14 DAY TRIAL // In a recent interview, Mark Rein, the vice president of Epic Games, has warned the industry not to ignore PlayStation Move and Kinect. The technology behind both peripherals has a lot of potential and could be used to create very interesting experiences, according to the Epic exec. It is just the beginning for Microsoft and Sony's motion controllers, in Rein's opinion, and more possibilities would come in the future.
Speaking to GamesIndustry.biz about the two peripherals, he said that “Wait until you see what people are going to do with these things. We're involved tangentially in both technologies actually. The Kinect adventures game is Unreal Engine 3 and that sorcery game that Sony has, that's also Unreal Engine 3. So we have Sony and Microsoft, first-party, both doing cool things with our technology and I wouldn't discount anything.”
Furthermore, he talked about the technology behind Kinect as having a potentially wider scope if implemented on other devices as well. His example was a tablet device that would use sensors like the ones that are part of Kinect to create deeper and more engaging mobile gaming experiences. “Who knows, maybe the future of Kinect is on your laptop? In fact I think that Microsoft already publicly said that they were going to do something with motion tech cameras on laptops. One of the things that they can do is recognise your face,” he continued to comment on the matter.
However, he was not so open as to reveal the name of the motion controller he prefers. He just said that Kinect could in fact be employed in the same ways as Move regarding gun peripherals, as the sensor could be used to detect other things than human bodies. Epic Games is currently hard at work on two big titles, Bulletstorm, a first person shooter designed for the PC, the Xbox 360 and the PlayStation 3, and the well-known Xbox 360 exclusive Gears of War 3. Both titles are set to ship at the beginning of 2011.