We've had the Kinect for a week now and we're more impressed than we expected to be with this $150 motion-control sensor/camera peripheral for the Xbox 360.
Here are some things you should know if you're thinking of picking one up:
- Space matters. You will need 7-8 feet of unobstructed space between you and the Kinect to play most games. With a few games, you can scrape by with about 6 feet. We increased the distance in our narrow living room to about 6.5 feet by placing the sensor up high on a shelf suspended between two IKEA cabinets that hangs over our TV. But even then, we had to slide the cabinets and shelf as far back as possible so now it's difficult to squeeze behind the TV if wiring needs to be adjusted. We're also considering adding some plastic sliders to the bottom of our sofa so it can be slid off to the side, giving us the extra 2-3 feet needed for some games, like Kinect Adventures. It's a shame this is the pack-in game, only because people who have small living rooms and only get this game will return their Kinects to the store, while others (such as Dance Central, Kinectimals and Kinect Sports) work reasonably well around the 6-foot range.
- Light matters too. If you find the sensor is not picking up your movements, you either need to move back or add more light. We have two lamps in our living room and if we forget to turn one on, it makes a difference.
- Keep clear of furniture and other obstacles. Our coffee table rolls, which makes it relatively easy to move off to the side for Kinect play and then return to a useful position during TV time. Even then, I did kick it once while playing a game that required me to hit a ball with my foot as it bounced to the left edge of the screen. Fortunately, I didn't hit it hard and have since moved the table a bit further away. Some guy has already destroyed his TV by smacking the pull cord on a low-hanging fan into it while playing Kinect Sports volleyball. Be careful out there!
- Wave and talk. To access the Kinect Hub, which is a sort of dashboard replacement optimized for the sensor, you wave your hand back and forth once the Kinect has fully started up. Once it acknowledges your wave, it will attempt to recognize you and sign in to your gamertag and Xbox Live. This only works if you've trained it using Kinect ID to know what you look like. There's also a Kinect Tuner to help if you're having problems; there this weird card with a face on it included with most games to help with that. Once you have it up and running, you can say "Xbox" to see a list of available commands and then say the command you want for voice control.
- Beyond gaming. Two compelling uses for Kinect beyond games are the video chat and room-to-room in-game chat. It can also be used to control movies, allowing you to pause ("Xbox Pause") and resume ("Xbox Play") a film with your voice as you run off to the kitchen or to check on a napping toddler. Alas, Netflix is not Kinect-enabled.
The Games
We picked up a few titles at launch. Here are our impressions:
Kinectimals. This is our family's overall favorite launch title. Despite it's "kitty-fied" appearance, this is a game is much deeper than it looks. You pick a wild feline to accompany you on your journey around an island paradise, you play movement games with it (or, often enough, your pet just watches or tries to "help" by knocking over some of your targets for you). You earn points by teaching your pet tricks and playing games to unlock new areas, challenges, activities and rewards.
You can actually get a good workout with some of the games, volleying balls with your pet. You also can drive RC vehicles - including an unlockable Halo Warthog and other surprises.
Kinect Sports. You don't think "sports" when you hear the name Rare (known for Banjo-Kazooie, Viva Pinata and, back in the day, GoldenEye: 007), but this game is packed with fun activities even if you're not much of a sports fan.
There's bowling, which feels much more natural than bowling did on the Wii, soccer (both the mini-games and main event are a blast), boxing, volleyball, table tennis and collection of track and field events including discus and hurdles.
I had a blast and started experiencing a light buzz similar to a "runner's high" after each session.
Dance Central. This is the game we've spent the least amount of time with for a variety of reasons. My excuse? I have no "moves" and I am terrible at any form of coordinated real-world dancing, so I'll have to invest much time in the game's "break it down" mode trying to learn them. You can hear GrrlGotGame playing this game during the Kinect Tour preview (MP3).
We also have the full track listing and there's already DLC (priced at $3 to the new dance moves for each track). We'll have a more in-depth look at this game soon. In the meantime, you can enter to win a copy from our site (closes 6 p.m. Wednesday, Nov. 17).
Kinect Adventures. We finally had to move the sofa out of the way to get enough clearance to play this title. The game claimed we had enough space to be squarely in the "Good" (but not "Great") zone, but then I'd start the first adventure and it would immediately lose all responsiveness. Those extra two feet make all of the difference.
This game is fun with more ball deflecting, white water rafting, a wooden roller coaster ride, a glass cube where you plug leaks with your hands and feet and their weird anti-gravity game where you pop bubbles by flapping your arms to float. As with all of the games so far, I enjoyed it and got a nice little workout playing - but it's not worth moving the sofa on a regular basis.
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