The Xbox Kinect - the best device to WASTE YOUR MONEY ON!

Yeah that's right - If your an Xbox Kinect owner, I strongly feel that you wasted your money on a bad product idea, or what is commonly know as a Gimmick.

Wow hold on - before you get out the pitchforks and rip me a new....anything, there is a few valid points I'd like to make first as to WHY I think that.

The First thing that sucks about the Kinect is: YOU are the controller.

What the ...???

I am the controller? No, I am the Player, i.e. Gamer - you know, the person that is playing the game the Kinect was made to run with. If I have to stand or sit a certain way just to play a game, Its not worth my time.

For serious, how hard is it to make a handheld controller? All you have to do is put buttons in places that aren't hard to reach, and feels comfortable in my hands. Does that sound hard? NO.

Does Microsoft make it hard to do that? In this case, YES.

You know that Madden game that is out? It uses both the Kinect AND Xbox Controller together.

WHY?

The Mic in the Kinect allows the player to issue calls by voice command to the teams, and the controller allows you to control your character. But check this: You can call those same commands with your controller. Your Handheld controller. THE CONTROLLER IN YOUR HANDS.

That is the major issue I have with the Kinect - It's very limited to what it's for. And not every game made to use the Kinect is a slam dunk like Madden is (btw, that's ONE of TWO games I think it's good for), there are other games that don't use it well at all.

Four Words: Steel. Battalion: Heavy. Armor.

To help quickly prove my point I've posted a link to the review of the Steel Battalion: Heavy Armor game from XPlay. Yes, that's the show got cancelled on G4, just like G4 got cancelled from my list of channels to watch on my TV - Yeah, I went there.

http://www.g4tv.com/videos/59521/steel-battalion-heavy-armor-review/

And to make sure there is no confusion (and just in case the G4 website goes poof from the internets), here is a snapshot of the written review of the game from the website itself:



OUCH.

Now there is a understandable, and barely acceptable usage for the Kinect I can accept - Just Dance 4.

I will admit, that people do like to dance, myself included and it's nice to be able to do so, without dealing with all the crap and BS you would find in a Nightclub, and I guess you could say its a good idea to get up off your lazy butt and get moving.

So, why to I barely accept this? That Question brings me to the second reason the XBox Kinect is a waste of money:

People get hurt!

We've seen the video on youtube - this is a thing:

It is very easy to get hurt using the Kinect - and not a lot of people will follow the directions on how to use the Kinect to avoid this, so 9 times out of 10 - things like this will happen:



Do you know how many times this would happen with a regular controller? Never. Zero. None. Nada. If you give me a number higher than zero, you will be officially declared the worst liar in gaming history.

And I didn't want to go there with this, but I am trying to make a point:



For those of you who have never seen that clip before, the kid was fine. She is OK.
But we can't ignore the fact that this kind of crap never happened with a handheld controller. I've never knocked anyone out with a controller, and I've been gaming for 3 decades.

And I don't feel old saying that either.

My Final thought - man, I just don't see a real big need to own a Kinect, and even though the technology behind it is cool, the application for it....not so much.

It's just another gimmick you don't need, taking up space that could be put to more important use - like keeping your porn dvd's, or a bowl of condoms. Yeah, that kind of stuff.

And if you lol'd at that poor kid getting smacked in the face by accident - for shame. What is wrong with you? Call Dr. Phil.

And don't buy the Kinect.

Laters.