As seen on All Age Gaming
15th February 2010 - Microsoft is at the pinnacle of
blending creativity and technology to make a future where your everyday
entertainment system feels like an extension of your body. This future was on
display at Microsoft’s Sydney University Event on February 9 which launched the
birth of Surface and Project Natal. Ian and my-self were there and firstly I
summarize what generally happened on the night and then Ian delves deeper into
the new technologies and what they entail.
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| People entering the event. |
The first half of the night was a hands-on experience with
Microsoft’s latest electronic toys. Groups of people were huddled around twelve
XBOX systems, four Dell laptops and Microsoft’s two newest innovations, Natal
and Surface. People showed off their Rock Band Beatles, Halo ODST and DJ Hero
skills while others marveled at James Cameron’s Avatar game adaptation on a
Hyundai 3D television. The event space was a bit cramped but there was just
enough room for people to game, move around and observe play. The Dell laptops
were there to display the variation within Dell’s latest line of laptops,
although they did not get as much attention as the other devices in the room.
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| Some of the screens for people to use. |
The rest of the night was a talk given by Robert Bach,
Microsoft’s President of Entertainment & Devices Division, on how Microsoft
plans to bring in a new technological age. He firstly stated how technology has
changed how we see entertainment. Traditionally entertainment could be split
into categories such as books, movies, sports etc. However, this view has now
been changed to the point that one cannot think about a movie without thinking
of the video clip or music that goes with it and vice versa. The same can be
said about how we view our entertainment. It is possible now to be watching a
show on television, while looking up information about it on your laptop and
chatting to your friend online about it via messenger on your phone. The
innovative move to make these three functions into only two or even one
function is what Microsoft calls ‘multi screens’. When forming this new
technology Bach claims Microsoft’s approach is ‘user centric’ and this is
achieved by seeing how people interact with their technology and trying to make
it easier.
The presentation then moved onto the latest technology being
brought out by Microsoft.
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Hyundai's 3D Screen which Avatar was run on.
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The First piece of technology on show was
Microsoft’s Surface. Robbie stood on the not so new Microsoft surface;
Microsoft’s ‘big-ass’ table computer with multi-touch sensors, something that
the general public has not had the chance to play with since it was released around
2005. It exists, but only in the lobby of high priced hotels. It seemed to be
the unofficial Australian launch, with an emphasis on education and big
business.
Now in all fairness, it may be a big achievement, in fact it
looks downright cool, placing your phone on the screen and
uploading/downloading data, playing with maps and generally taking the
interface between objects including the humble credit card. The thing is Apple
kind of came along and squashed those dreams with their iPhone. It has broken a
public stigma, associated with new technology, one they hope to repeat with the
recently announced iPad. Taking the simplest of input commands, touch, and
making it accessible to everyone, means no one wants to use a mobile the same
way again. Suddenly people are looking at technology differently, that they
personally have the ability, without any knowledge, to drive and interface with
the most complex of programs.
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| The Microsoft Surface. |
Human Centered Design
As All Age Gaming heads towards one year of online content,
it has left me thinking about my place in this whole thing. See, when I’m not
writing about games, I’m actually a teacher doing my best to educate
20-somethings on the pros and cons of said new technology. And sure enough, as
soon as I’ve shown them one video, another comes along.
So I’ve known about the Surface computer for a while, I’ve
also known about this .
TED has some of the smartest, innovative people in the world, all coming
together to make the world a better place, so when one of the most visionary
game designer behind some of the most beloved titles of the past two decades;
Earthworm Jim, MDK, Messiah, talks- you listen.
Heading toward 30, something like that really, really makes
you think. When I present something like the iPhone or Touch Screens to my
students, Human Centered Design always comes up, but what is it. It’s basically
a design philosophy which more and more game companies are embracing, which
puts the user of the interface i.e. Humans, at the centre. We are no longer
static observers of media. We are wholly interactive functional extensions,
namely through sight, sound and touch.
Until I can smell the internet and taste a movie, that will
have to do, but as Humans, we have something else: Emotion, reason and logic:
Logic has always been at the driving point of ‘smart’ technology; robots, AI
ect, but more recently art and science have come together to incorporate
emotions and reason too. Not only whether these artificial relationships
illicit happiness or sadness, but how far we can stretch the reality of the AI
itself.
Take Microsoft’s Natal, and Milo .
The user literally invests real emotion based on the feelings towards the
avatar who in return, through Natal can tell how you’re feeling. As we head
through 2010, with wireless and 3D interfacing becoming a norm, it’s going to
be ever more important that we invest in the other input commands, the
subjective ones and then output a response to the user that is both logical and
emotive.
But all this is indulgent right? What are the biggest issues
facing our world today; poverty, economics, global warming- Human Centered
Design is about that too. It is in a nutshell, about improving the quality of
life through sustainable technology created for the environment in which they
live. The $100 laptop is
a prime example
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| The Surface again |
Natural User Interface
This one I like. Usually on a Monday afternoon, the best thing I can come up with is Graphical
User Interfaces+ User Interface Design = Human Centered Design. Now, that can
be updated. Forget Graphical User Interfaces, that was so last year. Natural
User Interfaces are; you guessed it, Humans as extensions of the machine; our
body is both the control for input commands and directly receives the output of
stimulation weather it be sight, sound or emotion. It is, in my opinion, the
future.
Forget the Matrix, in the future everyone is going to be
playing with technology literally throwing data around the room, don’t believe
me? Check this out;
it is available now, and it works.
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| The future is now! |
The end is nigh
So what does all this mean, for you, the 20-something video
game junkie and the consumer; it does not mean the end. Certainly some people,
once again, are heralding the end of core video game content as we know it-
“All the developers are soft, Natal is too casual, ‘real games’ are dying”. I
tend to disagree, mostly because if anything games are taking an evolutionary
leap forward. Hind-sight is a wonderful thing because as we have seen,
computers have not died because of the console. The delivery methods have changed,
the business models are more mixed up than ever before, but the content is
still top notch.
Certainly, there are emerging trends currently in dummying
down gameplay for bigger and better graphics, more artistic styles and the ebb
and flow of casual gaming. But if anything I see Natal as giving back the PC
what it already had. I actually think we might see a shift of core-gaming back
to PCs in the next 5 years, with developers designing for all consoles but
essentially PC preferred for ‘hard-core’ games. Until the 20-somethings have
kids of their own they might just feel muscled out of the console market,
returning to more traditional methods. It is hard to see exactly where all this
is going, as much as the iPhone took off, people may just not be ready for the
‘next big thing’. 3D gives us hope for the future but is still too expensive.
Australian based Krome Studios were also there to pimp out
the new XBOX Live Game Room, and if it shows us nothing else it’s that: games
never die, people will always pay for them, and we love to play together. Our interview with
Krome Studios on the new Game Room feature can be read HERE.
Links:
Article Written By Ian Crane and Sussan Nunez
