Okay, didn’t really mean to combine these topics, but I’m kinda pressed for time here.
Has anyone here gotten the Playstation Move (new that stick-and-ball combined with a camera thing) yet? If so, one big question…how far back do you have to be from the camera? Because if it’s anywhere near as far as the Guncon3, I’m not buying it. Ever. (Seriously, the Guncon3 is the biggest ripoff ever. You have to be something like six feet back for it to work at all. Plus, like every other Guncon, it malfunctions like mad after a few hours, but that’s another issue.) Nobody forces “honor” on DKW. I’m too old for this junk.
Also, I’ve seen a few “classic-style” controllers for the Wii, including one with a Sony-style button layout (four normal buttons in diamond shape, four shoulder buttons). How do these correspond to the actual Wii controller buttons, since there are only five plus the Home button?
Also, which is the best Wii Zapper-style gun, in your opinion?
Yeah, I’m really new to this whole purely-motion-control ultra avant-garde controller thing. I’m not the one who bought it, honest…
I can’t speak for all the Move games, but the pack-in game Sports Champions recommends something like 8 feet for most of the sports. There are ways to position the camera to shorten the distance required. By comparison, EyePet needs the camera to be quite close and the camera aimed at the floor.
The configuration can vary from game to game. Usually, a button or two will replace some sort of motion control feature of the Wiimote. For example, in NBA Jam, if you use motion controls, you have to swing up and then down to shoot. If you use the classic controller, it’s just a matter of pressing the A button.
enalzi - Ah, I see. That sounds good. I need a second controller for the Wii anyway, and something that can simplify analog motions (which I doubt I’ll ever be any good at…seriously, that golf game is giving me nightmares right now) would be a real plus. Thanks.
As for the PS3 Move, I don’t care about manufacturer’s recommendations, I’m asking for the minimum distance the camera can pick up the peripheral. The game I had in mind was the shooter 3-pack (Razing Storm, Time Crisis 4 Arcade, Deadstorm Pirates), y’know, where that ball acts as the point of a gun. I think 2 feet is the farthest I could realistically manage.
That’s probably not enough. I work for Sony and I’m providing design support for several Move titles, so I have a Move set-up at my desk. I regularly play games sitting down about 3-5 feet from the camera. Two feet is really close though. I suspect you’d start to have tracking problems as the ball went out of the camera’s field of view.
You’re a tester? Wow, awesome. Okay, here’s the deal…I’m used to having things up close, particularly with the light gun games. My usual distance for the PS2 is anywhere from 1-6 inches. (I’m trying to take down Wild Dog here, I don’t have time for “honor”!) Now, if the gun is an automatic, like for Deadstorm Pirates, or has a wide spread, I might be able to handle…oh, let’s say, 3 feet. Fire and adjust, no prob. But I tried playing Time Crisis 4 with the Guncon where you have to be at least 6 feet back, and I swear there were days I couldn’t hit a brontosaurus with the handgun. The snipe-the-tires part was just torture; I think I got 16 misses on that on average.
Anyway, how exactly does the aim suffer as you get closer. If the crosshair (there is going to be a crosshair, right) gets jerky, I can deal with that. If the shots don’t register at all past a certain range, there might be a problem.
That’s almost certainly going to cause problems with most games. The Move uses a combination of visual and inertial tracking. The camera on top of the TV tracks the position of the lighted ball and uses the size of the ball to determine distance. But there are also accelerometers inside the wand that measure movement directly. The accelerometers fill in tracking data when the ball moves out of view of the camera, and the camera corrects for the natural drift that you get with the accelerometers. Basically the two different tracking systems are continuously double-checking and correcting each other.
If you move the wand really close to the screen it’s going to be out of the field of view of the camera. This is okay if you don’t keep it there for very long because the inertial tracking can take up the slack. But if you try to play an entire game that way, you’ll get drift. Over the course of a few minutes the cursor will wander away from where you’re pointing. Depending on how the game uses the camera data, you might get more jitter as well.
Your shots *will *register though. The camera doesn’t have to see the wand for button presses to be sent to the console.
However, if you were three feet away you’d probably be fine. Particularly since with a shooter you’re not going to be making large gestures that would take the wand outside the field of view of the camera.
I am vacillating between the PS with Move and the Wii for the kids at xmas. Will there be a Star Wars lego game so the boys can wave light sabres around?
Both systems already have Star Wars lego games, but neither uses the motion control capabilities, so if that’s what you’re buying the system for, you can save a lot of money and skip the Move.