14 DAY TRIAL // Cliff Bleszinski, the creative director of Epic Games and the man behind the Gears of War franchise, has talked about the Kinect sensor for the Xbox 360, saying that developers have yet to take advantage of the peripheral in a meaningful way.
Epic Games has had a close relationship with Microsoft and its Xbox 360 platform but, ever since the Kinect sensor was launched, the studio expressed its reluctance in using the device.
While there was a special Gears of War: Exile project in development some time ago that might have used the Kinect, it was quickly canceled by the studio and never mentioned again.
Speaking with GamesTM, Epic’s Cliff Bleszinski revealed that very few ideas from Exile had migrated to Gears of War: Judgment, the next full-fledged installment in the franchise.
“There are not a lot of things that wound up in there. There’s one thing actually that you just reminded me of though, is that we are not supporting Kinect in Gears Judgment,” the Epic designer said.
According to Bleszinski, while the Kinect is a pretty great device, developers of core games have yet to extract the potential of the sensor.
“I like Kinect, I’ve been a fan of it, but I don’t think it has been fully realised as far as the potential of the device. Dance Central 3 looks great and all, but I’m curious how the ‘core’ games will work out…”
Microsoft has been trying hard to make sure its core customers have reasons to buy the Kinect but, besides support in several big games, like Mass Effect 3 or The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim, which both used voice commands, there haven’t been any proper experiences that fully used the Kinect and attracted core gamers.
Even so, the company is confident that more core gamers will realize the important role of the Kinect.