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In 2009, Kinect was poised to take over the world. A witches' brew of infra-red projection, an RGB camera and a multiple array mic designed to support full 3D motion and voice control, it was the magical piece of hardware through which everyone could play games, by making everybody a video game peripheral.The sensor's original codename, "Project Natal", was both a reference to project incubator Alex Kipman's native burg, and a statement of intent: this was to be a new birth for an artform long hamstrung - or so it was maintained - by the need to master an abstract input mechanism before you could enjoy yourself. "The vast majority of people are just too intimidated to pick up a videogame controller," Steven Spielberg said during a conference cameo at E3 2009, adding that "the only way to bring interactive entertainment to everybody is to make it invisible."
Looking back some five years on from Kinect's eventual release, it all seems so quaint. Demand for controller-based experiences is unabated, and touchscreens rather than motion or voice controls have arguably given us the most convincing tech-led design innovations, thanks to the meteoric rise of smartphones and tablets. Kinect, meanwhile, has proven to be anything but "invisible" in practice.
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