Now that Weefz and I got to play with Microsoft’s Kinect (previously known as Project Natal) for Xbox 360 courtesy of the Kinect galleries, here’s my summary of our Kinect experience. As I covered in my Kinect galleries post last week, you can book your 30 min Kinect session either via facebook or in person at 4-6 Russell Street, Covent Garden, London, WC2E 7BN. The location itself is pretty easy to get to as it’s right next to the Covent Garden market. It is also pretty inconspicuous too with swathes of Kinect flags adorning the outside of the location. You really can’t miss it.

It’s been a long time since I’ve played such a well scripted and entertaining game as this. Batman: Arkham Asylum was originally released almost a year ago, but I just didn’t get round to playing it until recently. As it turned out Batman: Arkham Asylum is one of those games that I just couldn’t put down and had to play constantly until I finished it (rather like Assassin’s Creed II). After 3 fairly solid days play I had managed to complete pretty much everything the game had to offer, including all the tricky Riddler puzzles (more about these later). The fact that this game held my complete attention for so long indicates just how well crafted an experience it was.

Avid readers of this site will already know that occasional contributor – Tikipod – is responsible for quite a lot of Gravity Crash, being the lead artist and level designer. So am I going to sugar-coat this review because of his involvement? Err, nope, I will be as impartial as possible. So time for the review then. Well, Gravity Crash is a bit like Marmite. You either love it or hate it. Personally, I love it and Weefz hates it.

It’s me, Mario! Yep, it’s time to play that friendly, Princess saving, astronautic plumber again in the sequel to the fantastic Super Mario Galaxy. But this time Mario is joined by Yoshi too. See, I like Yoshi. I find him a lot more interesting and useful than Luigi. In Super Mario Galaxy 2 Yoshi has loads of really great skills and assets, like his massive tongue and insatiable appetite. Yoshi can simply eat and poo (coins) his way through levels planets. He also sulks and runs off when Mario gets knocked off him, which looks very cute! Luigi, to be honest, is a less fat, green Mario with few skills. He certainly can’t poo stars for start. Boring. Yoshi for the win.

How do non-gamers play? It’s a question that has puzzled me for a while. In a country where the main form of recreation involves throwing large volumes of toxic liquid down your throat and declaring “I can’t remember what happened. Must have been a GREAT NIGHT!”, I can’t help wondering how else people play. Sure there are places like Go Ape, which are great fun (unless you’re me) and certainly a type of play, but they’re an awful lot of hassle to organise. Not to mention expensive. And scary as shit. People read books and watch films for fun, but they’re very passive hobbies. I’m not sure that counts as play.

Remember the Drum Rocker I wrote about way back in March last year? Best games investment ever. Since I moved into my new place (with very few neighbours), we’ve been holding late night Rock Band parties and having a proper drum kit for them is just fantastic! Ion have now introduced a new version of
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It’s an exciting month in July with Crackdown 2 coming out on the 9th, the new Xbox 360 Slim on the 16th and StarCraft 2: Wings of Liberty on the 27th. Here’s what else is on the way:

E3 2010 – It’s here!

Cross Mario Kart with Project Gotham and you get Blur!

More knifey shenanigans, this time set in within the renaissance.