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Remembering Kinect - it was actually kind of cool for a while

K

Kittenwithbeer

Banned
While Kinect Sports was easily my favorite game; the hand-holding in it is infuriating and insulting. It's the problem with most Kinect games. They treat you like you're an idiot and can't figure out how to play a video game. Please stop holding my hand.

Yes, I know how to bowl. Yes, I know how to box. Okay I understand. Please never show that again. No! Please! No more menus! I just want to play soccer why are there so many menus!

Infuriating to the point where I never bought another Kinect title.

Pretty funny that the device that was touted as being so simple due to the lack of a controller ended up having the most instructions and hand-holding for. Look at Wii Sports. They did it right, Rare! Explain it to me once, but let me get to the game quick and fast! Seriously though... Words can't describe how upset I am at the menu upon menu in these titles when all I want to do is load-up tennis or soccer or breakout, etc.
 
SerTapTap

SerTapTap

Member
Man I remember talking about this thing and move with friends over pizza. Which would be good, were they bullshitting, whatever happened to the wii.

I...remember the chats more fondly than the Kinect. If it launched with 2.0 instead we might not be having this negative of a conversation, but who knows. Probably would have never gotten that much research without the Xbox 360 version sales.

Kittenwithbeer said:
While Kinect Sports was easily my favorite game; the hand-holding in it is infuriating and insulting. It's the problem with most Kinect games. They treat you like you're an idiot and can't figure out how to play a video game. Please stop holding my hand.

Yes, I know how to bowl. Yes, I know how to box. Okay I understand. Please never show that again. No! Please! No more menus! I just want to play soccer why are there so many menus!

Infuriating to the point where I never bought another Kinect title.
Click to expand...

This is a huge problem in "family friendly" games, most visible in Nintendo games since non-casuals wind up playing them often. There desperately needs to be "I am a gamer"/"I've played this before" options to turn that crap off.
 
A

Acosta

Member
"it was actually kind of cool for a while"

itagakipic.jpg
Click to expand...

"No"
 
SerTapTap

SerTapTap

Member
Artorias said:
That would be hilarious. If they were looking to kill the Xbox brand, that would be probably be a solid first step.
Click to expand...

Cam built in would be silly (you need to be able to position the camera), but a mic would be a good idea IMO. It's the most praised feature of Kinect 2.0 and should be fairly cheap.
 
Freeman

Freeman

Banned
The most stupid think IMO was not making it easily available for Windows, they had a lot to gain by doing that.
 
M

Marco1

Member
I see things like this and wonder what happened:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RN_zu3xVQ5M

Kinect should and would have been an amazing party piece in my house but what really happened was an embarrassment for the device. It never worked like it should have, the direction MS tried to take the device into was never what should have really happened.
 
G

Goldenroad

Member
It really wasn't. I bet I had 15 hours of fun with Kinect all told.

Trying to break it down, it would probably be like:

Kinect Adventure - 30 minutes
Fruit Ninja Kinect - 1 hour
Gunstringer - 3 hours
Child of Eden - 2 hours
H.A.T./Kinect Party - 3 hours
Dance Central 1 & 2 - 6 hours

As much as I really wanted to like Kinect and bought the software to support it, it just wasn't good and didn't lend itself to very memorable gaming experiences...though part of that may be because the most "memorable" stuff is from when I had way too much to drink to possibly remember it.
 
L

LastGamer84

Member
Kinect is, and always has been, about potential. From the beginning we were shown tech demos and videos showcasing potential uses. We were given scenarios and promises of future innovation that would revolutionize gaming as we know it.

And it was all at best an over exaggeration and at worst a lie. Kinect consistently failed to live up to its promises, both in the gaming and OS department, and its major features with the new console (IE the voice controls) could be just as easily accomplished via headset.

MS sold us on the potential, and has failed to deliver the goods. Good thing for them they finally realized what an anchor it was to their console and ditched it.
 
I

Illusive_Juan

Member
I wanted to like Kinect so much. I bought it at a midnight launch even!

But this game.... This is the first time I ever turned something off in the middle of playing and said, "Nope." The Kinect controls were so awkward and made the game frustrating.


RiseOfNightmares.jpg
 
K

Kuni

Member
Was always a device of false hopes and dreams trying to capture that Apple \ Wii magic in a bottle. Delighted to see it finally be put behind us.

I was taken in a little by... 5 mins and then realized how limited it actually was. No 3D movement alone made a very limited device. All it was good for was simulators where you stood still or on the rails.

For the specific experiences it was made for it was always with a proviso that there was a margin of error. Processing complex video input will always have a margin of error ... and we're not at 90%+ and I don't know if we ever will be.
 
M

massoluk

Banned
Man, the original Kinect reveal was just straight up lies.

Scan you skateboard into the game! - Nope
Be the pit crew! - Nope
Interact with Milo! - Nope
Be the Jedi! - Nope
 
O

onQ123

Member
Kinect came up short of it's promises but I guess you can blame that on marketing. People expected too much from it the 1st time around when it's just a baby step into 3D body tracking.


The 1st controllers & touchscreens on the market wasn't so good either but as time went by they got better and better until they became second nature.

Kinect gave 3D motion sensing a bad name in the gaming market because it didn't deliver what gamers thought they was going to get & they became really outspoken about it to the point where they will not give the better technology that's sure to come in the future a chance.


I think Kinect has about 2 more generations before it becomes second nature. While PlayStation Move was pretty close it's 1st time around because it used more mature technology. One day Kinect will be as natural as using a touchscreen & when that happen it will be amazing. But for now even with Kinect One it's being held back by it's immature technology.
 
S

ScoopEE

Neo Member
I never came around on motion Kinect, but voice Kinect was the best. Mass Effect 3 with voice commands vs. pause and play to swap weapons, trigger powers, etc. was a VERY different game experience...and very fun!
 
N

Nerokis

Member
Azure Dream said:
It blows my mind that they packed it in with the One, and they hardly did anything with it, until Kinect Sports Rivals hobbled in too late. They should've been ready at launch with Kinect-proving software, and instead they were too busy promoting it as an awkward TV remote and overpriced mic.

There were plenty of interesting things they could've done with it, many of which we saw glimmers of when people were tinkering with the 360 add-on. They hardly delivered on any of that, they get one game out that doesn't do well, then they throw it under the bus. It's amazing.
Click to expand...

I agree 100% with this sentiment. Even in the realm of "awkward TV remote and overpriced mic," Microsoft just did a terrible job selling the thing most of the time. It seems to me Microsoft saw its promise as a navigation, multitasking, etc. device, and bet the Kinect would be most compelling to a mass audience as a general entertainment enhancer, building on their "all in one" vision. So unfortunate. "Kinect, on!" just did not sell me - the voice stuff overall is still too awkward to give this functionality the sheen it probably needs to sell anyone (it will be really cool one day, even if Microsoft is not the one to deliver it!).

Instead, Microsoft could have built on what made the original Kinect interesting in the first place. It really is amazing that they invested so, so much into the new Kinect, but then did nothing software-wise to make it compelling. It is also frustrating, because I would have loved to see some genuine innovation in terms of gaming experiences and interactions. But Microsoft did not at all put the infrastructure in place needed to support the Kinect in that way, and now they're simply chasing parity with the PS4. Too bad, really.
 
S

soul creator

Member
Timeaisis said:
I'd never seen that Star Wars Kinect gif before. Was that presentation like...faked or something?
Click to expand...

It was way before the game came out, and it was intended for a "vision" of Kinect or whatever, and not an actual playable demo. None of the games in that Cirque Du Soleil thing were actually being played on stage. The Star Wars thing at that time was essentially a cutscene.

The first time Kinect Star Wars was actually playable in public was at E3 2012.

Here's some random KSW footage from the actual game intro, lol
 
C

cakely

Member
I don't think it was even kind of cool.

You ever wonder what the bottom of an avatar's shoe looks like?

x9FxLir.png


WELL BAM!
 
G

grandwizard

Member
There is no bigger crime in the universe than Kinect getting a Star Wars game over PSMove. Instead of getting the badass Lightsaber game we could have we got a terrible dancing and gesture game that barely worked.
 
O

onQ123

Member
Azure Dream said:
It blows my mind that they packed it in with the One, and they hardly did anything with it, until Kinect Sports Rivals hobbled in too late. They should've been ready at launch with Kinect-proving software, and instead they were too busy promoting it as an awkward TV remote and overpriced mic.

There were plenty of interesting things they could've done with it, many of which we saw glimmers of when people were tinkering with the 360 add-on. They hardly delivered on any of that, they get one game out that doesn't do well, then they throw it under the bus. It's amazing.
Click to expand...

When I seen that Kinect One was still 30FPS and not 60FPS I knew that Gaming wasn't Microsoft's intentions with Kinect on Xbox One.
 
M

Michael F. Assbender

Banned
Kinect is, was, and always will be garbage.

It's because of Kinect and the "TVTVTV" bullshit that the architecture of the Xbone is the way it is (namely: weaker than its nearest competitor by a fair margin).
 
S

Seik

Banned
I'll be honest, I never liked the Kinect.

On the positives, though, it gave us some great GIF material! :D

03.gif
dancing.gif


And of course, this beautiful pic of Miyamoto and Trinen. :lol

500x_miya2.jpg
 
N

nbnt

is responsible for the well-being of this island.
Yeah, I did enjoy the Kinect for a little while, mainly Child of Eden and Kinect Adventures. I used to play Kinect Adventures with one of my friends online, and it worked quite well.

Good riddance though. No matter how much I wanna enjoy Kinect 2, I just can't.
 
G

GeordieMark

Member
Never really clicked for me, until I played with my nephew. Watching kids play Kinect Adventures made me appreciate how cool it was. He loved it and it made me want to join in, seeing how much fun he was having.

I think sometimes gamers on forums forget that not everything is about them, and that there are an awful lot of people who thoroughly enjoyed, and continue to enjoy, Kinect.
 
Alx

Alx

Member
Kinect thread, here I am ! :D
I really like what kinect brought to the motion gaming genre (in addition to UI in general). It really captured that feeling of arcade gaming that becomes rare nowadays, all with its own innovation.
My favorite games on the previous generations were Dance Masters (great use of gesture into a dancing game, better than the competition), Kinect Sports (if only for beach volley) and Kinect Adventures (very nicely designed minigames)
I still have several other ones in my backlog, usually with around 30% completion : Fable the Journey, Child of Eden, that baseball pitching one... those were fun, I should go back to them.

I still think that the hate it is getting on Neogaf is (at least partly) irrational, and that those who say they can't make it work either don't want to, or maybe lack proper body perception. After all it's a new set of skills that all traditional gamers may not have... ;P
 
darthvargi

darthvargi

Member
EBE said:
in his defense, heres a video of his

darthvargi hope you dont mind me posting this
Click to expand...
No thanks for posting it EBE I always try to show a video of it played right (KinectAddict had one or two as well) when people dismiss it or just show someone not playing it properly. I would love to see a sequel with two SKU's to please both audiences. 1 sku being a standard retail game that just uses the Kinect 2.0 and another sku aka the deluxe model with a fancy new controller and of course it also supports Kinect 2.0. I'd buy the deluxe and man if it had a copilot mode with Kinect (say somebody is the reloader) it would be an amazing tank/mech simulation game.
 
T

T.O.P

Banned
Dance Central and Child of Eden made the kinect worth the price for me

I also tried Rise of Nightmares but that thing was impossible to control

Now it's Fitness, fitness and more Fitness on X1 wich is a pretty awesome feature
 
F

family_guy

Member
I personally don't think motion controls were ever fully taken advantage of. A controller is the right direction to go in, not a camera. I think they would have been more popular if most of the games took real advantage of them and the graphics weren't ass like many of the Wii games.
 
P

Peltz

Member
Azure Dream said:
It blows my mind that they packed it in with the One, and they hardly did anything with it, until Kinect Sports Rivals hobbled in too late. They should've been ready at launch with Kinect-proving software, and instead they were too busy promoting it as an awkward TV remote and overpriced mic.

There were plenty of interesting things they could've done with it, many of which we saw glimmers of when people were tinkering with the 360 add-on. They hardly delivered on any of that, they get one game out that doesn't do well, then they throw it under the bus. It's amazing.
Click to expand...

I'm someone who has never used either version of Kinect and I still can't help but agree with you. I didn't buy an Xbox One because I didn't see the vision for Kinect come together yet. But that didn't mean that I was against its inclusion with every Xbox One. I was simply waiting for them to show me something cool with it and Kinect Sports isn't enough.

I didn't want them to get rid of it or make it optional. I rather wanted them to show me why it was the future. It sucks that they are now chasing the PS4 instead of distinguishing the Xbox One further from it. If anything, they were probably to ahead of their time without enough market-reday applications to show off the tech early on in the hardware cycle.

Plus, the fact that the AI of the console couldn't understand you Siri-style and required precise voice commands just made it seem like shoddy last gen voice tech.
 
M

Majine

Banned
In my opinion, the Kinect dream is at its best when it's restrained.I like the XBO one, because of all the features that's outside the games are great, like "Record that", the login procedure, and instant game access. As soon as it's in the games, it just sucks.
 
E

EBE

Member
regarding Kinect on xbox one: im disappointed with its game output. there doesnt appear to be anything substantial in its future, if it even has one. off the top of my head i can only think of Dance Central Spotlight, Fantasia, and D4. where are the interesting downloadable titles like Haunt of Wreckateer or Fruit Ninja? doesnt ANYONE want to use the hardware?

even Kinect Sports Rivals, which i made the OT for and still play every once in a while, isnt enough to draw people in, especially when no mention of new sports or minigames have been made by Rare.

"it was actually kind of cool for while" is more about the Kinect's premature death than any loss of interest on my part. i think microsoft failed to capitalize on its success with new titles to keep people interested in the tech. the narrative might be very different now if they hadnt.
 
B

Bessy67

Member
EBE said:
regarding Kinect on xbox one: im disappointed with its game output. there doesnt appear to be anything substantial in its future, if it even has one. off the top of my head i can only think of Dance Central Spotlight, Fantasia, and D4. where are the interesting downloadable titles like Haunt of Wreckateer or Fruit Ninja? doesnt ANYONE want to use the hardware?

even Kinect Sports Rivals, which i made the OT for and still play every once in a while, isnt enough to draw people in, especially when no mention of new sports or minigames have been made by Rare.

"it was actually kind of cool for while" is more about the Kinect's premature death than any loss of interest on my part. i think microsoft failed to capitalize on its success with new titles to keep people interested in the tech. the narrative might be very different now if they hadnt.
Click to expand...
It really is baffling how they handled kinect on Xbox One. They pretty much just sent it out to die. I also enjoyed KSR and I use voice commands every day, but KSR is really the only game that uses it. They needed to have a bunch more kinect experiences ready to go by now if they wanted it to succeed.
 
I

iKhayal18

Member
I just bought one today!
24.50€, second hand but looks almost new.
I really liked the Just Dance games, so when I was looking for information about them, I discovered Dance Central. As I watched the videos on Youtube, I could easily notice that the choreographies were more realistic and that the movement detection was more precise that with the Wiimote controller (they should think about making the future Just Dance games compatible with WiiMotion+...). Also, the game looks more "complete" and has a lot of modes so that you can learn all the moves step by step. It seems a more "professional" experience compared to Just Dance.

So I bought Kinect just for Dance Central. I still have to try it tomorrow in the living room, because my room is to small and the sensor requieres a distance so that your whole body fits on it.

But yeah, 25€ for Kinect and 5€ for Dance Central. I don't know if it is too expensive after reading all those negative comments, but I plan to buy Dance Central 2 and Dance Central 3 and I think that with those games, the purchase might already be profitable.

(I also have to try if Just Dance games are better on Kinect that on Wii/Wii U)
 
F

FuturusX

Member
It was never cool and will not be cool until I scan in my skateboard...can I do that yet? Nope?

Than it's shite...

FreeMufasa said:
I can't help but think anyone who HATES kinetic is unhealthy, lazy and don't have friends.

So so so much fun
Click to expand...

But could not the same be said by people who dance in real life with friends...play sports with friends and are active and healthy. Namely anybody who relies on Kinect to do those things is lazy, unhealthy and has no friends.

Note:

I love Dance Central - but it can't beat dancing with real people.
 
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