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News

  Tsunoda: Natal Patch For Older Xbox 360 Games Unlikely
by Leigh Alexander
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September 28, 2009
 
Tsunoda: Natal Patch For Older Xbox 360 Games Unlikely
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Although Microsoft's Tokyo Game Show presentation of Space Invaders Extreme and Beautiful Katamari running on the gesture-controlled Project Natal tech were much-buzzed in the consumer press -- as was Natal-equipped Burnout Paradise at E3 -- they're exceptions, not the rule.

Microsoft's Kudo Tsunoda told consumer weblog Destructoid that the company isn't readily able to "patch" existing Xbox 360 games to work with Natal, and that the event demos shown this year required significant alterations to the game's code.

So if publishers want to enable current titles to work with Natal controls, they'll most likely have to re-release updated versions of their games in their entirety.

Microsoft presented demos of third-party publishers' games running on Natal by itself making the heavy edits required to allow them to work.
 
   
 
Comments

Arne Gleason
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I don't get why a controller patch wouldn't be readily doable. I can understand that mapping gestures to a button-and-stick scheme is misuse of Natal, but I bet there will be more than a few games that get that sort of patch (unless MS can restricts that on grounds of quality).

Jerome Russ
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I would imagine Microsoft sees all of the 'motion controlled' games for Wii, and doesn't want them. Motion controls don't make a game better if they aren't thought out, so my guess is that this is Microsoft's attempt at QC.

Brent Orford
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Not surprised, there's no money in it for Microsoft.

Revenue is based off of new game sales, not hardware sales, and not used game sales. Patching older games would increase the catalog of 'natal-enabled' games, but Microsoft wouldn't get much ROI on it, if any. Only Gamestop would benefit in its used game sales. By forcing publishers to re-release, they gain new-game revenue a second time around.


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