For the last two days, I've had the pleasure of playing Mass Effect 3 with the Kinect support and while I have plenty of hours left before I finish it (and possibly complain over the ending), I wanted to give an honest review of the gameplay before I would need to comment on the story, the ending, and how it might be lacking in some way.
The game picks up a few months after the end of Mass Effect 2, and the improvement in graphics is the first thing of note as you walk through the halls on Earth on your way to see the council that has been keeping you under house arrest. Of course, since I am using my Kinect, my first "oh-god-how-cool-is-this" moment is when I noticed that even the conversation options can be spoken into the Kinect, making the conversations more natural and interactive. This, of course, makes me think of the future in ten years when we'll just speak normally without pre-determined options and the characters understand us and the conversation continues according to what we Really want to say, but I digress...
After about five minutes of catching up story-wise, we jump right into some action sequences, re-learning the interface and controls, and shooting the bad guys. A race to escape Earth in order to rally the other races to band together to fight the Reapers (aka, the rest of the game) of course ensues.
I was surprised how quickly I changed from Disc 1 to Disc 2 as I progressed through the game, but then since I haven't finished it I don't know if it doubles back to Disc 1 again later like some games have done in the past, so I'll have that in the Post-Mortem review after I've finished it. The story is strong, the action sequences are as wonderful as ever, and the Kinect interface to control and direct your allies makes the game so much better it is astounding. The halls of my house ring with "Liara: Singularity! Garrus: Overload!" and "Grenade!" as I make my way through battle after battle. The conversation options, as always, determine whether you continue down your Paragon or Renegade paths. I have only noticed one thing I don't like, and it might be my Xbox more than the game. Occasionally, at the end of a conversation with another character, it will seem to freeze for a few moments before continuing on. The game music keeps going, but the characters involved in the conversation (usually when its doing a close up on someone's face) simply stops for about 30-45 seconds, which is just enough for me to worry about it having frozen, and not enough for me to reach for the power button before it starts up again and keeps going.
I haven't gone through the advanced training modules in the private console the commander has in order to see if it gives the Kinect commands in there, but they've been intuitive enough for me to figure them out rather easily. I'll give some examples below:
Attack - Tells your party (or a certain person if you say their name first) to attack the enemy in your sights.
Follow/Follow me - Has your allies regroup around you.
<Name> - If you state someone's name and look at a certain location, they'll move there. Keep this in mind as you try to remember everyone's powers, so that you don't make them walk somewhere while trying to remember what the name of what you want them to do is.
<Power> - If you only have one character with a particular power (singularity, incinerate, etc), simply stating the power you want used is enough to have someone do it at the enemy in your sights. Very handy, trust me.
Grenade - If you simply say/yell grenade, your character will throw it. If you say someone else's name first, that person will throw a grenade. Both are especially helpful against armored enemies and big mechs, as well as brutes.
So, gameplay-wise, my review ends here only because I want the Post-Mortem to be the in-depth story and details review that we all expect from a review after the game has been utterly obliterated.
Gameplay without Kinect: 8/10
Gameplay with Kinect: 10/10
Storyline so far: 9/10
Graphics: 9/10
Overall Score: 9/10
