Xbox Kinect: One Year Later

The Kinect was released in early November last year to immediate success; after selling 8 million units in the first 60 days, it entered the Guinness World Records as the Fastest Selling Consumer Electronics Device. But what does the future hold? IndustryGamers investigates.

[Captain Qwark 9]

good for navigating the dash, sh*t for gaming, simple as that

[Drekken]

Good, but not more efficient than a controller. A novelty at best.

[ApplEaglElephant]

Also, it just makes me laugh when i think back a year ago when people were yelling out "revolutionary control"

lolol. revolution my butt.

[darthv72]

This is a generalization of the awareness of gamers. I was picking up my son from a friends house. While I was waiting I watched as two boys were playing a boxing match in kinect sports.

I watched as they flailed about trying to knock the other one out and the observation was neither of them paid any attention to what the screen was telling them. I had to stop them, back them up and align them so the kinect could properly detect them.

After about 30 seconds or so they were all jumbled up again. Now these boys were roughly 10 and still didnt pay attention to what was needed to play properly. I am reminded of my own kids and how they play the wii and how i have to tell them to spread out so they dont hit each other.

Point is, kids dont listen and just want to play where as an adult (or more mature gamer) would be more inclined to follow the instructions to ensure a smooth playing experience. People can blame the camera because its easy to do so but are not so inclined to blame themselves for not playing by the rules.

A lack of personal responsibility is at fault when things arent going as they should. Kinect works great when you are working with it but it lags and misses and screws up when you are working against it.

It takes practice to get good at something. Even playing a videogame. How many times did it take losing a life in a game from doing something wrong before they tried it differently and then it worked? That number will vary from player to player but the bottom line is sometimes you need to adjust your play to play right.

These systems and games are reactive so if you do it wrong it will do it just as wrong. Then you scream at the tv and throw the controller but never take responsibility for your own actions because..."it's the games fault". That is a cop out and people know that.

On the topic of Kinect, it certainly has gotten better the more devs use it. That is to be expected. The evolution of the controller has gone from 1 button to many and with the time took trial and error to get the buttons to do what the devs want them to do.

Gesture control is just as evolutionary from the simple point here to there to reacting to the whole body and possibly even more minute detailed movement.

In the year it has been out it has delivered on the promise of controller free gaming. Its just most may not find the games it supports as appealing to them but you cant say there are NO games.

[TBM]

it wasnt worth my time and money to get it for my 360 then, and it isnt now.

[ZippyZapper]

Best on PC

[user858621]

Its getting exclusive games

Move on the other hand....

[darthv72]

but you wont be able to respond so anyways. While kinect is getting the exclusive games. your comment on move seems somewhat unjustified. Currently there arent very many exclusive MOVE ONLY games but the level of games that have been give move support via a patch is ever increasing.

There is the argument that it is only "core" games that matter when it comes to these two devices. We all know that isnt true but still some classify things to suit their liking.

Core move games are really just existing games given a new control scheme. Not all but the majority are this way. Kinect has its core games but the notion of "core" can be somewhat subjective. We all play games that appeal to us. Some may be casual but there are some hardcore casuals out there.

I used to consider someone who played games all the time as a hardcore gamer now it doesnt mean that anymore. Now its about if its a shooter...its core. If its a puzzle game its casual. Odd as this may seem, my wife is a hardcore puzzle game player. She digs zuma and tetris like others would dig MW of BF.

She may not play the same games but she is in the same league due to her commitment to the craft. I think we all are both casual and core depending on our moods. I may only play 'casually' for an hour or so on Gear or KZ3 and then play for hours on end at Dr mario or tetris.

Point is we are all gamers no matter how you classify it. All on the same side and will defend our position when someone tells us to turn it off. My kids have picked that up from me i guess. I tell them its time for bed and they want to keep playing. I can honestly say, when I was younger.....i was the same way.

[NYC_Gamer]

the hardware might not have the best software but at least it's getting real support

[Grave]

Microsoft has a camera for the 360?

[ZippyZapper]

At least it didn't flop like M O V E

[despair]

for me two problems from my personal experience, first is you have to fight the system way too much, its sometimes too much of a hassle when things don't work seamlessly and why would I choose something that doesn't work well a lot of the time compared to a controller that always works properly. I shouldn't have that additional obstacle of an iffy controller.

Second is the actual games which are still lacking badly, no titles for the average gamer and I like the party games for the most part but they don't really last long and are only good in groups. Also I just hate On-Rails but I guess that's a personal preference.

[JOLLY1]

I like that the article is pretty positive about the Kinect, but this website hates it. It is quite interesting. Kids love it. The speech recognitionin Forza is pretty interesting. Is it a game changer? No, not at all. It is just one more way I have have to try and hit 4 buttons at the same time though.

[Hanilugtehul]

I just wish they would make a great boxing game for the kinect, then i would buy it. Peace:-)