# Motion control discussion **URL:** \ **Category:** The Game Room\ **Created:** [July 26, 2010, 1:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/motion-control-discussion/548002 "2010-07-26T01:45:11Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 11\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![The\_Hamster\_King](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/8edcca/32.png) [@The\_Hamster\_King](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Hamster_King)\ **Post date:** [August 5, 2010, 9:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/motion-control-discussion/548002/21 "2010-08-05T21:34:06Z")
Here’s [a video](http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/digitalfoundry-future-of-playstation-move-article) showing off the technical capabilities of the Move. ---
**Author:** ![Sablicious](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/bbce88/32.png) [@Sablicious](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sablicious)\ **Post date:** [August 8, 2010, 5:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/motion-control-discussion/548002/22 "2010-08-08T17:48:00Z")
Motion controls are nothing but gimmicky evidence of the ‘casualization’ of the gaming industry. Nintendo demonstrated the easy money to be had in this area and the rest are following suit, as expected. To say that incorporating motion controls in games yields benefits like making gamers more sociable and healthier/fitter - a platform from which this stuff’s being promulgated from - is asinine. Ask anyone who plays video games as a hobby and see how much flailing and jumping around they want to be doing of an inebriated Saturday night! Give a Wii waggle wand to any given obese tween and see how much weight he loses as he finds ways to swing the thing while sitting on his fat b-hind! Motion sensing is just another fad game companies are trying to cash in on. Just like that sing-song crap, Eye Toy etc. The frustrating part is, this is coming at the price of the quality of the games themselves, whether it be through lost/wasted development time/talent or the very fact that games need to be designed around these toy control schemes. Just look at what happened to Nintendo’s once-revered franchises after they got the waggle treatment - they all turned fetid to shit. ---
**Author:** ![Gukumatz](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/74df32/32.png) [@Gukumatz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gukumatz)\ **Post date:** [August 8, 2010, 11:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/motion-control-discussion/548002/23 "2010-08-08T23:02:25Z")
I, for one, am looking forward to it. While I knew even before it was launched that the Wii wasn’t made for people like me, I still couldn’t quite shake the disappointment with the technology when I tried it. (Although it was a lot better when I tried the Motion+ version later.) I still retain some faint hope that I might get to play a truly immersive Jedi game some day. What I’m most worried about right now is the game companies who’re supposed to make these games. High-risk, new technology and none of the established franchises of the existing top-tier development studios are really suited to this technology. I’m probably going to wait for a year or two with getting the Sony Move until the “gimmick” phase of the controllers have worn off and the deliberate, innovating games start coming out. ---
**Author:** ![Arwin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/51bf81/32.png) [@Arwin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Arwin)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2010, 3:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/motion-control-discussion/548002/24 "2010-08-10T15:20:07Z")
> [@Gukumatz](#): > > I, for one, am looking forward to it. While I knew even before it was launched that the Wii wasn’t made for people like me, I still couldn’t quite shake the disappointment with the technology when I tried it. (Although it was a lot better when I tried the Motion+ version later.) I still retain some faint hope that I might get to play a truly immersive Jedi game some day. > > What I’m most worried about right now is the game companies who’re supposed to make these games. High-risk, new technology and none of the established franchises of the existing top-tier development studios are really suited to this technology. I’m probably going to wait for a year or two with getting the Sony Move until the “gimmick” phase of the controllers have worn off and the deliberate, innovating games start coming out. The problem with Jedi games is that they are movie licence games. Chances that they end up being good aren’t … good. But we can always hope! Certainly the Move seems to be the absolute perfect controller for it. In the mean time though, I’m already very happy with this kind of thing (posted it before): [![](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/fqi2eaY_gZ0/hqdefault.jpg "Playstation Move Table Tennis Tracking VASTLY SUPERIOR to Wii Sports Resort") ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fqi2eaY_gZ0) It’s great that this game in the Sports Champions collection actually has four difficulty levels, with the toughest basically being a full sim. Can’t wait to try it - apparently you can try it for free in the downloadable demo for this game. I preordered a Move controller for 40 euro online, will get a second one from a real store as soon as I can get it. Tumble by the way also seems to be a popular game based on some initial reviews. Very laid back and simple puzzler initially, but still a good showcase of true 1:1 movement and precision. Supports 3D as well, which as a combo much be at least a little mind-blowing). First movie shows tutorial, and the second some demo levels: ![](https://img.youtube.com/vi/d1Yul3m09Wc/maxresdefault.jpg)https://www.youtube.com/embed/d1Yul3m09Wc?feature=oembed&wmode=opaque ![](https://img.youtube.com/vi/T_Z7y_n2r3E/maxresdefault.jpg)https://www.youtube.com/embed/T_Z7y_n2r3E?feature=oembed&wmode=opaque By the way, my list of games supporting Move is already at 52 games with Move support, and mine is probably incomplete. 80-90% of those are announced for 2010 even. Just a month to go, can’t wait. @Sablicious: I … uh … disagree. ---
**Author:** ![Airk](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/9de053/32.png) [@Airk](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Airk)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2010, 10:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/motion-control-discussion/548002/25 "2010-08-10T22:53:42Z")
Jedi games don’t -have- to be movie tie in games. At least, not in the sense that they have to come out at the same time as a movie and blah blah all the reasons that make movie games suck. Lucasarts is their own studio, and they don’t need to time things to coincide with movie releases (Heck, there are unlikely to be more films to coincide with.) and the Star Wars franchise is enough part of popular consciousness that people will always be interested in ‘jedi games’. That said, I still think the likelihood of getting one that uses motion control and isn’t ass also isn’t really feasable. Count me thoroughly in the “still have no belief that this can actually work the way people want it to work” camp. ---
**Author:** ![Staver808](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/cc9497/32.png) [@Staver808](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Staver808)\ **Post date:** [August 19, 2010, 9:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/motion-control-discussion/548002/26 "2010-08-19T21:14:02Z")
> [@Airk](#): > > Yahtzee, of Zero Punctuation fame, wrote an article not too long ago explaining why he thinks motion control is a terrible idea. I tend to agree with him on this. The gist of the argument is this: > > The ultimate goal of a gaming interface is to remove barriers between the player and the game - with the direct neural interface as the sci-fi goal. The existing controller does a fairly good job of this. All you ever need to do is twitch your thumbs a bit. The amount of physical motion and the degree of reflexes required to make it are relatively small. The controller minimizes the amount of physical motion required to get the signals from the brain to the game. Now pretend that all of a sudden instead of tapping a button, I need to wave my hand. All of a sudden, I am doing much more work in an effort to get the game to understand what I’m doing. And odds are, I’m not waving my hand to make the character wave his hand - I’m waving my hand to throw something, or cast a magic spell, or something similarly completely unrelated to what I’m actually doing. It is no more intuitive - because lets face it, 90% of actions in games correspond poorly to actions I can/should be taking in real life, and it takes just as long to understand “Okay, if I need to cast levitate, I wave my right hand” as it does to understand “If I need to cast levitate, I push Y”. I think you’re making a big assumtion here. I feel there are two paradigms when it comes to sci-fi gaming and both have adherents. While I agree, one of the ultimate goals is the neural interface, you’re completely ignoring the Star Trek Holodeck experience. Complete immersion for all your senses (although I don’t recall if the holodeck does smells). Yes, this motion technology does move us away from the neural connection ideal, but I feel it moves us closer to the holodeck. To be honest, I’d use both technologies if they were available. Now if one excluded use of the other, I’d have to see what the library consisted of :P. > [@Airk](#): > > What’s more, we’ve actually made the action slower and enlarged the barrier between me thinking “Okay! Jump now!” and the character in the game actually jumping. Because no matter how lag free your motion control solution is, it takes me longer to jump than it does to push A. To me, Motion controls are a step backwards unless the idea to create a simulation of something I can already do. It’s great for fitness “games” and dancing “games”, but I’m putting games in quotes there for a reason. The “game” part of those comes from the rules built up around the activity - it’s essentially the same thing as having someone else there to say “Great! That’s 50 pushups! You’re really on a roll tonight, tiger! Now 50 jumping jacks and you’ll break your own record!” The -activity- isn’t a game, but you can build a game around it. For those of us who like…video games, as they have traditionally been defined, motion control doesn’t really seem to have a home. (Aside: I loathe driving games except for Crazy Taxi, so trying to sell me how awesome it is to tilt a controller to simulate steering is unlikely to sell me anything.) Yeah, it’s slower NOW. I don’t know how long you’ve used a touch interface, but I remember when the Palm Pilot just came out. It was a bit slow, you had to relearn how to write letters, you had to do it slowly and deliberately for it to read. Compare that to the current generation of smart phone touch interfaces. And this is what? Less than 10 years? Yeah, the Wii can be less respocive than ideal, but I look at the Wii and the Move and I see this leading to smaller and smaller sensors, better and more intuitive controls, and yes, I honestly believe this will lead, or at least help define virtual world technology. Keep in mind the interface is in its infancy, we’re not talking that this is the ultimate end result. Not to be rude about it, but you might not like driving. Honestly, I don’t care for driving games too much either, but obviously other people do. There are whole franchises built around the concept of virtual driving, so you must accept the arguement that the controller simulating steering is a valid arguement, regardless of how much it may apply to you or me. So just because we might not have a use for the tech, doesn’t make it worthless. I have never understood the whole blackberry thing. I just don’t get it. This doesn’t mean I dismiss the tech out of hand, nor do I ignore where that tech might eventually lead. This is all IMHO, YMMV of course, just something else to think about. ---
**Author:** ![Airk](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/9de053/32.png) [@Airk](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Airk)\ **Post date:** [August 20, 2010, 2:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/motion-control-discussion/548002/27 "2010-08-20T14:38:52Z")
Sorry, but pushing a button will -always- be faster than jumping. At least, until I get some sort of Shadowrun style wired reflexes that magiscientifically make my body able to move faster than a normal person’s. And even then it’ll still probably be faster to push the button. The holodeck comparison is fine, but frankly depends WAY more on the visual aspects of displaying the information. Motion controls are a tiny stumbling block by comparison to the whole, well, holographic aspect, so I don’t really consider this much progress in that regard. Is this a step on the road to somewhere interesting? Maybe. Does that mean we should be making games with it now? No. Though clearly a bunch of people disagree, which is fine, but…we’ll see what happens in a couple of months. ---
**Author:** ![Arwin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/51bf81/32.png) [@Arwin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Arwin)\ **Post date:** [August 20, 2010, 10:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/motion-control-discussion/548002/28 "2010-08-20T22:23:55Z")
Playstation Move won best hardware of show at Gamescom 2010, Europe’s largest public tradeshow. Other contenders were among others Kinect and the new Rockband controllers. Lots of positive impressions out there of RUSE (Ubisoft’s new RTS) and Virtua Tennis 4 that was available in playable form with both Move and 3D support. Killzone 3 was shown with Move controls and MAG was announced to get Move controls patched in. Also more Flight Control impressions including 4 player drop in drop out coop. Lots more stuff thats starting to become hard to keep up with. There’s a good blog out there, [iwaggle.blogspot.com](http://iwaggle.blogspot.com), which I’ve started to contribute to. I’m becoming increasingly confident that Move is going to be a very big success. ---
**Author:** ![Staver808](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/cc9497/32.png) [@Staver808](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Staver808)\ **Post date:** [August 21, 2010, 4:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/motion-control-discussion/548002/29 "2010-08-21T04:04:00Z")
> [@Airk](#): > > Sorry, but pushing a button will -always- be faster than jumping. At least, until I get some sort of Shadowrun style wired reflexes that magiscientifically make my body able to move faster than a normal person’s. And even then it’ll still probably be faster to push the button. How sweet would that be. It still angers me that my teachers lied to me when I was a kid. I remember them telling me we’d have flying cars and would be commuting to work on the moon when I was as old as I am now. Where the hell is my space ship and flying cars dammit?? Though I would take wired reflexes or a neural jack interface in a heartbeat. > [@Airk](#): > > The holodeck comparison is fine, but frankly depends WAY more on the visual aspects of displaying the information. Motion controls are a tiny stumbling block by comparison to the whole, well, holographic aspect, so I don’t really consider this much progress in that regard. > > Is this a step on the road to somewhere interesting? Maybe. Does that mean we should be making games with it now? No. Though clearly a bunch of people disagree, which is fine, but…we’ll see what happens in a couple of months. Okay, granted the holodeck is a LONG LONG way off, but this is a step in that direction. And if they don’t make games to pay for the technology, it will never get developed and improved upon. They need to see if it’s even viable as tech. So yeah, you’ll have to suffer through some pretty shitty games in the begining, but hopefully they’ll improve. At least that’s the way I see it. ---
**Author:** ![Arwin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/51bf81/32.png) [@Arwin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Arwin)\ **Post date:** [August 22, 2010, 7:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/motion-control-discussion/548002/30 "2010-08-22T07:51:17Z")
Move won best hardware at the big Gamescom 2010 show, over Kinect and the new Rockstar 3 peripherals. Gamescom is basically a cross between a European version E3 and PAX combined with a quarter million visitors in 4 days. ---
**Author:** ![Arwin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/51bf81/32.png) [@Arwin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Arwin)\ **Post date:** [September 2, 2010, 9:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/motion-control-discussion/548002/31 "2010-09-02T21:33:22Z")
Move’s press embargo lifted and there are loads of impressions out there now. The best videos, with picture in picture, are definitely on [iwaggle.blogspot.com](http://iwaggle.blogspot.com) [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/motion-control-discussion/548002.md?page=1)