Star Wars fans, prepare to connect with The Force in a kinectic way. On Monday, Microsoft Studios and LucasArts will formally announce the first Star Wars video game for Kinect, Microsoft’s hands-free, your-body-is-the-controller playing experience for the Xbox 360.

Simply called Kinect Star Wars, the game is intended for all ages and will hit stores this winter. Microsoft will preview the game this at E3 (aka the Electronic Entertainment Expo), the video game industry’s annual confab at the Los Angeles Convention Center. Check out the trailer for  a peek at the game and the gameplay:

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MzU_jXLQeKw

Kinect has turned out to be a big success for Microsoft, and Monday’s news that the company is planning to officially bring the technology to Windows users marks an important step in Kinect’s progress as a platform for new types of software and gesture-based user interfaces.

That said, if you take a look back, it’s not like we didn’t see this coming.
Even so, Kinect has turned out to be more successful than Microsoft originally imagined, with sales that dramatically beat estimates. It’s also helped reform the image of the software giant from a company that’s overly protective of its creations to one that’s paying attention to what people do with a product once it’s been launched–even if those uses fall outside the original intent.