Greenberg: “There will be millions of Natals in consumer’s homes this holiday”

1. I think he’s wrong. Natal smells like fail.
2. Sounds like the software bit of Natal will be part of the firmware or built into every game, then.
3. I read the headline as “There will be millions of Nazis in consumer’s homes this holiday”.

Oh gosh, I hope that’s just Marketing schpiel or else he’s *far* too close to his own project to be able to spot its many, many flaws.

The only way Natal will be installed in millions of homes by holiday 2010 is if it ships at an instant-impulse-purchase price along with a killer application to showcase its capabilities.

Better yet bundled with said killer application. Halo: Reach Natal bundle anyone?

Natal=FAIL its another HD DVD Situation lmao

Of course, the PS3 ‘wands’ are going to be complete failures too. I’m an equal-opportunity pessimist.

It entirely depends on capturing the casuals, because it’s going to take something insanely impressive for them to get the interest of the hardcore. That said, I think on the face of things it’s going to be easy to market Natal to casuals, so who knows.

Edit – Thinking about it… if it releases bundled with a 360 then he’s right by default. The 360 will likely do its usual x million over the holiday period so it’s not likely to be a prediction he has to worry about.

But.. but.. that’s cheating!

Natal looks shit and I’m pretty sure it will end up that way. The PS3 motion controls stand a far better chance.

Again, how it looks to us is irrelevant. The Wii controls look shit… but they certainly captured the attention of casuals.

Indeed, there are a whole bundle of non-gamers here in the office who were super-hyped for Natal when they saw it on the news last year. Whether they would ever be able to carry that enthusiasm through into sales is another thing altogether, though. Impressing is one thing, impressing enough to actually encourage a non-gamer to buy is another entirely.

Ultimately I guess it’ll all very much depend on the software. But I just can’t see it happening.

I’m still interested in Natal. There’s one sale

Yeah, I expect the software line up to be less than stellar and also expect maybe only 2-3 great games for it in the coming year or so. Cuss my stupid shiny-ocentric mind

News just in
Sony rep reckons millions of homes will have a wand.

That will also be true if they bundle it.

All I am really seeing here is that the Core audiance that visit this site isn’t all that interested in Natal. Of course we aren’t a fair indication of what the general public wants either. I remember the same type of critisim coming from the Core audiance over the Wii before it launched. But that seemed to do alright.

I have no idea if Natal will sell or not. I think it will have more to do with price and software or what if any kind of bundle it will have, then it does with what anyone here thinks about it.

The Wii is the GTA of the generation. Everyone wants to try it, they usually end up buying it.

Natal/Wans are the Saints Row/True Crime.

I am not actually comparing these products, just the perception of a trend. People dont want to buy copy-cats, even if they are somewhat better.

Its hardcore gamers who buy the Ps3 and 360, we are all hardcore on this blog and from what ive gathered hardcore gamers aint intrested in waving a wand around lol

Thing is, I don’t think Joe Public is going to see it as a copy-cat… providing it’s marketed properly. I’ve always said that if they can channel the Minority Report vibe then they’ll be well on their way.

If they come out and make it look like the Wii (tennis and the like), they’re going to fall on their faces.

@TH: It seems hardcore gamers are more interested in appearances than having fun. I’ve heard so many comments about people “looking stupid waving a wii remote around”… which is a fair comment, because I know for a fact I look like an ultrastud with a normal controller.

Natal is a total fail,Ps3 motion control is getting a much better chance since it’s already a well known and tested formula (Wii) plus next gen graphics

The Natal tech is great but its being marketed by Microsoft which is why I think its doomed. MS is many things but cool is not one of them and the company deep down at its core is still the same enterprise/IT nerd focused company its always been.

MS has never really understood how to be cool or appeal to mainstream whose experience of Microsoft will be formed by use of Windows at home or in the office. The people who bought the Xbox 360 to date are by and large hardcore gamers.

In the hands of Nintendo or even Apple I’m sure Natal could be a great hit with general public but I just dont see how MS will ever grain traction with Natal.

I’d wager what your going to see is if marketing plan A fails then MS will switch to plan B and shamelessly clone Nintendo advertising.

That seems likely. I think their best bet would be to hire someone completely different from their normal marketing people (who seem to do a fantastic job on hardcore games) for this one.

agreeing with some of the comments in here, with MS money and some clever marketing natal is an easy sell. Not forgetting the wiimote was probably designed as a gamecube accessory -(mario128!) and assuming MS market it as a new console which they say they will its difficult to see how they can fail.
On the other hand as definitive as the Gem is, as a wand based 1:1 solution, casuals will not appreciate the subtle differences. The average consumer is not going to be impressed with the tacked on RE5 controls when they’ve already seen it on RE4 wii. It will sell to a moderate proportion of the userbase at most.