Gadgetory

now Microsoft in need of a miracle this holiday season to get that stock going so far this year microsoft shares are down more than ten percent apples are up more than fifty percent or just about this thursday microsoft will unveil the highly anticipated connect gaming system buzz in the gaming world as many predicting connect could be the hot holiday item will connect be enough to move the needle for microsoft shares and turn around the reputation of Mister Softee joining us technobuffalo editor jon rettinger and Walter Pritchard city software analyst you have both played the game and I saw Steve Ballmer play the game with Tom Friedman it's a long story but it was sort of amazing to watch it so let me ask you jon rettinger what is your take is this really going to amaze and put people leave people in awe you know when you first look at it and you see someone play and you see them moving their hands around it looks a little gimmicky having seen connect and played with kinect it actually is as advertised it tracks your skeletal movement and it works amazingly well and i think it's a new paradigm shift for how we interact nachos with game consoles bauer eventually can interact with our televisions and computers alright what's your take Walter as a tech analyst do you think it's it's pretty neat yeah I think I mean I've played it the probably not as long as he's played with it I think it's I think it's pretty neat i think it's you know it sort of gives second life to to a game platform the xbox 360 is done pretty well over the last few years so i think from a from an investor perspective naked you know keeps the company relevant in a market that you know arguably will be much more important in the future of something connected to the TV where they don't have a position today and we're watching it right now John you know you see the guy were now the woman and she's moving and then the character behind her moves and it really does literally pick up if you stop or you're bored or anything it picks it picks all of that up in your opinion John how does this compare to the wii and the wii fit completely blows it away and this extends far past just gaming certainly moving the controller round at their hands is really kind of interesting but also controls how you interact with the xbox so you can play your video content by saying Xbox play so there's a lot more that it goes beyond just a movement it really is a lot of fun people are going to have to go out there and really try it and it is just an add-on for the existing xbox 360 if anybody who has one will be able to get kinect it's not a completely new console all right so Walter will this move the needle for Microsoft I mean we know we're looking at maybe two and a half to three million of these sold certainly that's a way more than say PlayStation would get I mean is this going to be the thing that actually juices microsoft shares now I think if you're looking at it from a numbers perspective there's there's really very little impact I mean it's this division control contributes say eight million eight billion in revenue over the course of the year here I think though from a longer-term perspective I think this is a company who's been pegged with a reputation for not being able to innovate and I think you know if this product is indeed successful and and and and sells well in the market I think I think they can help somewhat shed that reputation so I think it's all sort of a longer-term intangible positive in that respect and and John you're the kind of guy who's going to set that reputation people like you out blogging who are always blogging about sexy products like iPhones and not about Microsoft do you think that this will change that absolutely i think it's going to do wonders to changes perception about Microsoft and people go out there and actually see it and they see this in their friends house and they see the news media actually playing its give me one of those things that you really have to experience and go out there and try for yourself and there's a lot of synergy between the xbox platform and the Windows operating system so there's sort of a lot of interest for how this is going to affect the next generation with those operating system as well I think Microsoft definitely has a winner on their hand all right Walter you got the vote of the guys who are gonna make the call on that do you think it's going to end up being worth it from Microsoft to spend what we've seen is potentially five hundred million dollars in marketing by Christmas yeah I think I mean I think they sunk a lot of costs into Xbox those are those are years behind them at this point now they're generating profits I think I think anything incremental like this is definitely worth it and you know the returns are at this point positive okay well gentlemen thanks very much we appreciate it you I'm where jon rettinger Steve Ballmer is giving you a big pat in the back but just made that guy's day all right