Jul 202012
Kinect Joy Ride combines the fun of classic karting with the controller-free gameplay of Kinect. Enjoy five different game modes as you race through three unique worlds with stunning landscapes. Navigate obstacles, drift through corners and fly off jumps to wow your opponents with mid-air acrobatics. Then earn boosts, power-ups and other items to turn up the competition and the fun. It’s racing action, Kinect style.
Product Features
- Full body stunts
- Have some fun behind the wheel
- Go Faster, Higher and Wilder
Having Fun With Joy Ride Don’t judge this one by thinking it is just a racing game. Sure, it is not a hard core racing title. I wouldn’t even compare it to Mario Kart. Sure, it has the mode that has missles and freezing, but it doesn’t make or break the race. There is even an achievement for winning a battle race without using an item (which I got with not too much effort).Just last night, I put in this game, thinking I would just go through a race and grind out an achievement. However, as soon as I got my first boost and jump, it didn’t feel like grinding at all. I was having so much fun that I kept playing. It is nice because the more you play, the more you unlock.A lot of people see this as just a racing title. It is much more than that. If it was just racing, it would probably get dull. However, the other modes make it a lot more fun. There is the dash mode, where you go as fast as you can with boosts, etc. There is the crash mode, where you knock out statues and crash into stuff. there is the jump mode, where you are doing stunts and gaining huge air time. There is the pose mode, where you fly in the air and have to match poses.Overall, this is fun. It supports two players in the same room and has online play for the racing and battle modes. Don’t expect a Mario Kart sim or a detailed racing game. This is just a fun, casual, racing game that uses your body to race.One last note on the conrols. For me, for the most part, they work just fine. I was holding my hands close together at first and the car would make bigger moves. However, if I hold my hands slightly further apart (about as far apart as a normal steering wheel) then I have much more control. If I find I’m going out of control, then I stop and look at how I’m holding my hands and I see that I’m all goofy looking (arms twisted, etc.) The more you play, the more you’ll see these controls DO work.
Should be a $15 XBLA Game Some of you may recall that Kinect Joy Ride was originally supposed to premiere as a free game for Xbox LIVE Gold subscribers; however, that changed when it got pulled into the Kinect lineup. While they have expanded the game beyond what was originally intended, it is still hard to justify the $50.00 price tag for what is offered on the disc.The controls for Joy Ride require that you stand up for the duration of the game and they hold onto an imaginary steering wheel to control. Flips and other stunts are accomplished by twisting and turning your body off of jumps. While fun for a while, soon I was left wanting to sit back down and relax. However, as far as interactive entertainment racing goes, this is quite fun. Add in your friends or family and it is more enjoyable. Additionally, a nice touch is that Joy Ride offers (along with Kinect Sports & Adventures) is the use of KinectShare.com to share photos of you failing your arms about on Facebook.I didn’t really notice any lag while driving, but overall I would still say that steering an imaginary vehicle is hard to accomplish, but that may just take for time. It’s hard to understand why Joy Ride doesn’t offer speed control over the vehicles when the E3 promo video for Kinect had shown the player placing a leg forward or backwards to speed up or slow down. Maybe that is not possible since they reduced the quality of the Kinect Sensor camera to get production costs down, but I really have no clue.The weirdest thing about JoyRide is that the entire game is only 1.5 GB in size. Given that some Xbox LIVE Arcade titles (i.e. Lara Croft: GoL) far exceed that size, I do not know why this simply could not have been a $15 arcade title (and it probably should have been). There is only a small selection of cars and tracks, but being Microsoft, I wouldn’t be surprised to see some DLC come down the pipes for this. Ideally, I would really like to see Xbox partner with Hot Wheels to provide digital scans of the cars into the game. (The box states that it has the capacity for object scanning, but Microsoft has yet to reveal how that is to be used, if at all.)Overall, I would recommend this game to anyone who bought a Kinect. It is fun, but whether it is worthy of the price remains to be seen. Ultimately I figure I will have enough enjoyment out of it to justify buying it and I think a lot of people are going to like this game.
Too Much fun My Wife and I are both overweight and bought the kinect for our X-Box 360 in the hope we would move more. Joy Ride is so much fun that we will play until our knees give out and we have to sit down. After a rest break we’re at it again. I can’t recommend this game more highly.