X360 products are innovative - Schappert

By Tom Bramwell Published 23 July, 2008

Even if games like Lips are not "brand new".

John Schappert has defended Microsoft against accusations that its new Xbox 360 initiatives are unoriginal.

"Innovation doesn't mean that you have to do something completely brand new," Schappert, who is Microsoft's corporate VP of Live, Software and Services, told GamesIndustry.biz.

"World of Warcraft is a wonderful example - it's a game that I completely love. Now I played many MMOs before that, but it was the only one I invested a serious proportion of my life in," he said.

Xbox 360's forthcoming avatars are an example of the company taking an existing concept and giving it new legs, he said.

Meanwhile, he added, camera game You're In The Movies introduces new features to that genre and Lips has wireless microphones, which similar titles currently lack.

"I think our Primetime channel is another example of innovation where we've got time-slotted dynamic on-demand gaming," he continued.

Gameshow-style Endemol title 1 vs. 100 is the company's first Primetime product, and will allow players to join a massive online quiz for real prizes.

"It's not just me, it's me with the entire community," Schappert said, "and it goes into what Endemol says - that a third of their viewers also play along with the game on the computer or with their mobile phones. So there's innovation."

Head over to GamesIndustry.biz for the full interview.

Picture of Tom.

About Tom Bramwell

Tom is Operations director of Eurogamer Network and Editor-at-Large of Eurogamer.net. He joined the company in February 2000.

Read more articles from Tom by visiting the Tom Bramwell archive page.

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Comments (23) Latest comment 4 years ago

Comments threads automatically close after 30 days, but please feel free to continue chatting on the forum!

  • aldo_14 #1 4 years ago

    He added ..(snip).. Lips has wireless microphones, which similar titles currently lack.

    That's possibly the most pathetic claim at 'innovation' I've ever heard.

  • seasidebaz #2 4 years ago

    and Lips has wireless microphones, which similar titles currently lack.

    Lol, great "innovative feature" there. Despite the fact that Sony's wireless microphones are advertised at the start of Singstar... So what if they haven't been released? They've been made, so.....

    edit: i'm slow today :(
    Edited by 1 at 23/07/08 @ 09:12

  • Widge #3 4 years ago

    Schappert - "in favour of PS3 Trophy system since 2008"

  • bad09 #4 4 years ago

    If they were innovative he wouldn't need to defend would he?

    MS are still in my naughty book for all these casual rip offs and plastering quiz shows and avatars all over my dashboard.
    Edited by 1 at 23/07/08 @ 09:19

  • JonFE #5 4 years ago

    I'd argue that Lips innovation is singing along to your favourite songs as well as the provided ones - if that feature works that is :)

  • Zomoniac #6 4 years ago

    I'd argue that Lips innovation is singing along to your favourite songs as well as the provided ones - if that feature works that is :)

    Of course it won't. It won't have pitch recognition or words or anything. It will just play your music, display a visualiser, and you will sing along, your voice ever so slightly amplified. It's pointless.

  • erp #7 4 years ago

    I think he needs to look up the meaning of the word "innovation". His examples made no sense at all. So what if WOW is successful and not the first of its kind? No-one was claiming it was innovative.

  • Kiigan #8 4 years ago

    @Zomoniac

    Actually contradicts what the iNiS guys have said in interviews - specifically that they are working on an ambitious solution for finding the lyrics to your music etc.

  • Kiigan #9 4 years ago

    The Primetime stuff is clearly innovative. There's nothing else like it really.

  • miiiguel #10 4 years ago

    I'm not into this karaoke thing, but never heard of one that you can plug your mp3 player and the lyrics appear onscreen.

  • Widge #11 4 years ago

    Wonder if that works off and freedb tagging style thing, identifies the track through its tagging, then pulls off lyrics from a lyric database.

  • winnah #12 4 years ago

    @miiiguel

    yeah its called ur mum
    Edited by 1 at 23/07/08 @ 10:02

  • oreillymj #13 4 years ago

    MS Innovation = taking Apples coverflow, add a bit of XMB sauce, bung a couple of arms on a Mii = " a super rich new customer dashboard experience © "

  • SpaceMidget75 Verified Senior Software Developer, Minerva Computer Services #14 4 years ago

    The Lips thing is blatantly Evolutionary rather than innovative. There are three things that Zomoniac is missing in terms of using your own tracks that could make it work.

    1) Vocals in 95% of songs are mixed equally between L & R. You just cancel them off against each other to 'remove' the vocal. It's not perfect but all it needs to do is reduce the vocal so it will work fine. This has been available as PC software for years.

    2) Using the same technique you can scan through the song first (should be very quick) and work out the pitch for the vocal. That's you scoring sorted.

    2) The lyrics could be added to an online DB as someone else mentioned.

    As far as other innovations are concerned I think MS aren't any worse than their competitors.

    I think the whole Live thing is pretty innovative in it's marketplace but obviously people will find examples to show it's not.
    This is no different from almost any other product out there.

    In fact, it would be quite interesting to see if we can list ten things that are truly innovative in gaming. You'll probably find that most things have a precusor that contains more than 50% of what makes the new product innovative. I suspect most things are just evolutions.

    Here's mine: Herzog Zwei - First RTS ;)

  • GamesConnoisseur #15 4 years ago

    Who can claim to be totally innovative with an orginial ideas that has never been done elsewhere? I dont see any!

    Everyone stands on someone else shoulder, you just take something good and make it over and sell it as your own!

  • Darren #16 4 years ago

    I am sorry but much as I love my Xbox 360 for its games even I'll admit that there's very little on the platform that's genuinely new or innovative; it's made to appeal to the same kind of audience that loved the Xbox and all its core features are just expanded from that console.

    It was the Xbox that was ahead of its time and introduced ground-breaking features... it was the first console to introduce custom soundtracks, a standard HDD for games, Xbox LIVE, voice comms, Friends lists, messaging, downloadable content for games and Xbox LIVE Arcade. The Xbox 360 took all of those things and improved on them but didn't really introduce anything unique or different, everything was just slicker. Even its much tooted HD capabilities were nothing new as the Xbox had a few 720p games like the Tony Hawk series, FIFA 07, MX vs. ATV Unleashed, etc., etc.

    As for the games, well they're prettier versions of the stuff we played on the Xbox but, again, there's little or no innovation. Not that I'm complaining because real innovation is rare on ANY platform and just as rare in music, TV and movies. Even Nintendo's own Wii still has many games that are the same old stuff we've been playing for years only now with a new fun control scheme but that hardly makes them unique. Bar a few titles, e.g. Wii Fit, which isn't really a game anyway IMO, pretty much everything else is familiar for the most part.

  • jamie_fear #17 4 years ago

    @SpaceMidget75

    Haha, Herzog Zwei!

    I remember playing that on my Mega Drive. I also remember it being really hard.

  • SpaceMidget75 Verified Senior Software Developer, Minerva Computer Services #18 4 years ago

    @Darren

    I agree but I really think mostly they're all as bad as each other. As for Wii Fit:

    Yourself Fitness
    Eyetoy Kinetic

    Just showing how hard it is. ;)

    @jamie

    That game was awesome in two player. Still play it now on an emulator. Trying to figure it out when it was all in Japanese took me and my mate the best part of a day!

  • CreepinJesus #19 4 years ago

    Wasn't that 1 vs 100 thing on the lottery programme?

  • Beek4257 #20 4 years ago

    He should have just let go of the whole "innovate" thing and should have opted for "enhance", or at least trying to do so.
    Not that any of these VP guys are known for being subtle.

  • DSKUK #21 4 years ago

    All of the big three steal ideas and evolve them. The thing that MS seems to do is standardize them across their platform. Voice chat and messaging had been done in previous PC games, but MS made it compulsory to support it in all LIVE multiplayer games. Acheivements/goals had been done in a game here and there, but MS decided to make them compulsory across all games. I don't remember an uproar like this when PS3 added custom soundtracks, trophies and in game XMB by pushing the PS button on the controller.

  • darc #22 4 years ago

    I look at my Wii, and I look at my XBox360 (and then I blow the dust off my Wii so's to get a better look) and I begin to wonder whether "innovation" is always such a good thing.
    Edited by 1 at 23/07/08 @ 14:12

  • DFawkes #23 4 years ago

    Of course they aren't innovative, but it doesn't matter in the slightest if they're good fun! Scene It is fun, Lips will most likely be fun, Halo 3 was fun, and so on. Don't worry about innovation, just make sure sequels are good and rip-offs steal the good bits.