29 Apr 2012 - A new toy without controller....KINECT

I did a search on the internet to see if there are any dancing games suitable for kids on Wii.  In the end, I found that most of the titles are for Xbox Kinect.  For those who are not familiar with Kinect, it's actually an add-on sensor to the Xbox console that detect the player's movement.  The gameplay will be similar to Wii except that we play without holding any controller on our hand.  Other than our hands, it also detects our feet movement.  It comes with face and voice recognition as well.

After some consideration and discussion with Tracy, we decided to "own" it.  In the late afternoon, we went down to AMK hub and bought the Xbox console with 250GB HDD (Ultimate Action Pack Bundle) and the Kinect sensor.  We also bought some games that are suitable for kids.  For those who are interested in Kinect and feels like owning one too, just for info, you really need a bigger play area as compared to Wii.  The distance from the Kinect sensor must be about 1.8m away for single player games.  For two players games, you need about 2.4m.  Knowing that not many household (especially in Singapore) has such a big in-house open area, there is a third party add-on for the Kinect sensor that can reduce the distance requirement by 40%.  I did not buy that as I decided to try it out first.  Sad to say, my play area is just about right for single player game.  We tried two players game and it fails to detect at times.  My other bigger problem is Javier as he kept running in front of the TV screen and got the sensor "confused"........  Jerlene managed to play the Sesame Street games and enjoyed it.

As it was pretty late by the time we got home, I did not have time to explore all the games and features.  Will keep you all updated of our Kinect experience in the coming weeks.