Kinect Sports Rivals Reviews
While the majority of motion control games seem be best suited for party play, KSR takes the genre beyond party play with its Hub, online features and equally compelling single player experience. Wrap it all up in a sharp, colourful package that is priced right and you have a winner.
Kinect Sports Rivals is a great leap forward for the series but it still shows the shortcomings of the Kinect technology. While a majority of the sports work great, such as bowling and rock climbing, others (tennis in particular) really leave a lot to be desired. I love the shift in focus to offer a more well-rounded and robust gaming experience rather than being simply a polished tech-demo. Kinect Sports is one of the most played games on my 360 and this will likely hold a similar position on the Xbox One in my household.
While Kinect Sports Rivals adequately demonstrates the improvements made to the latest model of Kinect, uninspired gameplay lets the overall package down.
Rare kind of dropped the ball with Kinect Sports Rivals. It's not very fun to play, outside of jet ski racing, and the fact you have to wade through so much just to get to free play is tedious. Casual players probably won't mind trying out this Olympiad, but other players may want to stick to the more general – and less expensive – Xbox 360 collections.
Kinect Sports Rivals isn't the incredible demo that Microsoft's Kinect 2.0 peripheral needs in order to prove its worth, but it still exists as a relatively fun game.
Kinect Sports Rivals answers the question "What has Rare been up to?". Sadly, the game falls short of the mark on almost every category, with the biggest hit being on fun. With three of the six included events ranging from unpleasant to unplayable, you get dragged through dialogue I'd never, ever want to hear again.
It should go without saying that sports compilation games of this type are lightweight and disposable. But within that context, Kinect Sports Rivals does its job well. The motion sensing works, with a few exceptions, and the events are wrapped up in some beautiful presentation. Microsoft finally has a decent excuse for Xbox One's all-seeing eye.
".. the Kinect as a controller is impressive. I did my best to break the Kinect and it worked (at least partially) in every situation I came up with. "
Dust off Kinect, do some stretches and get ready to compete. Kinect Sports Rivals makes you pleased to own the motion controller.
KSR is better and deeper than most motion controlled games that I have played, especially of the family/sports compilation variety. However, it's still light on content and just doesn't have a great deal of staying power or replay value you would hope for.
It's not that Kinect Sports Rivals is a terrible game, but it certainly doesn't utilize the Kinect in any new meaningful ways. After Microsoft's claims of improving the Kinect, I just wanted RARE to be a little more experimental with the tech, and sadly, that doesn't happen here.
If you can stomach the price tag and a few other issues, there are some minigames worth your time.
[I]t doesn't seem to quite live up what we've been led to expect from the new Kinect sensor, resulting in a lot of frustration the ultimately gets in the way of the experience. It'll make a great rental for when you have friends over, but it's hard to recommend for anything beyond that.
You can squeeze a little bit of fun out of Kinect Sports Rivals. Some of the games aren't so bad and it certainly stands as a great demo of what the new Kinect can do. You can also have the game render a rule 63 version of yourself and… shut up… I was just curious what female me looked like. You even get an achievement for it. So that's kind of neat. It's just that every game in the compilation is shallow when done in single-player and broken when done in multiplayer. Even though you may have fun with the games that actually work, there's little here to keep you coming back to play them again a second time.
Instead of making a case as to why you need a Kinect, Kinect Sports Rivals shows that the peripheral—and most games revolving around it—still have a long way to come.
As a pack-in for the console, this would have been far easier to forgive, but at full price and with no proper multiplayer, it's a tough sell. Rare's game looks stunning and is enjoyably tame, but lacks in true winner's grit and star quality. Maybe next season.
Kinect Sports Rivals is a good game on the Xbox One but it's not the game that successfully turns Kinect into a true gaming medium. I'm sure this will come but for now, it is easily the best motion controlled game on any console and developers RARE have really thought outside the square in terms of translating these real world games onto the Xbox One console. Some games such as a soccer were a little too complicated, especially with the accuracy of the motion controls but other titles such as bowling and jet ski racing almost felt like the real thing.
Kinect Sports Rivals is solid enough to get players moving, and provides entertainment when competing against friends. As much as the game may try, however, the limitations of Kinect is its biggest rival.
Sprinting out of the starting blocks like Usain Bolt, Kinect Sports Rivals quickly pulls over short of the finish line and soils itself like Paula Radcliffe. Two of the six sports on offer here pack a real punch, with the others lagging way behind. A valiant effort, if not a lot more else. A genuine attempt at highly competitive sports are hampered by a needlessly convoluted interface.
The package as a whole is good enough to not be an embarrassment, but there are far too many times where the interface gets in the way of the entertainment that the generally passable gameplay provides.