Why Sony Turned Down Kinect And Settled On Move

Sony had considered a Kinect-esque camera before finally settling on PlayStation Move.

Anton Mikhailov, a software engineer at Sony Computer Entertainment America’s R&D department said that they had begun research on a Kinect like camera back in 2002 but canned the project since “the cost of the camera outweighed the advantages of what it offered”:

“At that time we were investigating a lot of technologies. We were looking into 3D cameras like Kinect. That started way back in 2002, so we already by that time had stopped that research. We worked with the London Studio guys on that.

So when we were working with the 3D cameras we felt the cost of the camera outweighed the advantages of what it offered.”

He also mentioned that the technology had a hard time working in ill lighting conditions:

“The issue with Kinetic is sometimes in certain lighting conditions it just wouldn’t work. The people that had Kinetic work had a great time with it, but when it didn’t it was a downer.

With Kinect what they found… Or the PrimeSense cameras and 3DV cameras is, you can solve those lighting issues, but you still don’t get a different experience. And it’s very hard to apply to other sorts of genres.”

via Eurogamer