No Kinect Voice Support For Mainland EU Until Spring

Sacré bleu! Microsoft have confirmed to Eurogamer Spain that Kinect’s snazzy voice recognition functionality will not be available on continental Europe until spring of next year. At launch, the device will only support British (UK) English, American English, Japanese and Mexican Spanish.

Bizarrely, even Canadians won’t be able to talk to their 360, any attempts to desperately seek comfort and compassion after a particularly brutal spat of name-calling on Halo 3 from their gigantic Wall-E companion completely out of the question. And don’t think just because you’re fluent in English and happen to live in an unsupported region you’ll be able to get around the restriction – the functionality is confirmed to be region-locked.

Strange days, as this also suggests that Australians, New Zealanders and Irish people will also have to wait until 2011 despite speaking English as their first language. Strewth/Jaysus! etc.

Microsoft also explained why, despite supporting “Mexican Spanish”, European Spanish people will have to wait. It’s all down to numbers, with the Latin-based variant spoken by nearly three times as many people as its Old World cousin.

Source: Eurogamer