KINECT LAUNCH GUIDE INTERVIEW: KUDO TSUNODA, MICROSOFT
[BIOGRAPHY] Name: Kudo Tsunoda Age: 36
Current Job: Creative Director, Kinect
Employment History: 1995-1997: Realtime Associates (Associate Producer)
2003-2008: Electronic Arts (General Manager and VP, EA Chicago)
2008-Present: Microsoft (General Manager)
Best Known For: Executive produced Fight Nightand Gears of War 2
skills’: “Games that teach you something. We’re already seeing that in the launch games. Kinect Sportsreally does make you learn the sports skills. Dance Centralhas taught me about dance. “Until now, all the time that we have spent playing video games only taught us how to play video games better – but here playing Xbox teaches you something. “And then there’s really meaningful interaction with characters. We’re just starting to scratch the surface – that’s something which will become more sophisticated and robust over time.” Right now, of course, the games
aren’t like that – they make use of purer body-tracking, and vocal commands to allow the cooler stuff like telling your Xbox to play a movie instead of pressing a button. But Tsunoda reckons that as Kinect is embedded in homes, the device will become a fixture, and an invisible one at that. The gimmick fades away.
www.mcvuk.com
‘Core gamers’ have been labelled as only liking shooters or violence. But what makes a core gamer, really, is someone who likes depth. Kinect allows that.
“ Kudo Tsunoda, Xbox
He casually shrugs off mentions of moaning fanboys, or the more eloquent commentary that Kinect’s target market doesn’t match the one the 360 does have. “Well, people on the internet are generally negative anyway so I try not to get too bent out of shape about that,” he jokes. “What interests me is that along the way in the journey of games ‘core gamers’ were labelled as people who only like shooters or violence. But what makes a core gamer, really, is someone who likes depth. Kinect allows that. No one really likes having to master the input device, those first few hours where you learn the muscle memory for the buttons. That’s a barrier we are removing straight away.”
POETRY IN MOTION
Although he may be in charge of the most hotly-tipped games device of 2010, Tsunoda is not the man to bug about allocations, ship figures or marketing plans: “As a creative person my focus has been on
ensuring Kinect is first and foremost a lot of fun – as long as you’ve got that sorted, the other stuff tends to take care of itself.” Plus there are people more talented in sales, marketing, and PR to work the ‘other stuff’ (they’re featured over the next few pages, in fact). Instead, Tsunoda is obsessed with the deeper detail of making big improvements to the way people play and experience interactivity. “There are a host of untapped ideas that Kinect can bring forth. One real element of gamer language – be it people in the industry, the media or players – is talking about a game’s feel and experience. That’s something we hope people will get closer to with Kinect. It’s not just that what Kinect offers is new to games – it’s that what we are doing is not being done in any other entertainment medium with any kind of technology full stop. This isn’t just about games to release at Christmas 2010, it’s for the future of entertainment.”
October 29th 2010 23
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48 |
Page 49 |
Page 50 |
Page 51 |
Page 52 |
Page 53 |
Page 54 |
Page 55 |
Page 56 |
Page 57 |
Page 58 |
Page 59 |
Page 60 |
Page 61 |
Page 62 |
Page 63 |
Page 64 |
Page 65 |
Page 66 |
Page 67 |
Page 68 |
Page 69 |
Page 70 |
Page 71 |
Page 72 |
Page 73 |
Page 74 |
Page 75 |
Page 76 |
Page 77 |
Page 78 |
Page 79 |
Page 80 |
Page 81 |
Page 82 |
Page 83 |
Page 84 |
Page 85 |
Page 86 |
Page 87 |
Page 88 |
Page 89 |
Page 90 |
Page 91 |
Page 92 |
Page 93 |
Page 94 |
Page 95 |
Page 96 |
Page 97 |
Page 98 |
Page 99 |
Page 100 |
Page 101 |
Page 102 |
Page 103 |
Page 104 |
Page 105 |
Page 106 |
Page 107 |
Page 108 |
Page 109 |
Page 110 |
Page 111 |
Page 112