While we all no doubt enjoyed GiantBomb’s heroic and rigorous battle with the Electronic Three, one could be forgiven for coming away with something of a mixed impression of the this year’s intended show stopper: Motion Control.    

It’s fair to say that if this really is the new frontier, it’s a future landscape populated by uncertain and shaky promise.

Despite having set the wheels in, well….motion, Nintendo seems destined to only a marginal degree of relevance thanks an overly iterative software lineup. Sony’s Move enjoys an interesting, if a little confused, appeal to both the mainstream audience and the hitherto impenetrable hardcore; Its clear however that software will make or break the device’s success.

Perhaps the most intriguing of the bunch, is Microsoft’s Kinect. The controller free interface provides the closest realization of the exciting future of the technology on the whole, something akin to the holodecks of the far flung future. It’s a shame then, that Kinect’s middling display of E3 demo titles showcased the technologies mix of fidelity issues and difficult to realize potential.

Nonetheless, It’s Kinect in particular that offers the most compelling microcosm for the trials and tribulations that threaten the success of the Motion control platform on the whole.

Scanning the media response to the unveiling of Kinect’s legitimate software lineup, the impression is relatively clear: While unique, these games aren’t quite the breathtaking leap into the future of control that we might have let ourselves imagine. Titles like Kinectimals, Kinect Adventures and Kinect Sports showcase an interesting mix of the promise of the technology; coupled with its limitations.

But here’s the fancy microcosm part – there’s an exciting, if somewhat surprising, silver lining. A glimmer of that potential we’ve all been crossing our fingers for.

Harmonix’s Dance Central highlights the ongoing importance of intuitive and tactful intergration of control interfaces with gameplay. Simply put, it doesn’t matter if you’re calibrating a gamepad or a futuristic motion sensing device, the end gameplay results needs to be satisfying and fun.

Dance Central owes its strikingly positive reaction to its clever employment of motion sensing; rather than tracking the entire body and trying to replace familiar gaming mechanics with tiresome 1:1 movements (like shooting or jumping), it instead looks for broad gestures. Without being tied down by cumbersome on screen 1:1 avatar modeling, Dance Central instantly allows itself to couple a learner friendly approach with a fluent and slick visual style.

Indeed, the games reception hints at the wisdom of incrementally introducing motion tracking to players, rather than throwing them in the deep end with (supposedly) 1:1 motion tracking and glitchy, unproved and unfamiliar technology.

It’s no coincidence that people have unanimously greeted the impending ‘motion explosion’ with little more than cold reluctance. Games simply play well with a gamepad. Hopefully, developers can latch on to the notion of tactful and intuitive intergration of the technology sooner, rather than later. It seems insane to produce titles that rely entirely on a new and unfamiliar technology, rather, it seems a better approach to intergrate that technology in ways that enhance existing paradigms of gameplay.

Imagine directing your squad around with legitimate hand signals (or wand movements), all the while retaining the fidelity and comfort of gamepad control for the essentials like aiming and movement. Think of the obvious appeal of a concept like well executed head tracking in your next car racing sim, or being able to literally look around the cockpit of your next X-Wing flight.

There’s no question that there’s   promise in the tech, and (thanks to the Wii) there’s no question that there’s an audience out there willing to embrace the idea. The real question is just how developers are going to execute it. Indeed, there’s really only one clear conclusion from our tussle with the Electronic Three this year; Its either going to be a genuinely exciting paradigm shift for the industry, or its going to be sloppy and short lived money making exercise.

Time will tell.