The Microsoft Kinect has been a bit of a laughing stock since it first launched. There weren’t many games that supported it, apart from voice commands, and those that did suffered from a variety of issues that made using a Kinect more of a detriment than a boost to gaming. People rolled their eyes when the Kinect was packaged with the Xbox One with launch and was planned to be required to be connected for the system to work. That was dialed back to the point where the Kinect was no longer sold with the Xbox One.

This week, Microsoft unveiled the second iteration of the Xbox One console, the Xbox One S. The Kinect has fallen so far down Microsoft’s priority list that the One S will require a special adaptor to plug the Kinect into the console.

For their part, Microsoft’s Matt Lapsen said that the removal of the Kinect port was a conscious choice in order to make the One S as small as possible.

In order to make this up to Xbox One S and Kinect owners, Microsoft will provide free Kinect-to-USB adapters for those who want to hook up their Kinect to their One S. Even that comes with a catch, though. You need to own an Xbox One console, an Xbox One S console and a Kinect and submit a claim, which includes all three serial numbers, to Microsoft and they will send you an adapter. They also recommend having the One and Kinect registered to your Microsoft account so you may not be able to borrow a friend’s Xbox One’s serial number to minimize cost to you. Given the requirement to own two consoles and a Kinect to get the adapter, I’m not sure many people will take up Microsoft on this offer.

While the One S doesn’t come with built-in Kinect support, I wouldn’t be shocked if the Project Scorpio console has a Kinect port. With Sony using the PlayStation Camera to support PlayStation VR, Microsoft could very well use the Kinect as its camera for VR support. Of course, that’s all dependent on who they work with for VR and if they’d be willing to support Kinect as a camera.

The Xbox One S releases in August and will be priced at about the same price as Xbox One consoles currently.

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