IndieCade isn't just a huge celebration of independent game development, it's also a street festival designed to appeal to all types of people, not just those who enjoy traditional video games. Enter Night Games, a special IndieCade event featuring lots of big, physical games designed to be played in the dark. That includes everything from the rhythmic, Kinect-powered Soundodger Live to The Hearst Collection, a life-sized recreation of a museum art heist, complete with laser security grid.

Head past the break for a video rundown of our favorite Night Games, which turned out to be one of the highlights of the entire IndieCade festival.

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Microsoft has responded to questions raised by a recent Advertising Age report, which suggested that Xbox One users could offer up a "data treasure trove" for marketing and advertising purposes.

Microsoft Chief Marketing and Strategy Officer Yusuf Mehdi addressed the Xbox One's potential for targeted advertising during a speech at the Association of National Advertisers Masters of Marketing Conference last week. Mehdi hinted that the Xbox One's bundled Kinect peripheral could track living room activity in order to serve users better-targeted dashboard advertisements.

Responding to a request for comment from Eurogamer, a Microsoft representative linked to this forum post from Microsoft Director of Product Planning Albert Penello, regarding a previous marketing-focused interview. Penello assures that the company will not use the Kinect's player-tracking features to collect data for its previously outlined Natural User Interface Advertisements.

"[...] Someone was talking about how some of the new Xbox One Kinect features *could* be used in advertising - since we can see expressions, engagement, etc. and how that might be used to target advertising," Penello wrote. "This is the point that seems to draw some controversy."

Penello continued: "First - nobody is working on that. We have a lot more interesting and pressing things to dedicate time towards. [...] I'm not aware of any active work in this space. Second - if something like that ever happened, you can be sure it wouldn't happen without the user having control over it. Period."

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A recent Microsoft blog explored the technology behind the Xbox One's Kinect hardware and how "time-of-flight" is expected to be a significant improvement on the Xbox 360's version of Kinect. The tech "emits light signals and then measures how long it takes them to return," which Microsoft said needs to be "accurate to 1/10,000,000,000 of a second."

The blog included two videos, the first demonstrating how the Xbox One's Kinect uses time-of-flight to track the 3D orientation of players as well as calculate force exerted by different muscles. The second video, seen after the break, shows off the camera's infrared sensors and ability to pick up movement while players are in the dark.

Microsoft's blog described the development process behind the next-gen camera and how assistants from Microsoft Research had to overcome issues such as motion blur. Sunil Acharya, senior director of engineering for Microsoft's Architecture and Silicon Management team, said that "the time-of-flight camera uses global shutter, which has helped reduce motion blur significantly - from 65 milliseconds in the original Kinect to fewer than 14 milliseconds now."

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The new Kinect for Xbox One can pick up two people speaking at once and discern what each one is saying. Kinect Sports Rivals studio Rare sounded off on the sensor's features via a new video, as shown by Microsoft Corporate VP Phil Harrison to the audience at the Eurogamer Expo in London today.

"It can not only hear two people speaking at once and understand two people speaking at once," said New Technology Lead Developer Nick Burton, "It can also see if their mouths are moving in a completely dark room. And that allows us to do crazy levels of detail."

Included with every Xbox One, this Kinect is certainly a significant upgrade from its predecessor. The new sensor can detect 25 various joints for 6 different people, recognize which player is using which controller, estimate players' heart rates, map faces to 1,400 points, and tell you if you're too fat. Wait, one of those is the Balance Board... we bet the new Kinect can do that too, but we probably shouldn't give it any more ideas.

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Microsoft has been awarded $15 million in damages by a jury following a patent infringement lawsuit first filed by Motorola in 2010. Motorola spokesman William Moss said in a statement (via the Seattle Times) that the company was "disappointed" but is looking forward "to an appeal of the novel legal issues raised in this case."

Motorola Mobility claimed Microsoft had infringed upon five different patents in the original lawsuit, though four were eventually dismissed over the years. The fifth patent, which deals with peer-to-peer communication between two wireless devices, then became the focus of the case over the last few years.

The last year saw the most developments in the case, with ITC Judge David Shaw ruling in favor of Motorola in April of last year. Shaw then pushed for an Xbox import ban in the US the following month, only to have the ITC remand his decision and push it back to an administrative law judge for a second look. The suit then went through the process again, though Shaw ruled in Microsoft's favor the second time around.

Illumiroom isn't on its way to stores, bundled with Xbox One or otherwise, for fear the price tag would topple the shelves, Microsoft planning lead for Xbox One Albert Penello said at Gamescom, reported by Aus Gamers.

Illumiroom, an initiative from Microsoft Research, looks like a nifty piece of technology – it connects to a console, ideally an Xbox One, and projects over a player's room, surrounding the TV and expanding game effects on top of real-world objects. "I wouldn't expect you'll see that," Penello said. "It's very, very cool tech but it's, like, for a consumer, it requires projectors and things. It's really super-neat if you're in the lab and you've got Microsoft money and you could totally set up this awesome lab, but... we looked at it, but for an average customer it's, like, thousands of dollars."

When it was first revealed in January, Illumiroom was labeled "proof-of-concept." In April, Microsoft Research said Illumiroom was still in the prototype stage.

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The Xbox One's ability to listen to your sultry, sensuous voice and translate those mouth noises into a command to watch New Girl on Netflix will only function in five markets at launch. Specifically, those markets are the United States, Canada, United Kingdom, France and Germany. This means that Xbox Ones sold in Australia, Austria, Brazil, Ireland, Italy, Mexico, Spain and New Zealand will be without this functionality on launch.

The news was mentioned at the very bottom of this lengthy Xbox One overview on Xbox.com. No further information was given beyond the fact that "Xbox voice commands will not be available in all markets on the product release date," so exactly when voice commands will make it to the remaining launch markets is anyone's guess. Earlier this month, Microsoft scaled the Xbox One's launch from 21 to 13 territories, with later reports citing Kinect localization as the main reason for this delay.

Freefall Racers looks like most kart games, except that it uses Kinect's motion controls and features skydiving squirrels instead of go-karts. The nutty XBLA game is due sometime next month, according to this video from publisher Deep Silver.

This isn't the first we've heard of Freefall Racers. It popped up on our radar back in May, correctly rumored as being developed by Kinect specialist studio Smoking Gun Interactive. You may recognize the Vancouver dev from its work on Kinect games like Home Run Stars, Mars Rover Landing, and Doodle Jump.

The video doesn't go into too much detail, but it does reveal some of the game's power-ups including the zapper, smoke-screen, and shield. It also spills the beans on a local two-player mode, featuring some competitive split-screen plummeting.

We're waiting for a release date to drop, but a price floats into view: $9.99/£7.99/€9.99.

Update: Deep Silver chips in with a release date: September 6.

Just Dance Kids 2014 will launch on October 22, Ubisoft announced today. As the fourth game in the Just Dance Kids series, this year's version will include 30 songs ranging from One Direction's "One Thing" to the Fraggle Rock TV show's opening theme song. Ubisoft provided a partial list of songs included in the game, which can be found after the break if you are morbidly curious.

The game includes an Xbox 360-exclusive "Just Create" mode, in which players use Kinect to assemble music videos using their own choreographed moves. Just Dance Kids 2014 also features a Wii U-only Dance Director mode, which allows one player to select dance moves for other players to perform. The game will launch on Wii U, Wii, Xbox 360 and PS3.

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The Xbox One launch was delayed to 2014 in eight territories – Belgium, Denmark, Finland, Netherlands, Norway, Russia, Sweden and Switzerland – but it wasn't because of a "volume issue," Microsoft Senior Director of Product Management and Planning Albert Penello told OXM. The delay came down to localization with the new Kinect, the site reported.

"People assume there's a volume issue which in fact there isn't," Penello said. "You're actually seeing pre-orders pop back up now because we're able allocate the countries' volumes back in. It's there; the problem is localization. And once people see the system and how integral it is – it's not just text integration."

The new Kinect doesn't work like the Xbox 360 Kinect, and its new features make localization more difficult, Penello said.

"I think people are using the way [voice] works on Xbox 360, which was an accessory we built five years after release, as how it's going to work here," he said. "But it's so much more elegant and so much more integrated, and in many ways it's a lot faster and more convenient, whereas on Xbox 360 it's a lesser version of doing the thing you're used to doing on your controller."

The Xbox One will launch as scheduled this November in Australia, Austria, Brazil, Canada, France, Germany, Ireland, Italy, Mexico, Spain, the UK, the US and New Zealand.

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Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer will retire from his position at some point during the next 12 months, the company announced this morning. The timing of Ballmer's departure is dependent on the process of finding his replacement, which is currently ongoing. In the meantime, Ballmer will continue his duties as usual.

The search for Ballmer's replacement is being helmed by a special committee, which includes Chuck Noski, Stephen Luczo and good ol' Billy Gates. The committee is considering applicants from both inside and outside the company, which means that now is the perfect time to submit your resume. Microsoft's press release didn't give exact requirements for the position, but Ballmer graduated magna cum laude from Harvard so we're going to guess that at least some college is required. It also probably helps if you're familiar with Excel.

One of the big features in Ubisoft's Rocksmith 2014 is Session Mode. In essence, it turns your gaming console or computer into a virtual jam band that listens to and adapts to how you play. It's pretty amazing, and we'll be posting a more detailed preview as soon as we can. In the meantime, here's a little sneak peek: Session Mode can work with electric stringed instruments other than a guitar, even if it wasn't intentionally designed to.

Jokingly, I asked executive producer Nao Higo (pictured right) if I'd be able to plug in my electric ukulele. Imagine my surprise when he told me it would work. The interface on the screen would still reflect the frets and strings of a guitar (which are very different from a ukulele's), but Higo said the virtual band would still listen to my notes and play along appropriately. Creative director Paul Cross (pictured left) added that a member of the dev team has even managed to successfully test Session Mode with an electric violin.

Of course, you can't play the main game with instruments other than a guitar or bass – there go my hopes of becoming an electric sitar virtuoso – but the fact that other instruments work at all is remarkable. Now I just have to find out if I can outfit my virtual jam band with a trumpet and I'll be in business.