Xbox Kinect

This year for Christmas I received the Xbox Kinect (plus Kinect Adventures).  I would recommend this product to anybody.  It comes with a copy of Kinect Adventures, which is a pretty decent starter game.  It is more than capable of keeping one occupied until they are able to spring for another game.  The only downside is that there are only five mini games, and variations on those games, so it can become repetitive fairly quickly. 

The Kinect itself has plenty of interesting features.  The first of which is of course the motion sensing technology.  It works great, and was able to pick up my movements with no trouble.  Pausing the game or exiting to the dashboard is as easy as holding my left arm at a 45 degree angle.  Selecting options is easy as well, requiring my hand to hover over my choice, while a time counts up to give me a chance to change my mind or make sure I'm choosing the option I want.  I'm sure the quality of the motion control will vary based on the programming of the individual games, but so far everything has worked wonderfully.

The second feature Kinect offers is the voice recognition.  Simply say "Xbox" while in the Kinect hub and a prompt of commands appears on the screen.  If you can read it, you can say it and the Xbox promptly obeys.  I have had no trouble getting it to follow my commands so far, and have never had to repeat myself.  My only wish is that it had more command options, such as powering down the system.  Also, I've noticed that while I can open and close the tray with voice command, if a game is in the tray, the only option is to play the game.  While, no big deal, because I'd be required to get up to remove the game regardless of what voice command offers, it was a little bit of a quirk.

The final and most standout feature in my opinion is the facial recognition.  I simply wave at the Xbox after turning it on and it recognizes me and logs me in under my Xbox LIVE account.  This feature is not perfect and the level of light in the area can affect it's ability to recognize an individual user.  To remedy this, Xbox offers users the option to go through the memorization process multiple times to allow for multiple levels of light and conditions.  For example, when I originally went through the facial recognition process, it was evening and the only thing illuminating my living room was artificial light.  The next day, while the room was filled with sunlight, I attempt to log in and the Kinect did not recognize me.  I simply went through the process again and now the Kinect recognizes me day and night.

Overall, I think the connect is a wonderful addition to the Xbox, and definitely advances it in the console wars between Xbox 360, Wii, and the PS3.  While, it is too soon to tell, I believe the capabilities of the Kinect has to potential to set Xbox miles ahead of the competition.

Review: Avatar

Avatar is a film that lives up to the hype, without a doubt.  Usually when a movie is amped up so much, and one goes to see it with such high expectations, it is easy to leave dissapointed.  I loved this movie from start to finish.  I went to see it in a regular movie theater setting, so I wasn't as taken with the special effects as those who might see it in IMAX (this is definitely on my to-do list, though).  I was suprised at how much I enjoyed the plot, as I had heard much about how it was the effects that made this film truly great, and the plot was average.  Read on.

Review: District 9

District 9 was a refreshing new Sci-fi movie that had me engaged for a good portion of the film.  The portrayal of this film as a mockumentary was an effective way of taking on the subject matter of this film.  I just wish it wouldn't have strayed away from this concept into a shoot-em up toward the end.  Read on for full review.

Review: Paranormal Activity

I'll admit, I am very easiliy scared, and watched a good portion of Paranormal Activity from behind my closed fingers.  This movie scared the crap out of me.  The film starts off relativly slow, but I didn't mind that one bit.  I was on the edge of my seat for a good portion near the end, as each night the paranormal activity escalated.  Read on for the full review.

My fiance and I watched Seven Pounds recently, and I found it to be a very wonderful film.  I know it has had mixed reviews, and I have had friends tell me that it is "so predictable."  In the below review, I will explain why that while it was predictable it didn't matter to this film.  Please note that this review may contain spoilers as I attempt to explain why I feel this movie was not predictable, but the fact that what I will reveal is made apparent in the very first scene, I feel this will not impact the viewing experience for any readers.  I will try to explain everything as ambiguously as possible, but even still it may not be possible to prevent spoilers.  All I can say now is that I strongly recommend watching this movie. Read on at your own discretion.

Review: Wii Fit Plus

Another item I received for Christmas is the new Wii Fit Plus.  I had seen this played at a friend's house when we had a Wii party after they bought theirs.  The new features were enough to convince me that it would be a great improvement over the original.  I tried it out with my mom Christmas Day.  She was the reason I decided to purchase the original Wii Fit, as her and my dad already had it.  Even she enjoyed the game significantly, and was asking to play it several times during the weekend I was in town.  Read on for my full review.

Review: Confessions of a Shopaholic

My fiance and I rented Confessions of a Shopaholic for a light-hearted movie to watch.  We have been falling behind on new releases, and I remember every time we saw a trailer for it, we'd both mention wanting to see it.  We made the right choice in renting this one.  My fiance enjoyed it, so this might be a pretty good chick flick to watch that the guys won't cringe about either.  Read on for the full review.

Review: Dragon Age Origins

This past weekend was a huge accomplishment for me.  I beat my very first RPG since Super Mario RPG for SNES.  Granted, I was 18 years old the first time I beat Super Mario RPG.  I'm not the most devoted gamer, especially when it comes to RPGs.  I will play until I get stuck, give up for months, and then come back again and feel the need to restart because I went without playing for so long.  It is a vicious, endless cycle.  Well, back on topic, I beat Dragon Age this weekend.  I had been playing this game quiet a bit, fighting it out with my fiance over who could play next.  This game was just amazing in my opinion.  Read on for the full review.

Review: Brothers

I went to see Brothers with some girl friends last night.  This is a very difficult movie for me to review at the moment.  The acting was great, but I left the film with a bad taste in my mouth.  It may have just been the subject matter it was focused on.  I had never seen the trailer for this film, so I was unsure of what I was in for, even though friends were able to give me a brief synopsis.  The leading cast was great, though my personal displeasure of Tobey Maguire may have had an impact on my outlook.  I will attempt to approach this film without personal bias.  I will also not reveal any spoilers, as anyone who had seen the trailer (which I had watched after seeing the movie) will have the basic idea of what this film is about.  Read on...

Review: I Love You, Man

My fiance and I subscribe to Netflix, and thus watch plenty of movies in our free time.  Our most recent rental was I Love You, Man.  This movie was not quiet what I expected, considering it starred both Paul Rudd and Jason Segel.  I was expecting a movie similar to Pineapple Express or the Hangover, which are both very funny movies.  This movie, however; was something anybody could enjoy.  I would have no regrets watching this movie with my grandmother, for example.  Read on for the full review.]

Review: New Moon - How the Twilight Saga Sucked Me In

 

I have kept myself far away from the Twilight mania that seems to be affecting women ages twelve to forty.  I overhead a co-worker talking about Twilight, and I did read it to see what it was all about.  After I finished the book, I found myself hating each and every one of the main characters.  Bella was superficial, Edward was a stalker, and all of Bella's friends were one dimensional.  I watched the movie out of curiosity to see what it was all about.  I found myself enjoying the movie very much.  Without Bella's constant narration, her and Edward seemed entirely different.  To add to the appeal, the baseball scene featured a song by my favorite artist.  "Super-massive Blackhole" by Muse.  Sure, it may be superficial of me to enjoy a movie because of one song added to the soundtrack, but that wasn't the sole reason I enjoyed the film. When the second film came out, I had decided I wanted to see it.  Before doing so, I had to read the book...

Review

I went into New Moon disliking many of the main characters, something that could have been a deal breaker for any other book.  I really did not want to like this book.  This did not matter in the end; however, because I loved it! The tension of New Moon sucked me in. I found myself able to ignore the skepticism I had of Bella and Edward (it is fiction, after all). The way Meyer handled the first few months after Edward left took my breath away. For a moment, I could feel that hole that Bella described endlessly. Then I found myself truly liking Jacob, and then disliking Edward less than I did before reading this book. It was entrancing. Though, I must admit that after reading this, I will have to join Team Jacob. 4 out of 5 stars.

Book Club: Manic

Recently, I joined a book club.  There is an interesting story behind my look for a local book club in the uppity suburbs at a later date.  At our very first meeting, we chose to read the book Manic: A Memoir.  The synopsis from the inside flap read:

"I didn't tell anyone that I was going to Santa Fe to kill myself."

On the outside, Terri Cheney was a highly successful, attractive Beverly Hills entertainment lawyer. But behind her seemingly flawless façade lay a dangerous secret—for the better part of her life Cheney had been battling debilitating bipolar disorder and concealing a pharmacy's worth of prescriptions meant to stabilize her moods and make her "normal."

In bursts of prose that mirror the devastating highs and extreme lows of her illness, Cheney describes her roller-coaster life with shocking honesty—from glamorous parties to a night in jail; from flying fourteen kites off the edge of a cliff in a thunderstorm to crying beneath her office desk; from electroshock therapy to a suicide attempt fueled by tequila and prescription painkillers.

With Manic, Cheney gives voice to the unarticulated madness she endured. The clinical terms used to describe her illness were so inadequate that she chose to focus instead on her own experience, in her words, "on what bipolar disorder felt like inside my own body." Here the events unfold episodically, from mood to mood, the way she lived and remembers life. In this way the reader is able to viscerally experience the incredible speeding highs of mania and the crushing blows of depression, just as Cheney did. Manic does not simply explain bipolar disorder—it takes us in its grasp and does not let go.

In the tradition of Darkness Visible and An Unquiet Mind, Manic is Girl, Interrupted with the girl all grown up. This harrowing yet hopeful book is more than just a searing insider's account of what it's really like to live with bipolar disorder. It is a testament to the sharp beauty of a life lived in extremes.

I'm not one to usually read memoirs, as I personally prefer fiction. For the sake of the book club I dove right in. We only gave ourselves a week to read this one, as it was short and the print was fairly large.

Review

Reading this book almost made me feel like I was bipolar. The author intentionally wrote the book so that the chapters were not in chronological order.  It felt as though she did it to give the reader a sense of how lost she was, and how her personality shifted drastically. This became a little confusing at the beginning.  As I read, though, all these mysterious people she'd mention became know.  The book comes together in the end.  By the time I finished the first chapter, it had drawn me in.  I was both mortified and hooked.  Throughout the book, the author makes some decisions that caused me to momentarily judge her decisions, but I had to remind myself of everything she had gone through, and that her brain chemistry was far different than mine, and there was no way I could emphasize.  This book is a really eye-opener into this mental illness that affects far too many people.  4 out of 5 stars.