texture, that's actually a 512x512 texture in the real game. 512? That's a 1024. It's a huge, huge, huge difference. Especially on terrain, weapons, cockpits, hands, effects, etc.

There's a reason the build is under NDA. It's not for showing off, or giving people a fair idea of what the game looks like, or for pixel counting. You'll still have your chance to scream "lolz pixels lazy devs Goldeneye N64 lololololol", but now is not the time.

(Well; menu images are probably full res.)

redred59 ragequiter recorded

https://skydrive.live.com/redir?resid=B3E5B0379C76A4C7!135&authkey=!AGIwNkaLsrowibg&ithint=video%2c.mp4

What a little coward.

Why is the PS4 selling so much more than the One with such a barren lineup though?

I think it's because more 'core' PS3 owners jumped into next gen early vs 360 ones.

Eh? What's the problem?

For a lot of people if it's not on Steam it doesn't exist.

I enjoyed Absolution even though it wasn't a true Hitman game really.

I'll be interested in the next one too I'm sure.

Same here and I loved Blood Money.

Certain levels in Absolution I absolutely adored.

Holding onto my hype hat for the meanwhile as some were thinking it was a scam, but according to Gaf a Xbox One beta for this maybe starting very soon.

http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showthread.php?t=752357

The music in this really is phenomenal.

Finally found the lightsaber sorry 'laser sword' Been on some utter rampages with that.

I don't know what it is but this game seems to invite a lot more exploration and experimentation than the previous games.

I was just about to post that.

Certainly showed me loads of stuff I didn't know about the game. Also reminded me how damm fun the matches look.

It seems after this week, we'll be getting more info on the game at last. I bet from the hints dropped, we'll be getting a 'beta' announcement pretty soon.

because he doesn't have the kinect plugged in so he wouldn't know how damn easy it is to do all the things he wants to do but is afraid whoever is left at Microsoft will all sit around a TV watching him getting angry trying to find the home screen.

Is that why

Seriously if his that paranoid, why not turn the camera away towards the wall? At least you can still use your voice.

Looking forward to it.

Lets also hope Dolby Digital audio via digital optical is added to that update, hopefully before Titanfall.

Oh it's that patch. I installed that when I first got the game and haven't had any problems.

Haven't had the time to dip into this the few last days. Is this patch a new one?

Seems to be a dead page.

This should work.

http://www.pkgrafix.co.uk/page5.html

You can smell stunted compromise on every pore of Bioshock:Infinite and it's a damn shame. I finally got to have a sitdown and play it through on PC recently after missing it at launch.

Everyone remember how amazing Bioshock was? The eerie tone and actual intriguing world to explore. The big daddies wandering round doing their jobs until you bothered them or the little sisters. All jettisoned in Infinite for pulled punches lightweight 'political' comment and shooting 100s and 100's of bad guys.

All leading to a smart ass ending that just had to try and tie into the wider world.

Killer Instinct is very,very addictive. Hats off to Double Helix. I laughed when they showed it at E3 but it's a damm solid game.

And the music, oh the music.

I paused the game and noticed that moving up and down through the options correspondences to the background music. Such a small detail but an amazing one

Some of the textures at the beginning are pretty rough. But that doesn't really bother me too much that fades into the background the more you play. The character models look extremely good though.

The sheer amount of zombies and city scope is much more impressive than previous games that what impresses me most.

What's the general consensus on the Xboxone noise wise at the moment? More and more people in the PS4 thread are now saying that theirs sound quite loud even when they have good ventilation. My PS4 currently is fairly quiet but I only play BF4 on it for 30-60 minutes at a time.

I've had my X1 for a few days now and I'm shocked at how quiet it is.

It's on now and I can't hear a sound from it. We'll see if that lasts although having the power brick outside the system should mean less heat and noise.

how do you create content? Or do you need to have done the online beta to access it?

HOLY SHIT I CAN FINALLY RUN IN MY HOUSE!

Just go into the online mode, press start and select the online tab you should see Creator (BETA) option in there.