Playing With the Future: Kinect

In the spirit of trying to blog more, and envelop a broader scope of topics than my cute kids, I am hereby starting a new feature: "Techie Thursday"! I'd like it to be an outlet to wane technological, from time to time, about new & exciting things that I geek out about. It will also point out what a giant nerd I am, so prepare yourself to be blown away by my astounding nerdery.
So without further ado, I present the first installment of Techie Thursday…

"Playing with the future"

I suck at keeping secrets. But I just can't hold it in any longer! After being restricted by NDA from blogging/Facebooking/photographing, etc., I can finally speak publicly about the coolest gadget I've seen since putting that Duck Hunt cartridge in the old Nintendo back in 1987-ish… And I wanted to tell the world about it, because I happen to think it's a technology that could really change the world does things, even beyond gaming!

We were given the incredible opportunity to participate in the beta program for testing Microsoft's Kinect for Xbox 360, which just released to the public today.

First let me preface this article by saying that my husband made me sign up for the beta. At that point, I didn't know what a "kinect" was, never mind the fact that it had something to do with that damned Xbox he seems to adore so very much [jealous, much, Shanna?] He very nearly declared that I would be disowned if I did not complete the beta application questionnaire. I mean, how dare I not take advantage of working for this company, who affords so many cool opportunities to test new technologies? So against my better judgment, I signed up. And later got notification that I was accepted. I thought, "Okay, I'm game. Neat!" Then I started to hear some buzz on blogs and magazines & stuff about this new peripheral for the Xbox 360 and I started getting a little excited about it.  Neat!

The sensor finally arrived in our interoffice mail in late July, looking very much like a shiny, beheaded Wall-E. Super futuristic-ey. Neat!

And it only got better from there. We hooked up the Kinect to our Xbox (ok, sidenote: we bought a newer, better, additional Xbox 360 because… well, because Jordan said so, and clearly he knows about these kinds of things. ) The setup process was SUPER DUPER RIDICULOUSLY EASY. Even my Dad could have done it -- and when it comes to technology, trust me, that's saying a lot. We had to download all the game titles we needed to test to the Xbox hard drive (this was only part of the beta, won't be necessary for the public release) and started playing. I won't spoil all the details for you, but suffice it to say that I was fascinated. This device is a small camera that you mount on top of your TV, which captures every movement your body makes… "I am the controller" is the slogan… and it's true. We played dodgeball, plugged leaks in an underwater shark tank, kicked goals, danced to FunkyTown, and whitewater rafted our way into the future of video gaming. FAMILY video gaming.
Cut to 3 hours later, when I finally looked up at the clock to realize I had lost all concept of time and sheepishly turned the thing off and made the kids go to bed. I woke up the next morning, sore and rarin' to beat my high score in Dance Central. That quickly became Asha's favorite game too, and we soon realized that it was a great way to spend some family time together, meanwhile actually getting some good exercise during gameplay!  It was simple enough that even the youngest of kids (the non-readers) could grasp the concepts quickly and play along with close to the same results as the grownups.  Even Bam Bam, at the ripe ol' age of 15 months, got in on the fun. NEAT!

Of course there were some minor bumps & hiccups as the beta release progressed, after all, that's the whole purpose for our testing it out before it hit the shelves.  But it was really fun participating in making something a better product for the world to play with!  Did I mention, NEAT?! 

Some cute footage of the mini-beta testers:

So I share this with you as a suggestion for a fantastic gift (Christmas is right around the corner!!)  that the entire family can enjoy. Moms, kids, the hardcore gamer Dads, teens, the "older" generation -- yep, Grandma & Grandpa loved playing too, even though we couldn't get Gramma to stop calling it "The Nintendo" -- will love it, I promise you it will provide hours of fun for everyone!   Though I fear sounding like a commercial, I truly think this is something that a lot of people are going to love. It will make the Wii look wii-diculous.  If the reactions of the people who have seen the Kinect so far are any indication of how the world will react, it will sell like hotcakes. Though I haven't seen many hotcake sales lately, so… maybe it'll "sell like Tickle-Me-Elmo circa 1995"!

Happy Gaming!  Thanks for reading!