After a rigorous day of doing my daily duties, I sat myself down to catch up on all of the daily news posting and CES information from around the web. There was one announcement that really confused me and had me questioning myself if Microsoft had lost their damn mind. It was the announcement of the Kinect for the PC. Now it wasn’t the initial announcement of it being for the PC as there have been many videos of people hacking the Kinect and creating new tools for their PC with it. The only issue I had was they are trying to charge $250 dollars for it.

You might try to argue that the Kinect being $250 is a reasonable price. I have to disagree with you though as the console version of the system retails for $99 to $149. If you purchase a bundle with a Kinect title for the system the most you could end up paying in the end is at the most $149.99. I think that it’s not worth the price for the PC. People have been speculating about Kinect for the PC for a while and it seems a lot of people were right as the PC hardware and SDK will be available on February 1st. How well will this hardware do though?

At the price point of $250 for the hardware, it’s asking for a little much. Yea, the benefits of having the Kinect might be great and may serve to create vast new ways to interact with our PC’s but, when you look at the cost of the hardware and what’s currently available, It does seem a little high priced. The Kinect for the 360 costs $149, the 3DS $199, and the soon to release PS Vita will cost $249.99. The point I’m trying to make is that this a little expensive for hardware that’s already been out and used on the platform already. If you compare the price points, the Kinect for PC is about 1.5 to 2.5 times the console version. Although, the use of the Kinect wasn’t official, it’s still capable of being done without having to purchase the actually device. That’s why I one might assume that there will probably be a price drop. However, here is a little tidbit that might prove me wrong.

“The incredible amount of innovation on Kinect for Xbox 360 this past year shows the potential for Kinect as a platform for developers and businesses to build new and innovative offerings. Along with many others, we have only begun to explore the potential of this amazing technology. This proliferation of creative and imaginative new ideas for Kinect, which we call the Kinect Effect, will expand even further with our commercial release of Kinect for Windows.”

The benefits of having the Kinect on the PC are looking quite good if you can get past the price point that they are asking. Aside from being able to play all of the motion based fitness titles that Microsoft and third parties companies have to offer. There are also some technological advances that can come from this. The use of the motion tracking could benefit PC gamers in creating new ways to control the PC via body movement or voice control. The rise in the price might be accompanied to the SDK for the Kinect which equates for the 100 dollar price increase.

The Kinect has always been a device that I really liked and appreciated for what it has to offer. However, with this announcement for the Kinect on the PC, I can’t really find a way that I can justify the price point. The new creations that it might bring are pretty intriguing and may encourage some new type of innovation but at what price do they charge?

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Source: Kinect For Windows Blog