Review code supplied by Microsoft

Kinect Sports Rivals is an important exclusive title for the Xbox One, more than most people may realise. With the Kinect being bundled in with every purchase of an Xbox One, to widespread criticism, Microsoft need a killer app that has the kind of impact Wii Sports had for the Nintendo Wii and justifies their decision to force their camera upon us. So does Rares first next-gen title achieve that? No, not even close.

The difference here in gameplay is that instead of using a motion controller you’re using your own body. While this does lead to a wider variety of games being available, due to the Kinect being able to track all your limbs instead of just a control in your hand, it also makes Kinect Sports Rivals far less fun because using your body as a controller just isn’t very enjoyable (for me at least), especially when the motion tracking still isn’t perfect.

While Kinect Sports Rivals has a fantastic cartoon art style and can be plenty of fun in certain games or with a group, the overall package is just too inconsistent, mediocre or unpolished to be anything more than a flash in the pan game most will play briefly before forgetting all about it. This may sound like I’m being overly critical, but it’s simply because I’d hoped for more because Kinect Sports Rivals can, at times, be very impressive. But let’s start right at the beginning, the initial set-up.

You’ll need to be prepared for the space requirements whether it is in your living room or bedroom. Small, compact rooms are not going to work.  For some games, such as the Wake Racing, it’ll suffice but for anything needing more arm or leg space, such as Football or Tennis, you’ll find your movements not being tracked as you move too close to a wall or piece of furniture. As a general rule you’ll need roughly six feet of space in all directions. I initially started my playthrough in a small room with a few feet of space. Once I’d realised more space was needed I moved my whole set up to my larger living room space. This drastically improved the performance of Kinect Sports Rivals. Giving me more accurate movements and a far more enjoyable experience overall. However expecting all players to have this kind of free space is unrealistic.

You’ll also be expected to have a well lit room. Usually this wouldn’t be a problem, I have a large window that lets an awful lot of light in but there are 2 issues here that forced me to close the curtains and turn a light on instead. Firstly, I live in England. We’re not particularly well known for our good weather and during my playthrough it had been dull and simply didn’t let in enough light resulting in the Kinect telling me it couldn’t recognise me. The second is privacy. People walk past all the time and I didn’t like the idea of them seeing an unfit, late-20’s idiot flaying his arms around in front of a TV and making my hands into pistols like I was trying to be John Wayne. Once you’ve got your ideal set up it’s time to create your avatar and it is here where Kinect Sports Rivals impressed me.

The calming voice of David Tennant (Dr Who) welcomes you to the game and walks you through the incredibly simple avatar creator. The whole process takes just a few short minutes in which time your body will be scanned and you’ll need to move closer to the camera to scan in multiple profiles of your face. You’ll need to tell the game if you’re an adult or child and your sex. While I have no doubt the camera can recognise these options, I feel this feature is in there simply to avoid inadvertently offending anybody. Can you imagine the uproar people would make if their sex is incorrectly chosen? It’s a great little tool that I really hope takes off in future titles that feature create-a-character modes.

The end result is a highly stylised but fairly accurate representation of the gamer. Kinect Sports Rivals recognises your hair colour, if you wear glasses and even if you have any facial hair which I found very impressive as I hadn’t shaved and my avatar had a nice bit of stubble to match. It’s the little things like that which left a mark with me. It can’t do everything though and Rare have smartly included a last minute customiser feature to correct the hair style, change your build, eye colour, skin tone and plenty more options just to help make your avatar as accurate as possible.

Let’s get in to the games now. You’ll be happy to know this time around Rare have included much more content for solo players. The solo campaign introduces you to Coach who will give you training in each of the events. Then it’s your turn to try the games out before being introduced to the new teams you’ll be able to compete with. There are 3 teams in Kinect Sports Rivals each with 2 members who talk to you via cut scenes, sign you up for events and try to entice you into eventually choosing their group to join at the end game instead of the rival teams. This feature starts off well, but never really explores any deeper into the rivalries between the teams.

The cut scenes end up becoming an annoying delay when you just want to get into your chosen mini-game and none of the teams offer a special perk or unique reason for joining them. At the end it’ll just be about personal preference. I went with the team that annoyed me the least (The Vipers) and was rewarded with team specific items and costumes for each sport. That’s really it for the campaign. It’s pretty short, fun in bursts but the annoying cut scenes really ruin the experience, though it’s nice to have a feeling of progression.

There are six sports featured in Kinect Sports Rivals. Bowling and Football are the only survivors from Kinect Sports, joining them are Wake Racing, Target Shooting, Climbing and Tennis, the latter being a evolution of Table Tennis from the previous game.  Each event has easy to learn controls combining body movement, voice controls for power ups and feature a solid progression of difficulty as you unlock harder versions of the event.

If you’ve played Wii Sports then you’ll know what you’re getting with Bowling and Tennis. They are upgraded versions with the game claiming you can control the spin of you bowling ball or the direction and style of your tennis shot. In practice this doesn’t quite come off. Bowling is easy, fun to play and looks great, but the recognition of your hand rotating to spin the ball is often inconstant leaving it feeling a little unrefined. Once you get used to what you can and can’t do, it’s definitely one of the more enjoyable games, especially playing with a group.

Tennis is very unresponsive. My shots often felt random as the timing of the in-game swing doesn’t feel in sync with my real life movements. The controls don’t seem to work correctly either as I’d find myself trying to lob a ball by swinging from low to high, but instead I’d connect with a straight shot of seemingly random power and direction or, worse yet, miss the ball entirely. They’re two enjoyable games but are certainly middle of the pack in this collection.

Wake Racing and Target Shooting are much better. These two games feel perfect. In Wake Racing you’ll be competing over various ocean courses, dodging mines, hazards and jumping off ramps to do tricks. This feels great. Turning takes a little getting used to as you learn to move your body for tighter turns, but after a while you’ll corner accurately, start pulling off flips after hitting large waves and genuinely having a great time. Target Shooting also works well. You’re set against a single opponent and between you both is a digital wall that displays a variety of targets to hit. Some need to be hit in sequence, others you’ll need to time for the most points and some appear above the wall meaning you can steal your opponents targets if your quick enough. Your hand is the gun and you need to hover over a target for the briefest of time for it to register and shoot the target.

Now we come on to the two events I found to be the biggest chores. Climbing and Football were, by far, the most frustrating to play. Climbing requires you to traverse your way up a vertical course, reaching up and closing your fist to grab each grip and moving your hand down to pull your avatar up. More often than not it seems your avatar just doesn’t do whats expected of it. You reach up, close you hand and try to move up but instead they just stay there, not grabbing the grip until you hovered you hand there and wait for your in-game movements to catch up. I found more success wildly flailing my arms instead of trying to be controlled.

Football has the same kind of issues. Passing the ball up through your team requires you to chose a controlled or a lobbed pass, decided by either a simple side-foot movement or an exaggerated high kick. The end result being a shot past the oppositions goalkeeper, then it’s your turn to take the role of the goalkeeper and stop them scoring. The timing of my passes or shots for power and direction never felt right, especially the case with the shooting where I found scoring was only possible if I swung my leg as hard as possible and hoping the ball ended up in the back of the net. These two events just aren’t any fun.

That’s all the events. Neither take up too much time with the most time consuming being Bowling. It just doesn’t feel like enough content to me, especially for a game being sold as a collection of mini games with the idea to showcase the new and improved Kinect and impress any doubters, but feels more of a missed opportunity. I’d have liked to see more games for a next-gen sequel, especially as Rare have removed 4 events from the previous game. Boxing would have been a welcome return, as would some Track and Field games and new additions like Golf or Baseball could have helped give the game a longer life.

Each game in Kinect Sports Rivals gives the players certain power ups to earn. These range from speed boosts, score multipliers, power boosts and many more. You’ll earn the power ups throughout the event with well placed shots, stunts, etc. Unleashing these power ups are best done via voice control, though you can control some by lifting your leg up slightly but the chances of that working is slim to none. They’re a good feature that adds a level of strategy when the difficulty of the events increase and these can be upgraded in the games store.

Every event you take part in will earn you experience in the sports, total player experience and coins. These all play a part in upgrading your avatar. New clothing and event specific equipment will become available to you as you gain experience and you can purchase these with the coins earned. Clothing has no special purpose but offers the player a wide variety of outfits to chose from, each custom made for the individual events. Power ups and equipment increase in price the more powerful they are. Working towards your desired purchase really helps progress the game a little more and it’s a welcome addition for more customisable options. You may also find custom costumes unlock if you’ve played other Xbox One games, for example owning Killer Instinct will unlock a unique outfit with the games logo for your avatar to wear.

Kinect Sports Rivals also has a companion app designed to run parallel to the main game. The Kinect Sports Rivals Hub will bring news, updates and new challenges to players and you can see how you rank in the leaderboard globally and between your friends. Kinect Sports Rivals will produce some good moments, but it’s far from the killer app Rare and Microsoft had hoped for and for a full price retail title there’s not enough content here to justify the price tag. Unfortunately only a few of the sports are fun to play and it has no long term appeal. When the Kinect body detection works well then there’s certainly fun to be had, but when it doesn’t it leaves you wondering what the problem is. Is it me? The Kinect? My Room set up?

Kinect Sports Rivals is released for Xbox One in North American on April 8th 2014 and in Europe on April 11th 2014.

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