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XBox Kinect

Back on Oct. 12, I started a thread about maybe getting a Wii Fitness Plus. Bantams wisely talked me into getting an XBox Kinect instead.

A long, meandering, and sad tale ensued.

Spoiler:
The Kinect isn't sold in the Philippines. So I bought one online and had it shipped to a friend of mine in California. Shipping it on to me was delayed when her husband needed a pacemaker installed and both of her kids had health problems. The boxes she shipped to me finally got here on Jan. 13, the day of my Big Party, at which I'd hope to unveil the game. But it was too late. :(

A few days later, when I was setting it up, Kinect froze on the update page. I thought maybe there was a problem with its WiFi feature and went looking for a wire I thought I had by which I could connect my WiFi directly to my XBox console. By the time I got back, the 220v-100v transformer [here, called an adapter] had overheated and had shorted out. I later discovered, the resulting power surge had also destroyed the AC-DC transformer. A local electrician opined that the power surge had also damaged the console, but stated he couldn't fix it.

We took the unit to the electrician who's supposed to be the best on the island. He couldn't fix the problem either but opined that the problem was not with the console but with the AC-DC transformer. I had purchased neither the regular Kinect or the slim model, but rather the somewhat rare S Model. I could find only one place on the internet that sold the transformer for the S Model, and so I bought one [from Ft. Myers Florida]. A couple of weeks later, it arrived, I hooked it up and, although the power system now worked :), the Kinect was still hanging on the update page.

My carpenter recommended a different electrician, who came out to the house yesterday. He found two problems. In the XBox controller, one of the batteries was dead; the other was dying. Also, there was no communications going on between my WiFi and the XBox console. Early one in my repair efforts, I had bought [for .50 cents] a wire by we could directly hook up the WiFi to the console. He hooked it up and presto, everything worked!


So, here's some first impression:

Kinect Adventure: River Rush. This was the first game I played. Good exercise. You rush down a jungle river while standing on an inflatable raft. Shuffle left and right to steer; jump to go airborne and collect "pins" to give you points.

Kinectimals: You get a cute cub as your pet. I chose a lion, and named him Leonitus. I didn't yet want to on the adventure, I just wanted to play with my pet, and so I didn't do too much with this.

Kinect Adventure: [handball]: When Irish came home, I tried to set her up with the River Rush game, but the menu wouldn't cooperate, and she ended up with kind of a handball game. She had fun before dinner.

Image may be NSFW.
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So far this morning, I tried:

Kinect Adventure: Bubble [something]. You're nearly weightless. The object is to pop bubbles, which you do by flapping your arms and flying up through them.

Star Wars: Rancor's Rampage. You play the big monster from Jaba's fortress, which has broken free and is wrecking the nearby town. I found I couldn't either jump or stomp, but I was most effective when I executed some knuckle-dragging haymakers on the townsfolk. The danger for me is that I ended up doing a lot of bent-over swipes with my claws. My bad back doesn't like for me to bend over like that.

Star Wars: Pod Racing. It took me a couple of moments for figure out how to steer: it's like a tank, one fist forward and one fist backwards. And to accelerate: Both fists far forward. There's a problem in that, again, I end up bending forward...and my back gets grumpy. Next time, I'll see if I can't play sitting down.

So far, so good. Remember, the purpose of these games is to get me up and moving around, so I can get at least some exercise. I'm playing in short bursts because I know I'm horrendously out of shape.

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