After forming initial impressions of Kinect whilst playing Dance Central, it was with a mild sense of excitement that I moved around to the rest of the Kinect offerings at the show. Microsoft were showing their three party game titles for the new controller; Joy Ride, Kinect Sports and Kinect Adventures, and there was again a reasonable crowd of Eurogamer Expo attendees. Kinect certainly knows how to draw a crowd.
Sadly I only got to try Joy Ride, I was alone and all of the games were set up for two player experiences; playing with the Microsoft rep on Joy Ride felt slightly like being paired with your teacher at school and wasn’t an experience I was keen to repeat.
If you remember back to last year’s E3, Joy Ride was announced as an XBLA title with no mention of motion controller support. Cut to this year’s E3 and the game has become a Kinect launch title. You steer by holding your hands straight out as if holding an invisible steering wheel, and then move your hands back to your chest or above your head to boost or perform tricks after a jump. There’s no need to worry about your speed as you have absolutely no control over it, you’re left to focus on navigating the course and using the available pick ups.
It takes a little while to get used to how Kinect and Joy Ride are interpreting your movements but once you do the game is pretty simple. It’s nowhere near as easy to pick up as Dance Central and you’ll almost certainly crash on your first lap or two. Once you realise you don’t seem to be able to turn particularly tightly, which will almost certainly limit the track design. However, it is reasonably responsive overall and once you’ve worked out where you need to be for Joy Ride to understand your turns the game works.
Sadly I can’t say the same from what I saw of people playing Kinect Sports and Adventures. Sports was being demoed with ping pong and it just didn’t seem to work. People were becoming frustrated with how their moves were being interpreted and it just didn’t look like they were having a lot of fun. Compared to Sports Champions it’s just not as easy to use or as intuitive.
Kinect Adventures actually looks the most like a traditional game and like it has the most potential for fun. Sadly it looks like it suffers from fairly significant lag issues, particularly whilst jumping but it does seem prevalent throughout the game. However, even with the lag people looked like they were enjoying themselves and I’m disappointed I didn’t try it out.
The main issue across all the Kinect games shown was menu navigation. As shown at E3 the first party games feature a system similar the Wii and PlayStation Move, an on-screen hand acts as a pointer, reacting to your movements. The hand seems to move at about half the speed of your actual hand, which is a little annoying, and you have to wait for a timer to complete when you hover over a button to select it. After watching a few dozen people try the system across the three first party titles most seemed to have issues, although personally it didn’t seem completely terrible.
Dance Central actually uses a very different system where you move your hand up and down to scroll through menu options and then swipe your hand across to select an option. This seemed a bit quicker and easier than Microsoft’s system, although a few people did still struggle with it.
Finally the actual technology itself. Basically it works, although not particularly well right now. People were able to switch in and out of games quickly and the camera quickly identified them, and seemed able to track multiple people at once. There was one issue where two people moved backwards instead of moving out of frame as new players stepped in. This seemed to confused the camera, although the audience behind them may have helped in the confusion.
You don’t need a huge amount of space to get it work but it’s not going to work in a small room. Whilst playing Dance Central it turned out I was too close to the camera, but I was maybe about two or three feet back. It looks like you need to be around five to six feet back solely because the camera need to get your whole body in frame. It’s hard to tell how well it will work in your living room, but with far less activity in the background some of the issues may lessen.
Overall Kinect has some potential but Microsoft don’t seem to be the ones capitalising on it. Dance Central was easily the best title on show, blowing the first party titles out of the water. The fitness games that are coming from Ubisoft and EA also look like they should be good, although they weren’t at the show. Right now I don’t see how it will slip into as many genres as the Wii or PlayStation Move but it still seems like fun. However, I won’t be buying it at release. Dance Central has shown me that the technology can be fun, but the price point is just to high for a few games that look interesting.
JokerSavage
I stopped reading fairly quickly, I didn’t see the point in Kinect when i learnt about it and thought then it’s simply a playstation eye with a little better tech\software. and now the software doesn’t live up! A racing game that you have no control over the speed, Not really interactive! The very first racing game (i played at least , Aged 33 now) could do left, right, faster and slower! Now you can’t.. Give this tech at this price a big miss, PS3 Move is a lot closer and i’m not getting that either! (at the moment, Killzone 3 my change that!!)
tonycawley
Good article, and it appears to be reported in an unbiased way. I’m very surprised that there are so many issues with Kinect, like the lag and it not recognising your actions sometimes. It’s been in development long enough, MS surely pay some of the best engineers there are, so it’s odd that it doesn’t work as it should. Still, MS being MS, they’ll market it brilliantly and it’ll sell massively. People will enjoy it for what it is, and all will be well. If only Sony had the same skill for marketting, Move would be much more popular now.
TSBonyman
You’re right, MS simply can’t afford for Kinect to fail, that would seriously dent their plans. Which is why they seem to be relying on PR stunts like the cirque de soleil and using celebrities, such as throwing a Kinect birthday party for that actor who plays Chuck.
ToastEggsBacon
So, let’s paraphrase.
It doesn’t work. Or rather, it just about works; but only on a handful of disposable third party dance and exercise games. Games that require precision simply don’t. There’s a racing game that doesn’t require you to control the speed and has limited ability to turn around corners.
But, that said, it does sort of work. Sort of, with a month to go, it barely works on a handful of games. And it sort of works, barely, with a handful of games, in an environment controlled and dictated to you by Microsoft, and yet even there you still had problems with the space requirements and the camera’s ability to read people’s motions.
I’m going to stick my neck out on this one. I genuinely have NO idea who in their right mind, and knowing information such as this, would walk into a shop between now and November and place an order for this to the tune of £130.
ico
Good point Toastetc but I feel as MS are trying to crack into the wii market a large majority of who this product is aimed at will not read / be aware of the specialist press so will just believe the hype and marketing and as tonycawley said it may well sell on the strength of this alone.
Raen
I’d sayI’d say that’s a bit too hatsh. The space requirement was my own fault with Dance Central, there was plenty of space to step back into I was just stupidly standing too close. And whilst the environment was set up by MS, it was busier and less controlled than a living would be with the first party games.
ToastEggsBacon
But that’s my point r.e space. You were playing in an environment controlled by MS and therefore had the room available to step back to 5 or 6 feet away. Taking furniture and other obstacles into account, how many people have got living rooms that can accompdate that sort of space. Currently I have a 360 in mine and my fiancees bedroom, and there’s nowhere near that sort of space available. It’d be a push in the front room..
This is by no means the first time I’ve read about issues with space from first hand user experiences. If Microsofts demonstration areas are anything like the make believe living rooms they use in their marketing materials, at least in terms of space, then that is totally out of sync with reality and how normal people live. I’d be interested to see how Kinect works post launch, when people who live in flats or your average 2-3 bedroom terrace, and not an Expo show floor, have had the chance to use it.
cc_star
That problem is hardly unique to Kinect though, Table Tennis requires a hell of a lot of room, and I’d imagine Kinect to require the same amount of room.
Also I don’t know how anyone could see their screen closer than 6ft, didn’t your mum tell you not to sit too close to the TV :p
stonyk
not owning a 360 I won’t be getting this, however am very interested in the space issue. I thought I owned quite a decent sized lounge and have a PS Move, however the space only JUST fits a Move in, and sometimes when I get too carried away my arm does go out of the camera’s view. I can see this being a massive issue with Kinnect. I’m probably about 5/6ft from the screen. I’m 5ft11 so this really will inhibit a lot of people.
Also, I have no idea how I’d fit 2 people in this space, let alone 1. Maybe 2 children?
djhsecondnature
The set up for Dance Central is as perfect as it’ll ever be as there were no people behind you.
djhsecondnature
Also I don’t understand how mental you all must be going whilst playing table tennis. I have pretty limited space with a sloped roof and manage fine…
dirtyhabit
Move can require space, depending on the game. I play table tennis, gladiator, archery and frisbee about 7ft From the screen, standing.
But tumble, FC and res5 etc can be played sitting. I find it a good mix, you can flail about like an idiot if you want, or chill like you would any other game, depending on what you fancy playing. Kinect only seems to have the ‘flail’ option.
Sounds to me like kinect has inherited alot of eyetoys frustrations when it comes to menus and detection issues, eyetoy menus were annoying to say the least.
cc_star
Not enormous space, just a usable space
I need to be far enough back from the screen so I can see it, about 6-8ft
Then there is the sideways movement and slight forwards & back needed for Table Tennis, roughly a 5ft square box which is 6-8ft away from the TV, and obviously enough height to smash the ball or whatever
The problem with Move is trying to fit the space I need with the space for a 2nd player who’s about half my height (my daughter, you know kinda the whole point of a motion control system)
I can’t imagine Kinect will need more space than that, or at least I’ve seen nothing to suggest it will so far.
Tuffcub
My TV is raised up so th ebottom is about 6ft off the ground. PSEye is about 4ft off tehground angle up slsightly. I can play Table tennis a tiny amount of space.
cc_star
Really not sure how unless you’re playing on easy.
The ball can come at you at a sharp angle off either side of the table which takes an outstretched arm in either direction… Thats a minimum of 6′ more if you take a step or two which is sometime needed, then there is the fact you need to be stood about 6′-8′ away from your screen so you can see it all unless you’ve got a small screen. then there is the fact you need to step back or forward depending if the opponent does a drop shot or a smash this means you’re operating in a 5′-7′ square which is itself the optimum distance from the TV (6′-8′)
Then there is the problem of the glowing sphere going out of the field of vision for smash shots or during gladitorial combat or whatever because to get an overhand swing and my belt buckle in the field of vision is impossible unless I stand even further back than the 6′-8′ and then my 5′ playing square would include half a sofa.
This problem is then doubled with my daughter stood beside me wanting some multiplayer gaming which is the whole point of motion gaming… Feckin nightmare if I’m honest, especially as this is the best game.
lewis815
*Waits for MS to announce a Kinect Controller*
iiekka
+1
TSBonyman
With regards the menu navigation it seems it’s down to what approach the developers use. We’re seeing similar similar different approaches with Move too.
It’s a pity that Microsoft themselves are using a method which doesn’t perform as well as a third party devs method and given that while i played Towers of Topai for PS3Eye recently and all it takes is to open and close your hand briefly to make a selection on the menu, it’s only fair to expect Kinect being newer tech would be much more responsive.
Still, TSA has yet to get it’s own Kinect to have a proper test so perhaps some of the issues will be less of an … erm.. issue.
Gamoc
Huh. With problems as bad as those, it’s difficult to believe that this releases next month.
3shirts
It really seems like it’s as problematic as Eyetoy but that was £30 not £100
monkeyspoon
I thought it looked really bad. The table tennis was leggy and nowhere near as good as move. It’s no different to eyetoy.
monkeyspoon
Laggy not leggy
FluBBa
So nothing has changed since Gamescom then…
I think it’s a marvelous technic when it works, but it seems it’s more miss than hit.
I hope Microsoft can fix it (if it’s up to them?) before release or a lot of people will end up very disappointed this christmas.
cc_star
I wouldn’t be surprised if everything is at the same software and firmware versions as Gamescom… hopefully for Kinect customer’s sake there is later soft/firmware versions before launch
Radboud
Yeah, but that will not solve the issue of the low quality camera they put in Kinect, they should have gone for the better camera and onboard processor and charge perhaps 30 – 40 pounds more. I’ll gladly pay extra for a tech that works very well, but I won’t pay less for tech that works from time to time.
I’ll wait for Kinect 2.0 which will probably be on us in 1-2 years time.
Raen
Most of the stuff was Gamescom or E3 builds
Raen
at the expo in general i mean, kinect wasn’t labelled
Quinlank
Yeah, I’d heard it was buggy as hell at the show, with only the dance game being well received. It’s hard to believe this is something expected to be ready to launch in a month’s time, it certainly isn’t sounding anywhere near ready just yet. Also, did I hear right the instruction manual for Kinect actually tells you how you need to dress to play it? A game controller with a dress code… What an age we live in! :D
Also, you forgot one important detail when talking about Joyride, it was announced as a FREE XBLA game, now they’re charging full retail with no explanation to the consumers they promised this free game to. That sounds like something you’d think SOMEONE would have quizzed them on by now.