The Kinect is dead. According to a recent report, Microsoft has officially stopped manufacturing the Xbox accessory.

Kinect has been on its last leg for a few years now, so it’s easy to forget that the device was actually a blistering success when it first launched.  It was the fastest-selling consumer product in 2011 and has sold approximately 35 million units since its debut, with a large portions of the sales coming in 2011 and 2012. 

Unfortunately for Microsoft, those early sales figures just weren’t sustainable. The Kinect ended up being more of a novelty than anything else. Gamers turned away from the device for a myriad of reasons and developers followed suit. The Kinect’s life wasn’t a waste though. It was the gaming world’s first major introduction to the capabilities of a depth camera.

Although the Kinect as a device is no more, it’s legacy will live on through Microsoft’s other technologies. The Kinect’s core sensor powers the Hololens and many of its other technologies helped to create Cortana, Windows facial recognition and more. 

By today’s standards, the Kinect doesn’t seem too impressive. But when it debuted in 2010, Siri and all the other legitimate voice assistants hadn’t even been brought to market yet. Its 3D tracking system was state of the art at the time and it was ultimately the start of the depth sensing revolution we find ourselves in now.

Things like the iPhone X facial recognition camera and the Vive’s postion scanning technologies just wouldn’t be a reality if not for the Kinect. The device may have moderately failed as a gaming peripheral, but it succeeded as an inspiration for bigger and better things.