Kinect or Wii?

There was some nervous (and a little stressful) umming and ahhing in our household prior to Christmas - why? - well eldest daughter requested a Kinect, which also meant buying an Xbox which we didn't already have.  A hefty price to pay if you buy 'the wrong thing'!  Especially as sooner or later you will have to go out and buy 'the right thing.'  (I'll give away my age here by saying I have friends who are still feeling the sting of having bought a Betamax instead of  a VHS video - it's prehistoric now, but the fear of wasting money on something that faces extinction in the technological survival of the fittest is ever present!) 

Why did she want a Kinect?  She'd seen it advertised of course and thoroughly bought the whole 'best thing since sliced bread' hype.  She knows nothing about Xboxes, she has played Wii thanks to friends and relatives.  Because of this - and no doubt a quite unfounded suspicion that Xboxes were solely the preserve of hard-core gamers who like playing soldiers - we felt more inclined to buy her a Wii.  It seemed more like family entertainment.  And most of the Wii packages on the shelves, including various extras such as balance boards (the extras being the main disadvantage of Wiis), were cheaper than the Xbox 360 Kinect packages.

 

Eventually the decision was taken out of our hands, fate in the form of 'you should have got round to this earlier' dictated that by the time we'd made our minds up, we couldn't find a Wii for love nor money anywhere and hurriedly ended up buying the Kinect.

So what have we learned, aside from the importance of buying Christmas presents earlier?  Well the Kinnect certainly is suitable for younger children, our four year old neice enjoyed playing a totally innocuous bubble popping game.  Unlike the Wii, using the body as controller feels pretty good and works well, BUT you need space!  At least six foot away from the sensor for one player and eight foot for two player games.  My forty-eight year old partner learned how unfit he was - even at popping bubbles!  Which brings me to the final point, Kinect's survival will depend critically upon producing quality games that appeal to both families and the more traditional Xbox gamer.

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