Microsoft Kinect Review: the Beginning of a Journey

Microsoft’s Kinect is promising a new way to play and experience games, the beginning of a new journey, as its makers like to say, but the specialty media remains skeptical. Should you go out and buy Kinect? Is Kinect worth the 150 bucks you’d have to pay?

I cannot answer you that, as I’ve never personally tested the device myself, but judging by what Kinect promises to be, damn sure I’d pay the price, at least to test it. This is the first true innovation in the gaming industry in a while. So far the buzz revolved around games, remakes and the like. We spoke about games on iPhone, iPad, Android, online, multiplayer, offline and so on. But a device that can learn your moves to enable gaming without controllers… well, that’s innovation. They are right, it is the beginning of a journey.

It may not be perfect, but then again, what is? It may still need good lighting, but the reviewers say it is already more advanced than any other previous technologies. I believe these people know what they are talking about. Now to the PR issues…

Microsoft needed a product like Kinect – such innovation brings the media focus on the right issues. “Technology,” said Microsoft’s Alex Kipman, “is making us less human.” A strange statement from a company dealing exclusively with technology – but the right statement, considering. Kinect basically makes people stand up and move, participate actively in a game, (full) body and soul. It’s not about pushing menu buttons and operating controllers – it’s about becoming the controller…

There are already a number of games available for Kinect: Kinect Sports, Kinect Adventures, Kinect Joy Ride, Dance Central, Your Shape: Fitness Evolved and Kinectimals. Moreover, bundled with Xbox LIVE, Kinect opens a whole world of entertainment experiences, including streaming music, HD movies, live sporting events, Facebook, Twitter, Video chat and more.

CNN is right: with Kinect, the new controller-free system for its Xbox 360 gaming console, Microsoft will definitely revolutionize how people interact with all their entertainment choices.

Clearly, Xbox Kinect’s PR firm Waggener Edstrom (WE) is getting this out to all the right media people.