Is kinect worth it ?

theteal

Lord Spence wrote: »

has the voice commands been activated yet for Ireland?? just got a new TV so waiting to buy a TV mount in smyths only a tenner so not bad

http://www.toys.ie/KINECT-TV-MOUNT-!H16223-prod.aspx?qwSessionID=b3b4beab-d533-4507-b36c-08964ca5ef47

that looks interesting, only a tenner. the only problem with kinect is where we can put it, it battles with one of the 5.1 speakers for position at the base of the telly which i actually think is too close to the ground for it to work super accurately. the mount would be very handy

emmo16

Fingleberries wrote: »

Hi All,

This thread has gone a little quiet over the last two weeks. Is anyone still playing with their Kinect? I'm tempted to get it, but waiting to see if it'll fizzle out first (You see, I've been burned with buying new technology early before - I own a Sega Mega CD 32X! :pac:)

Are there any decent games on the horizon, or are we going to have to wait until E3 to get something new announced?

(Note: I've seen the list on Wikipedia, and that doesn't fill me with confidence. But, then again, it's Wikipedia so might not be the most accurate).

Thanks.

Unforuntly it has lost most of it's appeal for me. I'm not a kid and not into dancing games. None of the games out are very challenging or much fun on your own. Sort of like the wii. Froza looks like the only decent game coming out and who knows when star wars will be out.
It has been hacked on the pc to play some first person shooters that look cool. Check out kinecthacks.net Microsoft are going to be releasing official win7 drivers and sdk this summer.

wildefalcon

To get the voice control working you need to change the location to UK or US.

Seems to work ok, though I suspect that it will get better as time goes by.

I'm using the EA Active 2 package, as I need to get to get fitter, the years are starting to clock up!

I find it very good, the tracking is good, not 100% but most of the time it is very intuitive and just works.

The kids have the sports package and love it, its great for them and allows a much higher degree of skill than I would have thought possible.

I suspect that a FPS addict would find little of benefit in it, but as a way for whole families to enjoy the xbox, it is very, very good.

You do need to have more than 6 feet clear for it to work, and accept the slightly cheesy graphics, but I'd recommend it as a family entertainment option.

reddevilfan

docdolittle wrote: »

It did have a few issues picking up movement in two player for a few of us playing on Christmas. It's really good, the only problem is I'm a lazy bastard and I woke up in bits the next day, sore shoulder and everything Felt like I hit the gym the day before :pac:

I also agree, the kinect sports game i just rented from the vision is absolutely brilliant.... TBH i was not sure so the option to try before i buy was a good option....

I rented it out and my whole family had a great day on it.. even my 5 yr old niece...

The boxing catergory wre me right down and my body was in bits, but the table tennis and bowling are just brilliant 9/10

Jofspring

This has lost my attention for the last few weeks but that has mainly been because there has been no decent new games out for it in a while.

Ardennes1944

Jofspring wrote: »

This has lost my attention for the last few weeks but that has mainly been because there has been no decent new games out for it in a while.

in a while? more like ever

Branoic

I've got the PS Move too, and haven't played the Move since about a week after getting it. I'm regularly playing Kinect though. The dance game is a good laugh with the missus, and I'm actually getting a lot of use out of Your Shape, the tracking and features in that game are great.

Voice commands are cool too. It's like living in the future you just need to set your location to UK and sign out of Live, and they work great.

Fingleberries

Hmmm. Twisted Pixel are getting in on the Kinect act - they have a decent pedigree with Maw, 'Splosion Man and Comic Jumper - maybe the first sign of non-shovelware things to come?

Link: http://www.thegunstringer.com/

Fingleberries

I succumbed and went and bought one of these newfangled gadgets at the weekend (I have a bunch of vouchers and Game were doing an offer of €149 for Kinect, incl. Adventures and either Dance Central or Joyride). So, I went for the Dance Central pack and immediately traded in Dance Central for Kinect Sports - I knew I wouldn't like Dance Central, and after playing the demo I was right.

First impressions are really cool, the setup was painless enough. (I bought one of the Crown TV Mounts for Kinect and it just about works with my Philips TV with a little re-jigging - it might be a difficult fit for some TV's, but I wasn't willing to pay €49.99 for the official Microsoft TV Mount). I have an average-to-small size living room and the TV is angled in one corner. With the TV mount it gives plenty of play room - two player might be a bit of a squeeze - but I have been able to play all games so far.

My first thoughts on the games I've played so far:

Kinect Adventures - a good demo for the hardware (We really liked the fish tank game where you're trying to plug leaks), overall good fun but the 'Story' mode has people that have too much caffeine or sugar in their system.

Dr. Kawashima's Brain and Body Exercises - a good game, fun to play with someone else. I can see it being a short term thing (like the Brain Training on the DS), but it's fun to try to compete against the family to see who can get the best score.

Kinect Sports - Definitely the pick of the bunch, the games are really fun and you can see some thought went into using Kinect to it's fullest. Little touches like the Intro Films that you see your avatar on the start line, or posing for the team photo in Footy. The fact the avatar is doing exactly what you are doing genuinely brings a smile almost every time. The other things are what I call 'Entrapment' - like when you get a smash in Table Tennis, a goal in the Footy, or a Strike - they play a catchy few bars of a song (Blur's Song 2, etc.) that are deliberately to get you to celebrate and they show you the captured video in your highlight reel just to make you laugh. It really works. All the games are good, some have hidden depth (Table Tennis, for example, allows you to move all around the table and even hide the ball you're about to serve). Also, the mini games are great fun and you can really work up a sweat playing it.


Overall, I'd have to say that my first impressions are incredibly positive and I'm happy with my purchase (particularly since I didn't pay full price myself). Like everyone else, I'd still be waiting for a few more games to come out on the system. But I've got a few to keep me going until then - and E3 is only a few months away, I'm sure that it won't be light on announcements... Hopefully.

Jo Satan

The first rail shooter I've seen for kinect

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WWMjOkt6_Nw&feature=player_embedded

Fingleberries

Here's the trailer for that Rails shooter - Heavy Fire Afghanistan

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eJDstfPTnTI

It's a bit SuperScope-y, I think - but that might be what we're looking at for a while. The next wave of Kinect titles to replace all the Dance / Sport mini-game compilations because they can be relatively easily done and are 'Hardcore' because you shoot and things explode, etc.

If only some of the ingenuity of the PC Kinect 'hacks' could be harnessed for games, it would be truly great.

thorbarry

Fingleberries wrote: »

Here's the trailer for that Rails shooter - Heavy Fire Afghanistan

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eJDstfPTnTI

It's a bit SuperScope-y, I think - but that might be what we're looking at for a while. The next wave of Kinect titles to replace all the Dance / Sport mini-game compilations because they can be relatively easily done and are 'Hardcore' because you shoot and things explode, etc.

If only some of the ingenuity of the PC Kinect 'hacks' could be harnessed for games, it would be truly great.

That looks terrible. I bet the makers know this and are hoping the controversial subject matter will be picked up by the media.

Fingleberries

So ... E3 has been and gone. Is anyone looking to dust off their Kinect one more time.

A rough list of the announcements are:

• Dance Central 2
• Disneyland Adventures
• Fable: The Journey
• Fifa 12
• Forza 4
• Fruit Ninja
• Ghost Recon Future Soldier (and all future Tom Clancy titles)
• Kinect Sports 2
• Madden 12
• Mass Effect 3
• Ryse
• Sesame Street: Once Upon a Monster
• Tiger Woods 12
  
  ...
  In Addition to the already annouced games:
• Child of Eden
• Codename D (Working Title)
• The Gunstringer
• Project Draco (Working Title)
• Rise of Nightmares
• Powerup Heroes
• Steel Battalion
• UFC Trainer
  
  ...
• Kinect Fun Labs
• Voice control for those outside US / UK.
• Bing Voice Search
• Full UI / Kinect integration.
  
  ...
  Not to forget (no matter how hard we might try)
• Star Wards Kinect - although this one looks like making me want to hide the Kinect for shame. An absolutely dreadful looking game.

There seem to be at least a decent quantity of games coming for Kinect, or that are augmented with Kinect functionality (á la ME3). Let's see how well they turn out... What do you all think?

Edit: Slight Caveat - EA Sports said that FIFA, Madden and Tiger Woods will contain Kinect features, they didn't say that they will specifically be included in the '12 versions. One would presume that the '12 versions are the ones they are talking about - to avoid being gazumped being first to the market, however.

Thecageyone

Add Ryse to the list, that's the one that grabbed my attention at E3:

http://www.gamespot.com/xbox360/action/ryse/index.html?tag=result%3Btitle%3B0