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  • Subject: Why Natal wouldn't work with Reach
Subject: Why Natal wouldn't work with Reach

DMH | TMA | Blueprint

Can't be too careful with your company. I can feel the devil walking next to me.

The rumor going around that Halo Reach might use Natal is probably a lie. Here are my main arguments against it.
1. Halo is a 3D game. For Natal to work 3D, you would need an infinite area to walk around in.
2. Vehicle boarding.
3. Multiplayer in general.

  • 07.22.2009 4:19 PM PDT

If you want to see the MC die, play Legendary. If you want to see MC finish the fight, play Halo 3. If you want to see MC finish the fight by dieing, why did you waste six years when you could have done it yourself right now?

☼►Popular Fusion - Doing anything, everything, and then some.◄☼

Natal won't work... for anything. It's a failure people are falling for, for some reason. Microsoft is not Nintendo.

  • 07.22.2009 4:22 PM PDT
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Your first point is retarded.
Harold Ryan said in an interview that he was very interested in Natal for Reach but they don't really have enough info on Natal so it probably won't be in the game.
If Natal was somehow used you'd still use a controller and Harold Ryan said that they wouldn't change the scheme that everyone was already so comfortable with.

Honestly, if you think Natal in Reach would be controllerless your really dumb.
Oh and I -blam!- hope with all my heart that they do add Natal just for all the dumb -blam!-s that are complaining about it, and I hope they make it a requirement just to spite these retards.


[Edited on 07.22.2009 4:26 PM PDT]

  • 07.22.2009 4:25 PM PDT
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Posted by: Achronos
It isn't our shiznit anymore.

Posted by: Karl2177
The rumor going around that Halo Reach might use Natal is probably a lie. Here are my main arguments against it.
1. Halo is a 3D game. For Natal to work 3D, you would need an infinite area to walk around in.
2. Vehicle boarding.
3. Multiplayer in general.


Easily solved problems.
1. No you wouldn't. Just make a hotspot on your floor that the camera targets, and when you walk between the hotspot and your t.v. your character moves forward while you stand still. Vice versa for moving backwards.
2. I would guess a motion to board vehicles. Maybe you could grab onto the vehicle and your character will animate the motion of jacking.
3. I don't get it. Can you elaborate?

[Edited on 07.22.2009 5:40 PM PDT]

  • 07.22.2009 4:32 PM PDT

If you want to see the MC die, play Legendary. If you want to see MC finish the fight, play Halo 3. If you want to see MC finish the fight by dieing, why did you waste six years when you could have done it yourself right now?

☼►Popular Fusion - Doing anything, everything, and then some.◄☼

Posted by: Dasherr
Honestly, if you think Natal in Reach would be controllerless your really dumb.
Oh and I -blam!- hope with all my heart that they do add Natal just for all the dumb -blam!-s that are complaining about it, and I hope they make it a requirement just to spite these retards.


Was this directed towards me? Fine, I'll bite. I honestly hope you're right, but I don't believe it'll be. I also hope... I'm a retard? XD

[Edited on 07.22.2009 4:36 PM PDT]

  • 07.22.2009 4:35 PM PDT

"I blame canser its going slutting itself around now so are bodys act like were aging faster stupid whore of a desies" ~ GruntX

Unfortunately, none of the reasons you offered are really legitimate. I'll just go ahead and quote myself, as I've already explained this before:

Posted by: KneeChee27
What most people are unaware of is that 3D motion capture technology is very finicky. Development studios that focus on 3D motion capture, and nothing else, can spend upwards of $100,000 for a 3D motion capture rig.

These studios have large, open spaces dedicated only to recording and animating. The walls and floors are plastered with highly reflective paper -- often coated in microscopic glass beads. Anywhere from 8 to 18 cameras are placed strategically around the recording area to fully capture the movement being performed. The room is then lit in such a manner than light is being reflected directly off the surrounding walls and floor into their respective cameras. On top of that, some studios make use of infrared cameras to measure distance in all three dimensions.

The use of highly reflective materials is for the purpose of aiding the camera in determining the difference between actors in the scene and the scene itself. The environment is made to perfectly reflect light so that the cameras can differentiate between white (the scene) and black (actors, foreign objects or scenery, and virtually anything else in the scene). Even with this setup, actors limbs are often confused with the background, sometimes their entire body getting mistaken by the capture equipment as being part of the scene itself.

If you need an example of what I'm talking about, look no further than the actual E3 presentation footage for Natal. Specifically, this infamous scene. Pay attention to the avatar's legs and arms. Notice how they begin to flip and jitter unnaturally. That's the device losing sight of the actor's limbs, and it happens quite frequently in motion capture studios.

If it weren't for the avatar's model being rigged with IK handles (IK stands for Inverse Kinematics), the avatar's legs and arms would have just floated off into 3D space. This brings me to my next point, which is that Natal's major function isn't to trace movement accurately, but to get a gist of movement and then make an educated guess as to what is actually being conveyed.

While that works for simple games, where an educated guess is enough, games like Halo, where your player is constantly moving, running, ducking, aiming, switching weapons (both on the ground and in one's inventory), etc. assumptions can be the difference between the player's life and death. To implement Natal for something like that would be ill advised.

The problem isn't converting your movement into in-game actions, the problem is that the technology isn't accurate enough to be fully implemented in an FPS game.

Another problem is that every other person and their mother who has read the news story about BUNGiE possibly including Natal in Halo: Reach immediately jumps to the conclusion that it will be fully implemented. There has never been any evidence to even suggest that Natal would completely replace a controller in any game, let alone a "hardcore" title with a well-established fanbase.

If Natal is implemented in Reach (and it very well could be), it WILL NOT be used for actual gameplay. It can't be. It simply wouldn't work. At most, it would be used for things such as interactive cutscenes, in-game puzzles or riddles (like the terminals in Halo 3 or the hacking puzzles in Bioshock), or as an alternative controller for things like forge mode.

  • 07.22.2009 4:47 PM PDT
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Posted by: Achronos
It isn't our shiznit anymore.

Posted by: KneeChee27

I posted a response to this in another thread, but that was pages ago so ill repost it.

Though I don't have much knowledge in VR technology, I'll try my best to respond to you. In your post, you talk about predictive behavior being wrong for complex games.In an interview with Alex Kipman, project director of Natal, he describes Natal's predictive behavior in the analogy of swinging a bat. When you swing a bat, the program knows when and where you're going to end before you're halfway done with the swing.

The problem with implementing this (in your opinion) was with complex games, where you would be walking one way and then could suddenly crouch and run the other way (along with doing multiple other things). I think he was talking about the finer details where if you move forward the game predicts where that foot will land before it ever makes it there. Or where that lunge will land. I don't think the game will predict grenade throws or fired shots. In the E3 video announcement of project Natal, specifically at the martial arts scene, is an example of the system working out predictive behavior for your whole body quite well. But if you're talking about Natal being able to process so much happening and accurately predict each movement, we'll have to wait and see.

I do agree with you on one point. Natal isn't going to have the perfect VR system where it will always keep track of you. There will be some bugs with the system, but it will not be totally unreliable. In this article, the author references a company's technology that is used in Natal that was originally used in pioneering ballistic missile technology. So the staff isn't just jumping blind into this technology. But then again, none of us knows what makes up Natal.

I hope I was on the right track.

  • 07.22.2009 5:11 PM PDT
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Nooo, It wasn't directed to anyone on this thread, I wasn't thinking... I apologize no ones retarded.

  • 07.22.2009 5:34 PM PDT

It's already been said, it might be included. Not for gameplay. For scrolling menus, no headset, simple movements (driving a Warthog by tilting your controller), Forge with more precision and ease, etc.

  • 07.22.2009 5:37 PM PDT

With great challenge can come great reward

You won't need Natal to play the game so it won't really mess anything up to bad.

  • 07.22.2009 7:07 PM PDT

DMH | TMA | Blueprint

Can't be too careful with your company. I can feel the devil walking next to me.

You all make excellent points. What I meant by multiplayer was running in a space, and using weapons, but some of you provided good returns to it.

Some decency has been found in the bungie.net forums.

  • 07.22.2009 7:26 PM PDT