Kinect Sports First Look Exclusive – Beach Volleyball

It’s nearly November yet which means that you’ll be able to play Kinect Sports in your own living room in the starting weeks of the next month. If you’d still like to give Kinect a play through before you buy there’s no need for worry; the Kinect building will in fact stay open until December 1st, giving you the entire month after it’s released to try it for free.
Keeping that in mind I would definitely recommend picking Kinect Sports up in full as the showcase is only a taste of the action to come. That said it has certainly kept me busy this month playing through the game, and with the events it does show off it does extremely well. One of these such events is Beach Volleyball – which has been included at the Kinect location in Toronto – that combines the quick reflexes of Table Tennis and the accuracy of Bowling creating a malleable tart analogy that was put here for the sheer sake of it.
In all seriousness I found that Beach Volleyball was one of most alluring games in the Kinect Sports library and you nearly forget you’re playing a game and lose yourself in the action.
Donning my Rare garb once more I stepped onto the cool sands of Waveside court and prepared to let loose my inner athlete; conveniently found within the pasty and gangly frame of a Rare fan. The video can be found below, with an awesome intro clip added on!

The concept of Volley Ball within itself is quite simple; return the serve while utilizing your teammates to best the opponents on the other side of the net. Because of this, Volley Ball in Kinect is very easy to get a hang of as most of the gameplay comes from natural reaction. For instance, when the Volley Ball is careening towards you, a pink circle will flash on the screen indicating where you’ll need to bump the serve back. This can be done in a multitude of positions whether you prefer going into proper Volley Ball stance – knees buckled, shoulders stiff, open arms at the ready as seen at 0:14 – or instead would rather the route of Table Tennis and give the ball a solid backhand as enacted at 0:20. You’re not restricted to just using your upper body as well; if the ball is too low for you to duck down in time you can always extend a leg and boot it back over, or use your head in literal fashion if the serve is coming toward your shoulders.

The most notorious and exhilarating gameplay element in Volley Ball is the ability to Spike which has become a favorite finisher of mine. For those unfamiliar with Volley Ball, a “spike” occurs when a player jumps into the air and pounds the Volley Ball downwards, thus causing a very powerful diagonal descent that is nearly fatal if you’re on the receiving end. Kinect Sports has included this element of play and it’s execution is definitely an exciting one to enact. Once you’ve set yourself up by having a teammate – either player controlled or computer – bop the ball into the air without it soaring over the opponents net the words “JUMP” will appear on screen encouraging you to physically jump into the air as quickly as possible. After you’ve gotten yourself up there your character will slow down to Bullet Time Conker’s Bad Fur Day Heist mode as you take the opportunity to smack the ball down the throat of the unlucky player on the other end of the net, Ka-pow!
The rush you get while executing this move can’t be put into words so I’ll let 0:36 speak for itself.

And that’s the gist of Volley Ball, very exciting and involving, but not too strenuous as to turn you into a sweaty mess by the end of it. I may still be reeling from my painful loss at the end of last blog, but I can see Volley Ball as a definite game of revenge when it comes to stuffing your friends after a triumphant leap over the net. Stay turned for the final event of the 100M Sprint which I’ll cover in the upcoming days before November!