My wife and I hate Valentine’s Day, mostly due to the fact that because of Christmas, birthdays, the Super Bowl and the like we’re really tired of going out and would rather just have a quiet evening at home. What made staying in truly worthwhile this year was the promise of the Mass Effect 3 demo, which we have both been eagerly awaiting. While she opted for a more traditional approach to the game I decided to take full advantage of the the Kinect offerings, because Microsoft promises the game is better that way and why on Earth would they be inclined to lie? So here are my unfiltered and unapproved views of voice commands for everything from dramatic dialogue reads, to combat, to opening doors.
The first several minutes of the Mass Effect 3 demo feature a lot of chatterboxes blabbering about how they’re probably all going to die instead of, you know, actual doing something useful about it. Thus, the very first time players are presented with the opportunity to use Kinect it’s to respond to a dialogue choice. Fully immersing myself in the experience, I read the line with as much dramatic flair as I could muster… and nothing happened. I tried again with the very weight of the universe in my three word response, but again there was no response. Finally, I gave in and read the line with no inflection whatsoever, as if I were back in 4th grade reading from the textbook when it was my turn, and the sensor finally registered. I proceeded through the rest of the conversations alternating between dramatic readings and straight reads with mixed results, but the whole time I could never shake the feeling that it just felt awkward. Randomly yelling a single non-curse word at my television seems strange, and the fact that my own voice is so different from that of Commander Shepard completely broke the sense of immersion. I think for dialogue I’ll go back to pressing buttons.
Things heat up in the second half of the demo as you finally get control of a full team in a combat situation, and it’s here where the Kinect controls shine. In one room a surge of enemies came through the door, and before they had time to fan out a yell of “Liara, Singularity!” sent a couple of them helplessly floating through the air as we ripped them to shreds with assault rifle rounds. Later on we came up against some hard-charging, heavily armored foes, but calling out Garrus to use his Concussive Shot stopped their forward charge and gave us the moment we needed to coordinate fire and bring the baddie down. Also, being able to run up to an enemy and scream “shotgun!” and then watch my character pull out a short-range death dealer was particularly satisfying, and now I foresee myself playing the game as some sort of crazed death-dealer, calling out the names of the weapons I’m going to use to obliterate foes. I wish I could see the look on their face when some unknown voice far in the distance lets out a cry of “sniper rifle!” and they spend the next few moments cowering in fear before the bullet rips their skull apart.
Oh, and you can also use the voice commands to open doors or activate terminals but really, why bother?
Though Kinect integration still felt bolted on for parts of the Mass Effect 3 demo, as a core piece of combat I couldn’t have enjoyed it more. If implementation into the full game is as smooth and enjoyable as the demo then I expect many entertaining (and loud) evenings ahead.
Brad the Broke Gamer 