Motion Gaming

Most of us have played the Wii.  I haven't played with Kinect yet but I picked up a used Move.  I don't see it being more sensitive/precise than the Wii.  However, it is much more comfortable to hold.  Combined witht he nav controller I am liking it.

The first thing I did after I got the Move was update all my titles that had Move updates - Heavy Rain and High Velocity Bowling.  I started with bowling, a classic motion controller game.  They didn't do a great job of retrofitting the Move controller.  But since it wasn't originally designed with the Move in mind you can understand... until you play Heavy Rain.  They adapted the move to that game very well.  I went through the first section and it was beauty (watched Strange Brew recently).

Then I tried of a couple of demos out - Kung Fu Rider, The Shoot, and Tumble.  Kung Fu Rider is your typical japanese crazy fun game.  You ride an office chair down a hill to avoid the mafia - yeah, crazy stuff.  You use the move controller ot dosge obstacles.  Fun game.

The Shoot is a gallery style western shooter - like the old cork gun games.  The Move controller is not a replacement for a lightgun.  It was ok but just seemed akward.

Tumble is a Jenga style game.  You need to stack block and not have them fall.  Interesting idea, didn't really catch my attention though.

After that I put in Sports Championship - the game that comes with the Move bundle.  Like Wii Sports there are many activities to do.  I haven't tried them all yet as some seem like they might be better with two controllers - the sword and archery ones.  I like the Disc golf and Boccee activities.  Disc golf does feel like you are throwing a disc.  I like the variety for Bocce.  You can play in a standard court or several different locations.  I like the park location because that is where I usually play bocce in realy life.

Finally I put in RUSE.  RUSE is an RTS.  I love RTS games but they never work well on console because the controller just sucks for a point and click genre.  The Move and nav controller controller make a big difference.  Since there isn't keyboard shortcuts like a PC RTS you can't make a console RTS as complex as a game like Starcraft.  However, considering the limitations then RUSE is satisfyingly complex enough that it isn't a watered down RTS made to fit on a console.  I tried the game with a normal controller - that just sucks.  It make me wonder if on the 360 side it has Kinect support. 

I ended up playing 2 hours and not realizing it.  The Move controller is so natural for that style of game.  There is some weirdness but it is the game's mechanics, not the Move at fault.  For example trying to select an individual unit in the middle of a group is difficult.  They made it a little easier with the Move controller though.  You can just select everything in that area then with the nav controller hold L1 and use X to scroll through the units to get to one you want.

I need to find someone else with a Move that also has the nav controller and see how that work in a local multiplayer game.  The first move device to pair up with the PS3 takes controller 7 slot.  The next takes slot 6.  The nav controllers take up their own slot.  So with two players that would be 4 controllers - how do the games know which nav controller pairs up with which Move controller?

On a related note because of that with most games you can use a normal controller as a nav controller.  The nav controller is basically the left side of a controller anyway with the X and square button added.