What I Think Of: Kinect Sports Rivals

This week I rearranged the furniture in my apartment for the first time in a long time. No, not because I needed to work on my sweet breakdancing skills (as if those need any extra work, I be breakin'), but because I downloaded Kinect Sports Rivals for the Xbox One and didn't want to release a break-neck speed bitchslap to my lamp.

So, how does Rare's newest entry in the Kinect Sports series hold up? Does the new Kinect make for a better experience? Read on and find out what I think of Kinect Sports Rivals.

Where to begin? Well lets start with the look of this game, which I will say looks really good. This is the first in the series on the Xbox One and it shows. Gone are the old Xbox avatars and in comes a graphical overhaul and a cartoon art-style that reminds me of Team Fortress 2. 

Side note: As someone who thoroughly enjoys TF2, I like anything that reminds me of that.

The water in the jetski racing game looks great, the bowling alley feels vibrant and alive, and so on. This is a great looking game.

Not distracting at all.

So the avatars are gone, how does one go about creating a character then? Well I am glad you asked, self. (He's always asking intelligent questions). The game starts with a very familiar voice saying "Each Champion starts with a ball of light". OMG I know that voice. Ladies and gentleman, it's the 10th (and best) Doctor himself: David Tennant. Right away I had a freaking nerd-gasm, once I recovered, he walked me though what was happening on my screen.

Once the Kinect sees you, it looks for your physique and adjusts body type. You then decide if you want to be a child/adult and male/female, pretty common stuff, but what comes next is simply fascinating.

The game asks you to come closer so it can see your face, you then look side to side, and up and down. It's using these images to mold a lifelike representation of your face, and it does a pretty damn good job of it. You will be pleasantly surprised with how much your in-game character looks like you.

Facemapping (or your next nightmare) in action.

You can then change your character as you see fit; change hair, add glasses, alter your physique, stuff like that.

So we have a character that looks like you, you've got a great looking island to look at and play in, we have DAVID FUCKING TENNANT talking to us! What's next? (See, great questions). How bout the actual sports themselves?

There are 6 sports in all: Bowling, Target Shooting, Jetski Racing, Rock Climbing, Tennis, and Soccer. Through the tutorial part of the game, you go through a sequence with "Coach" who teaches you what the motions are, then you play a game vs the AI. Each sport deserves its own little section, so let's go!

I will preface by saying I do NOT have an ideal setup (space, lighting, etc.) for Kinect games, so don't take my experience as the gospel truth. Your results may vary.

Bowling:

We have seen Bowling before in Kinect Sports and of course in Wii Sports, so it's no surprise that it found its way into Rivals. This is an easy game to translate to the Kinect: Hold ball where you want it to go and throw ball down the lane. You reach whichever hand you want to use out to the side and grab the ball, I will note that the game does a great job of figuring out when your hand is open and when it is closed. It even detects wrist movement and puts spin on the ball.

Overall Kinect experience here was pretty good. I had a few instances where the ball didn't go where I told it to and a couple places where it flat out dropped the ball for no reason, but again, not ideal setup. 

Target Shooting:

The goal in target shooting is to get more points than your opponent. You have basic targets that are worth different point values depending on the color, targets that take points away, targets that must be hit in order, and you can even steal targets from your opponent if they are in the right place.

You and your opponent shoot at the same time with your targets between you, with an impenetrable blue forcefield acting as your backstop. Below the backstop is a turret. When it lights up, you can shoot the turret and your opponent will have to dodge incoming fire or risk losing points and giving them to you. They can also do this and it can keep you on your toes.

You reach out the hand you want to use and grab the gun. You then point at the screen, this becomes your reticle. Once your crosshairs go over a target, it automatically fires. So, all you're doing is pointing at your screen. Not very strenuous.

I had a little trouble with this one, as my crosshairs kept shaking and moving even though I feel I had my arm pretty still. As my arm got tired, I would put it down to my side. When I brought my arm back up, I had a few instances where the reticle wouldn't come up at all. You dodge incoming turret fire by leaning left and right and I had no problems with that.

Jetski Racing:

I sure hope this paves the way for a rebooted Jet Moto game. 

This one I found myself having a lot of fun with. You reach both arms in front of you, as if you are grabbing both handlebars, you clench your right hand into a fist to accelerate, and turn your arms in a "handlebar" style, not a "steering wheel" style to turn. You can also lean into the turn with your body to turn sharper. Once you get the hang of this, it can be a lot of fun. They even throw in ramps you can lean forward or back on to do flips and gain potential boost.

It's worth mentioning again that I really like the way this looks graphically.

Overall had relatively few issues with this. I had a couple times where the ski turned by itself and a couple times where clenching my right hand did nothing, but it quickly got back on track. The trick is to make sure you are turning the ski with the right motion. It's not a car.

Rock Climbing:

This may be my favorite one and a good demonstration for how improved Kinect 2.0 is over its predecessor.

Your arms do the rock climbing motion, reach out and grab a peg and pull yourself up. The peg can be above you or to the side of you and Kinect does a great job of figuring out when your hand is open and when it is closed. There are obstacles along the way; giant fans that can blow you off the mountain, electrified pegs, other climbers who can pull you off, gravity, etc. You can also jump to skip a few pegs and get to a hard to reach peg if it's to your advantage.

As of this writing. I have not had many issues at all with this. Kinect is doing great at registering my moves and this sport is a lot of fun.

Tennis:

Another oldie but a goodie. The game takes care of the whole movement thing and you just worry about the hitting. You can add topspin, backspin, or lob it based on the way you swing your arm. Pretty self explanatory so I will just say it's tennis and it works.

Again, no real problems to speak of here. It detects my arm movement well and it is always satisfying to throw an overheard smash into my opponents face.

Soccer:

This is where I feel Rivals drops the ball (pun may or may not be intended depending on your mood).

It's a mutated form of Soccer in that you pass the ball to other versions of you, avoiding the defense, until you get to the you that's right in front of the net for a shot/header.You then watch the opponent do the same thing while you play Goaltender and save the upcoming shot.

This one just isn't fun to play, the timing doesn't feel right and it's overall boring.

I have had Kinect not register a few of my kicks a couple times. Given that Soccer is all about kicking, I kinda need that to work.

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Whew! So there's a rundown of the sports in Rivals. I've been impressed overall with how well Kinect has been keeping up with my actions and am finding a better time with this than the 360 games. Of course, it should be better, this is a new Kinect.

As you play each sport, you gain fans and level up, unlocking new equipment for each sport that can give you certain bonuses if equipped. You also gain coins which you can use to unlock gear in the Store.

They have special challenges which can win you a sponsor and sponsor themed gear.

When you jump into a sport, you play against another online person, kinda. I relate this to how in a Virtua Fighter or Tekken game, you fight against a person's "Ghost Data". That way you can actually pause the action, and also make sure you don't play the same game of tennis from now until the Xbox Two is released.

This is getting kinda long so I will touch on one last thing: there's a story!

There are 3 teams in the game: Eagle Legion, Viper Network, and Wolf Clan. Each come with the usual "over-the-top" characters that try to recruit you to join their team and represent them. I don't know how I feel about trying to fit narrative into a sports/fitness game, but hey I'm sure this will all make sense the more I play it. I do know, however that the Viper Network's "technology" guy is annoying and the reason why I won't pick them.

It seems you are on fire, I will help by throwing you to your death.

There is a lot to do in Kinect Sports Rivals, and while some miss the mark, this is an overall good package and it will be interesting to see where DLC can take this game going forward. It also shows that while it may not quite be there yet, Kinect 2.0 is a marked improvement over the original and is becoming more than just the way I use voice commands to navigate the Xbox One menus.

Also, DAVID FUCKING TENNANT