Finally Connecting with the Kinect in Mass Effect

Premise: I enjoyed a game more with Kinect than without it.

Yes, seriously.

Yes, this title was just too good not for me to use.

Yes, I am terribly late to the party with all you cool kids in your current gen swag.

Yes, I am still messing around with last gen hardware, the likes of which no one really liked anyways and is agreed to be vastly improved in function, ease and UI in its current iteration on the X1 (although still under utilized and unfocused).

Yes, it has be used for lots of other cool things (youtube innovative robotic technologies and other hacks using the kinect).

But dang it, am I glad to have had the Kinect for my first time playing Mass Effect 3 for the 360? Heck yes. Is it mostly gimmicky? Maybe. But after trying The Gunstringer and Fruit Ninja, the only Kinect titles that appealed to me, I wondered if there was anything else this shorter and wider-looking R.O.B. impersonator (been Sm4shing lately, so forgive me) could entertain me with besides probably secretly watching me creep out my cats next to me in my pajammies, yelling out voice commands and waving my arms like a madman trying to navigate the xbox dashboard quite inefficiently.

Well there is now in fact something I'm very much decidedly happy about keeping my Kinect plugged in for and it is not for webcam shows on xbox live's UNO. And yes my cats are still creeped out.

It is a title buried in criticism and backlash over either the general hate for EA and making the finale to the trilogy less RPG and more casually streamlined, straying from hardcore Bioware fans, or specifically the backpedaling that was done with the controversial ending. With everyone talking about this, no one noticed that "Hey, the Kinect features aren't all that bad. In fact, are they intuitive and make the game more engaging and fun, all the while still feeling natural?"

Upon discovering this surprise for a game that I was told to not be too excited about (something like wanting a gourmet meal and eating pepperoni pizza, one poster said), I wanted to see what others were saying or had said about this neglected mechanic. And yet, for all my googling, only two or three forum posts came up with barely any discussion or appreciation.

I thought to myself: "Was the hate for Kinect, mostly deserved mind you, so strong that people weren't seeing this feature for what it was with an open mind?"

I had played Mass Effect 1 and 2 and enjoyed both. In 2, which many assured me was the best of the series, I had gotten used to opening the squad power wheel and throwing out powers in tandem with my own, resulting in my Adept lifting enemies with awesome blueish-purple telepathic space wizardry and then either Miranda slamming them into the ground with her own biotic powers or my companion Garrus being ordered with the assigned d-pad to snipe the helpless victims in the air.

I loved it but with my time in the threequel and its use of Kinect, I don't think I can go back to what is probably the better game, but missing a feature I just enjoy too much.

And that is the squad voice commands. Something my inner geekiness loves about playing commander Shephard, but this time really as The Commander, voice orders and all. Using the d-pad worked in ME2, but just telling someone to take position here by pointing my reticule, saying their name and giving the command was so awesome that it doesn't matter how embarrassing I must sound to my wife upstairs. Nope! Still fun, don't care!

Better than just repositioning, which I got to do to ambush some enemies I lured into a trap in the beginning of the game with a pincer attack (again normal fare for strategy RPGS but this time with my voice), is that the voice commands that only work through the Kinect and not a regular headset, also are recognized for the various powers in the game as well. All without needing to pause the action, like in Dragon Age: Origins. Not only that, but it does it consistently, accurately and just as fast.

I told my biotic partner to use Stasis and freeze a group of enemies in place at a bottleneck in a hallway, then I cloaked and sniped them in the head. Awesome.

I needed extra damage and ordered a soldier to use inferno ammo. Handy!

Or I was an Adept and pulled someone into the air and I told someone to "throw" and off they went into the ground, ceiling, wall or over a cliff. Delightful.

Or instead of throw I told a soldier to use "carnage" and blast them with a shotgun after I threw a blackhole vortex called Singularity nearby. To heal, "first-aid" was enough. Teammates responded to their names, listening to "follow me" or "cover me" or "move to."

Upon googling the cheat sheet for voice commands, I was pleasantly surprised that there was also a "quick save" command, which could be abused by a ne'er-do-well or trolling roommate to overwrite a save, but they thought ahead and made it a separate save in addition to the autosaves and your manual ones. Sweet!

Now maybe it won't feel as good as in Skyrim yelling FUS-ROH-DAH. And you can't yell at my squadmates like in Binary Domain, and ok so it's not as smooth as There Came an Echo will be when it finally releases, and it's not as necessary or well done for the genre as Tom Clancy's End War was for its own (which utilized the headset but also works with Kinect I believe), and yes there are unnecessary voice implementation mechanics with actually reading out the dialogue out loud for choices or opening doors and picking up ammo and other redundant voice options (oddly enough, no "reload" command, not that it was needed).

I mean, folks, I bought this for $5 and was intent upon not enjoying it and returning it. And now I think it's a keeper. That genuinely shocked me. Other than that, I'm actually already thinking about future playthroughs and actually buying more DLC so I can play around with the voice feature more.

I've been spoiled. I now wish the Kinect was solely developed for voice command features in video games rather than motion or gestures. It could make strategy games a little more fun if the gimmick became less gimmick and more of a case of "why haven't we done more of this? Let's do more of this!" While we wait on VR technologies and Oculus Rift to introduce more engaging gaming experiences, someone out there needs to fill the gap now with little to no games that treat voice command mechanics in RPG's, action or adventured based titles, or the strategy genre, as little more than a diversion and not a solid absolutely necessary and fun feature.

If control is power and the idea is to give more control to the player and that in itself is addictive (see Call of Duty or Battlefield customizations as the norm or any RPG equipment or skill tree like with Diablo), give us more control with our own voices. For myself, there can be little else more empowering than letting me belt out with my own voice and still effectively play the game well.

For once, saving the world (again), from my couch (again), with my creeped out cats (for the first time in a while), hasn't been so much fun. For a game that was easily hyped and forgotten, has disappointed, and had tons of copies sadly laying around (for $5) last Black Friday at Target, it has won me over. Maybe it will win some of you over too.

This is Commander Shephard and I approve of this message.

[VGMMDI]

If you are enjoying the kinect this much you should check out Wreckateer. I didn't think I would have that much fun with it and I did. It turns you into a human slingshot to destroy castles.