TNW is not a publication that covers games, gamers, or gaming culture too often, but there are exceptions. We kept an eye on Microsoft today at its E3 keynote because it was important enough to warrant coverage from any watchdog of the company.
We’re glad we tuned in as it was rather eye-opening. Microsoft laid out its strategy for the future of console gaming: the Kinect, the Kinect, and more Kinect. The whole ordeal was a never-ending parade a Kinect-infused gaming.
No one at TNW is big on console gaming, so we were somewhat ambivalent to the new trend. But as it turns out, those who do love console gaming, the people who have owned an Xbox 360 since they first came out, are not ambivalent. Nor are they happy. They seem, in fact, to be up in arms over the Kinect and its, in their view, encroachment into their world.
We sashayed over to the Gaming subreddit, which has over 500,000 members, and took an image of their response to the Microsoft keynote. What follows is a screenshot of the front page of reddit.com/r/gaming as of this moment. Everything that is boxed in red is either a Kinect diss, or a negative reaction to the overall Microsoft E3 demonstration:
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We could have gone on, but that was as much as fit into a single browser page load. To supplement the above image, here are two of the best cartoons from the subreddit that we found. Given their massive ‘upvote’ support, we suspect that their message has high resonance among the members of /r/gaming, and thus gamers in general:
Title: What Xbox is Really Trying to Say [source]:
That the most hardcore Xbox fans are miffed at how seriously Microsoft is pushing the most ‘casual’ element of its gaming platform is not surprising. The level of vitriol is.
Sound off in the comments: do you like the Kinect, or just want a dang controller?
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