Rare not worried about Kinect lag times

UK developer Rare has batted off fears that lag times on Xbox 360 add-on Kinect will be a problem.

"Lag is not an issue," Rare's executive producer of technology and communications, Richard Burton, told GamesIndustry.biz sister site Eurogamer.net.

"As with any prototype stuff, of course it was in the past. That's to be expected. Where we're at now, not at all. Yes, we've done a lot work to make sure it wasn't a problem, but when you've got something that's copying what you're doing you can't have a lot of lag."

Eurogamer's technology expert Digital Foundry observed that the officially-quoted 150 millisecond response time for Kinect Sports does not take into account extra lag caused in sending the 360's video signal to a television. Nonetheless, "it's very close to full 1:1 tracking."

Rare is a staunch supporter of Kinect, though Burton was keen to point out this does not mean that the studio has shifted to purely casual titles.

"There's so much more data, so much more fidelity, so many more things you can do," he said. "Kinect's not just about tracking - there's voice recognition, identity, so many things. It's more than the sum of its parts."

Kinect - and Kinect Sports - launches in November. The price of the motion-control system remains unconfirmed, though will be revealed in August and is rumoured to be between $150 and $190.