At first I wasn't impressed with Xbox One's E3 showing, I was definitely not into motion tech gaming at all and I'm still not. However, months later down the road, I researched and read on forums about Kinect's voice control features. I really wanted to see what and how far the voice controls would go with the Xbox One. It wasn't until a few weeks ago that MSFT finally released what I would call a somewhat raw demo:
After watching this, it opened up the concept better for me. MSFT really wants the Xbox One to become the device that automates your entertainment, it's actually quite amazing if you think about it.
Home automation is relatively new to most consumers. To those who don't know what home automation is, in a nutshell it's controlling your entire home from a smart phone, tablet, PC, touch-screen wall panel, remotes, or even your voice. Home automation includes things such as controlling your lighting, TV and its programming, heating and cooling, windows, door locks, security system, garage doors, gates, outdoor lighting, swimming pool heating, home theater and home audio. All of this can get very pricey, I used to work for a company that at a minimum charged $50,000 just to get a job started, mainly in custom homes that were at least $1.2million and up. The average consumer doesn't have this kind of money laying around to have these luxuries.
On the entertainment side of things though, you've got the Xbox One at $499. When you dive deeper into the entertainment automation concept, it's quite unique and simple.
Scenario:
Walk into your living room, say, Xbox On. Your TV, home audio and Xbox all turn on within seconds.
Say, Xbox TV, TV comes up. Xbox, what's on ESPN, ESPN comes up. Xbox volume up, volume goes up. All of this without ever touching a single device, quite awesome.
There's more though, navigation, multi-tasking with snap video, all of these things are automated by Kinect's voice controls.
People always seem to think graphics are what next-generation gaming is about, or they say, oh it's the motion-tech games that make next-gen what it is...I disagree completely.
Next-gen is going to be all about entertainment automation. Eventually the cable box will be obsolete and we will see all cable entertainment go through Xbox Live through partnerships with cable companies. All of our digital entertainment will travel through the Xbox One, and future consoles for that matter.
For now though, we've got the Xbox One and voice controls are going to completely change the way we perceive our digital entertainment. Just as the touch-screen phone eliminated devices such as separate mp3 players, separate devices for email, internet, etc, the smartphone did just that, it combined all of the things we regularly use separate devices for and made it into one.
Xbox One is going to do this on the digital entertainment side of things. Again, at first I had some doubts grasping this concept and I think a lot of it has to do with the way MSFT handles their marketing message, they confuse people and they're vague. The technology is so new and sounds "too good to be true", that average consumers aren't really going to believe it until they either see it in raw format or get their own hands on it.
Entertainment automation is here folks and it begins this Friday, November 22, 2013.
After watching this, it opened up the concept better for me. MSFT really wants the Xbox One to become the device that automates your entertainment, it's actually quite amazing if you think about it.
Home automation is relatively new to most consumers. To those who don't know what home automation is, in a nutshell it's controlling your entire home from a smart phone, tablet, PC, touch-screen wall panel, remotes, or even your voice. Home automation includes things such as controlling your lighting, TV and its programming, heating and cooling, windows, door locks, security system, garage doors, gates, outdoor lighting, swimming pool heating, home theater and home audio. All of this can get very pricey, I used to work for a company that at a minimum charged $50,000 just to get a job started, mainly in custom homes that were at least $1.2million and up. The average consumer doesn't have this kind of money laying around to have these luxuries.
On the entertainment side of things though, you've got the Xbox One at $499. When you dive deeper into the entertainment automation concept, it's quite unique and simple.
Scenario:
Walk into your living room, say, Xbox On. Your TV, home audio and Xbox all turn on within seconds.
Say, Xbox TV, TV comes up. Xbox, what's on ESPN, ESPN comes up. Xbox volume up, volume goes up. All of this without ever touching a single device, quite awesome.
There's more though, navigation, multi-tasking with snap video, all of these things are automated by Kinect's voice controls.
People always seem to think graphics are what next-generation gaming is about, or they say, oh it's the motion-tech games that make next-gen what it is...I disagree completely.
Next-gen is going to be all about entertainment automation. Eventually the cable box will be obsolete and we will see all cable entertainment go through Xbox Live through partnerships with cable companies. All of our digital entertainment will travel through the Xbox One, and future consoles for that matter.
For now though, we've got the Xbox One and voice controls are going to completely change the way we perceive our digital entertainment. Just as the touch-screen phone eliminated devices such as separate mp3 players, separate devices for email, internet, etc, the smartphone did just that, it combined all of the things we regularly use separate devices for and made it into one.
Xbox One is going to do this on the digital entertainment side of things. Again, at first I had some doubts grasping this concept and I think a lot of it has to do with the way MSFT handles their marketing message, they confuse people and they're vague. The technology is so new and sounds "too good to be true", that average consumers aren't really going to believe it until they either see it in raw format or get their own hands on it.
Entertainment automation is here folks and it begins this Friday, November 22, 2013.
