Home Gaming Kinect Launch – The Good, The Bad and The Ugly

Kinect Launch – The Good, The Bad and The Ugly

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Kinect - Project Natal

So we’ve just got back from the Kinect launch (and a beer) and it’s time to post up some feelings. The launch itself had a lot to show us and nothing seems to fit it better than doing a The Good, The Bad and The Ugly.

As always lets start with

The Good

As expected the reveal was a huge spectacle with a ton of people, bright lights, cameras and some decent looking titles coming down the line from the Project Natal team.

The best of the bunch, or the ones I expect to sell by the bucketload are

Yoga

It was no surprise that a fitness game of some sort was revealed but I have to admit that the fact that Kinect can track your entire body and ensure your arms and legs are in the correct position really makes this game a must have for every bored (or active) housewife on the planet.

Stupid Platform Game

They didn’t announce a name for this one but it’s basically you on a platform and you need to jump to make it move faster and then icons of some sort appear in front and you need to bend your body in that shape to get all the icons. Sort of like Human Tetris.

Joy Ride

Arcade styled racer where up to 2 (that we saw) people can race against each other and pull of awesome stunts by flicking their body as they go.

Star Wars

Light sabres, using the force to move large objects or multiple enemies and speed bursts… all done by motion control. The crowd went wild.

Along with the games we were also shown video conference calling, photo sharing and multimedia controls using hand gestures.

The Bad

The bad can be summed up in two neat parts, the first being that no one at the event was given any hands on time with Kinect. There wasn’t a single booth or public area that we could use to even see if works at all.

The second follows on from the first and makes it even more worrying, the show was pretty much a canned show. They had actors up pretending they were using Kinect but if you watched carefully you could see that they were purely mimicking the actions and the show was just going to play no matter what happened.

It went fine and was mostly in time, though it was disturbing to see that they had added in glitches to the movement to possibly make you think it was being played in real time?

The Ugly

Oddly enough the ugly in my opinion was all down to Cirque De Soleil. They kept us entertained while we waited, which ended up being around 90 minutes. But apart from being an odd side show I never felt intrigued by what they were showing.

I read previously that the idea put forward by Cirque De Soleil was to lead us on a journey of how gaming and entertainment had changed over 3 vitals steps up until where we are today. But I seriously didn’t get that feeling when watching the show.

The other ugly is the fact that not a single soul stood up and said anything to us live, it was an entirely planned show from beginning to end and very little apart from the new name and dodgy logo was revealed.

We have no idea on an exact release date or price yet or whether it will be bundled with the Xbox 360 or not.

Conclusion

What I did see I generally thought was really good, if Kinect actually works I expect it to sell by the bucketload and be a great success.

And whether it works or not we should be able to tell you tomorrow.

Last Updated: June 14, 2010

19 Comments

  1. ReAVeR

    June 14, 2010 at 09:22

    Motion controlled Star Wars?…. Sold!

    Reply

  2. RSA-Ace

    June 14, 2010 at 09:27

    “They had actors up pretending they were using Kinect but if you watched carefully you could see that they were purely mimicking the actions and the show was just going to play no matter what happened.”

    That really is scary. Also I saw some pictures of people with white robes (what was that about?).

    I’m still going to say that Kinect 2 will be a revolution. Kinect 1 not so much. I think MS might have bit off a bit more than they can chew. But I’m still willing to wait and see.

    Reply

  3. Fox1

    June 14, 2010 at 09:36

    Double sold!

    Reply

  4. Fox1

    June 14, 2010 at 09:37

    Lets wait for the main conference and see.

    Reply

  5. Fox1

    June 14, 2010 at 09:41

  6. Nick de Bruyne

    June 14, 2010 at 09:44

    The robes had giant shoulder pads in them that lit up via a remote. and They used us as elements in the show, making the whole place glow different colours and so on. Also, they were ponchos

    Reply

  7. Dark

    June 14, 2010 at 09:53

    yeap thats hollywood for you. it happens a lot at E3 Im afraid 🙂

    Reply

  8. eltonriley

    June 14, 2010 at 10:28

    Sounds like the entire Kinect show was a sham. :pinch:

    Reply

  9. RSA-Ace

    June 14, 2010 at 10:59

    Yeah definitely. I think I’m even more intrigued now.

    I mean if they weren’t able to show Kinetic ‘live’ in an event which media weren’t allowed to live blog then what are they going to do tonight?

    Exciting stuff! I think the big news for MS will be the Xbox 360 slim.

    Reply

  10. lans

    June 14, 2010 at 11:12

    lololololololololol

    MS fails!!!
    Sonys gonna knock this e3 out the wazoo!!!!

    Kinetic??? scripted events, sounds worse than the wii, at least nintendo dont really give a rats butt about the hardcore coz they know we gonna rip em like were doin kinetic!!!!!!

    they should not have changed the name! project natal= positive buzz. Kinetic= lolololololololololololo!!!!!

    Reply

  11. SojournZA

    June 14, 2010 at 11:26

    Spot the fanboi?

    Nothing is set in stone an the chirps start, lol
    no offence Ians but relax dude :pirate:

    Reply

  12. Fox1

    June 14, 2010 at 11:26

    Why live blog a scripted event… lol

    Reply

  13. Fox1

    June 14, 2010 at 12:16

    @Nick. Sounds cool

    Reply

  14. WitWolfyZA

    June 14, 2010 at 12:21

    hmmmm… yet smoke and mirrors again?! …. Sounds like Milo all over again…

    Reply

  15. AC!D

    June 14, 2010 at 13:04

    I cant say im impressed. I thought it would be disappointing but not as bad as this. The reaction around the net seems to cautious with it looked ok or OMG they are using the media and millions of dollars to sell the public a sham. WOW talk about WTF reactions!

    Reply

  16. Geoffrey Tim

    June 14, 2010 at 13:09

    I can’t say I’m particularly impressed by anything revealed at the Natal/Kinect event – and even less impressed by the way it was scripted with actors and not a real-time demonstration.

    We’ll have to see what happens at their actual E3 conference – but my interest and confidence in Natal is diminishing. Rapidly.

    Reply

  17. KilzoneGeneralStrife

    June 14, 2010 at 17:09

    Well with the removal of the onboard chips and what not..its forced to use the 360’s processing power..pity..doubt a game like Milo can exist in the state they showed it in… .wait..that was also proven as a smoke n’ mirrors sham

    Reply

  18. Bertie

    June 19, 2010 at 22:06

    WOW I AM SO GONNA BUY THIS I PREORDERED IT TODAY LOL

    Reply

  19. Bertie

    June 19, 2010 at 22:06

    :angel: :alien: :alien: :angel: :wassat: :wassat: :pirate: 😉 :unsure: :tongue: 🙂 :wub: :heart: :biggrin: :biggrin: :whistle: :sleeping: :sleeping:

    Reply

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