‘Xbox Game Room’ announcement leaks; Project Natal due this year

Microsoft has some announcements for CES tonight, however, when you hear them they won’t be so new. A leaked video interview (now taken down, although the WMV file is still live) with Robbie Bach, President of the Entertainment & Devices Division at Microsoft, confirms Natal’s launch this year as well as a new “Game Room” for Xbox 360.

“Well, Game Room in some ways is sort of a retro approach.” Back said in the video interview. “And it’s interesting, there’s a generation of people — sort of my advanced, mature age [laughs] — who grew up with a set of games like Centipede. They look almost like casual, fun games today — at the time they were high-end, edgy games — and so Game Room is the idea of bringing that back to the market. And bringing that to a very broad audience.”

“And I think what we’re gonna find is that when people can get 30 or more of these games, they’re gonna love it for the experience. And it’s not just you and I who are gonna love it, even the people who would call themselves “hardcore gamers” are gonna say “Oh wow this is fun!” In a retro way. It’s sort of like my daughter going to watch Journey. I’m like, this is a band that was playing when I was growing up. And she thinks it’s a cool band and I like the music. And I think you’re gonna have the same phenomenon with Game Room. We’re gonna enjoy the games and they’re gonna think it’s cool. I think that’s very powerful.”

Microsoft’s CES press conference is at 9:30 EST tonight. Looks like we’ll hear more then.

Thanks, JoyStiq.