The success of the Microsoft Kinect and the Sony Move rests squarely on software. You can argue until you’re blue in the face about which one is better based on hardware specs but it is all going to come down to software. The best example of this is Guitar Hero (or Rock Band). I know Rich touched on this in his last show but I wanted to break it down a bit more.
With Guitar Hero, the public had to buy additional hardware to play various versions of the game. The game itself was very well done, addictive and became a huge hit. People were willing to pay for the additional hardware because the game was so great, and they enjoyed the novelty of using physical instruments as the game controller.
When you boil it all down, the Kinect and Move are exactly the same as Guitar Hero, but without the alluring tie in of the music game. Right now people are saying the Kinect is revolutionary and the Move is the Wii on steroids but if neither has the software to captivate gamers in the same way as Guitar Hero did, or the Wii, then both will only garner marginal success.
Which device will get the killer title first? What do you think?
