I'm Watching You!
A lot has been made over the past several months about “Motion Controlled Gaming”. Time for me to give my opinion on the whole Kinect deal. This is all about the Kinect and the technology behind it. I will post game reviews later and separately. For now this is just about how well the system works.
It all started back when the Wii was announced and showed the world that you could use hand held remotes to control on screen avatars. People loved being able to go bowling with their friends and never leave the comfort of their living rooms. However as time passed the novelty was quickly turned into a gimmick that everyone wanted a piece of. Shovel-ware packed the shelves full of games that had horrible motion controls shoehorned into the game. Consumers that didn’t know better were tricked into buying sub-sub-par games on the notion that it had some form of motion controls in it. The unfortunate victim here were the end users that had these games thrown at them and wanted nothing to do with them.
Sony was the first to make an attempt to capitalize on the Motion phenomenon by throwing together their “Sixaxis” controller. Unfortunately for them it was to early for the “hardcore” gamer to care at all about motion control. That coupled with the fact they “couldn’t put in rumble” was pretty much when Sony decided they needed to rethink things. Microsoft on the other hand, decided not to show their cards and hung back watching Sony try and fail to capture a new gaming market. Sony did all but abandon the motion notion by re-introducing rumble back into their controller with the Dual Shock 3 and severely limiting the amount of motion controlled features in games. A wise move on their part.
Flash forward a couple years to E3 2009. Sony and Microsoft both deem this the year that they will announce a TRUE form of motion control. Though at the time they were little more than “tech demos” both camps revealed their respective new peripherals. Sony announced the “Playstation Move” which in all honesty was little more than a higher fidelity version of the existing technology used for the Nintendo Wii. Microsoft, however decided to go a different route. They announced their project “Natal” (later to be finalized as the Kinect). This was all together different from the previous versions of proposed “motion controllers” because there simply were no controllers. The player is the controller.
Skip ahead to E3 2010, where project “Natal” now named “Kinect” is showed off in it’s almost finished state, as well as a LARGE stable of games to drop along side it. People that were quick to write off the addition of motion control to an existing 360 system were all of a sudden falling in love with games like Kinectimals and Dance Central. The hype train had officially hit full speed.
While the Playstation Move did quite well to show off what it could do with existing games as well as games for the future, it was basically things that we had all seen before. Kinect on the other hand was something of an enigma to those watching the E3 goings on from home. It’s one thing to hear about a game or a system from others, but until you get to experience it for yourself it doesn’t mean anything.
I was very skeptical in the beginning. Even with all that I had seen from E3, read in magazines and on the internet, I just couldn’t believe that this would be anything more than a gimmick. Something that would amaze people for a couple weeks then fizzle out and be gone as quickly as it came. Sure I put my money down on Kinect, but it was more of a “wait and see don’t get caught empty handed” kind of thing. Even upon purchasing the system I left it in the box until I saw people that I trusted playing it, and giving their frank and uncensored reviews of it. Those reviews were enough and I quickly became sucked in by what I was seeing.
Setting up my kinect for the first time was a breeze. I have heard of people having issues with the system and it taking them forever to get it going but honestly I think a lot of that has to do with the user. The interface makes itself pretty clear on what you need to be doing and when. If you plan on playing it a lot I highly suggest setting up your “Kinect ID”. This simply means that whenever you step into the cameras view it will do a quick facial scan and then sign you in automatically. In other words, the facial recognition technology works, and actually works quite well. Wearing a hat, it still knew who I was. Even now that I am growing a beard it still knows me and will sign me in.
I made this...
Some of the game interfaces work faster and better than others. Kinect Adventures and Dance Central (the only two I own) for instance have very different ways of interacting with the menus. Sure both still use your hands to select items and make your way around the menus but in different ways. Adventures has you hover you hand over whatever item you wish to select. It works, but it takes a bit more time. Dance Central on the other hand (no pun intended) has you simply swipe the screen over what ever you want to select. It works much faster and has more of that “Minority Report” feel to it.
Playing a game is really subject to the User Interface. It varies between titles, and is something that I will get into when I review each individual title down the road. However, I will say this; It works 90% of the time. There are certain times when the on screen characters limbs will wig out a bit (BAM!) but generally speaking it maps well. The biggest issue that some players have and will have is the amount of room really needed to play the games correctly. You need about 6 ft from your TV for single players and about 9ft for two players. For me, this isn’t an issue. I actually have plenty of space thanks to the way my “play space” is set up in my house. For some though they will have an issue. Gripe all you want but if you don’t have the room, don’t buy the product. You wouldn’t buy an oversized Mac truck and try and park it in a single car garage and then complain to Mac for the size of their truck would you? The same thing applies here. Do your research, take measurements if you have to, but if you can’t make the room, don’t complain about it, it’s not Microsoft’s fault.
Pausing the action or getting back to the Dashboard are both accomplished by simply holding your left arm at a 45degree angle at your side. Yeah it looks kinda dopey but in reality, with out using a controller (they don’t even have to be on anymore) how else would you do it? This will pop you back to a simplified version of the same menu you seen when you hit the guide button on your standard controller. Hover over whatever it is you wish to accomplish (Achievements, Kinect Dash, Friends, etc.) and you will be taken there.
The voice recognition is a bit spotty. Granted I have only used it for the express purpose of navigating the 360’s dashboard so I can’t speak for any in game interactions. The simple rule for menu use is “If you see it, you can speak it”. Meaning that once you say “Xbox” a few terms will pop up at the bottom of the screen or you can say whatever happens to be in the guide on screen (Play “game X”, ESPN, Sign In, etc.) after a couple seconds the system will do exactly what you wish.
Parties will be what draws a lot of folks to this system. The simple ease of being able to step into the camera’s range of view and immediately start playing is awesome. My 18 month old son accidentally got me two achievements this weekend simply by walking on screen while i was playing. The party potential for Kinect is immense. Imagine if they can hook this into a newer style of rock band (Harmonix did do dance central) and grade your stage performance as well as your prowess with a guitar or drums.
Yeah the long term will be the true test here. However if games actually innovate on the hardware it has potential to stick. The Wii really was a one trick pony… waggle waggle waggle. However with the Kinect camera literally seeing the player differently and being able to track your entire body (to a point) it has the potential to do more. Case in point Dance Central. You could have this game on the Wii or play it with the playstation move sure, but it wouldn’t be as accurate. The only thing it can track is hand movement. With Kinect however, it tracks each body part and gives you immediate feedback when you aren’t doing a certain dance move incorrectly. This kind of 1:1 fidelity also lends itself well to work out games. As I have said somewhere else, where I can’t be motivated to do a simple work out routine daily on my own, Dance Central and Adventures have already got me playing daily and sweating. Not to mention that if you offer people rewards for doing something (a.k.a. achievements) you will get many more people to participate in the process.
I know that the future is still kinda blurry with this thing, however the potential for greatness is there. That is why I picked one up. . . Well that and the fact that I don’t want to have to fight a 90yr old grandma of 12 on black Friday for one.
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